Woodlands Presentation
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Louise’s presentation for “Everyone Has a Story” at The Woodlands, July 21, 2025
The title of this presentation doesn’t refer to what we may or may not eat at Thanksgiving, although the prevalent theory is that the phrase is linked to colonial times & interactions between the Native Americans and the colonists who were bartering for wild turkeys and other goods. The colonists needed to be clear about the negotiations, so the phrase grew out of something like “Let’s be clear about this” or “Let’s speak plainly.” The term is now used in important matters to mean to engage in straight-forward, honest speech.
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This phrase does have to do with the name of the country in Asia which is where we lived for a short while. Turkey is located in Anatolia, West Asia with a small part located in southeast Europe called East Thrace. Eight countries border Turkey, including Greece, Syria, Iraq, and Iran.
So, the two uses of the word “Turkey” aren’t related. Totally random. The countries bordering Turkey are: Northwest: Greece and Bulgaria. Northeast: Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan (Nakhchivan exclave). East: Iran . Southeast: Iraq and Syria. Turkey also has maritime borders with:
Black Sea: Russia, Romania, and Ukraine.
Mediterranean Sea: Cyprus, Egypt.
What were you doing in 1976?
Nearly 50 years ago, we all were younger, stronger, braver than we are now, and not too worried about falling down or forgetting our words. Well, my story today concerns our young family's trip to southern Turkey at that time, probably the riskiest thing we have ever done. Turkey was the first of four countries we lived in during that year and certainly was the most challenging and unusual. The trip was not as risky in 1976 as it would be now. The world was a different place then, and I was much more daring than I am at this point in my life. Weren’t we all?
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A few things about Adana: Legend says it was founded by 2 Greek brothers who were sons of one of the Greek gods. Its name means “on the river” and it’s one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. It has been an important center of the international cotton trade. It is situated on the Seyhan River and is about 35 kilometers inland from the Mediterranean Sea. In 1976, when we were there the population was 500,000. Today, it’s 3 million.
Adana is 600 driving miles south of Istanbul. It still takes almost 13 hours to get there by train. One-and-one half hours by plane. In Jesus’ time Adana was called Anatolia or Asia Minor. Its official language is Turkish which dates back to the 11th century when it was brought in by Central Asians. 99% of Turks are Muslim now. As they were then. Turkey has always been an important security partner of the United States. Turkish money or currency is the lira which is also used in Syria. Today there are only 40 lira to one US dollar.
In 2023, a 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit southern Turkey & northern Syria. 58.000 people died. An aftershock of 7.5 magnitude occurred some nine hours later. Many news organizations sent their reporters to Adana to do their reporting. I remember watching the reports and wondering if that was our apartment building, they were standing close to.
You may be asking what on earth we were doing in southern Turkey anyway.
My husband, who had been teaching economics at Furman and had earned a sabbatical leave, had been offered a year-long teaching position in the US Air Force at four of its bases in Europe. What a wonderful opportunity had presented itself to us. All travel and lodging expenses were to be paid, and we would get to live in four foreign countries, Turkey being the first. As teachers, this would be a dream come true for us, and I agreed immediately that we should go. So, despite the fact that I would birth our fourth child barely three months before we were to leave, we signed the teaching contract, secured a sabbatical leave of absence from Furman, got our passports, rented out our Greenville house for a year, and prayed for guidance and courage. We were fearless and excited beyond measure, and off we went.
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Appeasing my parents had been another thing. In their opinion, taking their grandchildren to those strange places for that long was the height of stubbornness and danger. Somehow, their attitude made me more determined than ever to show them that we really were capable of taking care of our family wherever we were. My husband’s parents wondered if we had taken leave of our senses, but agreed to keep our dog, our cat, and our car for the year.
Our oldest child turned eight years old in July, and we left the States one month later. Our friends were at the airport to see us off and were flabbergasted to see the eleven suitcases that we checked. Yes, eleven. In addition, the three oldest girls and Dick and I had carry-on bags, as well. I also had a diaper bag. We flew from Greenville to Frankfurt, Germany for a few days of orientation. Then we flew to Adana, Turkey, for the first of our four assignments ~ at Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey. Incirlik was also used by the Turkish Air Force. It has always served as an important base for defense against ISIS.
I’m not sure I could have survived Turkey without access to the US military base.
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The one thing that I had questioned before we left the States was about our medical care in Europe. We were assured that while we were to live on the economy, we would have access at all times to English-speaking doctors and nurses at the Air Force bases and that the children would get their check-ups and immunizations on schedule. And, fortunately, our children reached their developmental milestones just as they would have had we stayed in the States that year. All this happened at the other bases we were later assigned to. Potty-training, losing teeth, and learning to read and to write in cursive all occurred when they should have. The baby, Anne, learned to crawl, sprout teeth, walk, and pull her sisters’ hair right on time.
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The Turkish flag’s design is very similar to the flag used by the Ottoman Empire.
Life in Turkey was quite different from anything we had ever known, but I wouldn’t take anything for the experience. We didn’t dare drink the water there at first, but by the time we left Adana 3 months later, we drank it wherever we went.
We were able to get formula and diapers at the base, as well as other necessary toiletries & essentials. I did have to boil water for cooking and for the powdered baby formula if I wasn’t able to bring water from the base.
We enrolled our two oldest girls, Mary and Elizabeth, in the American schools at the bases until we arrived at our fourth base which was in England. There we enrolled them in the local English school, which is why they came home speaking with an English accent. I really hated it when that accent disappeared.
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Speaking of Education: The Hodja was a character in Turkish literature. We were told that this person was an academic. We thought that would be appropriate for two teachers. So, we bought a set of bookends with the Hodja on them. And, obviously, it’s the college professor who rides along headed in a different direction.
