I arrived in Turkey as part of a ywam team.

    We were a mixed team from three different ywam schools. I had just finished the school of intercessory prayer and my teammates were from the discipleship training school, school of strategic missions, and other students from the school of intercessory prayer. We would be in Turkey for the next 10 weeks and during that time we would travel to 7 different cities and visit the ruins of the seven churches from the book of Revelations.
   We started in the city of Istanbul which is the largest and most diverse city in Turkey. It has a stronger European influence than the rest of Turkey and in many was is very different from the rest of the country. It is a large, busy, colorful city and we would spend a crazy first week here. It took some getting used to we had to get over jet leg and also get used to the language and cultural differences. I didn't like Istanbul at first but after a couple of  days I started to warm up to the city and soon came to love it. We both started and ended our journey in Istanbul.

         Crowded streets and rainy days would be a good way to describe our arrival in Turkey.

                  learning to navigate and adjust to city transportation would take time.

                                 A crowded tunnel leading to the metro.

 We would be staying in youth hostels most of out time in Turkey. We would fill up all the beds in a room so it was pretty much like staying in cheap hotels. We got used to rooming with 6 other people and sharing a bathroom. We would have to hand wash our clothes in the sinks and dry them on the radiators.

  Settling into our first room. We would be moving a lot and living from backpacks and suitcases for the next 10 weeks.

  We were blessed to always have western toilets but with the lack of shower curtains the bathroom would get soaked every time any one showered.

This is how we dried our clothes. It worked surprisingly well and we almost always had clothes hanging in our rooms.

   During our time in Istanbul we planned to visit a house of prayer, a church, and to just get a feel for being in Turkey. We hoped to get out and prayer walk and meet some English speaking locals and be able to share with them and learn about their lives and beliefs. Every city we traveled to from here would bring us farther and farther east into the country and it would get harder and harder to find people who spoke English until we visited the capital on our way back to Istanbul. So we hoped to make some friends here plus we would be back before heading home so we could see them again. The day after we arrived we got on a ferry to visit the church and speak to our contact. We hoped they would be able to tell us a bit more about the city.
    Istanbul is divided into two halves we stayed on the European side but would need to take a ferry to the eastern side to visit the church. We got up very early and got on the ferry for the hour 30 minute ride to the other half of the city.

    It was a beautiful morning and we enjoyed the ferry ride and a chance to see the city from the out on the water.

                      There was lots of sea gulls that followed the ferry across the bay.

                                  Leaving the European side.

                                    Approaching the Eastern side.

 

Almost there.

When we got to the other side we had to wait for our contact so he could show us to the church. Turkey is a Muslim country and Turks can be arrested for even owning a bible. So their aren't very many churches and most are small and kept pretty quiet. We knew that their was at least 7 houses of prayer and at least that many churches but we did not know for sure where they all were or how many we would be able to visit. We did get to visit the 7 houses of prayers and we got to visit several churches as well. Once we got to the church found out that they had another group their also that they were planning on talking with so we joined them and for about an hour a guy talked about the culture and some of the challenges the church faces. Then we had a short time of prayer. We planned on being away all day so even though that was all the church had planned we decided to eat lunch and stay in the eastern half of the city the rest of the afternoon. 

The next day we broke up into groups to explore more of the European side of the city. My group started at the bay and then soon found ourselves in a carpet store. Their are lots of carpet stores in Turkey and they are known for their carpets so it was easy to get invited into a store. Once they got you to come in they buy you tea and show you hundreds of carpets and tell you about all the designs. They are great salesmen and even though I really didn't want a carpet it was tempting to buy.. 

This is a bridge that separates the European side from the Eastern side it was not far from our hostel. See all the fishing poles this was a popular spot to fish.

Another picture of the bridge. Below the fishermen are lots of  fancy sea food restaurants.

One of the sea food restaurants had bean bag chairs instead of normal chairs.

The carpet shop we visited.

So many carpets to choose from we probably saw at least a hundred.

Some of our favorite designs

The next day we again went out and this time we ended up at the grand bazaar. It was a huge confusing crowded giant indoor bazaar. Their was so much stuff and such a variety. We spent a long time walking around and talking to the salesmen. There was so much to see.  

