Turkey Recap: Days 1 & 2 in Trabzon

Sorry for the extra long wait on the blog update. Jet lag has been brutal to me! I didn’t realize how tired I was, then add in grocery shopping, unpacking, laundry and classes and I’ve been lucky to make it to 9pm before crashing each night. Then, once I started writing, my computer's hardrive crashed again, so I've been reloading everything on my computer. But, I think I'm all set to start posting.

As I started writing in Microsoft Word I found that I was essentially writing a book and would never get to the point of putting it on the blog, so I’m going to divide it up even more than I intended so you can get as many details as possible. SO…. Now for the update you’ve been waiting for. We spent the trip divided between three cities: Trabzon, Rize, and Istanbul. Today I’ll update on days 1 & 2 of Trabzon.

I was part of the 2nd phase of the trip. Two guys left a few days before me. On Wednesday, John, Emily, Joseph and I flew out of Dulles at 10pm. We had a flight to Paris, a short layover, a flight to Istanbul, a 6 hour layover in the domestic terminal, and then a flight to Trabzon that got us there at 2:30 in the morning! That is A LOT of travel. I thought I was going to get some good sleep on my first leg – I had an aisle seat with nobody next to me, BUT… there was a Swedish mom and her son after the open seat. The kid stretched out across not only his mom, his, and the empty seat, but spent the entire flight kicking me! It was awful. At one point I jerked up and the mom realized what he was doing and fussed at him, but then he just cried the rest of the way. Misery. Our layover in Paris was pretty tight and we had to change terminals. Luckily, my French was good enough to help us navigate the train as well as order myself a croque-monsieur sandwich. It was delicious!!! I was so exhausted from the first flight that I put my hood up, popped in my earphones and slept all the way to Istanbul.

Once we got to Istanbul we got to go through customs. It reminded me of Kyrgyzstan. You wait in line, walked up to a counter, hand them your passport and a twenty and you’re in! They give you a nice sticker for the visa. This is the first time I’ve used my new passport since I got married. My old passport was filled with visas and stamps and this one was empty. I kind of felt like a loser. But now I have a pretty Turkey stamp : ) I was also nervous because it seems like every time I travel, my bags never make it. But sure enough they made it! Then came the hard part, 6 hours of waiting in the domestic terminal of the Istanbul airport. It was PACKED and hot and nasty. Believe it or not they have a sbarro, so we camped out.

Our flight was supposed to leave at 11:55 but it was raining and there was some sort of malfunction so we sat on the plane for 45 minutes before taking off. It was a relatively uneventful flight except for a girl completely panicking while we were landing. I’m not sure if she had never flown before or what but once her ears started popping she started crying and moaning and freaking out. If I had known Turkish I might have tried to comfort her (as the people in the 2 rows in either direction of her tried to do). Oh well. At least it was landing entertainment.

When we landed in Trabzon it was 2:30am. It was pouring rain and we had to walk from the plane to the terminal. Our guide, who just happened to be a Christian, who from here on out will be referred to as Randolph, and our translator, who also just happened to be a Christian and I will refer to as Ernest, picked us up and took us to our hotel. [Side note- for the security of anyone we met or interacted with in Turkey, I have changed their names.] As we drove from the airport to the hotel the only way I can describe the town I saw is like a European beach town. It’s on the coast, very hilly, but with the old crooked European lanes. It was very enchanting.

The whole way home we talked about how we were going to sleep in the next day until noon and just take it easy because we were so tired. When we walked into the hotel at 3am, our guide told us that we needed to be downstairs, ready to leave at 7:45 because he was going to “force” us through jet lag. We got up to the room and found a clean room with dorm beds and one of the most interesting showers I’ve seen. The bathroom had a sink, a toilet, and a showerhead… but no shower. You basically take a shower on the bathroom floor, trying not to get everything else wet in the process. It was interesting to say the least, but after flying for that long I was just glad to see a shower.

7:45 came E-A-R-L-Y the next morning but Randolph the guide assured us we were just doing tourist stuff that day so I put on my skinny jeans and toms and headed down to a breakfast of lentil soup, pumpkin pancakes and tea. They drink soooooooooooo much tea in Turkey. And this is from a person who actually likes drinking tea at home. They also drink it in these little glasses without handles. It takes skill to figure out how to hold those things without burning your fingers or dropping it. I was proud of myself that the Turkish people noticed I could drink it straight (it was strong) while most people in our group put sugar in it. In fact, Joseph would put 4 cubes in each cup!

