I can hear the winds of change blowing

I can hear the north wind blowing. That special wind that says, "Something new, something different, is coming." The wind that say, "It is time for you to move on, to go to a new place, and discover new things." Maybe you can hear it too in your own life, but maybe not.

Austin here with another blog update. And let me tell you that we are soon leaving Izmir. We quit our jobs a  few weeks ago, and we spent 12 incredibly exciting and intimate days with my dad, stepmom and half brother, Sean. Traveling Turkey in a whirlwind style, we first saw Cappadocia- the dwelling place of ancient Christians- where we explored caves, underground cities, and wonderful valleys. Then we moved on to Isatnbul for a day trip, a place that neither my dad nor Bea had seen. And finally we finished our time in Trabzon, a picturesque, Switzerland-like ocean paradise with mountains, monestaries, waterfalls, and fresh made yellow butter (which I brought home by the kilo.) Our parting with family brought on many emotions: the longing to stay with poeple that truly understand us, the desire to retutrn to the comforts and comunities of America; but also the realization that we still have a journey to fulfill, a road to follow.

So, in 2 weeks time, Kindra and I will move out of our Izmir apartment, and step off on our greatest feat yet: to hike the Lycian Way, a 500K trail , stretching the southern coastline of Turkey, filled with amazing beaches, steep trails, and a wide open space where we can simply enjoy each other and God in nature without the wild and chaotic distractions of the city. We have never undertook such a trek, and within our excitement also lies uncertainty and a hesitancy of our ability to complete it. The nice thing is we can always use public transportation or hitchhiking for part of the trek since it usually follows a main highway. But our desire is to hike most, if not all, of it. So in this season of transition, we are preparing our home, we are getting last kisses in with our cats, (both of which have grown into phenomenally cute and full sized animals, making it impossible to say goodbye), we are saying  goodbye to dear friends that have helped our sails fly open during our time in Izmir, and we are enjoying the last comforts of having a home.

You may ask, what lies beyond this month long hike that we will be attempting? That answer is also uncertain, but our rough plan is tor travel more in Turkey, and then to Georgia, and from there fly to Japan, and continue our hiatus in Asia.

Life has never been so  rich or crazy for us, but we do count ourselves so blessed and lucky to experience the life that is always new and dynamic. And we will see where this new chapter and potential discovery of new continents and cultures takes us. So stay tuned for our journey ahead, and pray for us, that we would not miss one iota of a chance to learn and grow into the fullness of people that we are truly made to be.

View from our balloon as we begin our flight

Getting them fired up!

Overlooking the beautiful Cappodocia area from the top of an ancient castle

Austin's dad and little brother in Cappodicia, on top of the castle

Amazing old "staircase" in the Ihlara Valley, an area filled with winding, hidden cave dwellings and endless adventurous explorations to find

The view just down the road from our apartment in Trabaon

Hiking up to the Sumela Monestary

View of the Monestary from the trail

Uzungul, a lake in Trabzon

The view from our top floor apartment in Trabzon

Reflections

Kindra and I painted a tranquil waterfall scene in our bedroom; it took a long time, but was totally worth it!

 Austin here with my first blog update in a long while.  I have felt hesitant over the last few months to blog, simply because this stage of our journey has had such personal and impacting effects on me.  I am developing into the man I was always meant to be, and to go through that process has meant wrestling with and struggling through the difficulties of my past and present.  The concept of blogging is an interesting one; ANYONE can read about how your life is going, whether close friend or distant relative.  It's easy to blog about how things are going well, or to share some of the hardships without the most painful or intimate details.  But it can be uncomfortable to be totally real, to reveal your inner soul, the depth of longings and fears that you feel. 

