this blog has been slowly bleeding to death since i've left Turkey, and i'd be happy to let it except for the fact that modern narratives tick-tock, and that means i have to write some sort of closing. my sparring with the concept of social entrepreneurs and Bono's cronies isn't a satisfying enough ending because this blog was never about such things.
in extension, i have a few things to share. first, new (new to you, a few months old to me) pictures are forthcoming here. second, i've started this thing as a more suitable place for the stuff i want digitally published, which, for the moment, is a collection of quotes from books that i'm reading. in the future, it might be pictures, my own writing, or sublime and flaming computer monitors.
nearly six months removed from my life in Turkey, i miss the ease and availability of non-prepackaged adventure. i also miss being struck by a daily strangeness that forced me to ask questions and justify my way of living. it was those constants that allowed me to write here. perhaps when/if i get back to Turkey or abroad, i'll start up a sequel to this blog. for now, farewell.
-tb
Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts
Monday, January 11, 2010
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
when speaking english turns you into a celebrity/freak
.
where are you from?
what is your name?
where are you from?
Diyarbakır, April 11th
where are you from?
what is your name?
where are you from?
Diyarbakır, April 11th
Thursday, April 16, 2009
in the life: teaching the war on terror
i haven't thought about 9/11 for a long time. but today the topic of my american cultural studies class was the war on terror, and i had to spend some time rethinking the events, fumbling with the definitions of terrorism and the strange metaphorical war the U.S.A has been involved in. the U.S. at war with an emotional state.
i had a guest in the class and after discussing definitions of terrorism and the war on terror, we discussed our experience of 9/11. i was sitting in a high school classroom, a senior, waiting to take a bus to work on cars all morning. after my guest told her experience we watched a clip of reactions to the attacks- no scenes of the flying planes, only the faces on the street looking up in teary eyed disbelief. i talked about how everyone knew someone who knew someone who died that day. the trauma was local. and i talked about the saturation of the image. the fact that the act--the plane crashing--was repeated while the country had it's eye on the building--that we watched as two towers crumbled--that this defined terrorism for us because it was so perfectly effective and run on a loop for weeks. the scenario for trauma could not have been greater.
i looked out at my class and saw students with tears in their eyes. i haven't felt emotional about the event since shock and awe, and it dawned on me that the vulgarity of that war, of our military response, the hubris of the Bush admin, the manipulation, has forever erased the feeling of tragedy and trauma i felt that day.
if i had played the events in reverse chronology, like i do when thinking of them normally, the disgust i feel for torture, ongoing secret prison camps abroad, and the self-righteous notion that we can bend history and culture with military force overshadows any of the pain i could feel about 9/11. looking both ways today makes me question how human beings can live through pain and trauma only to multiply it in the following months, even on people who felt sympathy for the attacks and mourned with the United States (as Afghanistan did).
as we moved on the students wiped their eyes and focused on the war, the deceit, the tactics that no one can honestly defend, and they quickly forgot about the faces on the New York street- the tack boards full of missing people signs, the businessmen covered in soot, the firemen looking up astonished. new scenes of tragedy- starving Iraqi children, babies dead on the side of a Bagdhad street, and brain-washed GIs plugging into "let the bodies hit the floor" replace what came before, anti-Americanism peaks, empathy and sadness replaced by hatred.
and i tried my best to explain: a traumatic event like none other witnessed in the U.S.- a vice president paranoid, carrying around a bio-medical suit and living secluded months under the mountains of Vermont, reading the daily security report and convincing himself that the U.S. might not see another day.
explaining the mentality of the Bush administration and how someone could carry out such clearly unethical actions is the same explanation i would use for students in the U.S. except in reverse. in the U.S. i might try to show Bin Laden not as devil incarnate but as a man living in a context, like many others, trampled on by foreign powers, trying to forge his religious, ethnic, and social identity and finding violence as the only outlet. there is no justification for the actions of either. but i want to identify the basis of there actions. what are the conditions that lead to such barbaric violence?
"Violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less identity, the more violence."
Marshall McLuhan
(thanks stef)
a few students went on to discuss their beliefs that the U.S. plotted, planned, or knew about the attacks and let them happen. i hear the question a lot: did Bush plan the 9/11 attacks? part of the question is specific to Turkey where their Islamic belief is almost always moderate and peaceful. they denounce this violence as not Islamic because the concept is so far from their personal beliefs. but it also enforces a perception of the U.S. as evil. again, a similar stance only in reverse: while i might have to argue with U.S. students to convince them that Islam teaches peace and that maybe poverty and the will to create one's own society (concrete, rational motives) have as much to do with terrorism as religious fundamentalism (or perversion), here i have to explain openness in American government- the leaks no president can stop- the instability of the 9/11 conspiracy claims (not to mention the enormity of such a risk). --my mind slips and i hear both classes at once-- and it all fits a sort of polarization that Robert Fisk talks about:
we might be long past 9/11 now. and anything that will be said probably has been, but the foundations of these problems haven't gone anywhere.
i had a guest in the class and after discussing definitions of terrorism and the war on terror, we discussed our experience of 9/11. i was sitting in a high school classroom, a senior, waiting to take a bus to work on cars all morning. after my guest told her experience we watched a clip of reactions to the attacks- no scenes of the flying planes, only the faces on the street looking up in teary eyed disbelief. i talked about how everyone knew someone who knew someone who died that day. the trauma was local. and i talked about the saturation of the image. the fact that the act--the plane crashing--was repeated while the country had it's eye on the building--that we watched as two towers crumbled--that this defined terrorism for us because it was so perfectly effective and run on a loop for weeks. the scenario for trauma could not have been greater.