While we drove through Trabzon, Randolph and Ernest told us their testimonies. Both, incredible. Randolph told us about how he and his wife came to Turkey. It was so cool to hear how they trusted each other and God so much to move halfway around the world and even stay while raising their three young children. Ernest also shared his story. In Turkey, a country of 74 million people, there are only 3500 Christians. That is a STAGGERING number. Hearing the struggle and the faith of a Christian in a country like that is both convicting and encouraging. It made me feel so guilty that I live in a country where it is so easy to be a Christian. It reminded me to be more grateful for what I have.

Our first destination of the day was Sumela Monastery. Now, I knew that when I was going to Turkey in March that it was going to be cold. No one told me to expect snow…As we started driving into the mountains it started to sprinkle a little, then there was a dusting on the ground, and then it was full out snowing and our van got stuck going up a hill. We had to stop to put on chains.

We drove the rest of the way up to the lodge. We stopped and spoke… and by we, I mean the translator… spoke to a local guy. They came to an agreement that we would all hike up to the monastery while Ernest would take our van to take that man to go fishing. I thought that was weird… if only I knew what that would mean for me later.

Then they told us that the hike was a good “30 minutes” to the monastery. Now, what they failed to mention was that by “30 minutes” they meant an hour, and that by a hike, they meant mountain climbing, and that there was 6 inches of snow including it snowing at the time. The local man just looked down at my sockless feet in my nice toms and shook his head. This was going to be bad.

It really bugs me when people use the phrase “it’s a god thing.” I’m not sure why, probably because Caleb doesn’t like that phrase. But anyways, that is the only way I can describe it, but my feet weren’t cold the entire way up. They were instantly soaked but I didn’t feel it. At least not until we got back down the mountain. So, up we climbed! The view was magnificent! Snow covered trees and a raging river and up in the mist, the view of an old monastery.

Of course we had some fun on the way up and lots of snowball fights broke out. When we got almost to the top, out of nowhere came the sound of music. I turned to one of the other guys and asked where it was coming from. I was told that it was Jesus guiding us up the rest of the way to the mountain. It wasn't Jesus... but it was a local man playing music. It was enchanting and I hoped maybe he was telling us that we were almost to the top...

Sure enough, when we turned the corner, the mountain ended and the staircase began. We were almost there! The vision of this ANCIENT monastery literally built into the rock emerged. It was incredible.

Now the whole reason we even went to this monastery was to see some fresco work. I was a bit hesitant. I’m not usually all that impressed by mosaics. These were breathtaking. To start with, they were OLD. The monastery itself was built in 386 AD and was in use pretty much until the Russians invaded in the 1920s. The frescos tell the stories of the Old Testament.

They have stories from Genesis

and Jonah.

and Elijah

and Moses parting the Red Sea

Additionally they tell the stories of Jesus. Behind the grafitti and the damage that has been done by Russians and other invaders, you can see Jesus teaching in the temple as a Child

Jesus riding in on a donkey

Being crucified

Being taken down from the cross

and emerging from the tomb.

I wish I could put into words the feelings that I had up at that monastery. Wet and cold and tired, but it didn’t even matter. To realize that I was on the top of a mountain in Turkey looking at ancient frescoes that had survived in a country that did not even believe in Jesus. These things were right here for the whole country to see! They were beautiful! They spoke the truth! And yet they were ignored, they were damaged, and it was heartbreaking. It was also a testimony that you can't hide the word of God. Despite Turkey's denial of Jesus as Christ, despite scratching out the eyes of the frescoes, despite the grafitti and the lack of care, the story of Jesus still shone through on those rocks. It was very powerful and moving.
It was hard to leave the monastery, but to be honest it was getting pretty cold. The climb back down was both easier and harder. The snow had stopped, but going downhill was slippery! Lots of people were skidding and sliding and falling the entire way down. Don’t worry mom- I didn’t fall once! Which is quite a feat considering everyone else was in tennis shoes.

