Above: Dolmen de Menga panorama, Antequera, España Eskişehir, Türkiye Friday 23 August 2024 As more people move to our cities there is one problem that planners have to face up to: Where are they going to put everyone? Above: Porsuk Çayı (Badger Stream), Eskişehir (Old City), Türkiye (Turkey) The lack of affordable accommodation is the… Continue reading Man cave
Tag: Turkey
Antequera: In transit
Eskişehir, Türkiye Saturday 10 August 2024 “No young person under 40 is ever to be allowed to travel abroad under any circumstances. Nor is anyone to be allowed to go for private reasons, but only on some public business, as a herald or ambassador or as an observer of one sort or another.“ Plato, The… Continue reading Antequera: In transit
Pendik possibilities
Above: Images of Pendil, Istanbul, Türkiye Beyoğlu, İstanbul, Türkiye Sunday 7 April 2024 “Yesterday I spoke to playwright and humourist Karlweis about keeping a diary. He said it was good to get into the habit of reckoning up with yourself, but that one never confronts oneself with the whole truth, there is always an element… Continue reading Pendik possibilities
Revolving doors
Eskişehir, Türkiye Monday 1 April 2024 Local elections in Türkiye took place on 31 March 2024 throughout the country’s 81 provinces. A total of 30 metropolitan and 1,363 district municipal mayors, alongside 1,282 provincial and 21,001 municipal councillors were elected, in addition to numerous local non-partisan positions such as neighbourhood wardens (muhtars) and elderly people’s councils. The… Continue reading Revolving doors
Canada Slim and the Museum of Innocence
Landschlacht, Switzerland, 19 August 2018 It has been ages since I have written about Turkey, but those who know me are aware that there are both many things I adore about this bridge between Asia and Europe and many things I abhor. Of the little exploration I have done in this great republic (the Turquoise… Continue reading Canada Slim and the Museum of Innocence
The rise of Recep
Landschlacht, Switzerland, St. Patrick’s Day 2017 I am a Turkey watcher. I have twice visited this beautiful country and I have rarely met a Turk I haven`t liked. I began to talk about Turkey in this blog, because of the event that began 2017: the ISIS attack on a nightclub in Istanbul. Above: The Reina restaurant/nightclub,… Continue reading The rise of Recep
The sorrow of Batman
Istanbul, Turkey, 10 September 2016 In Istanbul, extraordinary experiences are found around every corner. Here, dervishes whirl, müezzins call from minarets and people move between continents multiple times a day. Istanbul is home to millenia-old monuments and cutting edge art galleries – sometimes on the same block. It is an utterly beguiling city full of… Continue reading The sorrow of Batman
The sons of Karbala
St. Gallen, Switzerland, 9 January 2017 “Turkey seems to be falling to pieces, the fall will be a great misfortune. It is very important that England and Russia should come to a perfectly good understanding… and that neither should take any decisive step of which the other is not apprized.” “We have a sick man on… Continue reading The sons of Karbala
The fashionable dead
Landschlacht, Switzerland, 3 January 2017 The scene outside my window seems worlds apart and away for the world I am about to describe…for the streets here in this wee Swiss hamlet by the Lake of Constance are covered in snow both magical and mysterious. You could spend days explaining to me the science behind snowfall… Continue reading The fashionable dead
Take me back to Constantinople
Romanshorn, Switzerland, 2 January 2017 Slow start to the day and to the week finds us, the wife and I, having a late breakfast, then walking along the shores of the Lake of Constance. Here at least it has been a green Christmas season. In fact, yesterday´s Sonntag Zeitung remarks that Switzerland had never seen a… Continue reading Take me back to Constantinople