First day with the kids!

Well, today was my first day sort of shadowing one family to see how they teach their four kids. It was lot's of fun and also really crazy : ) Dani and Zach are 6th and 7th grade and do most of their work together, Aasia is 4 and does some preschool stuff and Alyssa is 1st grade and just learning to read. I worked mainly with the two little ones today and just observed the flow and all that they had to acheive in a day. This family lives about 10 minutes away from my cite (apartment bldg.) and they live just a bit further out in the village. Jamie and I took the bus halfway and walked the rest of the way. I observed lots on my way out there and recorded those in a few pictures. I like it out there- it felt like the country but sort of strange because there are these ancient ruins out behind their house, like in their backyard and they have olive and pomegranate trees growing in their yard...


An old cistern... Jeremiah 2:13 "My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water." I remember reading this verse a few years ago and thinking wow- that's great imagery... now only if I knew what a cistern looked like... I guess you can't see it here but it's inside that building...


The Turkish countryside

Oh you know.. ancient ruins in the backyard... no big deal.

There are greenhouses everywhere in the midst of this dirty, construction filled, arid land. It's really strange, but I'm not complaining... we get some amazing produce year-round because of it.

you can see the tip of a minaret rising up in the background of this greenhouse. It's so strange to be in the "country" and see ruins and greenhouses and chunky apartment buildings and mosques all in the same place... very interesting to me...