At the bottom, my feet were finally starting to feel the hike in essentially bare feet. I walked into the lodge and plopped down next to the heater. Luckily the local guy who had shook his head at my feet had actually bought me socks to put on when I got to the bottom- they were child sized, but you better believe I stuffed my frozen toes in there! Turkey has some interesting supersitions. They believe that if you put your bare feet on the ground, you will get sick. If you put ice in your drink, you will get sick (which means you can't get ice anywhere...) and of course my favorite. If a woman sits on the ground, she will become barren. Believe me, they FREAK OUT if you sit on the floor. Learned that one the hard way...

Once everyone else got down from the mountain it was time for lunch. We had mulama, which is like a fondue. It is made from cornmeal, oil, water, and cheese and it is DELICIOUS! They serve is boiling in a skillet and you dip your bread in it. I miss having mulama with my meals.

Next came the question I should have been expecting – would you like fish for lunch? When I say it was a question, it wasn’t really a question. I have a feeling that the local guy actually went fishing for our trouts while we climbed the mountain and then served them to us for lunch. It made sense in retrospect. I should also explain here that I DO NOT like eating things with bones, so you can imagine how I felt when an entire fish appeared on my plate.

With some instruction on how to open it up, I dug in. I’m not sure if it was the cold or the exhaustion but it was soooooooooooo good! In fact, it was so good that I ate trout again on the trip! This meal was also when I ate my new favorite food – lentil soup. It’s technically red lentil soup or ezogelin. It has the lentils, garlic, and mint and it may be the best thing I’ve ever eaten. I literally ate it morning noon and night for the rest of the trip and even brought home a package to make at home. Hope Caleb likes lentils! For dessert we had our first of many rice puddings.

After lunch we got back in the van and headed towards Trabzon’s Hagia Sophia. They put Turkish music on the radio and we all pretty much conked out. Best nap I’ve ever had in a van.

The church was beautiful. Again, yet another example of Christianity right there on the coast of the Black Sea that is not being utilized! We spoke with a guard and he said that most visitors were either Greek or Armenian. From the backyard of the church you can literally look out on the Black Sea as far as you can sea. It was wonderful.

Following out afternoon at the Hagia Sophia, we went back to the hotel for a team meeting on the project. Our job while we were there was to develop an interactive prayer guide. Each day we would take pictures of locations and come up with things for people to pray for at those sites. Then at night we were geo-tagging the pictures to those locations and uploading the prayers. Additionally, we were working on a monthly prayer guide for our church to pray for the Laz people in Turkey. Although there aren't really many Laz people in Trabzon itself, it is a bigger city out on the Black Sea coast and a good place for us to get out feet wet. Even though the people in that town aren't who FBCA has actually adopted, they still are a town needing significant prayer with very few believers.

That evening we walked around the center of town and had dinner. Of course, I had the lentil soup. By this time everyone was pretty much hyped up on caffeine (tea…endless cups of tea!) and exhausted so there was lots of laughing and goofing around. We bought a ton of baklava and headed back to the hotel for bed.

I’ll admit that this was a tough night for me. During our team meeting, I found out that our church had originally adopted the Kyrgyz people. Unfortunately, they found it to be too much of a challenge and had some problems with workers in the field so they abandoned the project and adopted the Laz people in Turkey. While I know that should not diminish what our church is doing in Turkey, this was a tough pill for me to swallow. The Kyrgyz people are particularly close to my heart. I think of my host sister Aika and brother Nari and think about the possibilities of them hearing about Jesus being lost. I think about all of the great things our church could have done there. But, I am trying not to get discouraged. I know that everything happens for a reason and that if the Kyrgyz were too much for my church, they are a perfect match for another church. One day I know my Kyrgyz family will hear about Jesus. I know it.

Well that is day 1 and 2. Check back tomorrow for days 3 & 4 in Trabzon!!

Delay

My sincerest apologies that I have not yet updated on my Turkey trip. When I came home and turned on my computer, it had another meltdown. This will be the third time in 3 years that I've had to completely wipe my hardrive and start over...

So.... once I can reload all of my pictures and documents to the computer you will have an update. Thanks for being patient!

Merhaba from Turkey!

