It's True, Americans Have Accents

 Cyprus

A few weeks ago we made our first solo trip in Turkey and headed to Cyprus for a weekend of tanning and relaxation. Cyprus is an island just south of mainland Turkey and it is divided into the north and south sides. South side is governed by the Greeks and is the more touristy side with more resorts than we wanted to see. We stayed on the north side which is governed by the Turks and is more laid back with more of a local feel.

Our trip started with us getting to the Adana airport and as soon as you walk through the doors you are greeted with security officers with metal detectors and x-ray machines. We followed an older man through the scanner who pulled out a knife and put it through the machine to be scanned....the security officer didn't bat an eye, just picked it up and removed it from the belt and stuck it in his own pocket. The man said "tamam" (OK) to acknowledge he understood he couldn't have the knife back. So then we get up to the counter to get our tickets, handed the guy our passports and all he did was look at us, then our pictures and printed our tickets. Not a word was said. We turned around to see we had to go through customs before we could get to the terminal. We walk up to the "Other Country Passports" counter and again the agent just stared at us. He turned around and yelled at other agent who yelled back in Turkish, he then proceeded to stamp our passports without saying a word. Then we were met with the "other" agent who looked at our passport pictures, looked at each one of us up and down a few times, looked at our passports again and just stared at us without saying a word. We quickly grabbed our documents before they decided that we were international drug smugglers. We threw our things on the x-ray machine and went through more metal detectors and finally we got to sit in the terminal and wait.

Somehow we made it through and we didn't have to say a word!

Everyone knows that airports are the best places to people watch. I promise it's even better in a foreign country! The only strange thing about people watching in a foreign country is that you are foreign to them so you tend to get stares right back. James and I tried to guess who was Greek and who were Turks. Our plane was late but as soon as it landed the passengers were rushed off and we were rushed on. American companies could learn a thing or two about quick turn a rounds. We sat down and a traditional older woman sat next to us and started speaking in Turkish. We giggled and smiled and said, "hayir Turkyie" (no Turkey) and figured that would be the last thing she would say to us. Nope, she wanted to have a conversation! We just kept giggling and saying tamam (ok).

We walked from this building to our plane.

We made up time and were in the air for about 20 minutes before landing. We were herded off just like we had seen earlier (I should mention that we walk on the flight line to get on and off the plane!) and were stopped by a customs desk. They checked our passports again and finally we were in Cyprus! Our hotel arranged a taxi pick-up for us so when we walked outside there was a tall Turkish man holding a sign with my name on it. We shook his hand and he turned and started walking, we followed him to his car and not a word was said. He punched the gas and we zoomed over the mountain, zipped in and out of cars, illegally passed, honked at all the other drivers, passed while going up hill and around corners and played chicken with several other drivers. Mind you that the a/c didn't work so the windows were down and my hair was blowing in my eyes, up my nose and in my mouth. I was sure that my hair would block my view of the accident that we were sure to end up in. Finally we turned down a dirt road with trash on either side. James and I looked at each other and knew we were thinking the same thing; "Dakin booked this hotel and if it's a dump it's her fault." We pulled up and it is definitely not your typical hotel or grounds. It was a small family run place with only 20 rooms and was built on a long narrow lot. The further toward the water we walked the prettier it got. Basically the buildings were sitting in the middle of gardens. We checked in and were starving so we had lunch on the terrace overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. They finished cleaning our room and we threw on our bathing suits and headed to the sandy man-made beach and took our first dip in the Med. We read and napped on our loungers and decided to take it easy that night and eat dinner at the hotel. James had chicken shish which is just a chicken kabob and I had chicken guvech which is a traditional Turkish dish. The food was AMAZING and we ended up eating most of our meals there.

Our taxi driver made us a little nervous.

Lunch on the terrace after we arrived.

James' chicken shish. The Turks grill these green peppers with everything! I love them and have been making James grill them at home for me. 

This was my chicken guvech. It's basically marinated chicken with veggies and some cheese and rice baked in a terracotta dish.