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We didn’t worry about whether the children would be behind their peers back in the States because the education they received while traveling during that year was unparalleled. Besides, they were great students, (I may be biased) had excellent teachers, caught up quickly, and never missed a beat. We were very pleased to hear one of our grown girls say recently that she was in the third grade before she realized that not everyone in her class had been to Turkey.
Our second and third bases were in Germany and Italy and our transitions went smoothly. Every day we woke up to new cultural practices and ideas. It was important to maintain a positive attitude about everything that was expected of us. Just like learning to drink the water in Turkey, making adjustments became our everyday goal, and I believe that we were successful in that endeavor.
Throughout our long careers in the classroom we drew inspiration from those experiences. Anecdotes from that exciting time in Turkey still come to mind even now in retirement. In today’s world, that trip would not be possible, and I’m eternally grateful that my husband and I took the risk to make the journey.
We learned a lot about that part of the world since we were living there.
I’m not going to give a history of Turkey or a geographical tour of the land. I just hope to let you know what life was like for us at that time in that place.
So, here are some of our daily experiences, in no particular order. Remember that we had no cell phones, no land line in our apartment, and no car.
All of our photos were taken with old fashioned cameras with film that had to be sent away to be developed. We are NOT photographers, we are picture takers, which may help to explain why the photos look blurry, aside from the fact that they are 50 years old. In addition, many of the people we encountered believed that they should NOT let their pictures be taken.
The only other English I was able to hear during the day was on the radio from the Armed Forces programming. I learned first-hand how frustrating it can be to not understand anything people around you were saying. As a foreign language teacher, I observed real life language learning -- a valuable lesson. The children heard English spoken at the American school at the base.
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One of our first experiences was with what I call free range chicken. It was possible to have fresh, really fresh, chicken, because each week, a farmer came around to the apartment with several live chickens in a cage to show you so that you could pick one out. He then went downstairs, and right outside the building, he chopped off the chicken's head, pulled out a few feathers, and then proudly presented to you the chicken you had picked out. I learned about this by watching a neighbor pick out a chicken. The farmer just left the chicken’s head down there, and some animal came later and got it. What a shocker for this city girl from the States! We never did get to the point of wanting really fresh, free range chicken that bad.
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About security and feeling safe: Standing in the runway at the airport when we arrived in Ankara were several Turkish soldiers with machine guns. The Turkish and Greek nations were at odds as usual and were about to go to war. What a scary sight! I remember wondering that if war came while we were there, what would we do? I innocently thought that the military would take care of us. Thankfully, war did not come at that time. Soldiers with machine guns monitored every place we went.
About the water: We all bathed and washed our hair in it, and I washed dishes in it. We gradually began to brush our teeth in it, too, although we didn't at first. Supposedly there's no danger about the dishes because once they're dried, the germs are dead. Besides, after you've been there a while your system builds up to things, like drinking the water and not worrying about what was in those ever-present lamb kabobs.
About riding the bus: We walked down to the corner of our street and caught a bus out to the base. Buses came along twelve times a day and all six of us rode for $1.20, or we could take a taxi at any time for about $1.80, but the taxi let us out at the gate of the base, and it was a long way to the commissary or to Dick's office from there. The buses were permitted to go all over the base. Also, the taxis were small foreign cars, and our family really filled one up.
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Once a taxi stopped to pick us up, but there was already a man in the back seat, and he had brought his goat along with him. We waited for the next taxi.
About driving in Adana: You ought to know how they drove in Adana at that time. Or maybe you shouldn't. People drove with one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the horn, and they blew the horn all the time. Of course, with all the horse carts, cows and herds of sheep in the streets, I guess they had to blow the horn. There were traffic lights at each corner, but no one paid the slightest bit of attention to them, even with policemen standing on the corner.
About the traffic laws in Adana: Traffic laws in Turkey were such that if there was a wreck, everyone in the car or on the bus was partly at fault for the wreck. Fortunately, we were never in a wreck, although the bus drivers often tried their best to have one. Imagine our surprise when we saw a fender bender and noticed everyone getting off the bus and running away. That's one of the main reasons that we didn't want to have a car in Turkey. In addition, if you were to run over a sheep or a goat or a cow and it died, you would have to pay for it and for several generations of its likely offspring.
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About time to pray: The imam at the local mosque issued the calls to prayer beginning at 5 a.m. This was all well and good except that he used loudspeakers to make the call. Since we slept with the windows open, we usually woke up, but we didn't feel like having prayer time. In fact, the largest mosque in Turkey was located in Adana at that time. As large as “our mosque’” was, it wasn’t that largest one. We had to gradually get used to the street noises.
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About the weather: The climate there was very much like that at a SC beach--a gentle breeze blew all the time. The highs were in the low 90's and the lows in the high 70's, pretty much like what we had been used to. There was no air conditioning except for a few buildings out at the base. Until the weather cooled down, the school day was from 7:30 a.m. to noon or 12:30. The children had to get on the bus about 7 a.m., so there were some early bedtimes. It never rained while we were there and stayed at 92 degrees almost every day,
Dick took the two oldest girls to the bus stop every morning. He had to be the school bus monitor sometimes ~ on a rotating schedule ~ not one of his favorite activities. When our children got on the bus they tried to pretend that they didn’t know each other.
On the way back to the apartment from the bus stop most mornings, Dick usually stopped at a small store to buy a loaf of freshly made bread that had been rolled out on a large stone. And yes, occasionally we did feel tiny flecks of stone in the bread. But it was soooo delicious. In Turkish, it was called “ekmek” ~ one of the few words we learned while there.
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About housekeeping: I was fortunate to get a maid. Her name was Emma, and she spoke English very well. She earned 60 lira a day which was about $3.60, and that included two-way transportation. There was no such thing as welfare or food stamps. Labor was very cheap. For example, when we rode the bus out to the base there were three attendants on the bus, a driver, a ticket-taker, and another man who just opened and closed the door. We paid 30 cents each for an eight-mile trip. Our 2 youngest children, Anne and Catherine, didn’t have to pay.
