Not all those who wander end up in Istanbul

Monday, February 24, 2014

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

The Highlights: Weeks 4-5 (The School of Seven Hills)

Monday, February 3, 2014

The Highlights: Week 3 (The Southeast)

Oh what's up, Tigris river?

Panorama of the Mesopotamian Plain. Pretty sweet.

Frisbee selfie at the Tigris river!!

Mor Gabriel Monastery in Tur'Abdın

A matchstick model of the monastery

Kind of "Mines of Moria"-esque

Where I am now. The top of the dorm building I'll be in for 5 or 6 more weeks

After an amazing week of travel in the southeast of Turkey, I am back in Istanbul at Yeditepe University. I'll wait a day or two before I write a post about my first impressions here. Sorry about not posting anything in a while. It's been pretty busy over here. As you could infer from the title, I'd like to talk about my trip to the southeast. Pictures soon to follow.

Last Monday, the cohort and I checked out of our hostels and got on a bus to go to the airport. It was snowing when we were leaving which was pretty awesome to me as a southern Californian. We flew out of Istanbul to Diyarbakır and got on a bus to take a quick tour of the city. The first place we stopped was at this huge wall surrounding part of the city. The wall is the second largest man-made wall after the Great Wall of China and it's made of black basalt so it's pretty awesome. After that we drove around some more and eventually got to our hotel. While we were driving around, I noticed that there were a lot of worn down, abandoned houses. It reminded me a lot of Ensenada and some parts of that city. It was pretty crazy seeing such a big economic disparity between Diyarbakır and Istanbul, however, it was nice to see a part of Turkey that wasn't super touristy. We were only there for about a day and a half and then we left for Mardin.

It was really, really cold when we got to Mardin. We checked into the hotel and went to dinner after getting settled in. It was really foggy the first two days we were there so I didn't do much. After the fogged cleared though, it was beautiful. Actually, beautiful isn't the right word. It was...incredible. A few friends and I walked up to the top of a small mountain and hung around there for a little. We could see the Mesopotamian Plain right in front of us and we were all awestruck by the view. While we were in Mardin we went to go visit a few monasteries and that was really cool. It was weird to me as an American that something could be that old. Two of the monasteries we went to were both over a thousand years old. Crazy. The buildings were beautiful and I'm still processing everything I saw there.

I did notice that while we were in the southeast I was getting stared at a lot. People kept asking me where I was from and what my ethnicity was. At first, I was more than a little annoyed by it, but I realized that there probably aren't a lot of Asian people that go to the southeast of Turkey and when they do, they're mostly tourists. After I realized that, it still made me kind of uncomfortable but there was nothing I could do about it so I just moved on.

Overall, the trip was a great experience. I learned a lot of cool things, saw a lot of cool things, ate some good food, and hung out with some cool people. One thing I think this trip definitely helped with was bringing our group closer together. There were some solid bonds forged on that trip, both between certain people I wouldn't have expected to become friends and the group as a whole. It was great for me bonding with some people and I'm getting closer with some of the group which is so much fun. However, I do really miss my friends and family back in the States, but as they say, abscence makes the heart grow fonder.

In the eternal words of Porky the Pig, "Th-th-th-that's all folks!" Thanks for reading, everyone. I'll try to post more often. Blessings upon you, dear friends. Until next time.

In Christ,
Ethan

Sunday, January 26, 2014

The Highlights: Week 2

From the Hagia Sophia, Grand Bazaar, around Istanbul, Turkish class, and hanging out

Friday, January 24, 2014

The First Test

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Merhaba, friends! I hope you've all been well. There are a few logistical things I need to get out of the way. First off, I know I haven't established a set day to write posts and there's somewhat of a reason for that. My hope and plan is to have a few entries a week so that I don't only always give you the highlights or this impression that I'm always doing fun stuff and you should be really jealous. I do really want to share my journey with you all and I think one way for me to do that is to tell you about things that happen regardless of if they're good/fun things or not. Secondly, I'll be going to southeastern Turkey for a week (starting next Monday so I'll be out of contact for that period of time. Now that that's out of the way, let's begin.

There was a pretty normal rhythm to this week, as far as a second week can go in Istanbul. We would have Turkish class in the mornings and have the afternoons free doing whatever we wanted. I spent a lot of the afternoons wandering around the city. One of the many things that makes Istanbul different from other major cities is that in Istanbul you can be walking down a busy street with a lot of different shops on it, but a few streets away could be something that was built hundreds of years ago (that's still taking some getting used to). Honestly, I haven't been doing a ton of tourist-y stuff since I've been here. I've been to the Grand Bazaar a few times and that's always an adventure. There are hundreds of shops in the Bazaar and even more people walking through it every day. The shopkeepers are used to seeing tourists there so myself and others in my group are trying to prove to them that we aren't as tourist-y as we may look by speaking Turkish when we can and haggling with them.

We had our first test of the semester yesterday, and that was an adventure in itself. We've only been learning Turkish for 8 days so no one was really sure what to expect, but it didn't end up being that bad. I did pretty well but now I have to put it into practice by speaking Turkish to shopkeepers and other Turkish people. We're done with our intensive Turkish class but we'll still be having classes a few times a week when we get to the university on the Asian side.

The test informally marked the end of the first leg of our trip. Like I said earlier, our group is taking a week-long trip to southeastern Turkey and after that, we'll be staying at Yeditepe University on the Asian side of Istanbul. This weekend we're all trying to squeeze in as much fun as we can before we start the rest of our classes. Today I went to the Hagia Sophia and walked around there for a little while. It is being restored or something right now so there was scaffolding taking up half of the bottom floor. Other than that it was incredible. It was so beautiful and full of history. It's crazy to think that emperors walked around there hundreds of years ago. After that, a few friends and I went to a hamam (which is a traditional Turkish bath) and it was amazing. We got scrubbed down and massaged by some old Turkish men. Great stuff.

Well, friends, that's all I can think of for now. Sorry if this is doesn't make any sense. I'm still getting used to blogging. Anyways, blessings upon you, my friends. Thanks for reading! Until next time.

In Christ,
Ethan