Life Training

* I know I've already written a blog similar, but this is my cumalitive, reflective mushy feelings blog that came from the group site.

It took me 10 word documents and about 4 hours spread out over a week to write this  post.  I would come back to it and some things wouldn't be quite right, or how I would have wanted to convey them.   This isn't the end.  I'm still going to post a little bit more,  like 600 years of Cypriot history I haven't even covered yet.

"You have to fall in love with the process of training to become a better player"  

-Blake Griffin 

After eating one snail, purchasing only three converters, dancing on fifth century ruins, jumping off a 35-foot cliff, hundreds of pictures and countless memories, I will finally be leaving Cyprus in just a few short days.

Sea Cave exploring

If you’re wondering why quote Blake Griffin, I’ll get to that, keep reading.

I try to put a little bit of me into everything I write, but lately it’s been hard.  In some ways I’ve grown in leaps and bounds, but at the same time I know that wherever I go I’m still true to form.  I came to Cyprus thinking that I knew it all, and while I was here I realized that I had forgotten it all, adventure, simplicity, beauty, and most importantly love.  This truly is Aphrodite’s island.  <3

So, “falling in love with the process of training…?”

Obviously, I’ve learned many a life lesson here, and they all draw back to love.  Do what you love, and love what you do, it shows.

I'm still the same silly me

Here comes the catch.  Learn to love to stretch yourself too.  I will refer to that as “training.”  My comfort zone was tossed out somewhere in the Nashville airport on June 1.  I haven’t seen it since then.  The day I traded in my frills was the day I discovered I had a crazy sense of adventure inside of me.  Deliberate decisions start as baby steps too. First I ate a snail, and it wasn’t that bad, next thing you know I’m eating squid and octopus. Turns out I would probably order octopus again. Train to make the out-of-the-ordinary decision.  When I do my eyes open, and then I realize I’ve forgotten how beautiful the world is. <3

So Blake plays basketball, which is a team sport, and training would involve the rest of team as well.  On this trip I’ve been surrounded by 12 extraordinary people, each with a distinct personality.  These are people that I might not have even crossed paths with any other situation.  Spending time with them is how this became the fastest month ever. I learned a lot new things from them too.

Aren't we cute

I’m leaving Cyprus a better “player” (person). I’m braver and bolder than ever before. I have to acknowledge that some things like life take work, very few things happen in an instant.  The tour guides often talk about how every major civilization has conquered Cyprus and left an imprint on it, well Cyprus has left one of those imprints on me.

I am no NBA all-star, I’m a girly-girl, and I don’t mean to preach. I saw this quote pop up in my Facebook newsfeed last week, and it screamed use me for blogging purposes.  One of my last memories of being at home was playing a basketball video game with my brother.  Of course, I was Blake Griffin.

Little did I know the training process I was going to get thrown into <3

Then I Decided to Snoop Around...

Cyprus has been home to a lot of my firsts.  This would include my first trip to visit a butcher.  If you know me well enough I’m not a meat eater.  I hate hamburgers, but I learned that butcher and I had more in common then I thought.

I try to forget that the first thing I saw when we arrived was a man pulling a whole lamb from the meat locker.  I was also trying to avoid noticing the chunks of meat on the ground, and the huge knives just sitting around.

Yes, that's raw meat just sitting there. Gross!

At this point, I was thanking God I wasn’t responsible for this shoot, and I took on the daunting role of sitting with everyone’s stuff for a while.  I spent sometime hanging out at somebody’s desk, and I couldn’t help but snoop around.   The more I looked I realized this guy is a mess, just like me.

There were evil eye charms hanging around everywhere, so clearly he’s superstitious like me.  Pictures of saints that mad me think of Bible verses that I keep pinned up as a reminder to keep up the faith when times got tough.  There was a clock, radio, unsorted books, and calculator because I imagined he had trouble with math too.  Everything right down to this hat that resembled an orange one I have as a basketball game freebie, resembled my desk back in Knoxville.  Somehow for some odd reason I was able to muster up a level of connection.

Just chillin'

The more I sat there and looked around I soon became envious.  The butcher shop was simple.  Smiling customers came in and out like they had been here a million times before, and lively banter between co-workers.  This was the type of simplicity that people try so hard to attain in their lives, and here it was at a butcher shop.