Emma worked for someone else during the week and came to us on Saturday and Sunday. Since she spoke English, I was able to leave Anne with her for the day from time to time so we could take some tours sponsored by the base to near-by places of interest. Emma was Moslem and wore her head covered. She also took her shoes off inside the door and worked barefooted, and she worked amazingly fast.
About the food: Emma occasionally fixed us wonderful Turkish meals. We had something like cabbage leaves stuffed with meat, rice, and onions and rolled up. She also fixed stuffed peppers and some kind of little biscuits with meat and cheese. She did all the shopping for things I couldn't get at the commissary.
Any fresh vegetables we bought, even on base, we had to wash in a Clorox solution before we could eat them.
Have you ever tasted things washed in bleach? And tried to get your children to eat them?
Lettuce was forbidden in any case. At the Officers Club, a green salad consisted of tomatoes and cucumbers. We didn’t eat salad anywhere else. Sometimes Emma washed tomatoes and cucumbers for us at our apartment, and they were fine. Every meal included ekmek.
About the electricity: The power company in Adana at that time could not keep up with the demand for electricity in the city, so the power was cut off every day in different parts of the city. Our off time was “scheduled” from 4:00 P.M. to 6:00 P.M. every afternoon, which made it quite challenging to prepare dinner.
However, we quickly learned that the word “scheduling” had a different meaning in Turkey ~ different from our notion of the word in English. We never knew when we would or would not have electricity.
Dick had the civilian status of captain, so we were able to have dinner at the Officers’ Club which was a lifesaver for someone whose electricity went out every afternoon.
I found out about the electricity the hard way one day when I tried to bake a cake, and the oven went out about halfway through baking. What a mess! Thank goodness there was a nice little bakery on the base, so when we needed a cake we went out there. After our first few weeks in Adana the electricity began to stay on all day, but ALAS, the water was turned off for two hours each day. We never knew when we would have to do without what.
But the worst, or I should say, the most challenging, was when the elevator in our building stopped working while we were on it. There’s just nothing like being stuck on a hot elevator with 4 small children, a stroller, diaper bags, and several bags of groceries. When this happened ~ remember, that schedule of theirs was just a figment of someone’s imagination, if we banged on the door and shouted loud enough, our landlord would usually come and get us out. He enjoyed much laughter at our expense.
About afternoon fun: There were some long afternoons since the older children came home by 12:30, but for fun there were several things to do, ~ we usually went to the park or went exploring. Sometimes we stayed in and did a lot of reading, coloring and drawing. There were only a few board games available at that time.
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Every city in Turkey has at least one Ataturk Park. Mustafa Kemal Ataturk was the founding father of the Republic of Turkey and served as its first president until his death in 1938. He undertook sweeping reforms which modernized Turkey into an industrialized nation.
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In addition to going to the park, we spent lots of afternoons inside. Elizabeth drew these pictures for our parents in case they had forgotten what all the children looked like.
We all drew a lot of pictures at that time. There was no TV and of course, no devices. And nobody at the park could understand a word we said.
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We also did some exploring.
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NOT FUN:
About the Gypsies: As we were going out and about, we often saw some gypsies working in the large cotton fields all along the countryside. Of course, there was no machinery anywhere to do the cotton picking. Labor was so cheap. People who picked cotton got between $2 and $3 a day for a twelve-hour day. There were lots of women and older children and a few old men who did the picking. Emma, our maid, said she made much better money ($3/day) as a maid and didn’t have to work as hard.
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There were rug shops everywhere.
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If any of us needed specialized medical care that wasn’t available at Incirlik, we would be flown on a plane like this, probably to Germany, The C-130 was widely used for various missions, including troop and equipment transport, airdrops, medical evacuations, search and rescue, and even firefighting.
We never really figured out how this illegal photo of this plane got into our camera. We weren’t ever supposed to take pictures of anything on the base.
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About the neighborhood children: These cute Turkish children in our neighborhood were really curious about us and our children. The adults felt sorry for my husband because he didn’t have a son to properly usher him into the next life, and it was ALL MY FAULT because I kept giving him girl children. Poor Dick Stanford.
Whenever we went outside, several children appeared out of nowhere, or so it seemed. We had no idea where they lived or where they came from. Somehow, language difficulties weren’t a hindrance to playing together. What wonderful language and communications research this would have provided for a researcher.
Remember, there were no toys ~ no tricycles, bicycles or riding toys. Occasionally we bought a soccer ball at the base, and that was about it. Whatever we bought at the base disappeared within a few days.
About the garbage dump across the street from our apartment:
We had an unusual sight one morning. Four shepherds brought a flock of about 70 or 80 sheep to graze in the vacant lot across the street from us. After a few minutes, they all walked off down the street in the middle of the street. The cars had to go around them and of course blew their horns constantly. At the same time, three cows were rumbling around in the garbage bins also across the street.
It was very interesting to stand out on our front balcony and watch people going through the garbage. Some took tin cans, some took papers or bottles, and some took old peelings and rinds and things for their livestock. It was all very specialized, but nothing went to waste there. The cans, bottles, and papers were sold (for next to nothing) to plants that recycled them. Then, of course, there were a few out and out beggars who were just looking for something to eat. We had a family birthday party one day, and it was quite sad seeing the neighborhood children the next day playing with our discarded party plates and napkins and hats.
Imagine telling your two oldest children (8 and 5 year-olds) that if they ever did get lost just look for the garbage dump near the vacant lot ~ our apartment was right across the street.
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Other Everyday Scenes:
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Turkey, particularly Istanbul, is known for its large and well-cared-for stray cat population. Cats were often associated with good luck and are still revered in Islamic tradition, where kindness to animals is emphasized. This is due to a combination of cultural and historical factors, including the Islamic belief that the Prophet Muhammad had a fondness for cats and urged his followers to take care of them. Many Turks view these street cats as communal pets, and there's a strong culture of feeding and caring for them, with locals & tourists often leaving food and water out for them. There’s a general attitude of protection for cats and other animals, but not dogs.
