Updates n’ Such

The first semester whipped by me. This blurred feeling is especially underscored by the fact that, in just a few days, I’ll be enjoying over a month off for our midterm holiday. It’s strange how fast it’s gone, it’s strange that I’ve now been married eight and a half months, and it’s strange to be finishing up a semester when most of the college students back home have only recently bought their books.

Right now I’m making a to-do to keep myself busy with all this free time. I’m the kind of person who rests hard when he’s on vacation, and, despite my homeland’s neurotic obsession with work, I consider this to be a good attribute. The nasty side of vacation, for me, is that I slip from enjoying sabbath to being a slug who reads and sleeps too much. The to-do list is the salt I sprinkle on this problem.

The major thing I need to prepare for is our trip to Iraq. We’re excited about spending 3 weeks in October working with some friends in the Kurdistan region of Northern Iraq. I posted about them awhile back here or you can check out their website here.

At first we were a little bummed about not having a ‘normal vacation’, but we both consider this to be time and money well spent. Please pray for us as we’re considering Iraq as an option for next year. We don’t really have a particular leaning. At this point it’s mostly just curiosity, but we hope God will offer some direction after the visit. The trip should be an adventure of its own since we have a 10 hour layover in Cairo, Egypt on the way there and a 3 day layover in Istanbul, Turkey on our way back.

I’m more than a little fired up about this since Turkish food and Istanbul are cooperatively two of my favorite things on the planet. Mmmmm köfte, iskender, and ayran. I can’t wait!