Izmir, Our Home away from Home

A week of busy busy busy.  A couple of things one should hope not to do on a mission; 1. Take over an apartment from a "hoarder", 2. Move and close down an apartment in a foreign land.  Of course we now have done both.

Flowers at the mall in  Izmir

A couple of weeks ago, we were in Izmir and spent 2 full days hauling stuff out of the place and cleaning things that had not seen a cleaning rag for at least 2 years, in my mind we had gotten a good start on all the work.  Boy was I wrong.  We had hardly touched all the junk that was in this apartment. Then we had to repair things that were broken and just worn out.  Legs on shelving units, lights, desks and closets were repaired, replaced or redone.  We emptied file cabinets, shelves and every nook and cranny.  We rewashed all the linens and wiped down all the shelves and cleaned everything.

Our stuff arrived from Istanbul and of course we had to reassemble the IKEA garbage furniture and attempt to get it all set up.  Derek calls IKEA, Swedish Walmart and he is right on.  The pieces are ok on the first assembly, but bounce it over 8 hours of highway and then try to reassemble the stuff is a real challenge.  Particularly as I think of all my tools just sitting in the house at home.  Innovation thankfully is part of my nature even if there is no Turkish concept of the word or the practice of innovation.  The Turks make do, but do not attempt to improve or update.

We gave much of our furniture to the Elders in Istanbul to move into another apartment and we will need to find some furniture to make this place comfortable.

Waiting for the train in Izmir.  Note the
old lady sitting behind Nori

Izmir does not have as many malls or shopping spots close to our apartment so we have to travel to the Koştaş, Turkish Home Depot in order to get any screws or anything else.  Then you cannot get too much because you have to carry it all back on the Metro or bus.  Nothing is simple here.  But it is better than Istanbul.

As we were traveling on the train from Esbaş back to Alsancak, that ıs our actual town or area ın Izmir, we had a unusual conversation with a Turk that spoke broken English.  First he gave me his seat and when I said that is ok, tamam, he said no I respect the Elders and you must take my seat.  After the next stop, the seat across from me was open and he sat down.  I thanked him again for the seat and he began to explain that he was so sorry for the problems in my country with the bomb in Boston and the deaths in Texas.  I think he was trying to share his sorrow for bad things.  We had a long conversation about how things can be so wrong, but that there are lots of good things in the world as well.  He is a math teacher in High School and tries to do his best for his students.  It is amazing how easy it is to discover the good hearts in so many people.

Tree on our street in Izmir.  All blossoms

Well tomorrow is our second opportunity to be the entire Sunday program.  Nori has volunteered to be the speaker so I do not have to be the entire program.  There is a cruise ship docking tomight so perhaps we will have some traveling members on the ship and double our attendance.

I have not been out taking any pictures here in Izmir so show some of the nice areas, but I will try to get more on the ball after we actually get the move finished.  I am sorry for Nori, because she has given up so much to serve here and then she has so much work to get the apartment just livable.  I try to fix all the broken stuff and move things around, but she has the brunt of the work.  Her commitment to make sure that everything is the most presentable simply adds to all her frustration and work load.

Pond at Domabaçi Place Istanbul

Pond and fountain at the Palace