Cats were everywhere -- in the shops, mosques, restaurants, buses, etcetera. And of course, cats and kittens are soooo attractive to little girls who want to chase them and hold them and take them home. (One of my worst nightmares!)
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About side trips to remote villages and getting thirsty & then having to go: The Rec Center on the base sponsored tours every weekend to the beach and other places of interest Thank goodness we could buy Pepsi and Coke everywhere we went--even in the most remote little villages. We felt safe drinking that.
Because I really needed to speak my native language with other adults, and out of natural curiosity about where we were, I signed us up for several day-long excursions that were offered by the Rec Center.
This may be indelicate, but that’s how it was, and we dealt with it. The only problem was that in most of these remote villages there was no commode--only a "Turkish john" also known as a “squat toilet” which is an adult-sized hole in the ground with a footprint on each side showing you where to put your feet when you go. Our young girls couldn’t get used to it and had a hard time releasing. However, toward the end of the day, they had to go & were finally able to. Needless to say I always carried plenty of tissue and wet washcloths. Actually, children were expected to go in the bushes somewhere nearby. Most places did have running water, although it wasn’t drinkable. I really didn’t think it would be appropriate to take a photo at these times.
We were still going through potty training with our 2YO, so there were some challenging times on these side trips. Many of you may recall what it was like potty training a 2 year-old girl.
We usually traveled by bus, both in and out of town. The buses were old and certainly not air-conditioned but we went anyway.
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I guess Safety regulations were still somewhat futuristic.
All our trips were memorable. We really enjoyed longer trips to Greece & to Istanbul. Since Istanbul was nearly 600 miles north of Adana, we flew again on the luxurious Turkish Airline. The next slide isn’t mine, obviously but we aren’t photographers, just picture takers.
We toured Topkapi Palace, the Grand Bazaar, Hagia Sohia, and the Blue Mosque among other places. Some of you have been to these places and will recognize them.
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The Sultan Ahmed Mosque in Istanbul is also known as the Blue Mosque. An Ottoman era mosque, it was built from 1609-1616 and is still a functioning mosque today. It is affiliated with the Sunni Islam tradition. It has six minarets and is next door to the Hagia Sophia mosque. Both mosques are principal tourist attractions in Istanbul.
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Hagia Sophia means “Holy Wisdom.” The mosque is renowned for its stunning architecture and rich history as a church, mosque, then a museum, and now a mosque again. It's a UNESCO World Heritage site and a major tourist attraction. Originally built as a Christian church in 537 AD, it was later converted into a mosque after the Ottoman conquest in 1453, and then into a museum in 1935 before being reconverted to a mosque in 2020. Many US art and architecture students nowadays go to Istanbul to study these beautiful structures.
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The Eurasia bridge across the Bosporus Sea is one of several bridges that connect Europe and Asia. We were able to see it from our hotel in Istanbul and were amazed to observe this significant historical landmark.
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Istanbul is unusual in many ways, including that it is one of the few cities in the world that lies in two continents. It is separated by the Bosporus Sea.
While we enjoyed our trip back into the 20th century in Istanbul, we loved our trip to Cyprus. Perhaps the most memorable of those excursions was to Cyprus.
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We spent the weekend in Cyprus and had a wonderful time. We stayed at a resort area near Famagusta and our hotel was right on the beach. The children thoroughly enjoyed the swimming and playing in the sand. The water is quite salty but clear as a bell, and there are no waves like there are in the Atlantic Ocean.
We also took a sight-seeing tour in Nicosia. It was really interesting to get used to riding on the left side of the road. The British were there for so long and their influence was evident everywhere. British influence in Cyprus was significant, stemming from a long period of rule (1878-1960) that transitioned from a protectorate to a Crown Colony. This influence is still visible in various aspects of Cypriot life today, including language, legal systems, and infrastructure. And yes, we heard some English, British English in Cyprus.
I spent my 32nd birthday swimming in the Mediterranean Sea with my family in Famagusta, Cyprus.
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I put this photo of Dick and our van in here because there weren’t many photos of him ~ he was always out at the base or taking pictures of us. In the 8 months we had that van which we purchased when we got to Germany, we put 25,000 miles on it and enjoyed many tailgate picnics along the way. We probably kept the peanut butter and jelly businesses going that fall.
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As we’ve looked back through the pictures and letters from that time, we’ve been thrilled and amazed at what all we did and saw and that we were even brave enough to accept such a wonderful travel opportunity. When we left Adana, we carried our eleven suitcases out to the plane ourselves (that was required) and headed for the second leg of our awesome year-long journey.
We wouldn’t take anything for having spent time in southern Turkey. At that time, Incirlik was considered a hardship base, which meant that those who were stationed there had to stay only 14 months, instead of the regular two- year assignment. It was located in an underdeveloped area of the world, and there were significant cultural challenges there. Life, indeed, was difficult on numerous levels. We learned a lot about many things, especially about being flexible and about not complaining about what we didn’t have. We made do every day, and loved every, well, almost every, minute of our time there. The people were friendly to us an accepted us as we were, and prayed for poor Dick Stanford,
Yes, that trip, starting in Turkey, was a risky undertaking, especially with four small children, no telephones, no car or GPS, multiple language barriers, different money and currency, and mysterious things in the water. But the risk was far outweighed by the unique experiences we had, and we are the grateful beneficiaries of all that we gained by accepting the risk. And we are also grateful for the opportunity to share some of our experiences with you here at Woodlands.
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I included the girl’s passport photos to show everyone that we came back in good shape. The girls not only survived, they thrived!.