i looked out at my class and saw students with tears in their eyes. i haven't felt emotional about the event since shock and awe, and it dawned on me that the vulgarity of that war, of our military response, the hubris of the Bush admin, the manipulation, has forever erased the feeling of tragedy and trauma i felt that day.
if i had played the events in reverse chronology, like i do when thinking of them normally, the disgust i feel for torture, ongoing secret prison camps abroad, and the self-righteous notion that we can bend history and culture with military force overshadows any of the pain i could feel about 9/11. looking both ways today makes me question how human beings can live through pain and trauma only to multiply it in the following months, even on people who felt sympathy for the attacks and mourned with the United States (as Afghanistan did).
as we moved on the students wiped their eyes and focused on the war, the deceit, the tactics that no one can honestly defend, and they quickly forgot about the faces on the New York street- the tack boards full of missing people signs, the businessmen covered in soot, the firemen looking up astonished. new scenes of tragedy- starving Iraqi children, babies dead on the side of a Bagdhad street, and brain-washed GIs plugging into "let the bodies hit the floor" replace what came before, anti-Americanism peaks, empathy and sadness replaced by hatred.
and i tried my best to explain: a traumatic event like none other witnessed in the U.S.- a vice president paranoid, carrying around a bio-medical suit and living secluded months under the mountains of Vermont, reading the daily security report and convincing himself that the U.S. might not see another day.
explaining the mentality of the Bush administration and how someone could carry out such clearly unethical actions is the same explanation i would use for students in the U.S. except in reverse. in the U.S. i might try to show Bin Laden not as devil incarnate but as a man living in a context, like many others, trampled on by foreign powers, trying to forge his religious, ethnic, and social identity and finding violence as the only outlet. there is no justification for the actions of either. but i want to identify the basis of there actions. what are the conditions that lead to such barbaric violence?
"Violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less identity, the more violence."
Marshall McLuhan
(thanks stef)
a few students went on to discuss their beliefs that the U.S. plotted, planned, or knew about the attacks and let them happen. i hear the question a lot: did Bush plan the 9/11 attacks? part of the question is specific to Turkey where their Islamic belief is almost always moderate and peaceful. they denounce this violence as not Islamic because the concept is so far from their personal beliefs. but it also enforces a perception of the U.S. as evil. again, a similar stance only in reverse: while i might have to argue with U.S. students to convince them that Islam teaches peace and that maybe poverty and the will to create one's own society (concrete, rational motives) have as much to do with terrorism as religious fundamentalism (or perversion), here i have to explain openness in American government- the leaks no president can stop- the instability of the 9/11 conspiracy claims (not to mention the enormity of such a risk). --my mind slips and i hear both classes at once-- and it all fits a sort of polarization that Robert Fisk talks about:
we might be long past 9/11 now. and anything that will be said probably has been, but the foundations of these problems haven't gone anywhere.
Monday, April 6, 2009
in the life: bottles
.
so i've got bottles up the wazoo. i'm socialized, like most of us, to never throw a plastic bottle away. where i come from you learn the recycle rap in 4th grade and you can't get it out of your head anymore than you can stop the reoccurring nightmare where your music teacher grins her butter-yellow teeth at you, pounding on a piano with her fists, and you wake up screaming in horror in a cold sweat and complete darkness, turning on the light to brush your teeth once more and vowing to stop drinking so much tea and coffee.
strange. here are some pics of what this has become, seven months of bottled water because the tap water here makes me sick. come on green Erzurum, give these bottles another chance at life. how bout some recycling?
obstructing a pretty view (or improving, depending on your style):
in the office, stashed in a once empty cabinet:
neatly stacked next to the window behind my bed:
crowding my living room windowsill:
overflowing from behind the refrigerator:
footnote: i didn't buy the coke. it was given to me by a friend after a party where no one could finish such a large bottle and it was going to go flat. yes i had some of it. yes i felt guilty. coke kills, we know.
so i've got bottles up the wazoo. i'm socialized, like most of us, to never throw a plastic bottle away. where i come from you learn the recycle rap in 4th grade and you can't get it out of your head anymore than you can stop the reoccurring nightmare where your music teacher grins her butter-yellow teeth at you, pounding on a piano with her fists, and you wake up screaming in horror in a cold sweat and complete darkness, turning on the light to brush your teeth once more and vowing to stop drinking so much tea and coffee.
strange. here are some pics of what this has become, seven months of bottled water because the tap water here makes me sick. come on green Erzurum, give these bottles another chance at life. how bout some recycling?
obstructing a pretty view (or improving, depending on your style):
in the office, stashed in a once empty cabinet:
neatly stacked next to the window behind my bed:
crowding my living room windowsill:
overflowing from behind the refrigerator:
footnote: i didn't buy the coke. it was given to me by a friend after a party where no one could finish such a large bottle and it was going to go flat. yes i had some of it. yes i felt guilty. coke kills, we know.
Friday, January 30, 2009
final trip journal-long train home
.maybe it's fitting to post this just before leaving the country to another home, maybe an expression of my lack of home or multiple homes.
12.14.08
sunday, 6pm
-just stepped onto the train and into my seat- happy to know that my body will make its way back from where it came. i'm sitting across from 2 young men- right across- in seats facing each other- two sets of legs for each quantity of leg room- hardly developed for the comfort of international strangers on a 23hr ride. to go with it a strange and maddening frequency is present all around me and my new friends look around curiously for its source. if nothing else, the company proves that i am not the only one. i'm eyeing the seats around me. i need an upgrade in comfort.
