Jonesberries

There are many American and Western holidays that I would never want to duplicate in a new country. That is not true of Thanksgiving. It is a holiday of giving thanks for a good harvest and provision of the last year. It is a moment to stop with friends and family to give thanks.

This year our family celebrated Thanksgiving in Bali. We are staying with a community for people who are HIV+. They are ex-drug addicts and prostitutes and the orphans they leave behind when they die. People from this community, Xtreme, go to the hospitals and bring home people who have been abandoned by there families. How great to celebrate Thanksgiving with people who are grateful with for every breath. Xtreme gives them a new family to be part of. Such a loving family heart can be felt here and such generosity with any and all of their simple possessions they.

We have been given such amazing hospitality here.  I have been humbled by their generosity, openness, honesty, love and acceptance. Not to mention the amazing cooking we have tasted. It was nice to do something little for them.

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We were taken for shopping, for the meal, at the “traditional market” for the meal.

At one point Andrew counted 41 people at the same time but about 50 came.

We got some great photos of our friends so I thought I would put them up here.

I am starting to see dynamic equivalents in cultures around the world for Thanksgiving. A few days ago,  here in Bali, there was a festival day in which the streets were full of motorbikes with families in full ceremonial dress and baskets of gifts to show respect for their deities. The Muslims celebrate Eid Al-Adha. This is when a lamb is slaughtered in remembrance of the Sacrifice where the Koran says God stopped Abraham’s cutting Ishmael’s throat. We were there watching as the men sang, the women watch, they all drank tea and the courtyard was full of sheep waiting for the slaughter. Families would bring home the slaughtered lamb, feast with their families and the poor families that could not afford their own lamb.

Now is a great time to come to Egypt. The tourism industry is down 90% at the moment, mainly because of the revolution, which means there is plenty of space and it’s not as crowded.

We did the camel rides around the pyramids which, btw, are still there after all those years. From the camel you get a shot of all 7 of them.

We also had a tour of the Cairo museum by Ibrahmim Morgan whom we recommend very highly.

Cirali, right next to the ancient town of Olympos, is simply the best place to wild camp in Turkey. The beach is the nicest in the country and there are free toilets and a water supply. We were parked next to the sand, under huge trees, and it was great! Plenty of other wild campers also from all over Europe.

But if you don’t have a camper, there are heaps of ensions to choose from. We had a bad experience in one of them and shifted over to Şahin Pension which was great. Apo is the friendly owner. He speaks English, German and Turkish. They have wifi, restaurant, and even their own boat for cruises. Good prices also. If you don’t mind a little walk into the main part of town, check out Şahin Pension down the end of the road.

Part of our family and team will be in India next week. Delhi, actually, And this is where I need someone to help me.

Because of an unusual ticket change, Air India will only make the flight change if someone actually walk into their office in Delhi on Monday and pay the 40 Euro fee for changing the tickets. Apparently we cannot do this remotely or through internet or phone. The Air India guy said ”Just get one of your friends to go and pay”

Yeah right!

So I need someone to physically go to Air India office on Monday morning and pay the fee. I will give more details on email. Can you help us?

Andrew took off this morning in our home to take warm clothes and blankets to the earthquake survivors in Eastern turkey.

Last night we took our personal belongings out of the truck so that it can fit more in for the 1400 km trip to the edge of Turkey. He takes Priscilla with him. She is being baptized by fire as she arrived only yesterday. Yikes! He left us to go to a Kurdish center in Antalya to pick up cargo and a young Kurdish man who has volunteered to be his translator/navigator. The Kurds are a persecuted minority here as in many other parts of the world. They tend to be quite poor.  In! faith they have gathered warm clothes and blankets for the earthquake survivors while having no means or money to send it across the country. So, on our end Andrew talked to Anna who talked to Ishmael who talked to the Kurds. Now, their sacrificial gifts are on their way.

Horray!

We will keep you posted on what happens next.

If you want to help with costs… It will be alot of fuel, food on the road and the cost of a place for the family at Sahin Pension while he is gone. They have given us a huge break for our one room that the 6 left behind are squeezing into but it is still way more than we usually pay for the night. Especially seeing as most nights we are wild camping for free.

Anyway… Here is where to give money:

“Turkish Earthquake Relief”

Community Development Initiatives, 3300 Bell Rd.,Montgomery, Alabama, 36116-1345,

RBC Centura Bank,CDI – Gateway, Account #521-0023545, Routing #053100850

If we get more than we can use we will pass it on to those that can use it well.

