Come Away With Us: February 2014

Our journey continues, having nothing to do with our physical location. As spring approaches, new things continue to develop and grow around us and in us.

For example...
We have a Turkish roommate! His name is Uluch, and he is a great friend of Austin's from his previous time living in Izmir. He's an awesome roommate, and complements us both so well.

We have kittens we are quickly becoming cats, and are currently in some weird obsession/love stage with Austin, following him around the house everywhere meowing and wanting to be held by him or lay on him. I'm trying not to be jealous... ; )

We have natural gas!! Hot water for showers, gas for cooking, it's a wonderful luxury now and we are SO thankful!

We have 2 American couples coming to visit in the next few weeks, and Austin's dad/family coming to visit shortly after!

And we have had a fresh deposit of joy and playfulness in our lives, with our French friends having stayed with us for the past 4 days!

As a result of that, I have a slight desire to live in France someday, especially as a significant proportion of the coolest people we've met on this trip are French or live in French. Hmmm....

With so many new things coming into our lives, it can be easy to forget about the internal journey we are on, and it can be tempting to just distract myself, to not reflect on what is happening inside, right now.

There are times when we feel incredibly blessed.
There are times when we feel lost.
There are times when we feel hopeful and energized.
There are times when we feel discouraged and lethargic.

It is a wonderful and painful blessing when God allows things that are already present in your heart to be exposed by circumstances, by reality. The popular example is a man who reacts in anger to someone provoking him, and telling God about it, "God that man was so terrible, he MADE me so angry!" And the Lord responds, "Son, it wasn't that man who MADE you angry-he just revealed the anger that was already in your heart." The true condition of our hearts is exposed in the moment of difficulty and trial; it's not the external stimulant that causes the reaction, but the reaction that is born out of what is in us.

This season is revealing what is in us. The good, the bad, the ugly; the flowers, and the weeds.

For me (Kindra) I am learning how quickly I give up. I give up fighting for things I know to be right or needed, I give up on trying new things, I give up on learning new things, I give up on trying to connect with people, and I give up trying to connect with God. Quickly, with very little resistance. Throughout my life I've learned that when I fight, I lose. I can't win, and when I try, it just hurts those around me (especially myself) and creates unneeded drama. I am learning that these are all LIES, and it is hugely important for me to learn how to fight well. Fight for our marriage, fight for friendships, fight for people's relationships with God, fight for life.

Our French friends spent the past 4 days or so with us after returning from their Turkish travels, and it's easy to say that we haven't laughed so hard, over such a long period of time, possibly ever! We played games like tag, hide and seek-ish (French version, it's way better!), and all sorts of variations every day. Aaaaaand 2 nights....1 in a big park for 2 hours, and 1 in our apartment for several hours, in the dark, with plenty of shrieking and pranks. Friendship is truly one of the greatest and most powerful gifts God has given us, and it is something to be cherished and protected.

When we have times like that, we are reminded that there is unbelievable JOY to be had and FUN to be experienced. We have been reminded that really, we are most ourselves, most thriving, when we are childlike, not allowing the anxieties responsibilities and cares of life to stifle the life that is desperately trying to breathe through us.

To help us continue in the spirit of play, fun, enjoyment, laughter and new things, we've made an ADVENTURE LIST! It has about 20 things to do in the area that we'd really love to experience, and we have a goal of doing as many things on that list as possible. It's been a great motivator for us, and I totally recommend it to anyone wanting to encourage more innovation and new things in your life. =)

With only a short 4 weeks or so left before we travel with Austin's dad/family, we want to make the most of the remaining time we have here, and give Father all the room in our lives to do what He wants.

I pray you are having a meaningful and intimate internal journey with God of your own, and that He is showing you beautiful truths about yourself and Him.

It hasn't been 2 months since our last blog post......really....

This past month has flown by faster than any in recent memory, but first I'll (Kindra) backtrack to where we left off and reflect quickly on the holidays.

We kicked off the Christmas season with a Christmas party at our *now old* apartment for coworkers from Amerikan Kultur, complete with cookie decorating and carols. Despite the fact that we had to work Christmas Eve AND Day, we a wonderful Christmas in Izmir, watching 'Elf,' going ice skating, and even eating out at the only "Mexican" restaurant in town (which certainly was a far cry from Santa Barbara, but still great.)