630pm
on my way- ripped ticket, some thousand km of crawling transportation behind me. a new friend arrived in the meantime, making this a tight fitting foursome. no seatback table to write on, i'm cramped up- 2 books, a notebook, and a manuscript in my lap, my camcorder around my neck, the only thing i can't bear to lose. the young man in front of me, Mustafa, speaks some English and so our physical situation has become slightly more comfortable in conversation. something hit me in the stomach, the throat, hearing his phone call, hearing the verb for eat, thinking he is talking to his mother at home, in Sivas, some 15hrs away, talking about what he would eat after his travel. and the feeling was the memory of me doing something similar once upon a time, on trips back from Ohio or Southern Illinois. the feeling's amelioration came with a familiar face, the çay man i spent 34 hrs with on the way to Istanbul, strolling through the aisle again, seeing me and sharing a moment of confusion- you, again, you can't be serious.
645pm
w/ the lack of leg room, i'm resigned to let them lay in the aisle and being right next to the bathroom and exit, they interrupt a steady stream of passengers. passengers interrupt my recline. the possibility of sleep or comfort on this trip dims, although i might just walk back to Ray's cafe (that moving diner) throw down something and pass out in that relatively comfortable booth.
810pm
warm after soup and çay in Ray's restaurant car where i'll stay as long as i feel welcome. my nails are longer than they've been in years. my beard overgrown, my hair a mess like always, as i look at myself and the darkness beyond the window. its only been 10 days of travel, but the distance and time spent on the move make it feel like a month.
12.15.08
monday, 515am
i'm growing impatient with this terrible ride.
635am
Sivas all covered in snow, moons and stars fading. the best and worst of a country down the train line.
715am
when i was young- a boy's age- a school day snowed out- i'd think of it all and create my next monster- he carried himself from one white object to another with a small but critical ability to leap. it could lead him anywhere on a snow day- here, especially in my living room, next to the fire- all that snow on the porch, through the window, the porcelain snowman on the mantle, the whiteness of the pages lying in front of me. in me, this skin a whiter shade.
425pm
i'm not sure if that sound is the train car rubbing against the packed snow or a dog being beaten to death in the car ahead of mine. neither would surprise me. almost home.
12.14.08
sunday, 6pm
-just stepped onto the train and into my seat- happy to know that my body will make its way back from where it came. i'm sitting across from 2 young men- right across- in seats facing each other- two sets of legs for each quantity of leg room- hardly developed for the comfort of international strangers on a 23hr ride. to go with it a strange and maddening frequency is present all around me and my new friends look around curiously for its source. if nothing else, the company proves that i am not the only one. i'm eyeing the seats around me. i need an upgrade in comfort.
630pm
on my way- ripped ticket, some thousand km of crawling transportation behind me. a new friend arrived in the meantime, making this a tight fitting foursome. no seatback table to write on, i'm cramped up- 2 books, a notebook, and a manuscript in my lap, my camcorder around my neck, the only thing i can't bear to lose. the young man in front of me, Mustafa, speaks some English and so our physical situation has become slightly more comfortable in conversation. something hit me in the stomach, the throat, hearing his phone call, hearing the verb for eat, thinking he is talking to his mother at home, in Sivas, some 15hrs away, talking about what he would eat after his travel. and the feeling was the memory of me doing something similar once upon a time, on trips back from Ohio or Southern Illinois. the feeling's amelioration came with a familiar face, the çay man i spent 34 hrs with on the way to Istanbul, strolling through the aisle again, seeing me and sharing a moment of confusion- you, again, you can't be serious.
645pm
w/ the lack of leg room, i'm resigned to let them lay in the aisle and being right next to the bathroom and exit, they interrupt a steady stream of passengers. passengers interrupt my recline. the possibility of sleep or comfort on this trip dims, although i might just walk back to Ray's cafe (that moving diner) throw down something and pass out in that relatively comfortable booth.
810pm
warm after soup and çay in Ray's restaurant car where i'll stay as long as i feel welcome. my nails are longer than they've been in years. my beard overgrown, my hair a mess like always, as i look at myself and the darkness beyond the window. its only been 10 days of travel, but the distance and time spent on the move make it feel like a month.
12.15.08
monday, 515am
i'm growing impatient with this terrible ride.
635am
Sivas all covered in snow, moons and stars fading. the best and worst of a country down the train line.
715am
when i was young- a boy's age- a school day snowed out- i'd think of it all and create my next monster- he carried himself from one white object to another with a small but critical ability to leap. it could lead him anywhere on a snow day- here, especially in my living room, next to the fire- all that snow on the porch, through the window, the porcelain snowman on the mantle, the whiteness of the pages lying in front of me. in me, this skin a whiter shade.
425pm
i'm not sure if that sound is the train car rubbing against the packed snow or a dog being beaten to death in the car ahead of mine. neither would surprise me. almost home.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
my last class of the semester
-
the key for the computer cabinet is missing again, 5 minutes to class, an hour of presentations with power point to get to. some panicked students, i try my best to stay calm. the key finds itself, probably in a student's bag or pocket from last week. now the projector isn't working again, it flickers out and shows a blue screen, then it's back again. it looks stable, but fusses out, and then back. we start class hoping it stays up.
a student i call the spokesperson because he's a bit older and speaks for the class enters the room, clicks off the light, and presents a candle-lit cake. the class sings happy birthday to a student who sits at the back of the classroom. i can't remember if it was in english or turkish. cake and pastries are passed around. the students are taking pictures. after 5 minutes or so i quiet them down, relatively quiet, and we start.