So enevitably, I will hold back from sharing everything about everything, but I would like to spread out here a few personal thoughts of our last few months.  Our reasoning for staying in Turkey was developmental in nature, to learn deep things from God about ourselves.  And I would definitely say that this has happened, through a number of unexpected avenues and pathways.  We faced immense hardship searching for a new apartment while working 30+ hours a week teaching English, and our relationship grew apart as we were sooo busy and focused on different things.  After a series of difficult conversations and relational dischord, we discovered how apart we had become, and how it was necssarry to "restart" our relationship, and do things like shopping at the pazar together and cooking together as opposed to doing things apart to be more efficent.  Life is not about efficiency; life is about being present with those closest to us, and I am definitely sure that simply being with Kindra and having a ton of fun together through life's ups and downs is so much better than slugging through the journey alone.  I have a tendency to do most things on my own, like I don't need anyone, like I have a deep rooted belief that no one has my back, and that I have to fend for myself.  This is so not true; Kindra is one special girl who time and time again surprises me with her care, ingenuity, and energy for life.  I am so thankful for her.

Through the journey, I have learned a few things, the first one being that I don't want to live in Turkey again.  Now, don't get me wrong, Turkey is a great country full of natural beauty, rich culture, and great food.  Living here and learning the language has been a fulfilling and beautiful experience.  But at the same thing, through working and living up close and personal with the culture this time round, I have been able to see more deeply into some of the culture's pitfalls.  Conformity is paramount in Turkey, and to be different, say to be a homosexual or a Christian Turk or a minority such as a Kurd or someone who wants to follow their own dreams and not their family's is to go against unsavory traditions that are rooted in control and fear, not in love or freedom.  Families can be quick to mock, criticize and disown their children for any of the reasons I mentioned, and although this similar attitude can exist in America, I see it being much more prevalent and destructive in Turkey.  There are also an alarming number of unhealthy relational disconnects between fathers and their sons, and I know a number of young Turkish men who feel belittled and distant from their dads.  In addition, in our workplace (and most workplaces in Turkey), employee discrimination and greedy business practices are unbelievably present, and discouraging to think about.  Add to this a toxic corruption scandal surrounding the Turkish Prime Minister, Tayyip Erdogan, and it's easy to see why I am ready to move on, at least from city life.  To balance this all out, I would say that we have made a great deal of close friends, and found a niche in Izmir, with a huge park nearby and snuggly cats (who are growing like crazy!). 

On a more positive note, my journey into good nutrition has evolved: I am currently a relatively strict follower of the Weston A. Price Diet (somewhat similar to Paleo).  Given the resources of cheap and fresh meats and dairy, it made sense for me to give it a try at this stage of our trip.  I now eat daily liberal amounts of butter, eggs, meats of all varieties, properly soaked bulgur and walnuts, homemade unpasteurized yogurt, beetroot tonics, and some vegetables cooked or raw.  Additionally, weekly I will consume some form of animal organ meat, and perhaps a homemade bone broth.  Crazy, right?  It's totally the opposite of the FDA/USDA's recommendations for reducing fat/saturated fat intake, but I personally think these recommendations are based on bad science and a huge lobby from the grain, sugar and processed vegetable oil industries.  Anyways, I feel amazing, and I also feel I have finally found my dietary niche.  Sometimes I do want to simply go out and hunt an animal, maybe someday. Our roommate Uluc is totally in on the diet too, we drool while talking about butter and meat, all while Kindra laughs at us and eats her chocolate pound cake.

Looking back on the last twenty months or so, since we began our journey, so much has happened.  We have WWOOFed, bought and subsequently destroyed a cheap car, met amazing people, met difficult people, camped in every weather imaginable, saw many of the world's most stunning beauties, learned a lot about eachother, discovered endless avenues of the closeness of God, and found ourselves in a whole new way.  This six month run in Turkey has solifidied in many ways who we are and what we desire out of life.  I have learned about tenderness, about representing myself, about caring for Kindra.  I have also matured a great deal; I feel more equipped to handle difficult people and manage uncomfortable environments.  Most of all, I feel that I have a better grip on the life I want to live, one of tender love and presentness to anyone I meet, one of people surrounding us, a community where we can care for and accept each other.  I want a life not based on status, on money, on career, on fake pleasantries, on hiding my heart, but rather a life free and real and loving, where I can be fully myself, and give others the space to feel the same.  I want a life in the wild, where we make our own food and have property where nature and peacefulness are ever present.  I want a life of freeing others and discovering more and more the freedom and experience that God has for me.  I want a family, children who are in our midst day in and day out, not away at a daycare or school, but rather soaking in our love and learning to find themselves underneath our shade.  This is all a great deal counter cultural, but I don't mind it, I am not afraid to be different.  Are you?

