30 Before I'm 30

I was reading a blog the other day that talked about 40 things the author wanted to do before he was 40. It inspired me to do the same. Truth be told, it was kind of difficult. Maybe it was difficult because I'm afraid of commitment, and putting 30 things that I want to do in writing seems like a lot of pressure. All the same, my friend and I sat down, and here is the list of the first 30 (rather superficial) things that came to mind:

1. Be on Cash Cab (NY or Chicago... I won't be picky)
2. Ride a double-decker bus in London
3. Run a 1/2 marathon
4. Become advanced/fluent in two foreign languages
5. Try rakı (a Turkish liqueur)
6. See a camel in the flesh
7. Swim in the Mediterranean
8. Make a scrapbook
9. Volunteer with a charity on a regular basis
10. Go to the Cherry Blossom Festival in DC
11. Get engaged
12. Go to a Needtobreathe concert
13. Attend a World Cup game
14. Visit the San Diego Zoo
15. Try sushi
16. Attend a live taping of any show (SNL, Ellen, Oprah, Price is Right, etc...)
17. Own a dog
18. Go to NYC at Christmas time
19. Take a road-trip coast to coast in the U.S.
20. Make a pumpkin pie from scratch
21. Have zero credit card debt
22. Get a second tattoo (don't read this one, mom!)
23. See Les Misérables on Broadway
24. Watch an entire television series in one weekend
25. Learn to play the violin (well)
26. Go parasailing
27. See the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade live (maybe even walk a balloon!)
28. Start my PhD
29. Go to Mexico
30. --- (Free space)

The 30th one is blank because as previously mentioned, I'm a bit of a commitment-phobe. I'm all but positive that there's some other goal I want to accomplish before I'm 30, and when I think of it, I want to have room for it on my list. :o)

What are your top bucket list picks?

Another reason to hate Dave Matthews' Band

I've never been a big fan of DMB. It's not that I think they're terrible. Back when they were popular, I simply found his whiny voice to be ridiculously overrated. Regardless, in the past few months of living abroad, I've found another reason to dislike the band aside from their poor sound quality and egotistical name.

There is a quote of theirs that I really liked in college. It went like this:

"Turns out, not where but who you're with that really matters."

I used to like that quote...until I found myself on a plane heading 20 hours away from all of the people that mattered most to me. If it's who you're with that matters most, then I was about to have the worst year imaginable. As I was flying from Munich to Izmir on that last flight, all I could think of was that stupid quote, and moreover, what a mistake I had made. I would have given anything for the flight attendant to be selling airplane tickets from her little beverage cart so that I could just stay on the plane and return home to my 'who'.

Luckily for me, she was not offering tickets with the drinks, or I would have never had the fantastic five months that I have had. While I have missed being with my loved ones so much, I have also been able to grow and experience amazing things I would never have done otherwise. Which leads me to resent Dave Mathews a little for his misleading quote, because I think he's got it partially wrong. It's not that the 'who' in your life isn't important; of course, people are important. Relationships are what make our lives bearable. But, I think there's a better 'wh-' question word that encompasses both 'where' and 'who' --- 'why.' If I were Dave Matthews, I would have written the line something like this:

"Turns out, it's not where you are or who you're with that matters, it's why you're doing what you're doing."

It might be a bit wordy for a melody, but to me, the most important factor is why are you living your life the way you are. Maybe your 'why' is because of the 'where.' Maybe it's because of the 'who.' Or maybe it's because you're fulfilling some purpose for a period of time. To me, if you can justify 'why,' that's what really matters. It's too easy to make decisions based on 'where' and 'who' alone. Making a big life decision based on 'why' requires that you have done some sort of examination of your life; you know where you've been and you know where you want to go.

It's with that thought in my head that I start to plan what comes next. Somehow, when I was finishing college, I thought by the age of 26 I wouldn't have to keep planning my future year after year. Yet, I don't think I'd have it any other way. I'm happy with my 'why,' and it's only a matter of time before I figure out what the next stage looks like. Maybe it's Turkey for another year. Maybe it's going back to school in the Midwest. Maybe it's teaching again South Carolina. At this point, selling seashells on the beach is also a viable option.