the same presentations, some good, some could use work. i'm glad it is the last week. this class has been a student-centered experiment that failed in most ways. the 4th presentation of the night, a student brings a friend up to play McCartney's Yesterday, turning down the lights first, a slide show of hippies young and old playing in the background. the spokesperson clicks on his lighter and sways with the music. some students sing along. everyone cheers after the final line. the presentation is about 60's counterculture.
now 2 students in hippie garb come to the front of the class, and when the presenter starts talking about drug culture the spokesperson comes up with a bag of goods. some herb as fake pot, orbitz gum as fake hits of acid. he is the dealer, rolling joints and distributing. later the presenter talks about the symbolism of flower power while handing out flowers to the class. at the end of the night, we take class pictures. and i realize how much i'm going to miss these classes when i'm gone. the element of surprise each class brings, the ability for certain students to rise above the monotony and really get into a topic, and how much my mood can swing in a class.
-
the key for the computer cabinet is missing again, 5 minutes to class, an hour of presentations with power point to get to. some panicked students, i try my best to stay calm. the key finds itself, probably in a student's bag or pocket from last week. now the projector isn't working again, it flickers out and shows a blue screen, then it's back again. it looks stable, but fusses out, and then back. we start class hoping it stays up.
a student i call the spokesperson because he's a bit older and speaks for the class enters the room, clicks off the light, and presents a candle-lit cake. the class sings happy birthday to a student who sits at the back of the classroom. i can't remember if it was in english or turkish. cake and pastries are passed around. the students are taking pictures. after 5 minutes or so i quiet them down, relatively quiet, and we start.
the same presentations, some good, some could use work. i'm glad it is the last week. this class has been a student-centered experiment that failed in most ways. the 4th presentation of the night, a student brings a friend up to play McCartney's Yesterday, turning down the lights first, a slide show of hippies young and old playing in the background. the spokesperson clicks on his lighter and sways with the music. some students sing along. everyone cheers after the final line. the presentation is about 60's counterculture.
now 2 students in hippie garb come to the front of the class, and when the presenter starts talking about drug culture the spokesperson comes up with a bag of goods. some herb as fake pot, orbitz gum as fake hits of acid. he is the dealer, rolling joints and distributing. later the presenter talks about the symbolism of flower power while handing out flowers to the class. at the end of the night, we take class pictures. and i realize how much i'm going to miss these classes when i'm gone. the element of surprise each class brings, the ability for certain students to rise above the monotony and really get into a topic, and how much my mood can swing in a class.
-
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
trip journal 2
8:28PM, Saturday
my head feels tight, my neck tense, slept for an hour or 2 after the beer. only 60 pgs through Erewhon.
12:35AM, Sunday
more sleep- wandered through the whole of the train- got starred at- the food car is a moving cafe- tired of Butler, on to Rorty- deciding that the Turkish educational system is run by Platonists.-
watched the cutest boy get smacked hard across the face by his baba- i just about to take a picture of him- 4 yrs old but he starred at his father- no hint of tears- the boy instead explained calmly to his father what he had been doing- he had a bottle of orange soda and was dancing with it, entertaining the travelers around him- slapped for insubordination and nothing else.
1:50AM
listening to Of Montreal, "he's just a slutty little flirt...," happy after some Philosophy and Social Hope and hot tea- want to dance in the comfortable aisles of this sleeping train.
4:15AM
Kaseri- we've been through the mountains, Erzincan and Sivas, to Ankara now. K got off here, and so did the Gendarme, the rural army, who rode with us for 2 hrs, pulling through bags, recording ID numbers with a microphone, machine guns slung over their shoulders. my first time for this, but i'm not surprised. i see a machine gun a day in Erzurum and slide through random checkpoints and metal detectors, often with pockets full of change, detectors detecting nothing, or beeping and the guard waving us through.
the irrelevant theatre of power. only slightly more clear in Turkey than in america. they checked none of my bags and these ID numbers, i know through the bureaucratic mess of getting my residence permit, will only be lost and forgotten with millions of others.
the purpose is not detection but the appearance of detection, like taking my shoes off in an american airport, or standing in that ridiculous air-puffer room- the purpose is not to find anything, like i would put something in the sole of my shoe i couldn't put in my pocket, but for me to bow to the theatre of power by inconveniencing myself, disrupting my travel, as if i'm admitting in my silence that yes, you should be doing this, you have every right to, sir, for my protection, i bow to you, happily look at my shoe, take my number, disrupt the order of my clothes, anything else? let's make sure we take every precaution.
halfway through my trip.
6:14AM
i wake up to a vivid, alien scenery, but can't turn the god-damned flash off my camera. i will disable it manually if forced to- i hate, passionately, hate flash- didn't Sony imagine a situation in which one wanted to capture a beautiful scene through a window? what the fuck.
9:08AM
the car is the quietest it has been- folks sprawled out, mouths agape, in all sorts of interesting forms- impossible for me to get more than 2 hrs sleep at a time-
7:50PM
sitting in the restaurant car, this moving, mostly empty cafe- sitting alone, reading, Raki, french fries. i think that is the Marmara sea outside my window, bridges lit up. 2 hrs from Istanbul.
my head feels tight, my neck tense, slept for an hour or 2 after the beer. only 60 pgs through Erewhon.
12:35AM, Sunday
more sleep- wandered through the whole of the train- got starred at- the food car is a moving cafe- tired of Butler, on to Rorty- deciding that the Turkish educational system is run by Platonists.-
watched the cutest boy get smacked hard across the face by his baba- i just about to take a picture of him- 4 yrs old but he starred at his father- no hint of tears- the boy instead explained calmly to his father what he had been doing- he had a bottle of orange soda and was dancing with it, entertaining the travelers around him- slapped for insubordination and nothing else.