The Kurds have stepped out in faith. We have tried to follow suit. How about you.

Sorry no pics yet

Thanks.

Turkey has just experience a huge earthquake. 7.2. A thousand people feared dead. Maybe more.

(Photo: Reuters/Abdurrahman Antakyali/Anadolu Agency)

We are 1000kms from the earthquake and did not feel anything. Far enough from the earthquake to be unaffected but close enough to drive there and assist the rescue efforts.

I have a friend named Ismael who is contacting the Red Crescent today to see if our family can help out. We have a strong truck and could easily transport cans of food, blankets, tents or water. The main road out of Vans is destroyed but I think our 4×4 overlander, with its high clearance, could make it through.

Once I hear from the Red Crescent what the needs are and how we could help, I will post something here.

QUITE POSSIBLY, I might need some volunteers to come. You would fly to Antalya tomorrow and we will take 2.5 days to drive there. We might need money for diesel and food and whatever supplies are needed. Will let you know soon.

When you are traveling renovations are a celebration of a beautiful symphony of time, money and resources playing together.. You can’t say, ” Hey, I think I will make a bookshelf today so I will go to my neighbourhood builders supply, hang out with some fellow builder amateurs and make my beautiful shelf.” No, it just doesn’t happen that way when you are traveling.

Here is how it happened for us.

We established our need – we have books. our particle board shelves are falling off the wall and it all looks cluttery.

We drew or design – aaah a bit of style.

Then, we decide to build.

It is now over a month ago now. While we were in Germany Andrew was gone for a week so I filled up my time with deconstructing our disintegrating old shelves and start building new ones. I got as far as a “shelf skeleton” and secured the books with “plumbers tape” so my kids wouldn’t be showered with books on their next journey. Now, just to let you know, plumbers tape and duct tape are diy motorhome essentials.

Now, shortly after, we started heading for a land where builders’s supply stores took on a new look. One that was hard to identify where to buy a nice sheet of ply to finish off the job. So…. last week I just about jumped out of the truck when I saw a “pile of ply” next to the road. A few days later, Me and Abi took a nice trip on the bus and had some beautiful ply delivered to our camping ground.

After very careful measuring over and over by the families old dislecsic, me, and lots of noise which annoyed little old men with their afternoon game of “Okay”. Taking a break to offer Turkish delight to the old men with their afternoon game in order to go with their cup of apple tea. Our masterpiece is complete. Well, not quite a masterpiece, but we like it.

Hey. If you have an old model Kindle or an outdated iPad, and you need a good reason to upgrade, here’s that excuse you are looking for:

Our kids are homeschooled and lugging around paper books is sooooooo early 21st Centrury. We want to migrate to ebooks and ereaders and reduce the books in our backpacks.

Can you help us? Let me know if you want to donate one and I will give you the address to send it. Thanks.

There seems to be two places to wild camp in Turkey: the beach and the forest. We went to the forest and found a sweet little spot for the evening. Really beautiful. And quiet.

A regular part of our travels is sorting through left over coins. Try as we might to spend all the currency before we leave a country either by putting it into the tank, exchanging it at the border or (the kid’s favourite) spending it on special foods.

We always seem to find extra coins in pockets or corners or…. So, a natural part of our homeschooling is to sort through the coins and put in small ziplock backs labeled with the country. Now we put the smaller bags into one larger bag of the continent. Alot of times the kids will count the money in each bag and put a small piece of paper in with the amount.  The bag goes into the safe and comes out when we return or when we meet someone going the opposite direction we make an exchange of currencies. It is always nice to have enough for a loaf of bread, or coffee or a pay toilet when coming into a new country, as we always say.

Hannah is our bookeeper. At first we did an XL document on the computer. Now that she has her own ipod we have put Xpensilite on it. We save receipts in a metal box on the dash. She takes the receipts and enters them into her ipod and converts the currency back to USD. She takes photos of any that are over USD 50 in value. She seems to really love doing this and she does it well.

We have changed to an ipod app for pocket money as well, called “allowabank”. Abi keeps her home currency in USD but the others keep their home currency in NZD. Every purchase must be converted to their home currency.

The world is quite small for our kids. They grew up understanding multiple currencies. They also understand different economies. Just crossing a border bread can go up to 10 times the cost of the previous country. We were poor in Germany, we are rich in Bulgaria. However we have the same amount of money. It is one thing to know this in your head. It is another thing entirely to know how it feels.