The title is true but not for me. You see Russ had been to Turkey many times. I hadn’t! I couldn’t understand why anyone would want to keep going back to the same country year after year and I certainly wasn’t going to! I wanted to see different places.
I loved my cruises, Russ loved Turkey. We day tripped to Turkey on one of our cruises but it wasn’t enough for him. The moment came; a compromise had to be made. One day as Russ sat watching the world cup, (yes, I pick my moments well,) I heard myself say it. “Why don’t we move to Turkey?” He raised a finger to me, not the middle one, one that said wait a moment and you will have my undivided attention. I waited, the goal was missed, he groaned with the agony of seeing the cup leave our grasp. “What did you just say?” I repeated, “Why don’t we move to Turkey?
The girls have left and we are both capable of moving and working from home, you love Turkey, so why don’t we just go?” “You might hate it!” He tells me. “Russ, we live in Croydon! I can live anywhere with sun, sand, sea and Sangria.” OK, the wrong country but you get my drift. The days past and as we talked we got more and more excited at the prospect of moving.
A three week holiday was booked in Kusadasi, (A cruise port. No coincidence) insisted on by Russ in case I hated the place. We viewed properties online before we went, you know, just in case I didn’t hate it and off we headed to Turkey.
It was dark when we arrived but the atmosphere hit us in the face. Friendly people everywhere, smiling, happy and couldn’t do enough for you! The following day we had a good look around and headed for the beach. By week two, tanned, fatter and relaxed we had seen many properties but one really stood out to us. It was one we had viewed online several times before leaving and now we had arranged to go and view it.
The minute we pulled up outside it, there was a familiarity. Inside, I felt I was at home! I could see me in the kitchen cooking. I could see me sunbathing on the balcony, (whoops, I mean, I could see me making an office in the house and working.) and I could see guests and dinner parties with wine flowing on the veranda. Russ turned to me with a big beaming face. This is it for me! How do you feel? “I think we need to see how we go about making this ours,” I told him.
We had a few days of running around and money seemed to leak from every pore. Solicitors, estate agent, Tapu office, tax offices, banks and taxis here there and everywhere. We put in for our military clearance and waited. We were only in week two of our holiday but we had done it! We had a property to move to and all we could think about from that moment was getting home, selling up, selling things off and getting back to Kusadasi.
Around Christmas time, we had the news that our military clearance had been granted. I can’t deny we had sweated on that coming through since we had put in for it on the first week of October! On a cold, miserable, dismal night, 7th of February 2012, we were stood on OUR veranda with several large cases, waiting for someone to turn up with our key and let us in. Russ and I were cold, wet, hungry, no gas, no electric but we were home and despite everything, the happiest two people in the whole world in that moment.
I now live in Turkey, a country Russ loved and it is clear to see why. I too am in love with the country, the culture and the lifestyle. There is no place in the world quite like it. Oh and if I go on any cruises in future, it will be to colder climates. No sun, plenty of sea as one thing I don’t need since moving here is holiday weather!