The following day we went to Kyrenia Harbor for our day of exploring the fort and people watch. It was only about two miles away so we opted to walk. It was hot and humid but was really cool to see the main drag of town. We got to the harbor and there were men fishing off the walls, British tourists eating fish and chips and guys trying to get us to take a ride on their party boats. We LOVED it! The entire harbor is situated around a fort which of course we had to explore. Once we were finished we headed back to the hotel jumped in our suits and headed for the beach. We read and napped the rest of the afternoon.

Fisherman fishing off the harbor wall.

Part of the harbor.

Inside the Kyrenia Fort.

Our last day there we spent the morning reading on our balcony and laying on the beach. We had seen a few other guests walk up the coast a little ways and turn up a street so we checked that out around lunch time. It turns out they were going to a little restaurant called The Terrace. It was really cute and is where I tried kofte for the first time. This one was a traditional Cypriotic rendition and made with herbs and shredded potato shaped into ovals and deep fried. I licked my plate clean. Even James liked it which really says something. We finished the afternoon with, you guessed it, laying on the beach!

Me getting ready for my kofte at The Terrace restaurant. 

The life.

The next morning we got up and our taxi driver picked us up and though he didn't drive like a psycho we did see a cement truck driving up the mountain and dumping cement on the shoulder to lighten his load so he could make it to the top.

We went through security 2 times and of course customs again just in Cyprus. Oh and James lost his boarding pass and blamed me. He found it quickly but I think I'm starting to see a trend with who he tends to blame.  We landed in Adana and went through customs again and security two more times. As we were leaving we saw a woman open a suitcase that was full of produce! She had peppers, tomatoes, zucchini, onions, parsley, she had a rolling farmers market. Anything goes in Turkey…except knives in an airport. That’s a no-no.

Overall our trip was exactly what we were looking for. Laid back, friendly, good food, a beach and a whole lot of sun.

Our  dinner view of Cyprus each night of our trip.

Side Note: It turns out that Cyprus is a destination for old Brits and Americans are not a typical sighting on the north side. We were the youngest people at our hotel by about 45 years and everyone kept saying they loved our accents and asking where we were from.

James Bond Bridge

The newest James Bond movie takes place in Istanbul, Turkey and at the very beginning of the movie there is a fight scene on top of a train that is going over a bridge, which is now nicknamed the James Bond Bridge. (Although the movie takes place in Istanbul, the bridge is just outside of Adana.) We have wanted to see it so when Bryan and Leigh invited us we jumped in the car and headed to the mountains with them. As we were driving into the little town at the base of the mountain, I noticed what I thought was a dog laying on the front patio of a store. As we got closer I realized that there was a pool of blood around where the head should have been. It turns out it was a headless lamb laying on the front patio of a butcher shop. It kind of reminded me of the movie Napoleon Dynamite, when the farmer shoots the cow just as the bus full of kids drives by. 

So we got to the top of the mountain and there was a palm covered lean-to, which is a common thing to see in Turkey and it said “sikma” on a hand painted sign. I had been raving about sikma on the way up so I was excited for everyone to try it. Sikma is like a super thin tortilla stuffed with potato, tomato, cheese, basil, anything really. This particular one was stuffed with feta and basil. The girls loved it and the boys gave us theirs to eat. After speaking with the little Turkish girl for a while and eating some fresh cherries we were ready to walk across the famous bridge! There is only so much you can do at a bridge so we took a few pictures and then headed back down the mountain.

Our lean-to restaurant. 

Our delicious feta and basil stuffed sikma with the bridge in the background.