All I know for certain is that, at this moment, I'm where I am supposed to be... and that I still hate Dave Matthews' Band.

November Holiday : Redux

Hi friends! I promised this ages ago, but I finally got around to putting all of the pictures I took when I went on my vacation in November, including the ones I did not put on facebook. These photos include: Germany, Plzen, Prague, Krakow, and Auschwitz.

Just click on the picture above, and it will take you to my Picasa photo album online. Enjoy :)

Happy 2011 !!

As is customary around this time of year, I made a few new year’s resolutions. One of which was to update my blog more regularly. Seeing as how it is now January 25, you now know why I don’t typically make resolutions… Regardless – here’s what I’ve been up to!

Christmas came and went. I celebrated a few times with friends from work and friends from church. It was sad not being home with my family, but being able to open presents on skype and see everyone at home made it a lot easier!

January has been rather boring. I haven’t taken any trips or done anything exciting. The first semester of school has officially finished, and I now have a four week break. By ‘break’, I mean I don’t have any students to teach, but I still have to go to my office to do work. By ‘work’, I mean try to break my record of beating Spider Solitaire with 4 suits twice in a row.

Lucky for me, I only have to do this laborious work for two weeks and then my family comes! My mom, dad, grandmother, and brother are coming to visit, and I couldn't be more excited! Our itinerary includes: Izmir (5 days), Istanbul (1 day), Athens (2 days), and Paris (3 days). My family will then continue on to visit my grandmother's family in the south of France, but sadly, I have to return here to teach. It'll be a jam-packed 10 days - but I can't wait! If you want to check out our adventure, I made a little wiki to outline some of the things we plan to do. It's not much, but it's a neat little website. The Biler European Adventure

I fully intend on having a new post within a week. If not, feel free to send guilt e-mails until I do :)

My roommate, Jessie, and I with our Christmas cookies!

An earthquake, Eastern Europe Tour, and Thanksgiving!

Well, at least I'm consistent with my once a month blogging. :)

November has been a fascinating month. I survived my first earthquake! It was a 5.3 although I wasn't exactly sure what was happening when I noticed my room shaking, and by the time I realized what it was, it was over.

Two weeks ago, there was a week-long holiday in Turkey called the "Kurban Bayram" or the "Sheep/victim/sacrifice holiday" (kurban means many things in Turkish). This is when they gather lots of sheep/goats and sacrifice them in honor of the Abraham/Isaac story from the Bible (although they believe the story to be Abraham and his other son Ishmael). While my students told me stories about the sheep they got to kill, I decided to leave Turkey and take advantage of how close I am to other countries. I got the chance to tour three countries in Europe: Germany, the Czech Republic, and Poland. It was a great holiday! I went with one of my friends from work, and we just traveled making last minute hostel reservations and booking trains from city to city. We did a lot of free walking tours (www.neweuropetours.eu), which I highly recommend! My favorite city was Prague where we got to see the astronomical clock (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prague_Astronomical_Clock). I also saw Auschwitz when I was in Krakow which was a very sad but powerful visit.

I have some pictures available on facebook, but I will have a Picasa link for you soon so you can see the rest of the pictures that I didn't post to facebook. Hopefully, I will have that soon!

Back in Izmir, I have just moved apartments! The girl I was subleasing for returned home, and so I moved in with another friend from work and it has been great! I couldn't have asked for an easier transition. Just yesterday, we celebrated Thanksgiving (albeit a few days late). It was quite a memorable meal, and definitely the first Thanksgiving dinner I have attended where the Americans were outnumbered. There were 3 Americans, 4 Turks, 1 Swede, and 1 Brit; and we had quite the food selection: Chicken (turkey is very difficult to find and very expensive in Turkey, ironically enough), stove-top stuffing (courtesy of my roommate's parents' visit the week before), Swedish meatballs, cabbage, çiğ köfte (a Turkish meal), mashed potatoes, cornbread, and pumpkin-ginger cupcakes. While quite an eclectic meal and group, it was a lot of fun!

Can you spot the Americans?