Merhaba! (hello)

I am officially back from Turkey. I got back last night after a solid 24 hours of traveling. To top it off, I have a horrendous cold which made traveling that much more fun. Honestly, I have mixed feelings being back. I have traveled alot of places, but Turkey is by far one of the coolest places I've been. God did some amazing things while we were there and we worked really hard, so I'm whipped! I'm glad to be back in my own bed with a nice, clean shower, but I actually miss the people we worked with and seeing so many new things each day.

I am currently loading all of the pictures and videos onto my computer. In 10 days we took 6,558 pictures and almost 2 1/2 hours of video. I have soooooo many pictures and stories I want to share that there is no way I can put it all into one post. I'm WAY too tired to think straight and write it all up now, so here are a few preview pictures. Keep checking the blog this week, I'll update it every day or two with more Turkey stuff.

Here I am. Send me!

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I. Send me!" ~ Isaiah 6:8

Today I am leaving with my church to go on a 10 day mission trip to Central Asia. Due to the sensitive nature of this country, I am not allowed to say where I am going. This is a Muslim country, but Christianity is not illegal. The danger is not to us, rather it is to protect the field workers in the country. I can say that I am not going to any country that is currently attempting to overthrow its government. But, we will be in a variety of locations over the next 10 days interacting with an unreached people group. In fact, until a few months ago, there was not a single known believer in this particular people group. There is now 1.

My church, First Baptist Church Alexandria, has a passion for missions in Central Asia. This time, we are working with the International Mission Board to create an interactive prayer guide. Because there are so many unreached people groups who are difficult to find or even interact with, this project will hopefully create a prototype to help reach unreached people groups not only in Central Asia, but around the world. Hopefully this will allow people to come after us and go into dangerous areas and simply pray for these people, without the danger of getting caught for prosletizing.

Our mission is to travel around in the region and take pictures of anything and everything we can. For example, if we took a picture of a door frame, we would write a prayer for God to open the doors to their hearts that they might be willing to listen and seek Him. If we see a mosque, we would pray that God would encourage the people to ask questions or their imams and seek the real truth. That they would grow frustrated with their religion and seek answers elsewhere. If we take a picture of a restaurant, the prayer would read that we hope the people are filled with a hunger and a thirst for God's word. Etc.

It is going to be an incredibly long 10 days with considerable travel and long days. There are four of us going on the trip, one other girl and two guys. We will be working with the field workers and translator all day and then doing the editing on the project at night. We would greatly appreciate your thoughts and prayers while we are gone, especially for safety and good health.

We are leaving today (Wed.) and will be returning on the 19th. Luckily for me this completely covers my spring break and I am not missing a single class. I'm incredibly excited about this trip. I have had a interest and passion for the Central Asian peoples since my summer in Kyrgyzstan (not where we are going). When I left my host family, I promised myself that I would go back to the region one day when I could actually make a difference. The first day that Caleb and I walked into this church in August, they had a Kyrgyz yurt on the stage and were talking about their heart for missions in Central Asia. It was a perfect match. I can't wait to see what God has in store for this trip.

Thank you to everyone who has supported me financially in order to make it possible to even go on the trip. It is so far away and domestic travel in the country can be tricky, so it was rather expensive, but everyone has been so generous and completely covered the cost of the trip for me. Thank you. Now we ask for your prayers not only for us but for those we will come in contact with while we are gone.

The blog is going radio silent for the next 10 days. There won't be internet where we are going and I'm not even taking my laptop or cell phone. BUT, when I get back I promise lots of updates and pictures.

"Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” ~ Matthew 28:17-20

Take Me Out to the Ballgame.... Or not

Well, I am officially a sports reporter for the school newspaper, The Hatchet. I laugh everytime I say that... who names their school paper the hatchet? We figure its because good ol' George used a hatchet to cut down that cherry tree, but who knows? Anyways, I've decided to be a sports reporter and I officially received my first assignment. Today I was assigned a women's double header softball game!