We had heard about a really pretty canyon not far from the little town we drove through so the boys drove and drove and were on the verge of calling it a day. That is until I told them which way I thought we should go. The boys still say they got us there. Anyway, we got to the trail head and we were surprised that the trail followed a stream and it was green with trees and brush! The trail was nicely developed with guardrails and sturdy bridges. We were pleasantly surprised. The pleasantness dissipated when we came upon the campground we had been told about. The whole concept of this campground was awesome; raised personal platforms, restrooms, community fire ring. Unfortunately, it is hard to see all of this because of the disgusting amount of trash. Eastern Turks are not known for their clean streets but this was pretty shocking. I think the boys suggested at a meeting to get a group together for a service project and clean up the campground. James and I are planning on doing some camping here once we clean it up and it cools off.

James and Bryan

This mountain was covered with sunflower fields that had already been harvested so we stopped and grabbed a few to try and plant in our yards. 

Can you believe there is the color green here!?

The Turks are very proud of their country and you will find Turkish flags any and everywhere. 

This is the campground with covered platforms. The water runs right next to the site and there are bathrooms around the corner. In the middle is the community fire ring that is currently taken over by trash. Awesome concept though. 

As of now we don’t have anything trips planned for the immediate future but we will make sure to keep y’all posted! Love and miss you and make sure to send me pictures to decorate our walls with!

Uzgunum! Sorry!

I can't believe my last post was about Cappadoccia! Keeping up a blog is hard work! So, this will be the most random and haphazard entry (hopefully) you’ll have to read from me.

Some really great things have been happening for us...sorry family but no, we are not pregnant. You may or may not know that before we left Utah, I had started going back to school to get a second degree, this time in dental hygiene. Obviously, it is a hands on type of program so online is not an option, which means that while we are overseas school had to be put on hold. It took me a little while to realize that jobs here are scarce and it takes a while to get picked up for one so I decided instead of keeping idle, I might as well learn about the dental industry. There is a program that gives military spouses scholarships to further their education. I applied and was granted some money to start an online dental assisting course! I am currently learning the administrative side (not exactly enthralling) and soon will get to learn about chair side assisting.

Even with this program I still had a lot of free time on my hands so I decided to start working at the bowling alley until something more suitable came along. Then I was offered a job at the youth center which is more suited toward my degree field and it is Monday-Friday and I am off work by 1730 each day! You have no idea how amazing it is to have a schedule that isn’t totally all over the place! It’s life changing.

So now comes the randomness.

James and I went to a store on base that sells handmade carpets. James was in love with a super dark, manly one that had shapes that reminded me of video games. I’m the kind of wife that doesn’t mind if he plays games but their characters will not be displayed in my house. There was one that we both loved and it was a small doormat, we left without it but the next day James came home from work with a surprise… he had gone back on his lunch hour and bought our first handmade rug! The blues and oranges remind us of home sweet home, the southwest.

Our handmade doormat!

There is not a ton in Adana but one of the things you must see is the Adana Mosque. We didn’t have our car so we hopped on the dolmus with Brian and Leigh and our shawls in tow. We got there and there were quite a few people around and some tried to get us to “hire” them to show us around. We are too cheap for that and we felt pretty confident we could figure it out. Once we walked up to the Mosque we didn’t know what to do! We knew we could go in but weren’t sure where to enter and we definitely did not want to offend or upset anyone so we made a couple of passes in front of the area we thought we were supposed to enter from. Finally a man said we could come in but needed to take our shoes off and put them in a bag and the women needed to cover their hair before entering. We followed directions and were amazed when we walked in. It’s something you can’t really explain but you can feel how important their religion, culture and customs are when you are in the mosque. A kind man explained that the Arabic writings on the walls were scriptures from the Koran and each one had a number. Because Turks don’t speak Arabic there was a “key” on one of the walls that translated each scripture into Turkish. There are 6 minarets (spires) which is where the man sings the call to prayer from multiple times a day. There was marble and gold, large chandeliers and people praying. If you ever get the chance to explore a mosque or any other religious building for that matter, go with an open mind and an open heart. It will be an eye opening and beautiful experience.

Adana Mosque from across the Seyhan River.

Leigh, Addison and myself, respectfully covering our beautiful locks.

One of the many areas to wash your feet before entering the mosque. You will find these all over Turkey.