As you finish reading this, I wish you a beautiful day and a wonderful journey in your life, in its own way and time.  We are unsure of our steps after Turkey, but we are sure of the spirit in which we want to take them, and this is enough for us :)

Love be upon you!

What We Have

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.

Turkish Whirlwind!

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. =)

Enjoying Christmas Day with Elf and a hot chocolate =)

Our Christmas loot!

The tree we painted in our new living room with Esteban and Zihya

Our Christmas party at our old apartments, with some coworkers.

We learned about light drawings from the Frenchies, and experimented during our bonfire.

Savoring a sunset from the park across our apartment.

Our new kittens from the park, Cossette and Saffron.

The house warming party at our new place, with 2 pictures as gifts from coworkers.

With one of my students and friends who helped us with our housing debacles, Devran.

Some of our favorite students and coworkers, from L-R: Umut, Nevzat, Aycha, Burcu, Devran, Tulparay.

Beautiful Zihya

Austin posing with a new house warming gift.

From our balcony window.

We found a terrific free world map, so naturally it's on our wall!

Esteban!

Burcu with her gorgeous dog Caramel playing at the park.

Our view from our living room. Not so bad...

From Fehtiye, where we spent New Years Eve!

Yuuuum!

The uncle of our coworker Aycha, who took us and another coworker, Tulparay, to her families house in Fehtiye/Mulaga for NYE

Aycha with her cousin.

Tulparay and Aycha.

Fehtiye is absolutely beautiful.

Austin took a NY dip in the ocean!

On the drive from Mulaga to Fehtiye.

At her families house in Mulaga.

We were treated to a totally organic, home grown, traditional Turkish breakfast in Mulaga. A meal we still talk about.

The city square of Bornova, where we work at Amerikan Kultur.

Our fish!! Before the black one started eating the white one they lived together, now they have their own tanks.

Austin took a trip to Mars when a friend Uluch took us on a tour of his work at Space Camp Turkey.

Flight control, we are ready for launch.

The next astronaut

The beautiful ruins of Agora in Izmir

Agora

There's a First Time for Everything...

So they say. We've been continuing our list of 'firsts' since we arrived in Turkey over 1 month ago, and recently it feels like we've had a jet pack propelling us forward into new things so fast we may lose a limb if we don't hold on!

Two of the biggest firsts for us happened at almost the same time (in this past week within a day or so of each other), and solidified our winter stay in Turkey: work and housing.

I made Deviled Eggs for Thanksgiving! After remembering with such fondness my Grandma Nancy's famous eggs, mine weren't quite the same-but they were pretty darn good!

Our Thanksgiving feast! We felt so  blessed to be included in our friends' celebration.

Since being here, we have been almost exclusively staying with friends, house and city hopping once a week, lugging our packs around on public transportation that was never intended to accommodate someone with backpacking packs. For me (Kindra), in spite of the wonderful times we were having with people at their homes, I was becoming increasingly ready to have our own space. Particularly as the possibility of having jobs was becoming more and more realistic, I was craving a space to unwind COMPLETELY without expectations of interaction or engaging with those around me. The introvert in me was becoming slightly grumpy at the lack of private space and quiet time, yet the extrovert was loathe to leave the exciting and fun environments of families, friends, new people, games, and meaningful conversations. Like the terrific time we had with some 15 fellow Yanks for Thanksgiving last week! It was a blast! The introvert prevailed, however, and once we finally found an apartment that was: a) furnished b) in the general area we wanted and c) a month to month rental, (which we were continuing to trust God for despite its supreme lack in this area) it only took us 20 minutes to look at the place, agree upon it, give the first month's rent in cash and have the keys in our hands. It took several days to reach that point, but, as is the case with many things in Turkey, once a decision is made on something, everything else moves very quickly. So this is our FIRST apartment in a foreign country as a married couple- woohoo!

