Güle Güle Turkey

Our final week in Turkey has been one filled with mixed emotions. On the one hand, we have been feeling sad knowing that we must say goodbye to these wonderful people, who have welcomed us into their home with open arms, treated us like family and made our time here so incredibly special with their hospitality, warmth and generosity. On the other hand, we have been getting increasingly excited about the prospect of seeing Alex again, as we prepare to return to the UK and head down to Dartmouth for a Families' Weekend at the Britannia Royal Naval College. Perhaps this is the best situation to be in, since it is hard to feel sad for long when there is so much excitement about what lies ahead!

We are all looking forward to seeing OC Mitchell this weekend

I find myself feeling incredibly inspired by Hatice and Muammer, having spent so much time with them and learned so much from them over the past month. In many ways, it is hard to believe that they have only been living this way for 8 years; prior to this, Muammer was a policeman, working in different cities across Turkey. Apparently, in an effort to prevent corruption, civil servants such as police officers do not stay working in one locality for more than a few years, before being moved on to a new area of the government's choosing. Therefore, Hatice and Muammer spent years moving with their family from one place to the next, before finally settling down back on the family farm in Antalya when Muammer retired from the police force. In the relatively short time that they have been there, they have achieved so much that one could be forgiven for thinking that they have always lived this way! They are completely in tune with their land, their livestock and the seasons, using traditional methods of farming, cooking and preserving in order to sustain themselves year round.

We ordered this breakfast from Hatice on one of our last days; 
almost everything you see here has been grown and/or produced by her!

I was very impressed with how healthily they ate. Almost every meal contained masses of fresh produce, supplemented with olives, lettuce leaves, chutneys, preserves and fermented cabbage. Stuffed peppers, bulgur wheat dishes wrapped in lettuce leaves or cooked in cabbage, foraged greens with extra virgin olive oil and fresh lemon juice - their daily vitamin intake must be through the roof! Meat was not eaten very often; I asked about this and Hatice told me that, whilst they love to eat meat, it is expensive so they eat their own slaughtered livestock and they didn't have much available right now. Presumably they will have some later in the year, since most of their female goats are due to give birth next month. Speaking of which, Hatice and I had an amusing misunderstanding in this respect, whereby I thought she was expecting another grandchild and congratulated her, at which point she burst out laughing and explained that it was the goats giving birth next month, not her daughter! Google Translate is certainly invaluable, but not infallible.

One of my kids with a couple of goats, who are expecting their own kids!

Another thing that I really loved about living on the farm is how the wood burning stoves are completely fuelled by wood from the forest; sometimes felled and sometimes fallen, but never impacting the forest itself in a negative way. I found it very satisfying to go for walks into the forest gathering wood for the fire, whether that was collecting pine cones and dead wood for kindling or dragging back larger sections for cutting with the chainsaw. We would see neighbours doing the same and, in fact, it seems that neighbouring families work together in their collection of wood from the forest. One day, when we were dragging down some larger sections of wood from the edge of the forest, Hatice told me to leave the length of the wood I was about to bring, as she said it was for the neighbours. I found it heartening to see that humans can live so well in harmony with a beautiful pine forest, when so often in modern life we see such areas being exploited and even decimated for material gain.

The firewood cutting/storage area also made a great playground!

Still on the subject of fires, I was very interested to learn about how they generate fire lighting materials on the farm. In Europe, use of those white, chemical blocks is commonplace for lighting fires of any kind. Here in Turkey, however, they use a more natural method whereby they burn thin strips of very oily pine to start the fire. This is very effective; the pine fire-lighting strip is highly flammable, and burns hot for a decent amount of time. The oily pine is created by stripping the bark off a section of pine tree (one that is earmarked to be felled in the near future), causing the tree to attempt to repair itself. This results in the wood surrounding the wound getting saturated with pine oil, and this oily timber can then be kept separate and split into long thin fire-lighting strips when the tree is eventually felled. Simple, sustainable and easily obtainable.

Beth, looking rather serious, next to a pine tree
which has been wounded to produce fire-lighting materials

As we say "güle güle" (goodbye) to Turkey, I reflect on what we will take away from the trip. If it were down to Zach, we'd be taking away a bag full of empty shotgun cartridges, a selection of old shoes, various plumbing fittings and a host of other "treasure" that he has collected during his time here. Beth would be likely to smuggle a cat and a few chickens in her bag, given half a chance. In actual fact, upon arrival at the airport this afternoon, I did discover Beth had filled her pockets with masses of the purple variety of myrtle berries. These stain everything blue (including the mouth of the consumer) so I convinced her to bin them all before we went through security, promising to replace them with some other berries upon arrival in the UK (which I have now done). Material items aside (especially as I don't want to be reminded of the plastic container of olives which split and leaked all over our hand luggage), I think the main points I will take away from this trip are:

1. The certainty that we can easily and quickly learn a new language when immersed in it
2. The knowledge that it is possible to live sustainably and in harmony with nature
3. The inspiration that this can be achieved at any point in our lives, no matter how late, and in a relatively short amount of time, for anyone driven to do so and willing to work at it

We will miss this gorgeous forest, and Super Meowsers!