The men are standing in front of what we were told is basically the link to Allah. This is also the direction you face when praying. On the right you will see some stairs, this is where the "preacher" gives the week's sermon each Friday. 

James and I in the mosque.

It was a glorious day when our household goods finally arrived! At 0900 some Turkish men stopped by to pick up our loaner furniture and by 0930 another gaggle of men arrived with large crates in the bed of their truck. All of our boxes had a sticker with a number on it and we had sheets of paper that had a description of each number which we used to cross check to make sure everything was there. The movers were annoyed with us because we made them stop at the front door with every box so we could check the number. Everything seemed to be in almost perfect condition including our 7x4 foot mirror! We were sure it would be shattered by the time it got here but somehow it made the journey. We were unpacked and organized within 3 days. I’ve got to say though, with only two bedrooms and 1 bathroom, we are stuffed to the max. The house is small but cute and with our own things hanging on the walls and stuffed away in every corner, it feels like home. I did a tour of our home so you could see what our neighborhood looks like and where we call home! Click on Our Turkish Home and then click on the Youtube link.

I turned 25 in May and James and I celebrated by buying carpets! We looked at all of the beautiful handmade carpets but opted for a few machine made ones for now. This way we won’t have a coronary if something spills or the dog pukes on them. The next day we went to dinner with our friends, Bryan and Leigh and their adorable daughter, Addison. Remember that restaurant our sponsor took us to when we first arrived? Well, that’s where we tried to go. Neither of us had a car yet so we decided to take the dolmus (mini bus used as public transportation) which we had taken before which drove right in front of the restaurant. We got on and the driver went into Adana but never went near our destination. He tried to ask us where we were going but sometimes that whole not knowing English/Turkish makes communication difficult. He pulled up to another dolmus and that driver told us to get on his bus…we stuffed (ironic because dolmus in Turkish means “to stuff”) ourselves onto our new ride and we broke out the phones for Google Translate. We didn’t know the name of the restaurant just that it was in the furniture district. Our new driver acted like he knew what we wanted and began driving and we sat/stood while we had 20 sets of eyes on these goofy Americans. The driver turned down the street we needed and we could see the restaurant at the end of the road so we pointed and said “tamam (OK), evet (yes).” All of a sudden a man behind us began yelling at the driver and pointing at us. The driver started yelling back at him and everyone’s eyes that had begun to shift away during the drive were back on us. We can only assume that this wasn’t the regular route and the man was upset that the driver was deviating for the stupid Americans. I stood up and said, “Lutfen dur, teshekular (please stop, thank you)” and we walked the rest of the way to dinner. During dinner we saw about 10 more dolmus’ that said Incirlik (the ones that stop in front of the base) drive by so we really don’t know what the man was so upset about! Dinner was great and afterward we walked back to the corner that we had been dropped off at and we stood there and waited for a bus…and waited….and waited. The dolmus’ had stopped running! Lucky for us a taxi driver had followed us from the restaurant and was sitting across the street. After a while he walked over to us and asked if we needed a ride. Luckily we got home in one piece!

Leigh and I after my birthday dinner. 

We finally got our car! Unfortunately, it didn’t pass the mandatory Turkish inspection. What the hell?! If you saw the kind of cars on the road here, you would have the same question. When James picked the car up from the port he said it started up and it looked fine but when he started driving it and the brakes weren’t working properly. When your husband calls you and says your car brakes aren’t working you tend to freak out, especially if you have to drive in Turkey. Seriously, we thought Utah drivers were bad but they ain’t got nothin’ on these Turks so brakes are kind of important here. We took the car the next day to get inspected and we pulled up and a man opens our back door and hops in the back seat and starts speaking/yelling to us in Turkish. We just stared at him. He started pointing past the inspection station to what looked like a mechanic garage and yelling the word ergos. James kept pointing at the inspection station saying we need to go here. I told James maybe he knows something we don’t so we went to the garage. Turns out it was the safety and emissions testing area and they didn’t actually test our car, they just passed us and made us pay for the card that proves we had it tested. Then we headed back over to the inspection station with this man in the back of our car who speaks zero English. He had us pull through some gate in front of a crowd of Turkish men. We parked and I stayed in the car to wait while James got out and followed our random tour guide. I didn’t feel unsafe, I was just the only woman there and I didn’t feel like being stared at by 100 men. I was reading my book and James walked in front of the car and our car horn went off. Turkish men literally ran to our car and demanded to know why we would do that. James looked at me, then at the men and then pointed to me and raised his shoulders as if to say she did it and I have no idea why.