1:50AM
listening to Of Montreal, "he's just a slutty little flirt...," happy after some Philosophy and Social Hope and hot tea- want to dance in the comfortable aisles of this sleeping train.
4:15AM
Kaseri- we've been through the mountains, Erzincan and Sivas, to Ankara now. K got off here, and so did the Gendarme, the rural army, who rode with us for 2 hrs, pulling through bags, recording ID numbers with a microphone, machine guns slung over their shoulders. my first time for this, but i'm not surprised. i see a machine gun a day in Erzurum and slide through random checkpoints and metal detectors, often with pockets full of change, detectors detecting nothing, or beeping and the guard waving us through.
the irrelevant theatre of power. only slightly more clear in Turkey than in america. they checked none of my bags and these ID numbers, i know through the bureaucratic mess of getting my residence permit, will only be lost and forgotten with millions of others.
the purpose is not detection but the appearance of detection, like taking my shoes off in an american airport, or standing in that ridiculous air-puffer room- the purpose is not to find anything, like i would put something in the sole of my shoe i couldn't put in my pocket, but for me to bow to the theatre of power by inconveniencing myself, disrupting my travel, as if i'm admitting in my silence that yes, you should be doing this, you have every right to, sir, for my protection, i bow to you, happily look at my shoe, take my number, disrupt the order of my clothes, anything else? let's make sure we take every precaution.
halfway through my trip.
6:14AM
i wake up to a vivid, alien scenery, but can't turn the god-damned flash off my camera. i will disable it manually if forced to- i hate, passionately, hate flash- didn't Sony imagine a situation in which one wanted to capture a beautiful scene through a window? what the fuck.
9:08AM
the car is the quietest it has been- folks sprawled out, mouths agape, in all sorts of interesting forms- impossible for me to get more than 2 hrs sleep at a time-
7:50PM
sitting in the restaurant car, this moving, mostly empty cafe- sitting alone, reading, Raki, french fries. i think that is the Marmara sea outside my window, bridges lit up. 2 hrs from Istanbul.
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
trip journal 1
1:40 pm, Sunday December 6th
i'm headed slowly through the mountains now- the valleys opening up at moments with humbling sights- the plains here in the valleys, the icy brooks running through them and the snow-capped mountains in the distance have me thinking of glaciers and tectonic plates.
-just now we've slid into our first tunnel, cutting through a rocky hill- in these plains I see sheep and lamb and mountain goats and cattle, followed by young boys with long sticks- I want to take a picture of them but i've already revealed myself as a yabanci, helpless in communication if i wasn't, by chance, sitting right behind a highschool english teacher. i am a foreigner, but don't want to reveal myself as a rich foreigner yet- a student of mine told me not to fall asleep cause someone would nab my wallet, an exaggeration from a suburbanite Turk, but i think i'll be careful- anyway the beauty of this orange light on the thin grasses running up hills and my slow crawl through them would be lost in whatever picture I might take.
-on the train some are reading the papers, sleeping, studying for tests, losing themselves in the scenery, and two 30 something men are taking turns in their double seat to pray, kneeling and stretching towards Mecca- i read Samuel Butler's highly pastoral introduction to Erewhon and think of myself in the novel- biding my time as i move slowly through the mountain to a city so large and busy in comparison i can't really believe it.
to be meat and a person from tüpbebek on Vimeo.
4:25pm
humanity, children, beer
an old woman found the only non-Turk on the train to scream at- waking me from my daze- wanting my seat for reasons unknown, practically jumping into my lap. was i in her seat? did she have no seat and so demanded mine? did she have a mental disorder? my new english speaking friend calmed her and offered her his seat. and i soon learned of her bad knees and her sudden need to rest- after a few minutes, she made her way to the back of the car, with another woman, and the help of the high school english teacher and some other young men carrying her bags.
-later two young girls approached him, 10 or 11, trying to read his english essay. i handed them Erewhon and they flipped through it curiously before proclaiming they “do not love english.” i asked their names. they wore long pink and bright green dresses and had matching boots and socks- shy but unafraid to approach foreign strangers. i'm committing myself to learning more Turkish because i want to communicate with children. in these moments- K, my friend taking the women's bags, and the two strangers next to us moving over in their double seat to fit K- i saw the train come alive- smiling, together on our journey and in this moment writing i'm content but not drunk, after K bought me 2 pints of beer and mercimek soup. i'm lucky here, in this seat, in this company, on this grinding train, next to these humbling mountains.
i'm headed slowly through the mountains now- the valleys opening up at moments with humbling sights- the plains here in the valleys, the icy brooks running through them and the snow-capped mountains in the distance have me thinking of glaciers and tectonic plates.
-just now we've slid into our first tunnel, cutting through a rocky hill- in these plains I see sheep and lamb and mountain goats and cattle, followed by young boys with long sticks- I want to take a picture of them but i've already revealed myself as a yabanci, helpless in communication if i wasn't, by chance, sitting right behind a highschool english teacher. i am a foreigner, but don't want to reveal myself as a rich foreigner yet- a student of mine told me not to fall asleep cause someone would nab my wallet, an exaggeration from a suburbanite Turk, but i think i'll be careful- anyway the beauty of this orange light on the thin grasses running up hills and my slow crawl through them would be lost in whatever picture I might take.