Daily Life in Turkey

Well, it was only a matter of time before I let an entire month go by without updating my blog. It wasn't that I forgot or intended to neglect my blog; I actually thought about updating a lot, but I didn't really know what to say. This is mostly due to the fact that I've now entered "normal Turkey life" in working a full-time job, finding a daily routine, and doing other nonexciting things. But, in the interest of letting you all know that I am still alive and giving you a better idea of what my weekly routines are, here is my post on my "day-to-day life."

Normal Activity #1: Work

Tomorrow marks the start of my 5th week with students, and so far things have been going great! I probably have an advantage with my students because, as a foreigner, I'm a bit of a novelty which might make them better behaved (at first). If you read my blog in 3 months, I might be complaining about the students and their lack of motivation; however, for now, I love my students.

I work each day from 11- 7 which turns out to be the perfect schedule for me. I can take my time in the mornings (which we all know I need lots of time to get motivated and moving), and then stay up later to hopefully catch family and friends on Skype. I only teach between 4-6 hours a day and never start be fore 1:45. Usually, I'm doing some lesson planning or taking a Turkish class before then, but I've also become addicted to Spider Solitaire. Now that I use a superior computer at home (aka a Mac), I've forgotten how much I miss playing minesweeper and solitaire!

My super-sweet ride to work each day- by dolmuş. This mini-bus (which in my opinion slightly resembles the Mystery Machine from Scooby-Doo) is unique; it's part bus, part taxi. It follows a specific route (like a bus) but without designated stops. Anyone who flags it down can get on and tell the driver to stop wherever they want to get off as long as it's on the route.

My office! My desk is the one in the middle.

The creepy picture of Ataturk that stares at my every day in my office. There's a picture of him in every room of the school, but most are nice, normal pictures... unlike this one.

Normal activity #2: Running

I was a bit lazy my first month here. I blamed it on 'adjusting' to a new lifestyle, jetlag, finding my way around, and many other things- but really, I just wasn't motivated to go run. Luckily for me, one of my roommates is an avid runner and is very good at getting me up in the morning to go for runs. I've decided to give myself a goal to work towards (which will hopefully keep me more self-motivated) which is to run a half-marathon in March - http://www.runtalya.com.tr/ It's in Antalya (hence the cute English name of Runtalya), right by the Mediterranean Sea - quite the perfect location for my first 13.1 mile journey. Again, you may read my blog in 3 months and find I have abandoned this idealistic goal-- but I hope not!

The entrance to the track my roommate and I like to run on

The park where we run occasionally

Normal activity #3: Learning Turkish

I'd like to say that after having been 'immersed' in the Turkish language for almost 2 months now, I'm fluent in Turkish- or at least able to hold conversations- or at least able to feel comfortable going into clothing stores alone ... but I'm not. I have the basics and am feeling more confident each day; however, living/working/socializing with English speakers has seriously limited my Turkish exposure. I am getting really good at identifying when Turks ask me where I'm from (Nerelesin?) since nearly everyone asks that after they hear me stumble through a few Turkish words :)

I'm taking classes twice a week with a Turkish speaker, and I'm also doing more studying by myself; but, I'm not really as dedicated to language study as perhaps I should be. I did just download some awesome Turkish pop music to start running to, so hopefully that will help.



Normal Activity #4: Weekends

Each weekend looks pretty different. Sometimes I go on short day-trips with my friends from work, or sometimes we just hang out in Izmir. Other times I just stay in my pajamas all day Saturday and watch Friends with my roommates (we've successfully finished Season 9 and are working on Season 10. I'm very blessed to live with someone who has the complete series!) I also catch up on my American TV shows that I miss. I have to wait to watch them on the internet, which is a pain, but at least I can still be informed on the happenings of Leonard, Sheldon, and Penny. Each Sunday I do go to church which has been great! I really like my church and the people that go there. It's all in Turkish, but there is a translator each week to help the foreigners that attend.

My church

And that pretty much covers the most of my time here! It is nice to finally have a routine and structure here, though; I feel less like a tourist pretending to live here and more like someone who actually lives here.

Turkish Trains

This past weekend, I went on a retreat with the local church that my roommates attend, and overall, it was a wonderful experience; however, what stuck out to me the most was the train trip there.