<Let's Talk Turkey Slide Show>
Louise’s presentation for “Everyone Has a Story” at The Woodlands, July 21, 2025
The title of this presentation doesn’t refer to what we may or may not eat at Thanksgiving, although the prevalent theory is that the phrase is linked to colonial times & interactions between the Native Americans and the colonists who were bartering for wild turkeys and other goods. The colonists needed to be clear about the negotiations, so the phrase grew out of something like “Let’s be clear about this” or “Let’s speak plainly.” The term is now used in important matters to mean to engage in straight-forward, honest speech.
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This phrase does have to do with the name of the country in Asia which is where we lived for a short while. Turkey is located in Anatolia, West Asia with a small part located in southeast Europe called East Thrace. Eight countries border Turkey, including Greece, Syria, Iraq, and Iran.
So, the two uses of the word “Turkey” aren’t related. Totally random. The countries bordering Turkey are: Northwest: Greece and Bulgaria. Northeast: Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan (Nakhchivan exclave). East: Iran . Southeast: Iraq and Syria. Turkey also has maritime borders with:
Black Sea: Russia, Romania, and Ukraine.
Mediterranean Sea: Cyprus, Egypt.
What were you doing in 1976?
Nearly 50 years ago, we all were younger, stronger, braver than we are now, and not too worried about falling down or forgetting our words. Well, my story today concerns our young family's trip to southern Turkey at that time, probably the riskiest thing we have ever done. Turkey was the first of four countries we lived in during that year and certainly was the most challenging and unusual. The trip was not as risky in 1976 as it would be now. The world was a different place then, and I was much more daring than I am at this point in my life. Weren’t we all?
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A few things about Adana: Legend says it was founded by 2 Greek brothers who were sons of one of the Greek gods. Its name means “on the river” and it’s one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world. It has been an important center of the international cotton trade. It is situated on the Seyhan River and is about 35 kilometers inland from the Mediterranean Sea. In 1976, when we were there the population was 500,000. Today, it’s 3 million.
Adana is 600 driving miles south of Istanbul. It still takes almost 13 hours to get there by train. One-and-one half hours by plane. In Jesus’ time Adana was called Anatolia or Asia Minor. Its official language is Turkish which dates back to the 11th century when it was brought in by Central Asians. 99% of Turks are Muslim now. As they were then. Turkey has always been an important security partner of the United States. Turkish money or currency is the lira which is also used in Syria. Today there are only 40 lira to one US dollar.
In 2023, a 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit southern Turkey & northern Syria. 58.000 people died. An aftershock of 7.5 magnitude occurred some nine hours later. Many news organizations sent their reporters to Adana to do their reporting. I remember watching the reports and wondering if that was our apartment building, they were standing close to.
You may be asking what on earth we were doing in southern Turkey anyway.
My husband, who had been teaching economics at Furman and had earned a sabbatical leave, had been offered a year-long teaching position in the US Air Force at four of its bases in Europe. What a wonderful opportunity had presented itself to us. All travel and lodging expenses were to be paid, and we would get to live in four foreign countries, Turkey being the first. As teachers, this would be a dream come true for us, and I agreed immediately that we should go. So, despite the fact that I would birth our fourth child barely three months before we were to leave, we signed the teaching contract, secured a sabbatical leave of absence from Furman, got our passports, rented out our Greenville house for a year, and prayed for guidance and courage. We were fearless and excited beyond measure, and off we went.
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Appeasing my parents had been another thing. In their opinion, taking their grandchildren to those strange places for that long was the height of stubbornness and danger. Somehow, their attitude made me more determined than ever to show them that we really were capable of taking care of our family wherever we were. My husband’s parents wondered if we had taken leave of our senses, but agreed to keep our dog, our cat, and our car for the year.
Our oldest child turned eight years old in July, and we left the States one month later. Our friends were at the airport to see us off and were flabbergasted to see the eleven suitcases that we checked. Yes, eleven. In addition, the three oldest girls and Dick and I had carry-on bags, as well. I also had a diaper bag. We flew from Greenville to Frankfurt, Germany for a few days of orientation. Then we flew to Adana, Turkey, for the first of our four assignments ~ at Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey. Incirlik was also used by the Turkish Air Force. It has always served as an important base for defense against ISIS.
I’m not sure I could have survived Turkey without access to the US military base.
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The one thing that I had questioned before we left the States was about our medical care in Europe. We were assured that while we were to live on the economy, we would have access at all times to English-speaking doctors and nurses at the Air Force bases and that the children would get their check-ups and immunizations on schedule. And, fortunately, our children reached their developmental milestones just as they would have had we stayed in the States that year. All this happened at the other bases we were later assigned to. Potty-training, losing teeth, and learning to read and to write in cursive all occurred when they should have. The baby, Anne, learned to crawl, sprout teeth, walk, and pull her sisters’ hair right on time.
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The Turkish flag’s design is very similar to the flag used by the Ottoman Empire.
Life in Turkey was quite different from anything we had ever known, but I wouldn’t take anything for the experience. We didn’t dare drink the water there at first, but by the time we left Adana 3 months later, we drank it wherever we went.
We were able to get formula and diapers at the base, as well as other necessary toiletries & essentials. I did have to boil water for cooking and for the powdered baby formula if I wasn’t able to bring water from the base.
We enrolled our two oldest girls, Mary and Elizabeth, in the American schools at the bases until we arrived at our fourth base which was in England. There we enrolled them in the local English school, which is why they came home speaking with an English accent. I really hated it when that accent disappeared.
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Speaking of Education: The Hodja was a character in Turkish literature. We were told that this person was an academic. We thought that would be appropriate for two teachers. So, we bought a set of bookends with the Hodja on them. And, obviously, it’s the college professor who rides along headed in a different direction.
