On Tomatoes, Old Stuff, and Lesiure

By Dave Carter

                I have always had mixed feelings when biting into a tomato.  I never got caught up on the philosophical origins on the red plant’s family history being either a fruit or vegetable.  I was never sure if I liked them.  My time in Turkey thus far has taught me a valuable lesson on my own tastes.  I do in fact have a conditional love of this fruit/vegetable.  I enjoy the way they taste under the condition that they are fresh from a garden, not fresh from some back of the restaurant refrigerator.  How did I learn this?  Through experiential education.

Part of our breakfast buffet at one of the hotels

                 You may be wondering what an Adventure Education major’s views are on this journey through Turkey.  You may also be wondering what an Adventure Education major is.  Well let me first clarify the second pondering first.  Adventure Education is a legitimate major at Messiah College.  We utilize adventure activities like backpacking, team building, canoeing, caving, etc. as a catalyst for further learning.  We play but also reflect on what we learned through that experience about ourselves and about our interactions with others.  While doing this we had required classes like rock climbing, canoeing, caving, a wilderness encounter to either the Texan desert or Hawaiian islands.  Jealousy is not the topic for today so let’s move on. 

                Through my time studying/playing I have become a large proponent for experiential education as a supplemental source for learning.  Physically engaging with the subject you are studying greatly enhances learning for many individuals.  Over the past week we have visited almost all seven churches of Revelation.  We could have studied these letters in a class room, written extensive research based documents but we chose to leave our national borders and travel to Turkey.  There is something to be said about reaching out and touching the rubble of what once was and what is still read about.  We have heard the words of Revelation while sitting in the shadows of ancient pillars and walls.  

I am still processing how this impacting my Biblical view but this trip has already impacted my world view.  We had the experience of living with Turkish families for three nights.  We shared meals and stories with them.  We exchanged tales of our home life, compared our sports, agreed that football (soccer) should be more popular in the United States, found out how to use a beday, eaten lamb kabobs, and so much more.  This is how you should learn culture, learn a language.  Experiential education causes us to rub elbows with the people we would study in a class room.  We are eating the foods some people only read about.  During my homestay I was woken to the song of the call to prayer from the local mosque pouring through the open apartment window.  You cannot understand the extent of a culture being described as hospitable until you sit on the terrace of a Turkish apartment eating stuffed eggplant and grape leaves until your host mother believes you are full.  It is at this breakfast table where I reevaluated my opinions of the tomato.

Temple to Trajan in Pergamum

While engaging with the people of Turkey I have started to reflect on my own vocation and specialization of Adventure Education.  These adventure activities and my future job potential are directly related to how our culture responds to leisure.  I am a firm believer that you should pursue what you love but you need to be practical.  The reality of not being able to be anything you want to be when you grow up is a stark reality.  We each need to consider what brings us joy and how that can be pursued in our everyday life.  Leisure should not be the reward or sole reason for our working.  A culture trapped in this mindset develops amazing technologies that create wondrous opportunities and wondrous paradoxes.  We have never been so connected to the world as we are now through the advances in the internet and global communications but we are losing the nuclear family, children are growing up instant access to answers without the need to learn.  Our green places are being developed and ostracized as mysterious places without wi-fi access.  Our vegetables come from cans and frozen food isles not backyard gardens.  Where did the tomato on this Big Mac come from?

   This was never meant to be a soap box.  This is meant to be a reflection of my experience thus far in Turkey.  Turkey wishes to continue its push towards Westernization.  As I sit on its beaches, eating home grown tomatoes for breakfast and sipping tea I wonder what I will learn next.  As I earn final three credits for my undergrad I ponder on the applications of Paul’s letters, on John’s letters to the seven churches, to my own walk.  As I contemplate two more weeks in this beautiful country I worry about my own future and when Turkey will start canning its tomatoes.