First of all, buying the train ticket in advance was the first excursion that I accomplished by myself and totally in Turkish. Well, when I say by myself, I mean my roommate gave me her ticket with a little post-it note that read "This is my friend's ticket; I need the same one please." Essentially, my role was reading the ticket-agent my script, and then handing it to her just in case I was completely un-understandable. But, still- I was alone when I did it. Honestly, I felt accomplished in just finding the train station by myself. :) When you live in a foreign country, things you did by yourself as a 5-year old in the States feel like monumental achievements.

Anyways, we rushed to leave for the train station well over an hour before our train was about to leave- which I felt was a bit unnecessary, seeing as how we already had our tickets. How wrong I was. We were leaving at the start of the Turkish "Bayram" holiday which is a 2.5 day celebration of the end of Ramadan. By the time we made it to the station, we had 45 minutes before our train left and every single seat on the train was already taken. I thought people were on the wrong train. Or maybe we were on the wrong train. Surely the train station would not overbook a train so that people would be expected to stand for a 1.5 hour train ride. Wrong again.

Standing doesn't really accurately describe our train experience; it was more like leaning against the two (or four) people who were smooshed up against you. I was actually one of the fortunate ones who got to lean against the front wall as I stood facing the people in the front row seats while I shared their leg-space-area with their luggage. I felt bad for the people who were in the car's entry-way as they didn't really get any of the air-conditioning and were more tightly packed than any metro I've ever been in.

In the midst of this hot, miserable, and slightly smelly car, I got to see a whole different side of Turkish people though. As people began crowding the entry-ways and up and down the aisle, people were moving over to try and fit 3 people where normally only 2 would sit; people were letting strangers' children sit on their laps so they didn't have to stand; and when we stopped at every station (where of course no one got off) they waved the new people in with smiles, saying "there's always room for one more." While this statement might be accurate for cookies or jell-o, I'm not sure that it was 100% factual at the time- but generous nonetheless.

In the end, it was worth it. I had a fabulous experience at the retreat, and got to take a mountain hike at sunrise to see Ephesus.

For the record, we took the bus back where we had seats, tons of leg room, and even a free beverage :o)

İzmir in Pictures!

Here are some pictures of things I see on a daily basis:

My apartment building- lots of trees and greenery in my neighborhood.

The sidewalk outside my apartment

My lovely little kitchen!

Downtown İzmir (about 20 min from my apt) with colleagues

Fountains near the pier

Downtown in Alsancak

View from the ferry

More to come! :o)

Don't be a chicken; go to Turkey

Welcome to my blog! I'll be updating this periodically to chronicle my adventures in Turkey where I'm teaching English at a local university. After months of planning and anticipation, I'm finally here in Izmir, Turkey.

After over 20 hours of traveling, I made it to my new home on Monday of this week. As far as international travel goes, I really had the best possible experience. On the last flight, however, I was hit with the reality that: I was entering a country where I basically had zero language skills, didn't know a single person that I had ever physically met, and was leaving behind amazing family and friends. All of a sudden, a year felt like an extremely long time, and I was ready to simply book a return flight home once I arrived at the airport. Fortunately, I was provided with wonderful friends and helpful people right from the moment I stepped off the plane. My present roommates have been absolutely amazing and I don't know if I could have survived my first few days without them.

Lessons learned thus far in Turkey:

1) I need to live by the sea someday. It's absolutely amazing to have such beautiful scenery.
2) Mumbling is very underrated. When you don't quite know how to pronounce a word, knowing at least the first syllable and using wild hand gestures can usually get the point across.
3) Living in a foreign country is a very humbling experience. It usually necessitates making a fool out of yourself on almost a daily basis.
4) Starbucks and McDonalds truly are everywhere (although I would have to say Burger King is more popular here than the golden arches).
5) There is no 'right -of-way' as a pedestrian or driver- a speeding car trumps the little green signal telling you it's safe to cross.
6) Never be too proud to carry a map. You never know when you will take the metro unnecessarily and then walk for 35 minutes when you were really 5 minutes from you're apartment all along.
7) Waiters in Turkey tend to clear of tables right away, even if you're in the middle of eating what's on your plate. Eat fast or go hungry. Or learn the words for "I'm not finished yet." They really should add that to the Turkish essential phrases list.

I miss all of you in the States bunches and hope to talk with you soon!