Since Christmas, we have been in an absolute WHIRLWIND of changes and more new things, starting with the biggest: a new apartment.

We knew going into our agreement with our old place that we may not be able to stay for the entire time we were here, but it was still an emotional and difficult period for me. Saying goodbye again to a place that had become home and familiar was far from what I wanted to do, but since the owners had another group coming in and there wasn't enough room for all of us to stay, we had little choice in the matter. So we began what turned out to be an outrageously confusing, frustrating, and unpredictable experience. 2 of my more advanced B2 students, Burcu and Devran, basically took us under their wing and came with us to look at apartments, call people, translate, ask questions, steer us clear of shady people/places and generally find an apartment for us for an entire week! Without their help, we have no idea what we would have ended up with: as it is, we found a wonderful place right across the street from the biggest park in Izmir, with 3 bedrooms and a gigantic living room. For almost exactly 1/2 the price we were previously paying.

After an exhausting/disappointing/emotional week of house hunting, we signed the lease, which was a whole experience in itself of drinking chai with the landlord and realtor for 1 1/2 hours while the realtor wrote up the lease by hand, only to enter into the next, far more challenging hurdle-making the apartment into a home.

One of the reasons the apartment is 1/2 the price is that it's 2x older, and hasn't been lived in for we don't know how long, but the previous tenants were students....it is the definition of a fixer upper. Oh, and it was empty, meaning no furniture. And in Turkey, no furniture means NO furniture: no refrigerator, no stove, no light bulbs, sometimes no light fixtures....there's a reason they call them "bosh", which literally means "empty."Step 1 though was to make the place liveable. No small task, considering we were starting from the place of sitting down on the old, wooden floors to eat dinner, and would stand up with layers of dust, dirt and grime attached to our entire bodies. I can't remember any time I've cleaned more in my entire life, but the end result has been absolutely worth the effort and that much sweeter. Step 2 was to find furniture, for which we employed the help of Burcu and Devran again, which was another crazy, cultural experience.

Step 3 was a rather unexpected one- preparing our guest room. We had known that our French friends that we met on the road in Croatia would be coming to visit, but we had no idea when or how long they would stay. We found out after "living" in our new place for 1 week in our new pad, which really means cleaning and working our asses off for 1 week, that our friends would be coming in 2 days- woohoo!!! Also, oh, crap-we JUST finished making the place liveable today, and haven't even started on a guest room....but yay!

And so began the terrific 2 weeks we've just passed of having our lovely Frenchies stay with us. It was a time of belly laughs, amazing French food, and community. We went on hikes and ice skating, made bonfires, had dance nights, played countless games of Dominion, engaged in several nerf battles, played soccer, and hosted a house warming party for our Amerikan Kultur colleagues. But one of the coolest things we did with them is take in 2 kittens from our local park!! They're each 3 months old, and were sufficiently pathetic looking to convince us to take them in. They have been a source of supreme joy and laughter for us, and we just named them today. Saffron and Cossette have stolen our hearts!

I've learned afresh why French is one of the coolest languages in the world and many moments just sat next to them listening, enraptured by the intonations and musicality of every word (even when they were just talking about what to do for dinner.) Did you know that there are several words for kissing in French, depending on what kind of kiss it is? Aggressive, romantic, slow, fast, etc. In French each of these has its own word. Don't even get me started on the words for making love: they have phrases like "the 6th sense," "entering the Garden of Eden," and way more that are all significantly more romantic and poetic than the "it's business time."

Esteban and Zihya left this afternoon, and it's just Austin and I in our new apartment for the fist time since we made it inhabitable. With cutting our work hours at Amerikan Kultur in half and beginning more lucrative private tutoring, we should have much more time to do the things that we love most: hiking, being outside, connecting with God, learning new things, making new friends, and traveling. Our French friends will be back from their Turkish couch surfing/hitchhiking adventures in about 3 weeks, and in the meantime we will be doing.....well who knows, really? We'll be taking each day as it comes, and savoring the moments in a world where anything is possible. For now, at least, we'll start with trying to get an oven that works and gas so we can have hot water. =)