-on the train some are reading the papers, sleeping, studying for tests, losing themselves in the scenery, and two 30 something men are taking turns in their double seat to pray, kneeling and stretching towards Mecca- i read Samuel Butler's highly pastoral introduction to Erewhon and think of myself in the novel- biding my time as i move slowly through the mountain to a city so large and busy in comparison i can't really believe it.
to be meat and a person from tüpbebek on Vimeo.
4:25pm
humanity, children, beer
an old woman found the only non-Turk on the train to scream at- waking me from my daze- wanting my seat for reasons unknown, practically jumping into my lap. was i in her seat? did she have no seat and so demanded mine? did she have a mental disorder? my new english speaking friend calmed her and offered her his seat. and i soon learned of her bad knees and her sudden need to rest- after a few minutes, she made her way to the back of the car, with another woman, and the help of the high school english teacher and some other young men carrying her bags.
-later two young girls approached him, 10 or 11, trying to read his english essay. i handed them Erewhon and they flipped through it curiously before proclaiming they “do not love english.” i asked their names. they wore long pink and bright green dresses and had matching boots and socks- shy but unafraid to approach foreign strangers. i'm committing myself to learning more Turkish because i want to communicate with children. in these moments- K, my friend taking the women's bags, and the two strangers next to us moving over in their double seat to fit K- i saw the train come alive- smiling, together on our journey and in this moment writing i'm content but not drunk, after K bought me 2 pints of beer and mercimek soup. i'm lucky here, in this seat, in this company, on this grinding train, next to these humbling mountains.
Friday, December 5, 2008
the plan
the week of Dec. 8th is Kurban Bayram (Sacrifice Holiday). it follows the story of Abraham, which is about exactly the same in the Qur'an and the Bible. (if you don't know, it happened like this). so for the Bayram they make or find those spiritual meats, and they eat them and give them.
my Bayram means time, travel, and a plan:
my Bayram means time, travel, and a plan:
- Erzurum to Istanbul by train Dec. 6th and 7th (33hrs and 647 miles- i was asked "what made you decide not to walk?" next time, my friend)
- read Samuel Butler's Erewhon, Buket Uzuner's Istanbullu, Richard Rorty's Philosophy and Social Hope
- take pictures, study Turkish, find someone to play chess with
- find a way to a bed, a floor, a couch
- meet C. and see his Istanbul
- find used books, used clothes, and Indian food
- film cats in the street and old houses
- bus ride to Ankara and then Konya Dec. 11 (8-9hrs 365miles)
- read the Qur'an, study Turkish, listen to DemNow
- find my way to a bed, couch, floor, bar, pide
- watch the dervishes whirl
- eat dinner with another C's parents
- play chess with M
- Sunday morning bus ride to Ankara (2-3hrs 138 miles)
- read the Masnavi
- Ankara to Erzurum by train (23hrs 447 miles)
- listen to Bob Dylan
- read Howard Zinn's People's History, Jane Mayer's The Dark Side, Orhan Pamuk's My Name is Red
- stretch
- teach my Monday night class
- tell you what happened
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Turkey's turkey- my thanksgiving
my normal thanksgiving is turkey and ham, potatoes, some football i'm not really watching, maybe a beer and some wine, sparkling white grape juice, falling asleep in the corner of a leather couch, keeping myself occupied with brothers, family, books, video games, lots of dessert, waking up in the backseat when we pull into my subdivision at home. in the last years it has been similar, minus family and plus grad students, spending the day writing seminar papers before i eat.
this year we're substituting butterball for village-fresh turkey, picked, plucked, and slaughtered in front of my friend T. 4 americans are sharing the experience with about 12 Turks, filling one of our small apartments, using our collective utensils, tables and chairs, hoping the holiday translates.
post meal update:
good. nice turkey, some great stuffing, too much dessert, raki, and wine. then i beat a Turkish boy in chess- i shouldn't brag cause he's like 10 but he's really good and is nicknamed "yaşlı adam" (the old man) because of how much he plays board games. afterward we went up Palandöken and watched some Turkish folk music and tried to dance.
this year we're substituting butterball for village-fresh turkey, picked, plucked, and slaughtered in front of my friend T. 4 americans are sharing the experience with about 12 Turks, filling one of our small apartments, using our collective utensils, tables and chairs, hoping the holiday translates.
post meal update:
good. nice turkey, some great stuffing, too much dessert, raki, and wine. then i beat a Turkish boy in chess- i shouldn't brag cause he's like 10 but he's really good and is nicknamed "yaşlı adam" (the old man) because of how much he plays board games. afterward we went up Palandöken and watched some Turkish folk music and tried to dance.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
am i alive?
this morning i hopelessly clicked on my tüpbebek shortcut and actually found my block. (glory be!) then i read the news. blogger has been temporarily unbanned, waiting for "missing evidence." to temporarily celebrate, i'm going to post some missing content: pictures from fall in Erzurum. but i also want to write a bit more about the ban and my thoughts, especially as it relates to Cumhuriyet Bayramı- Republic Day in Turkey, October 29th.