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We didn’t worry about whether the children would be behind their peers back in the States because the education they received while traveling during that year was unparalleled. Besides, they were great students, (I may be biased) had excellent teachers, caught up quickly, and never missed a beat. We were very pleased to hear one of our grown girls say recently that she was in the third grade before she realized that not everyone in her class had been to Turkey.
Our second and third bases were in Germany and Italy and our transitions went smoothly. Every day we woke up to new cultural practices and ideas. It was important to maintain a positive attitude about everything that was expected of us. Just like learning to drink the water in Turkey, making adjustments became our everyday goal, and I believe that we were successful in that endeavor.
Throughout our long careers in the classroom we drew inspiration from those experiences. Anecdotes from that exciting time in Turkey still come to mind even now in retirement. In today’s world, that trip would not be possible, and I’m eternally grateful that my husband and I took the risk to make the journey.
We learned a lot about that part of the world since we were living there.
I’m not going to give a history of Turkey or a geographical tour of the land. I just hope to let you know what life was like for us at that time in that place.
So, here are some of our daily experiences, in no particular order. Remember that we had no cell phones, no land line in our apartment, and no car.
All of our photos were taken with old fashioned cameras with film that had to be sent away to be developed. We are NOT photographers, we are picture takers, which may help to explain why the photos look blurry, aside from the fact that they are 50 years old. In addition, many of the people we encountered believed that they should NOT let their pictures be taken.
The only other English I was able to hear during the day was on the radio from the Armed Forces programming. I learned first-hand how frustrating it can be to not understand anything people around you were saying. As a foreign language teacher, I observed real life language learning -- a valuable lesson. The children heard English spoken at the American school at the base.
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One of our first experiences was with what I call free range chicken. It was possible to have fresh, really fresh, chicken, because each week, a farmer came around to the apartment with several live chickens in a cage to show you so that you could pick one out. He then went downstairs, and right outside the building, he chopped off the chicken's head, pulled out a few feathers, and then proudly presented to you the chicken you had picked out. I learned about this by watching a neighbor pick out a chicken. The farmer just left the chicken’s head down there, and some animal came later and got it. What a shocker for this city girl from the States! We never did get to the point of wanting really fresh, free range chicken that bad.
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About security and feeling safe: Standing in the runway at the airport when we arrived in Ankara were several Turkish soldiers with machine guns. The Turkish and Greek nations were at odds as usual and were about to go to war. What a scary sight! I remember wondering that if war came while we were there, what would we do? I innocently thought that the military would take care of us. Thankfully, war did not come at that time. Soldiers with machine guns monitored every place we went.
About the water: We all bathed and washed our hair in it, and I washed dishes in it. We gradually began to brush our teeth in it, too, although we didn't at first. Supposedly there's no danger about the dishes because once they're dried, the germs are dead. Besides, after you've been there a while your system builds up to things, like drinking the water and not worrying about what was in those ever-present lamb kabobs.
About riding the bus: We walked down to the corner of our street and caught a bus out to the base. Buses came along twelve times a day and all six of us rode for $1.20, or we could take a taxi at any time for about $1.80, but the taxi let us out at the gate of the base, and it was a long way to the commissary or to Dick's office from there. The buses were permitted to go all over the base. Also, the taxis were small foreign cars, and our family really filled one up.
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Once a taxi stopped to pick us up, but there was already a man in the back seat, and he had brought his goat along with him. We waited for the next taxi.
About driving in Adana: You ought to know how they drove in Adana at that time. Or maybe you shouldn't. People drove with one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the horn, and they blew the horn all the time. Of course, with all the horse carts, cows and herds of sheep in the streets, I guess they had to blow the horn. There were traffic lights at each corner, but no one paid the slightest bit of attention to them, even with policemen standing on the corner.
About the traffic laws in Adana: Traffic laws in Turkey were such that if there was a wreck, everyone in the car or on the bus was partly at fault for the wreck. Fortunately, we were never in a wreck, although the bus drivers often tried their best to have one. Imagine our surprise when we saw a fender bender and noticed everyone getting off the bus and running away. That's one of the main reasons that we didn't want to have a car in Turkey. In addition, if you were to run over a sheep or a goat or a cow and it died, you would have to pay for it and for several generations of its likely offspring.
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About time to pray: The imam at the local mosque issued the calls to prayer beginning at 5 a.m. This was all well and good except that he used loudspeakers to make the call. Since we slept with the windows open, we usually woke up, but we didn't feel like having prayer time. In fact, the largest mosque in Turkey was located in Adana at that time. As large as “our mosque’” was, it wasn’t that largest one. We had to gradually get used to the street noises.
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About the weather: The climate there was very much like that at a SC beach--a gentle breeze blew all the time. The highs were in the low 90's and the lows in the high 70's, pretty much like what we had been used to. There was no air conditioning except for a few buildings out at the base. Until the weather cooled down, the school day was from 7:30 a.m. to noon or 12:30. The children had to get on the bus about 7 a.m., so there were some early bedtimes. It never rained while we were there and stayed at 92 degrees almost every day,
Dick took the two oldest girls to the bus stop every morning. He had to be the school bus monitor sometimes ~ on a rotating schedule ~ not one of his favorite activities. When our children got on the bus they tried to pretend that they didn’t know each other.
On the way back to the apartment from the bus stop most mornings, Dick usually stopped at a small store to buy a loaf of freshly made bread that had been rolled out on a large stone. And yes, occasionally we did feel tiny flecks of stone in the bread. But it was soooo delicious. In Turkish, it was called “ekmek” ~ one of the few words we learned while there.
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About housekeeping: I was fortunate to get a maid. Her name was Emma, and she spoke English very well. She earned 60 lira a day which was about $3.60, and that included two-way transportation. There was no such thing as welfare or food stamps. Labor was very cheap. For example, when we rode the bus out to the base there were three attendants on the bus, a driver, a ticket-taker, and another man who just opened and closed the door. We paid 30 cents each for an eight-mile trip. Our 2 youngest children, Anne and Catherine, didn’t have to pay.