Ceramics

Each item is hand made.

 

All the designs had meanings and have been used for generations.

The evil eye this design is believed to protect you from the evil.

lots of souvenirs.

Tea sets.

Jewelry

So many earrings.

Lights

  There are many ancient sites in Istanbul. We saw the blue mosque, the Hagia Sofia and castle. While our days were filled with touring, prayer walking, and visiting people we got the evening off to rest or do what ever we wanted. A group of us soon started hanging out in some of the local cafes. We would play backgammon and sometimes have the chance to meet university students. 

One of our favorite places to eat.

The bay at night. The bright lights are floating boat restaurants. Notice the lit up mosque in the back ground.

Backgammon game board. This is a very popular game in Turkey.

Soon our time came to an end and we got ready to leave. We would be taking the night bus to our next destination Izmir. We had to pack up and put all of our stuff into one room early in the morning so we would only have to pay for one room on the last day. So that evening we all had to fit into one room with all our luggage and until the night bus came around 10pm. 

   We arrived in Izmir very early in the morning and quickly found our hostel and got our rooms figured out.

    Most people planned to take the day off and catch up on sleep, but a few of us had been able to sleep fine so we headed out to explore the city. We found a park that was quite close by so we walked through it. It was a large park with lots of fountains, statues, and orange trees. We picked some of the oranges but they turned out to be very sour. We looked around for a bit more and then headed back to the hostel.

                                     Crowded apartments with stores underneath.

                                                        A park by the sea.

   We called these outdoor gyms. They were quite common and fun, but had no resistance or weights so they seemed kind of pointless. They had a great view though.

                                            Getting in our morning work out.

    Later that night after dinner we went to a prayer house that was going to have an late night prayer time. I guess it started around 8pm and was going to go until midnight. We arrived around 7 and had time to talk with the couple that were running it. It is the only prayer house but they told us about a fairly large church that we could go to.We ended up only staying until around 9pm and then decided we need to go since a lot of people were feeling sick and others were starting to fall asleep.
    The next day we met as a team to discuss what we would be doing. We knew we would be returning to the house of prayer at least a couple of times and that we would also visit the church. We would only be in Izmir a little over a week but we would have two Sundays so we were glad their was a church we could visit. We also planned on visiting the 7 churches from revelations so that would mean at least two days we would be gone all day traveling. It takes three days to see all the churches but the last day we would go straight from the churches to the next city were we would be staying. We also wanted to spend some time just prayer walking and trying to meet people. We didn't know much about the city but hoped to be able to meet people and get to learn a little more about the history of the city and about the people lives.
    We were told to seek God and pray about where we should go and then we divided up into groups to head out. We found a lot of cool things in this city. We ended up doing things like taking long prayer walks, having worship times in local parks, visiting a hospital, and a museum.
                            We saw many impressive statues most without any explanation.

  Shopping for scarves was one of our favorite past times and a great way to meet store owners.

 

       I really enjoyed going to the hospital. We were just walking by when we decided to go in and see if we could visit the kids. We told them we were interested in the history of the hospital and that we would also like to visit some kids. They quickly got us some info on the hospital and then said we could visit the kids that were in the hospital school. We were surprised to learn that they had a school for the kids but we were excited to be able to visit the kids and see it. We had a really good time and the doctors and teachers that work there were really welcoming and excited that we had come to visit. They could speak pretty good English and they happily told us about the hospital, the school, and about how they had come to work their. They said they would love it if we would visit them and one guy even brought up pictures of his home town and said we would love the area and invited us to visit it. Sadly we would not have time to visit any of them and most of them had come from far away towns.
                                                  The hospital school, staff, and kids.

                                            Two girls we met while visiting the hospital.

     We also spent a day visiting with the family that runs the prayer house. They took us to their house and we spend the day hanging out. They had three kids and we had fun playing with them and praying for the family. They had some of the other local missionary's come by. We enjoyed our time in this city and the time went by quickly. We were amazed by the ruins of the seven churches and soon found ourselves heading on to our next destination.