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With patience, the sour grape becomes halva and the mulberry leaf satin.

This Turkish proverb joins two slow transformations. Koruk is the sour, unripe grape; given time on the vine it ripens and turns sweet, and helva, a traditional sweet, stands for that sweetness. Atlas is a glossy satin woven from silk, and silk comes from the cocoons of silkworms fed on mulberry leaves. In both images something unpromising becomes precious, but only with time. A similar line circulates in English as a Chinese proverb: with time and patience the mulberry leaf becomes a silk gown.