Emma worked for someone else during the week and came to us on Saturday and Sunday. Since she spoke English, I was able to leave Anne with her for the day from time to time so we could take some tours sponsored by the base to near-by places of interest. Emma was Moslem and wore her head covered. She also took her shoes off inside the door and worked barefooted, and she worked amazingly fast.
About the food: Emma occasionally fixed us wonderful Turkish meals. We had something like cabbage leaves stuffed with meat, rice, and onions and rolled up. She also fixed stuffed peppers and some kind of little biscuits with meat and cheese. She did all the shopping for things I couldn't get at the commissary.
Any fresh vegetables we bought, even on base, we had to wash in a Clorox solution before we could eat them.
Have you ever tasted things washed in bleach? And tried to get your children to eat them?
Lettuce was forbidden in any case. At the Officers Club, a green salad consisted of tomatoes and cucumbers. We didn’t eat salad anywhere else. Sometimes Emma washed tomatoes and cucumbers for us at our apartment, and they were fine. Every meal included ekmek.
About the electricity: The power company in Adana at that time could not keep up with the demand for electricity in the city, so the power was cut off every day in different parts of the city. Our off time was “scheduled” from 4:00 P.M. to 6:00 P.M. every afternoon, which made it quite challenging to prepare dinner.
However, we quickly learned that the word “scheduling” had a different meaning in Turkey ~ different from our notion of the word in English. We never knew when we would or would not have electricity.
Dick had the civilian status of captain, so we were able to have dinner at the Officers’ Club which was a lifesaver for someone whose electricity went out every afternoon.
I found out about the electricity the hard way one day when I tried to bake a cake, and the oven went out about halfway through baking. What a mess! Thank goodness there was a nice little bakery on the base, so when we needed a cake we went out there. After our first few weeks in Adana the electricity began to stay on all day, but ALAS, the water was turned off for two hours each day. We never knew when we would have to do without what.
But the worst, or I should say, the most challenging, was when the elevator in our building stopped working while we were on it. There’s just nothing like being stuck on a hot elevator with 4 small children, a stroller, diaper bags, and several bags of groceries. When this happened ~ remember, that schedule of theirs was just a figment of someone’s imagination, if we banged on the door and shouted loud enough, our landlord would usually come and get us out. He enjoyed much laughter at our expense.
About afternoon fun: There were some long afternoons since the older children came home by 12:30, but for fun there were several things to do, ~ we usually went to the park or went exploring. Sometimes we stayed in and did a lot of reading, coloring and drawing. There were only a few board games available at that time.
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Every city in Turkey has at least one Ataturk Park. Mustafa Kemal Ataturk was the founding father of the Republic of Turkey and served as its first president until his death in 1938. He undertook sweeping reforms which modernized Turkey into an industrialized nation.
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In addition to going to the park, we spent lots of afternoons inside. Elizabeth drew these pictures for our parents in case they had forgotten what all the children looked like.
We all drew a lot of pictures at that time. There was no TV and of course, no devices. And nobody at the park could understand a word we said.
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We also did some exploring.
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NOT FUN:
About the Gypsies: As we were going out and about, we often saw some gypsies working in the large cotton fields all along the countryside. Of course, there was no machinery anywhere to do the cotton picking. Labor was so cheap. People who picked cotton got between $2 and $3 a day for a twelve-hour day. There were lots of women and older children and a few old men who did the picking. Emma, our maid, said she made much better money ($3/day) as a maid and didn’t have to work as hard.
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There were rug shops everywhere.
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If any of us needed specialized medical care that wasn’t available at Incirlik, we would be flown on a plane like this, probably to Germany, The C-130 was widely used for various missions, including troop and equipment transport, airdrops, medical evacuations, search and rescue, and even firefighting.
We never really figured out how this illegal photo of this plane got into our camera. We weren’t ever supposed to take pictures of anything on the base.
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About the neighborhood children: These cute Turkish children in our neighborhood were really curious about us and our children. The adults felt sorry for my husband because he didn’t have a son to properly usher him into the next life, and it was ALL MY FAULT because I kept giving him girl children. Poor Dick Stanford.
Whenever we went outside, several children appeared out of nowhere, or so it seemed. We had no idea where they lived or where they came from. Somehow, language difficulties weren’t a hindrance to playing together. What wonderful language and communications research this would have provided for a researcher.
Remember, there were no toys ~ no tricycles, bicycles or riding toys. Occasionally we bought a soccer ball at the base, and that was about it. Whatever we bought at the base disappeared within a few days.
About the garbage dump across the street from our apartment:
We had an unusual sight one morning. Four shepherds brought a flock of about 70 or 80 sheep to graze in the vacant lot across the street from us. After a few minutes, they all walked off down the street in the middle of the street. The cars had to go around them and of course blew their horns constantly. At the same time, three cows were rumbling around in the garbage bins also across the street.
It was very interesting to stand out on our front balcony and watch people going through the garbage. Some took tin cans, some took papers or bottles, and some took old peelings and rinds and things for their livestock. It was all very specialized, but nothing went to waste there. The cans, bottles, and papers were sold (for next to nothing) to plants that recycled them. Then, of course, there were a few out and out beggars who were just looking for something to eat. We had a family birthday party one day, and it was quite sad seeing the neighborhood children the next day playing with our discarded party plates and napkins and hats.
Imagine telling your two oldest children (8 and 5 year-olds) that if they ever did get lost just look for the garbage dump near the vacant lot ~ our apartment was right across the street.
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Other Everyday Scenes:
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Turkey, particularly Istanbul, is known for its large and well-cared-for stray cat population. Cats were often associated with good luck and are still revered in Islamic tradition, where kindness to animals is emphasized. This is due to a combination of cultural and historical factors, including the Islamic belief that the Prophet Muhammad had a fondness for cats and urged his followers to take care of them. Many Turks view these street cats as communal pets, and there's a strong culture of feeding and caring for them, with locals & tourists often leaving food and water out for them. There’s a general attitude of protection for cats and other animals, but not dogs.