We must liberate our concepts of justice, our laws and our legal institutions from the bonds which, even though they are incompatible with the needs of our century, still hold a tight grip on us. -Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
digi-turk, a large Turkish cable provider, sued over blogger sites linking to free football games and a local court in Diyarbakir province (South-Eastern Turkey) made the ruling, which banned access to all blogger sites in Turkey. there are a few issues for the legal system to iron out here, like why a provincial court can make a ruling that bans access to internet for the whole country, and why the entire blog hosting service is banned instead of the specific sites breaching intellectual property rights (something that could be done with just a bit more work). but because of these anomalies, the bans can't represent the majority of the Turkish people or the Turkish courts.
in discussion boards about the banning of blogspot, i saw a lot of Turkish people very upset. but i asked my students about the banning and they seemed indifferent or apathetic. most answered by saying that they know how to get around banned sites with proxy servers, and they all know that youtube was banned because of attacks/criticism/satire on/of/about the founder of the modern Turkish Republic: Kemal Atatürk. but i was thinking, especially now that it is the Republic Holiday, of the countries the founder of modern Turkey was looking to as models of his Republic. for better or worse, he looked at Europe and The West when structuring the Turkish Republic (France especially influenced the political system and language). the list of countries that censor internet include Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. and i wonder what Atatürk would think about censorship and to find his Republic in this company on this issue today, even when the censorship is done in attempts to preserve his own legacy from defamation.
to be clear, i'm not trying to write for anyone, although i am trying to make an argument towards the release of censorship on certain grounds. and i'm finding myself more vocal on this topic since it has affected me personally. not only do i host this site on blogger, but i host 2 other sites for my students, one on American Cultural Studies and the other on Introductory Phonetics. much content like this gets caught up in the bans and inhibit the population from information and perspective.
----
by the way, i found an interesting Turkish group doing some action on this issue and others: meet the Young Civilians.
We must liberate our concepts of justice, our laws and our legal institutions from the bonds which, even though they are incompatible with the needs of our century, still hold a tight grip on us. -Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
digi-turk, a large Turkish cable provider, sued over blogger sites linking to free football games and a local court in Diyarbakir province (South-Eastern Turkey) made the ruling, which banned access to all blogger sites in Turkey. there are a few issues for the legal system to iron out here, like why a provincial court can make a ruling that bans access to internet for the whole country, and why the entire blog hosting service is banned instead of the specific sites breaching intellectual property rights (something that could be done with just a bit more work). but because of these anomalies, the bans can't represent the majority of the Turkish people or the Turkish courts.
in discussion boards about the banning of blogspot, i saw a lot of Turkish people very upset. but i asked my students about the banning and they seemed indifferent or apathetic. most answered by saying that they know how to get around banned sites with proxy servers, and they all know that youtube was banned because of attacks/criticism/satire on/of/about the founder of the modern Turkish Republic: Kemal Atatürk. but i was thinking, especially now that it is the Republic Holiday, of the countries the founder of modern Turkey was looking to as models of his Republic. for better or worse, he looked at Europe and The West when structuring the Turkish Republic (France especially influenced the political system and language). the list of countries that censor internet include Iran, North Korea, and Saudi Arabia. and i wonder what Atatürk would think about censorship and to find his Republic in this company on this issue today, even when the censorship is done in attempts to preserve his own legacy from defamation.
to be clear, i'm not trying to write for anyone, although i am trying to make an argument towards the release of censorship on certain grounds. and i'm finding myself more vocal on this topic since it has affected me personally. not only do i host this site on blogger, but i host 2 other sites for my students, one on American Cultural Studies and the other on Introductory Phonetics. much content like this gets caught up in the bans and inhibit the population from information and perspective.
----
by the way, i found an interesting Turkish group doing some action on this issue and others: meet the Young Civilians.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
bilgi- Ergenekon
so it has been a week since my last post and about two weeks since a post with real substance. but i have been coming to the site and adding news articles related to the happenings in Turkey, and i'll take this post to discuss some of them.
after increased warfare with the militant-separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in the last 3 weeks, Turkey expanded its military missions in Iraq and the PKK has increased violence in South-Eastern Turkey against civilians and the military. later, reports that Abdullah Öcalan, the founding leader of PKK, was being abused in prison (where he serves a life sentence) led to protests in Istanbul and many cities in South-Eastern Turkey.
what has led in the headlines though is the mysterious Ergenekon, a supposed ultra-nationalist group known sometimes as the "deep state." some ninety presumed members have been indicted and were set to go on trial last Monday, but the hearings were postponed amidst a chaotic courtroom and will resume sometime this week. those accused of being part of the group, which is sometimes characterized as a terrorist organization, include academics, journalists, and high-ranking military and government officials. some are claiming that this is the biggest court case in Turkey's history.
the story of Ergenekon is interesting as it deals directly with age-old debates and factions in Turkish politics (mainly the relationship between a secular state and an Islamic majority), reflects the variety of perspectives and opinions in the Turkish press, and will test the democratic function of the current conservative government. Ergenekon has two recent charges, first for planning an assassination against Kurdish leaders and Orhan Pamuk (the nobel prize winning Turkish novelist) and next for plotting to overthrow the current government (there have been 3 military coups in Turkey's history, so the fear is justified). newspapers supporting the AKP, the Justice and Development Party that has been in power since 2002, report on links between Ergenekon and decades of terrorist attacks, military coups, and assassinations. they claim, for instance, that both Hezbollah and the PKK either have ties with or are sub-sections of Ergenekon. seemingly more objective sources reference plenty of misinformation in these charges against Ergenekon, citing contradictions in the farcically long 2,500 page indictment and the investigative dossier approaching 10,000 pages (as a reference, the Nuremberg Trial had an indictment of 70 pages). conflicting charges name past leaders of the PKK both as members of Ergenekon and as assassination targets by Ergenekon.
in my research of the story and history, the existence of Ergenekon is rarely contested, but it may be a name for individuals or small groups of influential secular-nationalists, perhaps linked more by a shared ideology than an administrative structure, that occasionally carried out violent acts to support their ideological goals. but it is likely that the AKP, which barely staved of its dissolution for being theocratic, is now tying its political opponents to Ergenekon and creating a series of specious links to do so.