Inspiration stems from weird places. Turns out one of my worst enemies (O.K. that’s exaggerating a bit), was a lot like me after all.  I’ve already established that I don’t intend to be a butcher, but I’m at a stage where I need to some thought into my future profession. I’ve got a wide variety of interests, and there are days I worry that I’ll be stuck somewhere unhappy.  Seeing that another mess like me could successfully find his place in the world gave me hope.

"The World is Pretty Amazing"

(Yes, it's been one week since a substantial blog post, and I'm pretty sure you might or might not have heard about my cliff jumping, just wait for the snails and octopus!!)

"I am learning all the time. The tombstone will be my diploma."  -Eartha Kitt

About five years ago, one of my favorite shirts had "the world is pretty amazing" written on it.  It took an incredible adventure in Ayia Napa last weekend to make me realize that I had forgotten that fact.  

I was presented with an opportunity to go explore the Sea Caves. The sad thing is I actually had to sit there and think if I really wanted to go or not.  I had woken up expecting the picture perfect summer day, which consisted of tanning and read a sappy Nicholas Sparks book. It's funny how things change is such a short matter of time.  

As if I haven't learned by now, Cyprus is an extraordinary place, and the Sea Cave just prove my point.  I had never seen water and waves so beautiful. I was running around taking all kinds of crazy pictures, including the dirt on ground, so I could remember every single detail.

My favorite part of the day was when Aaron got bored of taking pictures, and decided to go cliff jumping.  Somewhere along the way, I was convinced to jump off the cliff too.  Live life with no regrets, right?  It reminded me of a saying that my Mom would use to teach me how to think for myself, "if so-and-so jumped off the cliff would you follow?" Well, put into the correct context, that answer would be yes, and so would Chelsey and Emma.   

After we acquired our adrenaline rushes, Dr. Legg took us on the tour of the Sea Caves.  (Note: future advice to any interested party, if Dr. Legg offers any surprise Sea Cave excursions, the answer is always yes).  We stopped at many points, and the the seemed to get more gorgeous as we went around.  There was crystal clear water, and not a cloud in the sky.  I began to loose track of where the water me the sky. the beauty is indescribable, and even the best of camera still can't capture it quite right.  

Chelsey laughed at me a few days earlier for too frequently using the phrase "life changing." Truth be told, this day was life changing, and a much needed wake-up-call.  My mom often calls me "frilly," and I couldn't wait to surprise her with a text that read, "I just jumped off a 35-foot cliff!" I had never been so excited to see my friends jump off the cliff too.  I was pushing people out of the way for picture purposes. I saw Mediterranean blues so beautiful that I began to question why pink was my favorite color in the first place.  

I had to make the deliberate decision and do something out-of-the-ordinary, in order to learn more about the world. Trading "frilly" for "adventuresome," wasn't as hard as it seems either.  I actually enjoyed being "adventuresome" for the day.  It took leaving my comfort zone behind to discover that the world is pretty amazing, and I will always remember that 

Check these out:  

The group blog site.  We have to have all our entries in by today, which means there should be plenty of new stories every 30 minutes.  I still have two more to knock down.  

This guy did a back flip jump,  I just youtube searched Cavo Grecko cliff jumping.

Crunch Time

Bloggers Note: Every blog from now on was written if the last 48 hours of my journey.  I'll be writing all day long today, so I'll be spitting out blogs like they're nothing.   Maybe I'll run down to Zorba's too. (What is Zorba's? Oh yeah I haven't blogged about that).

I'm planning on blogging right up to the second I have to board the plane in the Charlotte airport.

I do worry about finding the right words, to shape my story. I can be kinda picky about what I put out.  I have enjoyed my online diary, and I'm thankful for all those who have taken interest.   I am planning on keeping up the habit.  My blog in Knoxville might not be as interesting though.  It would probably read like this:  Sitting in the library writing a history paper when Tyler Bray walked by. He's really tall.  Yep, life at UT can get a little crazy sometimes, but at least I've had a once-in-a-lifetime adventure to document.

 My only regret from the trip is that I didn't write more, and I'd taken more pictures.

Writer's Block

I've gotten the worst case of writer's block at the worst possible time.  I have so much to say and the trip is coming to an end.  I have seven word documents pulled up, and everything is half written.  Somethings are just so hard to find the right words for.  I'm kind of unhappy with everything I've got right now.  I might be pulling an all-nighter just from blogging.

In other news, here's a picture to brighten your day:

While I'm Away

I've been craving sweet tea all weekend long.  I've found all sorts of lemon tea, peach tea, green tea,  but it's not the same.   I've decided that I would make that a part of my first meal back home.  

