Nâzım Hikmet had a dream

Yaşamak bir ağaç gibi tek ve hür
ve bir orman gibi kardeşçesine,
bu hasret bizim.

To live like a tree and at liberty
and brotherly like the trees of a forest,
this yearning is ours.

Nâzım Hikmet (15 January 1902 – 3 June 1963)

Beers & Books XC – Orhan Pamuk

Without patience and the skill of a craftsman,
even the greatest talent is wasted.

Orhan Pamuk *7 June 1952

[Capita Turciensis] Laughing Lhursday*

Recently [2008] - I was just reading the last chapter of The Bastard of Istanbul - I heard Tetrapilotomos chuckle, which induced following dialogue:

- Yes?

- Blimey, no wonder there's a steady increase of population in Turkey.

- What are you busy with, Tetrapilotomos?

- Merowinger time.

- I see. And what does this have to do with the population growth in Turkey?

- Do you know what aureum caput regni means?

- Golden head of the imperium, or so?

- Not bad. And caput orbis?

- Head of the world.

- Not bad. And what's a colloquial German word for broken?

- Kaputt. Spelled with one t less in English it means a) utterly finished, defeated, or destroyed and b) unable to function.

- Not bad. And do you know what a condom is being called in Turkish.

- No idea.

- Kaput.

* [For first time visitors]: Typo in the title? Nah. It's just that
I would not let a tiny T spoil an avantgardistic alliteration.

Perverted Minds

How perverted minds those must have
who would call a murderous aggression
Zeytin Dalı Harekâtı / Operation Olive Branch?

Peace Price for Erdoĝan

With twelve days delay:
September 22nd, Aslı Erdoĝan in Osnabrück received the Erich Maria Remarque Friedenspreis (= PeacePrice).

And this months a book with some of her very latest essays got published in German:

Nicht einmal das Schweigen gehört uns noch.

It won't come as a surprise that in Turkey these essays 'do not exist'.
It seems in English they have not (yet) been published, but in French:
Le silence même n'est plus à toi (Lettres turques.

Finally, here the English wikipedia entry about Erich Maria Remarque.
And here the English wikipedia entry about his most famous book: Im Westen nicht Neues / All Quiet on the Western Front.

Evolution of Stupidity

Darwin’s theory of evolution has been excluded from the most recent draft of Turkey’s new national curriculum, which will be released following the Eid al-Fitr holiday, the head of the Education Ministry’s curriculum board, Alpaslan Durmuş, has said.

Durmuş told educators during an Ankara seminar on June 20 that the ministry had presented the draft to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who has approved it.

More here.

House Arrest for a Homeless

The “house arrest” of a homeless man, who was previously unable to move outside the boundaries of a confined public area in Istanbul, has been lifted, Doğan News Agency reported on June 22.
More here.

Hilarious Dimwits

This afternoon my friend Tetrapilotomos, looking up from proof-reading the 1,669 pages of his opus magnum 'Pre-Assyrian philately in a Nutshell', murmered: "I am not surprised. Apart from that Fethullah Gülen is a most sinister person, prosecutors by grace of Recep Taqīya ... eh: Tayyip Erdoğan seem to be hilarious dimwits." 

I hardly could believe my ears. "Ahem, isn't RTE the most intelligent person in this universe and all galaxies, yet to discover?"

Silence. Turning a page, Tetrapilotomos murmured: "Next you'll call the poor idiots who voted for him to become their president, Turkey's superbest educated  crème de la crème."

"Uff, do you think they are not?"

Instead of giving an answer, before turning another page, my friend passed me a note with a link and grumbled: "Read this." 

Turkish prosecutors have demanded 3,623 aggravated life sentences for the U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen, as a total of all cases filed against him.

In addition to the aggravated life terms, the prosecutors also sought 2,923 years in jail for Gülen, widely believed to have been behind the failed July 15, 2016 coup attempt, daily Yeni Şafak reported on May 8.

A judicial fine equivalent to 2.2 million days was also imposed on Gülen, who was named as the prime suspect in 22 cases filed across Turkey regarding the thwarted coup that left 249 people killed and 2,193 wounded.

Full article here.

Ten years ago

In memoriam Hrant Dink.

Cihan's a clever horse

His name could well be

Josef Adolf Erdoğan.

Cihan* knew before.

* Cihan means World / Welt / mondo, mundo

Cui bono?

As so often, my heart it cries.

Goldfingers aka Scumbags

Readers who regularly do read what my "Seldom Boring" friends (on the sidebar) are posting will know that not only when it comes to "Turkish affairs" Erkan's Field Diary is an excellent source.

Some months ago this very headline caught my interest:

Meet Sarraf,

the Great (Turkish) Gatsby

Reading the article added to  certain thoughts that Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Effendi would not only call a prejudice.
After all, Turkishness is unrivalled, eh?

Sound of Pots and Tans

Scum in uniform

Kneeling terrorist
Defender of Democracy
is teaching her love

Brave Defenders of Democracy

Taqiyya ... err ... Tayyip Erdoğan's pride:
Five brave defender of democracy
risking their lives against a heavily armed terrorist.

See the joy
in this brave civil policeman's face?

And here another police hero
defending democracy against a "Terror-Lady in Red"

There are more nice photos to be seen here.

Okay, that's Turkey. Of course, such things could not happen in the most wonderful of all democracies in this universe and those yet to discover, could they?

Oops. Isn't that Lt John Pike
defending the USA against a whole bunch of terrorists?

