Sunday, September 2, 2012

Training camp, Settled In

Good afternoon from Ankara, Turkey everyone!  I arrived back here from our training camp on Friday afternoon.  It was a wonderful training camp up near the mountains.  It was great getting to know about my teammates and coaching staff at the camp.  I think it was a successful camp in terms of preparing guys for this up coming season.  I know we have a lot more work ahead of us in this pre-season but I think the camp was a great first stepping stone for our team.  Our whole team was very enthusiastic and worked extremely hard during the whole camp.  For most of the camp we did 2 a days.  We had strength and conditioning in the morning and basketball practice at night.  It felt amazing being able to get back on the court with a group of guys and compete.  I am thrilled to get the season going!  As I mentioned I came back on Friday afternoon, and this weekend Aj and I have been getting the essentials for our apartment (ie. groceries, few pots and pans, new bed sheets, etc).  We are still waiting on a few things for our apartment but all in all we really enjoy it.

We are on the 2nd floor of our building with a huge balcony.  Our apartment has 2 bedrooms (master and regular), living room, kitchen, 1 bathroom, and a nice little entryway.  It is one of the smaller apartments that we have had in terms of square footage but we still enjoy it (visitors always welcome).  The apartment is about 5 minutes from the gym which I really like because Ankara is huge city and it makes it easy to get to and from practice.  We are also extremely close to one of the biggest malls in Ankara and a lot of nice restaurants are by us.  Aj and I have had some great adventures already living here.

Today,  we went to a market within walking distance.  We had an absolute blast there.  I have never been to a market this big before and I thoroughly enjoyed it.  We ended up getting bananas, peaches, tomatoes, lettuce, and pears for an extremely great price.  I am totally looking forward to going back there next week again.  At times it is a little difficult with the language barrier because not a lot of people that we have come across have been able to speak English.  But, that is all part of the fun!

Its time for us to eat some dinner now.  I want to apologize if I am not grammatically correct all the time, NO ENGLISH major here so deal with it haha!  The pictures posted below are few shots from the market (mega amount of green beans huh?).  I hope you have a great Sunday morning/afternoon.  Enjoy the church bells and organ playing!  God Bless, Philippians 4:13




Green beans

Assortment of produce
Green beans up close














3 comments:

  1. Those vegetables look WONDERFUL!!!! yummmm

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  2. Don't forget to have a chicken shawarma! The Turks know how to make the best ones!

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  3. Good luck with the new team. Sounds like an interesting place....

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