Today in Istanbul had record-breaking high temperatures. 42.2 degrees Celsius, which to me means nothing. But thanks to DoganApartmani (a turkish variation of google homepage) I understand that to be 87 degrees Farenheit with 61% humidity. The last few nights have been hard to sleep through because there has been no breeze, but tonight is looking up.

The Turkish Language and Culture program has been taking up more of our time than I had anticipated it would. We pull some long days, sometimes 9am-5pm even. And then we have homework on top of that. By the time all of our school responsibilities are accomplished we have just enough time to eat, shower, and get a little bit of computer time. Overall I have felt pretty disconnected from my life back home considering I sleep about 15 feet away from two friends' computers. I long to write posts much more frequently than this on both xanga and the threeturkeys.blogspot.com site, to post pictures of these amazing places we've been seeing, to email and skype and everything, but there's just not enough time.

Satan has been on the move. He's trying really hard to spoil our adventure with irritation, discouragement, physical and linguistic discomfort and so on, but we're wise to him. One thought that's really been on my mind is this: Satan wants nothing more than to isolate us. From Turks, from the people involved with our program, from each other. The fight between heaven and hell is real, my friends. I'm totally convinced of that. I feel it. The war wages inside of my very body! Anyway, I'm really thankful that our eyes have been graciously able to see through some of this stuff. We're praying against it and you're more than welcome to join us in that.

I've been putting some of my energies towards creating an online photo album in which all of our pictures are consolidated. It'll be ready for viewing in just a couple of days, I hope. (Insallah!) And we can continue to add pictures to the album as we take them throughout the next 7 weeks.

It is SO good to be here. The campus is beautiful. We walk right by the Bosphorus every day on our way to class and I say, sometimes aloud and sometimes just in my head, "Gunaydin Bogaz..." (which means "Goodmorning Bosphorus") I am so blessed to be here and to be sharing this experience with my two girlfriends.

I
am
alive.