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VICTORIA — Andy Rautins’ considerable facial hair says everything about where he’s been for the past two years.

No longer the fresh-faced player who departed for Europe several years ago, Rautins arrived at Toronto Raptors training camp wearing a big beard rivalled only by Lithuanian forward Jonas Valanciunas.

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It’s a holdover from his two seasons playing for Gaziantep, a Turkish city barely 60 kilometres from the war-torn Syrian border, and a target of numerous recent deadly bombings.

“That’s why I grew (the beard) out initially, to try to blend in,” Rautins said. “A lot of people thought I was Turkish, so that helped me out a lot. But you’re still on (team) posters around the city, you never really know. Any kind of little thing helps out, I guess.”

Terrorist attacks have killed hundreds of people in Turkey over the past couple of years. Among the most deadly: 39 people, mostly foreigners, were shot dead in a nightclub in Istanbul, and a bomb killed 50 people at a wedding in Gaziantep.

“As a parent, it was terrifying,” said his dad, Leo Rautins. “If I went two days without hearing from him, I’d call and leave a message: ‘Andy, where the hell are you? Call me!”‘