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