i feel odd sometimes writing about Turkish political events but thought that some people back home might be interested. and the news story seems to represent a lot of the current tensions. i'm intersted in Turkish perspectives, from those watching this blog and the events in Turkey. i'll post some more as things happen-the trial will likely take months.
after increased warfare with the militant-separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in the last 3 weeks, Turkey expanded its military missions in Iraq and the PKK has increased violence in South-Eastern Turkey against civilians and the military. later, reports that Abdullah Öcalan, the founding leader of PKK, was being abused in prison (where he serves a life sentence) led to protests in Istanbul and many cities in South-Eastern Turkey.
what has led in the headlines though is the mysterious Ergenekon, a supposed ultra-nationalist group known sometimes as the "deep state." some ninety presumed members have been indicted and were set to go on trial last Monday, but the hearings were postponed amidst a chaotic courtroom and will resume sometime this week. those accused of being part of the group, which is sometimes characterized as a terrorist organization, include academics, journalists, and high-ranking military and government officials. some are claiming that this is the biggest court case in Turkey's history.
the story of Ergenekon is interesting as it deals directly with age-old debates and factions in Turkish politics (mainly the relationship between a secular state and an Islamic majority), reflects the variety of perspectives and opinions in the Turkish press, and will test the democratic function of the current conservative government. Ergenekon has two recent charges, first for planning an assassination against Kurdish leaders and Orhan Pamuk (the nobel prize winning Turkish novelist) and next for plotting to overthrow the current government (there have been 3 military coups in Turkey's history, so the fear is justified). newspapers supporting the AKP, the Justice and Development Party that has been in power since 2002, report on links between Ergenekon and decades of terrorist attacks, military coups, and assassinations. they claim, for instance, that both Hezbollah and the PKK either have ties with or are sub-sections of Ergenekon. seemingly more objective sources reference plenty of misinformation in these charges against Ergenekon, citing contradictions in the farcically long 2,500 page indictment and the investigative dossier approaching 10,000 pages (as a reference, the Nuremberg Trial had an indictment of 70 pages). conflicting charges name past leaders of the PKK both as members of Ergenekon and as assassination targets by Ergenekon.
in my research of the story and history, the existence of Ergenekon is rarely contested, but it may be a name for individuals or small groups of influential secular-nationalists, perhaps linked more by a shared ideology than an administrative structure, that occasionally carried out violent acts to support their ideological goals. but it is likely that the AKP, which barely staved of its dissolution for being theocratic, is now tying its political opponents to Ergenekon and creating a series of specious links to do so.
i feel odd sometimes writing about Turkish political events but thought that some people back home might be interested. and the news story seems to represent a lot of the current tensions. i'm intersted in Turkish perspectives, from those watching this blog and the events in Turkey. i'll post some more as things happen-the trial will likely take months.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
smooth slow record Konya
i'm working with a sony dcr-sr300 handycam which has a "smooth slow record" function that takes about 4 seconds of video and slows it into 12 seconds. when the audio is on it records-weird-in real time, so i take the films in silence. i'm only just begining to see what is interesting in this format and have gladly passed the filming water drip from a fountain stage (no promises i won't regress).
unstable movements, as a rule, seem to be the most interesting to take. the balance of a motorcycle and the slow change of facial expressions and body movements attracted me in my last outing with the camera.
the videos below were all taken on the first day of the post-Ramadan holiday. the streets in Konya were more active than in the last 3 days of my stay as people moved across town to visit with family and eat their first lunch in a month (more on my McDonalds experience with them later). the day was uncharacteristically cold and overcast.
Faces Konya from tüpbebek on Vimeo.
unstable movements, as a rule, seem to be the most interesting to take. the balance of a motorcycle and the slow change of facial expressions and body movements attracted me in my last outing with the camera.
the videos below were all taken on the first day of the post-Ramadan holiday. the streets in Konya were more active than in the last 3 days of my stay as people moved across town to visit with family and eat their first lunch in a month (more on my McDonalds experience with them later). the day was uncharacteristically cold and overcast.
Faces Konya from tüpbebek on Vimeo.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
kedi
probably the most endearing surprise in my 3 days in Istanbul were the cats. i've heard you can tell a lot about a culture by the way they treat their animals. in chiapas mexico, poverty violated everyone and it wasn't suprising to see an elderly man in the market taking out some frustration by whacking a stray, starving dog with his cane.
in istanbul cats and dogs have few official owners but they have become surrogate pets for tourists and shopkeepers. streetcats find friends who feed them and provide temporary shelter. in alleys restaurant workers happily offer their scraps to waiting cats and dogs who moan in joy over the meals. i walked around practicing "kedi" and wondering if i could find a part-time pet in Erzurum.
kedi and/or crotch shots from tüpbebek on Vimeo.
in istanbul cats and dogs have few official owners but they have become surrogate pets for tourists and shopkeepers. streetcats find friends who feed them and provide temporary shelter. in alleys restaurant workers happily offer their scraps to waiting cats and dogs who moan in joy over the meals. i walked around practicing "kedi" and wondering if i could find a part-time pet in Erzurum.
kedi and/or crotch shots from tüpbebek on Vimeo.
Saturday, September 27, 2008
On Tüpbebek
- (trans: ten tube babies)
- the name should be obvious
- this is the tube baby
- bebek is for myself, and everyone
- Ted Stevens (R-Alaska)
- artificial-asexual color and shape insemination
- say what you mean:
- i thought it was cute and messy
- this is for the diverse crowd of people i wish i had here with me
- recourse our life in a tube.
- sorry to confused future Turkish tube parents
- leave comments, questions, frustrations, please
- love
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
Posts
