PANDEMIC, SCREEN, REUNION

Being so connected to one’s phone… How did we ever live without it? Pre-2000… Our cognitive maps changed completely. I swear, our brains, our brain structures have changed.

The Frequent Flyer

We are starting a new style here, of writing some ‘blog pieces’… Let’s see how it will go!

So how is life? ‘Çok şükür’… Thank God.. Gottseidank. We are alive. The climate is changing, Greta the Climate Action Kid is leading the world and we are following avidly.

Elveda, Olaylı 2013!

Geleneksel Yeni Yıl Mektubumun 2013 edisyonundan alıntılar (İngilizce metin)

In Memory of our Professor Emre Madran

Text (in Turkish) of my memorial speech for our dear colleague and professor, Emre Madran made at the ICOMOS Turkish National Committee General Assembly dated 14 December 2013.

The Race to Slowness

(With thanks to Özlem Özülker..) Engage in the oft-missing luxury of unhurried movement. Life is so fast, especially modern life. We get out of balance with the speed, intensity, complexity. Slowness is something we miss, at a deep level, something we crave. 1. Improve Lymph Flow Going at slow speed activates the pulsing lymph flow […]

Crowdfunding Campaigns

Full Page Ad in the New York Times on the Gezi Protests: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/full-page-ad-for-turkish-democracy-in-action Istanbul United the Movie: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/istanbul-united-the-movie Ziazan the Movie- when it comes to chocolate, there are no borders (Turkish-Armenian co-production): http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/ziazan—2 Kusursuzlar (The Impeccables) the Movie: http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/kusursuzlar-the-impeccables

Notes about handling the ‘culture of speed’

I recently read a book called The Culture of Speed by John Tomlinson. Here is my review of it on Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/704890372. I made some notes out of it, because they resonate with the ‘down time’ that I have been going through since November 2012. ‘Downshifting‘: to change a highly paid but stressful job for one […]

Non-Governmental Organizations

Greenpeace: http://www.greenpeace.org/turkey/tr/ Avaaz.org: http://www.avaaz.org/en/index.php Amnesty International Turkey: http://www.amnesty.org.tr/ai Girl Effect: http://www.girleffect.org http://www.girleffect.org/why-girls/#&panel1-1

Emine Yıldırım- Film Reviews

Emine Yıldırım (Today’s Zaman’da Film Eleştirmeni/ Film Critic at Today’s Zaman):  https://twitter.com/MarmosetEmine

Mongolian Weekly News no. 8 – The Final Episode!

Greetings to everybody once again, with one last cyber-newsletter before I fly back to Ankara via Moscow next Sunday. The MWC is quite a bit longer, in the effort not to leave anything left unsaid that could or should be said about this Mongolian experience, additional commentary.

Mongolian Weekly News no. 7 – New Year Edition

Date: January 2, 2000 Dear Friends, How are you after the crazy (or relaxed) New Year parties? Any hangovers? Over here we had plenty! Saturday was a totally blurry day. Not that we here in UB had too much wild fun, but we did have our share of champagne! At the National Opera House overlooking […]

Mongolian Weekly News no. 6

Welcome to the last MWC of the year. I hope the holidays have been going well for you so far. As for UB, Christmas is being celebrated around the relevant pious households and communities, with the appropriate snowy urban landscape to accompany.

Mongolian Weekly News no. 5

Ha ha! Thought I’d given up, eh?.. Alas, I am back to plug up your inboxes once again! hope all your weeks have been fine and full of good fortune. As it is the time of the year where everybody is wishing each other well as part of the season’s greetings, I hope the general rise of positive energy has been helping in this respect.

Mongolian Weekly News no. 4

Welcome back to another gruelling round of MWN. This time, though, the @#$% computer has stabbed me in the back and malfunctioned, so after a lot of lost time, whatever nerves and good spirits left will be squeezed out into a more shorthand-type mail.

Mongolian Weekly News no. 3

Here is yet another episode of the by-now-getting-established News from Mongolia. Even though it is 2 am here, I am very intent on finishing this on time (i.e. one week from the previous one) and being disciplined about it.

Mongolian Weekly News no. 2

As a result of some nice feedback, I got used to the idea of writing the story of my daily life and times in the Far East to you good people. (Maybe you can gather that it is not the busiest of places in the world, so that I can sit down and write stuff like this!)

Mongolian Rhapsody

Hi from Ulaan Baatar… I arrived yesterday from Beijing. Directly my parents whisked me off to an international women’s club ball, with a grand raffle and dancing and a lot of smiling, fake and not, where my fatigue after traveling from 7.30 am onwards topped with some wine finally showed their effects, and today I slept till 12 noon.

Mongolia 1999-2000

The Mongolian Weekly Cyber, November 1999- January 2000 Introduction At age 24, after my year of master studies in York, England, I spent part of the winter of 1999-2000 with my parents in Ulan Bator (Ulaan Baatar in the local way of saying it), capital of Mongolia, my father being the Turkish Ambassador there from […]

Southeast Anatolia 2001

Joi (my friend Jaideep Chakrabarti) and I met with the tour group at İstanbul – Atatürk Airport. Threw ourselves into the airplane, for the 07.00 am Diyarbakır flight, in a grumpy early morning mood..!

Gallipoli 2003

Last year, some things that happened to me one after the other affected me in such a way that I promised myself, many months in advance, to “go to commemorate Gallipolu next year”.

Capoeira Links

Capoeira (/ˌkæpuːˈɛərə/; Portuguese pronunciation: [kapuˈejɾɐ])) is a Brazilian martial art that combines elements of dance, acrobatics and music, and is sometimes referred to as a game. It was developed in Brazil mainly by African descendants with native Brazilian influences, probably beginning in the 16th century. It is known by quick and complex moves, using mainly power, speed, and […]

Giyotin Film Links

Giyotin Film is a film and audio-visual production company based in Istanbul. https://www.giyotinfilm.com Canavarlar Sofrası (The Monsters’ Dinner): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1877803/ Kusursuzlar (The Impeccables): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2394021