James' face when the Turks asked why he honked his car horn.

The keys were in James’ pocket and his chapstick hit the horn button and yes, he knew it was his fault. Once I realized he was blaming me, I asked why he would do that. You know what his response was? “Because I didn’t want them to be mad at me.” Thank you husband of mine for throwing me under the dolmus. Anyway, our car didn’t pass the inspection. The inspection guy also didn’t speak any English and just kept saying yok (no). We felt kind of helpless because there was no way to communicate as to what was wrong, how to fix it, where to fix it and how long we had before we could have it re-inspected, etc. We took it back to that ergos garage place and the man was no help either. I had googled some things about the cars “symptoms” and we were pretty sure we knew it was the rotors not the brakes. It turns out that while the car was on the boat the moisture in the air rusted the rotors so when the brakes tried to grab it, it couldn’t catch. We had to have the rotors shaved down. There is a little mechanic garage on base that is more expensive but we were willing to pay a little more to have the convenience of the English tongue! The following week James took the car back to the inspection station and it finally passed. I still cringe every time I hear him tell me how much is cost for us to get our car here. It think it was worth it though.

About ready to drive through the bay to have the car inspected for the first time.

So, we’re on a Turkish base so obviously there are Turkish nationals that work here. One of the nationals that works with James invited us to her wedding a couple of weeks ago. OMG. What an experience! We thought it was going to be traditional with women on one side and men on the other, long dresses and no alcohol but we were totally wrong. Everyone dresses very modern and it seemed like all of their friends were gorgeous! Anyway, there were two wedding at this hotel but we didn’t know it at the time so we walked down a flight of stairs and we were met at the bottom by a wedding photographer. She motioned for us to pose and took a picture of each couple that came down. We sat at the bottom of the stairs for quite a while waiting for someone to walk down that we recognized. I looked down the hall and realized we were waiting at the wrong wedding! We walked over to the other room and again there was a photographer waiting for us to snap a picture. I hope the other couple enjoys their picture of the Whitmers at their wedding. We sat down at the “American” table (other people from the squadron) and munched on the food that was already on the table. There were waiters coming around and filling our glasses up with Raki (Turkish liquor) and local wine. We were all visiting when the room when black and the loudest music of all time started bursting through the speakers that were directly behind us. The giant doors at the front of the room opened and a spotlight lit up the beautiful bride and groom! They walked down the “isle” and stopped at a table with a cloaked woman (officiant) and two high back chairs. I don’t know what the woman said but both Begum and Mert said, “evet" (yes) and as quickly as it started, the ceremony was over and we were on to the party. It was nonstop dancing from then on. James wouldn't dance with me because he was embarrassed so I sat back down and a woman from the dance floor started pointing at me and motioning for me to come and dance with her. How can you pass up an opportunity to dance with a Turkish woman? I got up, danced a bit and then we had to leave so we could make the base curfew. I sure hope we get invited to another Turkish wedding. Click on Quick Wedding Video and then click on the Youtube link to watch a snippet of what the wedding looked like. Click on this Wedding Entrance link to watch the bride and groom's entrance. It will be black at first but you'll soon see the flashing of lights and the beautiful couple!

I know it's red and hard to see but this is the bride and groom in their high back chairs with the officiant in the robe. They are signing their marriage documents. 

If you got to the end of this post it’s probably because you are family and you felt obligated to read everything! I love and miss y’all and I will be posting about our trip to Cyprus very soon!