Here's a couple of happenings that I miss back home. 

My poor kitty

I received an excited message from my brother about a week into this trip.  He just bought and is now reading Through My Eyes  co-written by Tim Tebow.  WHYYY?  I probably would not be the first to admit that I am so tired of Tebow, and now his book is at our house.    If I was at home this would have been prevented.    

Also my beautiful cat Callie now has an ugly shaved patch on her back.  She had to undergo surgery for an infection caused by a tick bite. I guess nobody love Callie as much as I do and doesn't check her as throughly as I do for bugs.   Now she sitting at the house with ugly bald spot.  Not cute.  Maybe I should find her a friend here. 

Goes to show, you take the girl out of Tennessee, but you can't take the Tennessee out of the girl. 

Crossfades, Chinese, and Children's Books

"You have to fall in love with the process of training to become a better player" 

Blake Griffin 

Yes, Mom I know that you hate it when I mention athletes, but this popped up at the top of my Facebook newsfeed on Thursday, and it just screamed use me for blogging purposes.  I think he has a point here that goes along well with my Cyprus trip. 

Wednesday could be considered as busy or not busy as you would like to call it.  It was overall productive, and maybe one of my favorite days here. 

 I spent the bulk of the day watching confectionary footage and editing the documentary.   We seemed to be fixated on the part where the baker puts together baklava, putting a layer of dough and a brush on butter on top, over, and over and over.  Seriously there is 23 minutes of baklava dough layering.  For editing's sake to make the process shorter, we put crossfades in to smooth the transitions where there is time-laspe, and there are lots of crossfades.   

As silly as it is, Wednesday the thought finally occurred to me that I was making a documentary in Cyprus. 

Me being cool 2007 style. 

I mean, how weird is that.  If you would have told me that four years ago,  I wouldn't believe you. I probably would have laughed in your face.

This month has certainly been a crossfade, an important transition period in my life.   I feel that I've grown in tremendous strides as a person from week-to-week as I've been here.  Seriously, go back and read some of the first blogs.  Cyprus is some life training, becoming a better player, so to speak.

Here's another example from Wednesday:  We all wanted Chinese food for dinner.  Little did we know the lengths that we would go through to get Chinese food.

 We found the delivery number of the restaurant.  Called the first time to check the prices, but had no menu.  So, we finally decided to drive to the restaurant to pick up menus,  and of course the first time we saw it we drove passed it, turned around to go to it, and drove past it again, and then turned around a second time, and finally made it.  We  got our menus went back.  It took us around another 30 minutes to decide what everybody wanted to eat, wrote it down and ordered.   The delivery man then called us 30 minutes later to say that he was lost, so then we had to give him directions,  and then after the 2-hour process was complete I was eating my much beloved sweet-and-sour chicken.

  My point here is it's all about the process.  Trying to figure out how to get the Chinese food is one of my favorite odd memories from the trip.  If the process wasn't so lengthy, well I might not remember it one month from now.

Me in Cyprus, still being cool. 

Finally children's book. If you know me well enough, I've been saying for the past three years I'm going to write a children's book.  I have some ideas and character names all picked out.  When I told some of my friends they thought it was  something like every other idea I have, kinda silly.  So then I decided to take the challenge and prove myself.

Then I did something really crazy, I actually started writing my book.  Yes, I spent three years saying I was going to write a book, but I never actually wrote anything.  It's kinda like another favorite thing of mine, tanning.  I adore my tan, but I spend hours in the sun to get this tan.  I can say I want to write a children's book, but I just can't sit around and wait for it to just happen.  You need to put some time into it, nothing is going to happen or change in an instant.

I am no NBA all-star, and I don't mean to preach.  Most days I get frustrated and mad that things don't go my way, but Blake's got it right.  This is just training, how are you supposed to grow into a better person ("player") if you don't enjoy life, have no goals, or don't do anything at all.  Life is the process and love it.

 I'm pretty sure you've been asking the question the whole time why base this whole blog off of a Blake Griffin quote?   Well, one of my memories of my last night in Nashville was playing a NBA2K on Xbox with my brother.  Of coarse I was Blake Griffin.

Check these out:

Blake Griffin talks about doing a reality TV show
The list of Chinese restaurants in Nicosia, the portal that started the infamous quest.
Where in the world did I pick out names for characters in my book?  I won't tell you which ones, but I'm using two from this list.