Cats were everywhere -- in the shops, mosques, restaurants, buses, etcetera. And of course, cats and kittens are soooo attractive to little girls who want to chase them and hold them and take them home. (One of my worst nightmares!)
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About side trips to remote villages and getting thirsty & then having to go: The Rec Center on the base sponsored tours every weekend to the beach and other places of interest Thank goodness we could buy Pepsi and Coke everywhere we went--even in the most remote little villages. We felt safe drinking that.
Because I really needed to speak my native language with other adults, and out of natural curiosity about where we were, I signed us up for several day-long excursions that were offered by the Rec Center.
This may be indelicate, but that’s how it was, and we dealt with it. The only problem was that in most of these remote villages there was no commode--only a "Turkish john" also known as a “squat toilet” which is an adult-sized hole in the ground with a footprint on each side showing you where to put your feet when you go. Our young girls couldn’t get used to it and had a hard time releasing. However, toward the end of the day, they had to go & were finally able to. Needless to say I always carried plenty of tissue and wet washcloths. Actually, children were expected to go in the bushes somewhere nearby. Most places did have running water, although it wasn’t drinkable. I really didn’t think it would be appropriate to take a photo at these times.
We were still going through potty training with our 2YO, so there were some challenging times on these side trips. Many of you may recall what it was like potty training a 2 year-old girl.
We usually traveled by bus, both in and out of town. The buses were old and certainly not air-conditioned but we went anyway.
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I guess Safety regulations were still somewhat futuristic.
All our trips were memorable. We really enjoyed longer trips to Greece & to Istanbul. Since Istanbul was nearly 600 miles north of Adana, we flew again on the luxurious Turkish Airline. The next slide isn’t mine, obviously but we aren’t photographers, just picture takers.
We toured Topkapi Palace, the Grand Bazaar, Hagia Sohia, and the Blue Mosque among other places. Some of you have been to these places and will recognize them.
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The Sultan Ahmed Mosque in Istanbul is also known as the Blue Mosque. An Ottoman era mosque, it was built from 1609-1616 and is still a functioning mosque today. It is affiliated with the Sunni Islam tradition. It has six minarets and is next door to the Hagia Sophia mosque. Both mosques are principal tourist attractions in Istanbul.
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Hagia Sophia means “Holy Wisdom.” The mosque is renowned for its stunning architecture and rich history as a church, mosque, then a museum, and now a mosque again. It's a UNESCO World Heritage site and a major tourist attraction. Originally built as a Christian church in 537 AD, it was later converted into a mosque after the Ottoman conquest in 1453, and then into a museum in 1935 before being reconverted to a mosque in 2020. Many US art and architecture students nowadays go to Istanbul to study these beautiful structures.
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The Eurasia bridge across the Bosporus Sea is one of several bridges that connect Europe and Asia. We were able to see it from our hotel in Istanbul and were amazed to observe this significant historical landmark.
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Istanbul is unusual in many ways, including that it is one of the few cities in the world that lies in two continents. It is separated by the Bosporus Sea.
While we enjoyed our trip back into the 20th century in Istanbul, we loved our trip to Cyprus. Perhaps the most memorable of those excursions was to Cyprus.
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We spent the weekend in Cyprus and had a wonderful time. We stayed at a resort area near Famagusta and our hotel was right on the beach. The children thoroughly enjoyed the swimming and playing in the sand. The water is quite salty but clear as a bell, and there are no waves like there are in the Atlantic Ocean.
We also took a sight-seeing tour in Nicosia. It was really interesting to get used to riding on the left side of the road. The British were there for so long and their influence was evident everywhere. British influence in Cyprus was significant, stemming from a long period of rule (1878-1960) that transitioned from a protectorate to a Crown Colony. This influence is still visible in various aspects of Cypriot life today, including language, legal systems, and infrastructure. And yes, we heard some English, British English in Cyprus.
I spent my 32nd birthday swimming in the Mediterranean Sea with my family in Famagusta, Cyprus.
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I put this photo of Dick and our van in here because there weren’t many photos of him ~ he was always out at the base or taking pictures of us. In the 8 months we had that van which we purchased when we got to Germany, we put 25,000 miles on it and enjoyed many tailgate picnics along the way. We probably kept the peanut butter and jelly businesses going that fall.
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As we’ve looked back through the pictures and letters from that time, we’ve been thrilled and amazed at what all we did and saw and that we were even brave enough to accept such a wonderful travel opportunity. When we left Adana, we carried our eleven suitcases out to the plane ourselves (that was required) and headed for the second leg of our awesome year-long journey.
We wouldn’t take anything for having spent time in southern Turkey. At that time, Incirlik was considered a hardship base, which meant that those who were stationed there had to stay only 14 months, instead of the regular two- year assignment. It was located in an underdeveloped area of the world, and there were significant cultural challenges there. Life, indeed, was difficult on numerous levels. We learned a lot about many things, especially about being flexible and about not complaining about what we didn’t have. We made do every day, and loved every, well, almost every, minute of our time there. The people were friendly to us an accepted us as we were, and prayed for poor Dick Stanford,
Yes, that trip, starting in Turkey, was a risky undertaking, especially with four small children, no telephones, no car or GPS, multiple language barriers, different money and currency, and mysterious things in the water. But the risk was far outweighed by the unique experiences we had, and we are the grateful beneficiaries of all that we gained by accepting the risk. And we are also grateful for the opportunity to share some of our experiences with you here at Woodlands.
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I included the girl’s passport photos to show everyone that we came back in good shape. The girls not only survived, they thrived!.
<Let's Talk Turkey Slide Show>
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