If you know me at all, you know that I LOVE softball. I played it for years and my dad helped to coach my team. Thinking about my assignment this week made me think back on all my great softball memories. Our team was originally called the Lookouts. We had these AWESOME hats with giant eyeballs on them... the official hats of the actual Lookouts team. Our team was made up of a bunch of girls who had never played before, but after lots of practice we became a pretty awesome team. In fact, one year we played a division up we were so good. We then morphed into the Braves when we turned to fast-pitch. Thinking back, we had some pretty great memories... winning the championship with exactly the minimum number of players needed to play, coaches that loved us... even when we complained about practicing in the Texas heat, and lots of fun swim parties with my friend Caroline (who had a pet goat) house. There were also some rough memories, like practicing my pitching with my mom and hitting her in the face with a pitch so hard that her eye was black for weeks, hitting a line drive off a girl's thigh and then being mad when my coach wouldn't let me run all the way around the bases while she cried on the field (it was a live ball! just because she couldn't stand up doesn't mean I shouldn't be allowed to score right? haha), and playing an entire season with a cast on my hand and it wedged up in my glove.

BUT, softball is a great sport so I was super enthused to get the assignment. I packed up my pad and pen to take notes and threw a granola bar in my bag so I'd have a snack last night. I could barely sleep I was so excited. And, when I woke up, it was raining.... I know from experience you can play softball in the rain, but then I checked the weather and it predicted 100% chance of thunderstorms and a flood warning all afternoon. So I threw on my rain slicker and headed up to campus only to have my editor tell me that the game was cancelled. So disappointing!!! But, he promised that in the future I would get first dibs on softball games since I actually understand the game and got rained out today.

So.... I'm officially a sports reporter with nothing to report for today except for heavy rain and a long afternoon of paper writing. Oh well, maybe its God's way of telling me I should actually spend some serious time on homework today. Until next time, this is Stephanie, signing off.

(check out how skinny I was... and tan! man... the good ol' days)

Go Mavs!

It's been a crazy week and I haven't had much time for blogging. This week is Caleb's spring break so he went home to Little Rock for a little rest and relaxation. It is not my spring break, next week is midterms so classes have been pretty busy. BUT last weekend, our DC event of the week was to go to a Wizards game.

The Wizards aren't exactly popular here. They are TERRIBLE and last year they had a player bring a gun into the locker room so they've not had very good PR lately. This may sound like a bad thing, BUT bad teams make for CHEAP tickets. Sooooo since the Dallas Mavericks were in town for the weekend, we decided to go!

Now when I say cheap tickets, I do mean cheap tickets. We sat 2 rows from the top of the entire arena, but hey, at least we were in the arena!

Our seats were interesting to say the least. When we first got to the game, the family sitting in the row in front of us were clearly having a family meltdown. I still don't know what they were fighting about, but they were unhappy to say the least. Mama wasn't happy, so nobody was happy. It was sooooo awkward, but at the same time I couldn't help but watch!

The other good thing about the Wizards being lousy is that there were lots of Mavs fans in the building. Unfortunately, those people were not sitting next to Caleb. A woman who was WAY overdressed to be sitting in the rafters sat next to him, hip to hip, knee to knee. She kept knocking into Caleb. AND she thought of herself as a HUGE Wizards fan but clearly knew nothing about basketball. She was loud and obnoxious. Apparently they have a tradition to stand until the Wizards score (which as Caleb said, is stupid, because who knows how long that might take) and she wanted us and the people behind us to stand up. Obviously we didn't want to and the family behind us was completely decked out in Mavs jerseys, so neither did they. She was not happy. By the end of the 3rd she was so hacked off that they left.

Next to ME, was an Asian man who clearly did not speak English. Also, he was narcoleptic. He just kept falling asleep! Weird!!! Who pays money to go to a game and then falls asleep. Those chairs aren't exactly comfortable and its not exactly quiet in there... I still don't understand.

One of the funniest things was that they passed out 3D glasses when we walked in. They kept hyping this awesome opening video that was in 3D. So we put on our glasses and got ready

The video was awful, an embarassment really. First of all it basically was "a day in the life" of a wizard getting ready for the game, it lasted about 30 seconds, AND.... IT WASN'T EVEN IN 3D!!!!! Ridiculous. Oh well, at least we got to wear some awesome 3D glasses.

In the end, the game was alot closer than it should have been. Caleb thinks the Mavs were playing, but not really playing. In the end they decided to play and won! Whoop! AND to complete the night, we walked past my favorite new cupcake place in Chinatown. They have peanut butter cup cupcakes, and let me tell you, it is the best thing I have ever put in my mouth!!! Yum! It was a great Saturday!