Our living room! It's a little orange...we call it the Life Room.

Our new pad has 3 rooms, which we're thinking of opening up to couch surfers (!), a small kitchen, huge living room and 2 bathrooms-1 of which has 2 separate showers side by side......? Not sure what that's about, but as we have been saying more and more often: "Hey, it's Turkey!" Meaning-logic is not a prevalent value of this culture, so there are many things that, especially to a Westerner, can seem confusing or unnecessary. It all adds to the color and life of this place, and can be a refreshing break for us from what sometimes seems the too logical and practical, thought through approach of many Americans.

The other major FIRST is work-we are "official" English teachers/conversation club facilitators/our boss told us upon giving us our schedule that we can "do whatever you'd like with the classes-they're all yours!" So we have teachers books, and classes varying between levels A (beginner), B (intermediate) and C (advanced). Every level has 2 additional levels, 1 and 2. So A1 is the very beginning of the course, and C2 is the end goal for students, with a graduation certificate to reward their efforts at the end. All sounds great, right? Well we certainly thought so......and then we had our very FIRST class last night.

Austin paying with one of the many children we've met staying with different families. This guy and his family are all Kiwis! (From New Zealand)

We taught separate classes, Austin's was a C1, mine a B2. 9 of 12 students showed up for him, 5 of 7 for me. We were originally told that we should try and focus on listening and speaking as much as possible, since we are the only native English speakers in the program right now, and we thought-how hard can that be? Just talk and listen for 2 1/2 hrs. Sure! Great in theory-until we realized that the A/B/C/1/2 levels didn't really mean much at all, and the levels of English that we were dealing with were in NO position to be speaking and listening to the things we had planned to discuss. So despite our preparedness with our list of 'get to know you' questions, a great lesson plan and even colorful name tags, with only 2/5 students in my class and a few in Austin's being at the levels we had thought fitting for their class level, it quickly turned more into this formula: 1) student A speak about themselves for about 30 seconds (instead of 5 minutes) 2) student B ask a question from our "get to know you" sheet in badly pronounced English 3) student A have no idea what the question means, and student B has no clue either 4) student C or D, the only students who could really speak or understand, translate the question in Turkish, with responses of gales of laughter from everyone else, and student A responds in Turkish 5) Student C or D translates the response into English, and finally 6) when I, teacher, ask student A to try saying that in English now that they've heard what it sounds like, they all laugh and say "too hard" or some equivalent. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh

We later learned a key piece of information that fit these seemingly unfitting puzzle pieces together-the students are not required to take any sort of exam after their first test of speaking when they first join the program to determine which level they are at, which seems basically pointless. After this initial "test", the students MUST be passed after the end of each level, no matter what their abilities are. Which means a student can take a test, for some reason be put into a B1 class, have TERRIBLE English, and at the end of the session-which lasts only 1 1/2 months- move onto the B2 class. Because that's what you do. And EVERY student receives a "diploma" at the end of the program, after "graduating" C2. No matter what. So when a fellow teacher, upon hearing that 2 of my students were in B2, remarked "I had them in B1 last session and I specifically said these 2 should not advance under any circumstances, they couldn't keep up with B1 at all and I suggested they move back to A1 or A2-how on earth did they end up in B2 now? I'm so sorry for you," I was less surprised than you might think.

So here we are!  With our Christmas decore in place, and *mostly* moved into our new huge, slightly cold apartment, working in an unpredictable English environment. Every day is an adventure-although the flavor and color of our adventures have changed slightly. From rustic to city, camp food to stove tops and an oven that appears to not work, solitude and wilderness to cars and flashing store signs. We're trusting God to provide for us just as much in this new season as He has in our past ones, and boy has it been an unexpected ride so far!

We've decorated our living room with silver sparkly stars and tinsel

Finishing touches of home decoration-maps in the hallway, and Christmas in the living room

Armed and ready!