I get the feeling as if only recently there was a man saying: "When I see a policeman with a club beating a man on the ground, I don't have to ask whose side I'm on."

Now, Lt. Pike and his brave Turkish comrades  – they all definitely being beacons of intelligence – will teach this George Orwell, once they have caught him, I bet.

Freeing Turkey from Justice

[No language skills necessary] 



An excellent coverage of what happens in Turkey offers Professor Erkan Saka's Field Diary.

Hypatia and Medine

So-called International or World Days of whatsoever leave me cold.
Day of the book for me is on 365 days, and on 366 days in leap-years. Same goes for water, bread, animals, human rights etc. etc..

Thus it will not come as a surprise that the International Women's Day for me neither is anything special.

Do I hear anyone hissing "Damn macho!"?

Sshhh sshhhh ... :)

Anyway, Welshcakes over at Sicily Scene last Monday posted such a wonderful homage to a remarkable Italian woman (oh, just don't be too lazy to drop over; I am quite sure you will not regret) that I started to think about what woman in history I'd like to praise with an homage. Well, actually I did not have to think twice.

Thus, I checked the internet, ... and got delighted: Not only that I found a nicely done video about my heroine, but there got some other admirable women mentioned.




Just to make sure: To be admired (by me), a woman does not need to be scientist or famous for this and that. I have met and do meet many women who will never be mentioned in a history book, and still are lovely, remarkable, do admirable things. And some I know who are able to put better within one or two sentences what I would perhaps not be able to explain in 50.

And what is about the second name mentioned in your title? you might ask.

Well, yes, Medine.
Medine is not famous. And the sad realist in myself is sure she will not be mentioned in history books.
You see, Medine's no scientist, no artist, no philosopher. I don't know if she was a passionate reader; if she wrote poems. I don't even know if she was able to read, properly, ... if she was given the chance, if she got encouraged to discover the realm of the letters, numbers and symbols, supported to develop her talents.

And still I do wish that once she will be mentioned in history books!

Men who from generation to generation had been taught to believe (sic!), that - (perhaps) except of one's mother - girls and women are less worth, and that "a man who does not beat his wife is no man", suddenly perceived that it is of great advantage to have an excellently learned and educated daughter, to marry an excellently learned and educated wife, to get an excellently learned and educated daughter-in-law, as she will be able to excellently - with love and knowledge - support ... their son, their grandson to become an excellently learned and educated human being.

Medine will not have a son.
I'd like so much to know more about Medine.
Unfortunately, I do not know much more about her than that she's 16 and, that it's said she sometimes talked to boys, that complaining violence against her mother and herself she asked policemen for help and shortly afterwards disappeared - buried alive by her father and grandfather.

The peace of the night.

Whom the (snow-)bells toll

Well, actually I intended just to title '... and some more', but would first time visitors have known I were refering to the previous post? [Ha ha, no link here!]
After all, one does not need to be arrogant to not expect too much from the average 'stumblers upon', hm? :)

Anyway, why Whom the (snow-)bells toll?
Nah :), not primarily as this would offer the opportunity to mention en passant, that about thirty years ago colleagues used to call me Hemingway, but because Schneeglöckchen translated in English are not snowdrops but snowbells.

Ahem ... end of the beforegoing.

It's often said that nature is 'magical'. A few people in Haiti, Chile and Turkey, to name but a few countries, would perhaps / probably not wholeheartedly agree these days, especially not those who are dead; well, and those who had / have to learn that what humans use to call natural desaster (or so) does not necessarily increase fellow sufferers' ethic standards.
Oh, by the way, did you hear, watch anything about Haiti during the past fortnight?
Nothing? Ah, I am so glad! Isn't this global solidarity wonderful a thing? Some benefit galas, and before you could say f.e. religion or helpfulness, all Haitians got a new roof over their heads, enough to drink and eat; hospitals, schools, ah ... the whole infrastructure was renewed.
Isn't it a pity that good news are (considered to be) no news?
Still, isn't it wonderful to live in these times? In times when no wo/man feels so desperate to fall on her/his knees and cry "Oh, please, God, help me!", as there's always a fellow human not only willing to be g(o)od but really does help?
Brave new world!

End of the beforegoing.

What you are witnessing, in case you did not a while ago surf on to the next world-shattering important blogger(s) is, what a tiny step it is from taciturnity to logorrhoea as, of course, I could just have written:

This was what I saw on Saturday.

This was what I saw on Sunday.

And this when looking a bit closer.

Apropos, looking closer. Just thinking of everything's fine by now in Haiti, Chile, Turkey .... ah, and, of course, in China's democracy, I am. Liu Xiabo is free!! And so is Hu Jia. No priest or imam letting a little boy suck their holy pricks, no freedom fighter in Kongo or elsewhere raping a girl or woman together with his fellow heroes, and when after some seconds his manhood's getting limp, letting do his bajonet - oh, well or a fucking wooden stick - the rest to increase the woman's delight; Mr. Obama has declared Order 81 null and void, and consequently the Masters of Monsanto became bio famers; in Nigeria ... ...

... ah! Stop! This could have become such a lovely little post!! Lovely little flowers in snow. How cute! Harbingers of spring. Now, isn't there still hope?! I mean, it does not happen often that seasons change, does it? It's really surprising.

Forget it!

Rather than going on boring you, I quit and go on writing three or four pages more of what's going to become another glorious novel that will shatter the world ... not.
Who cares?! As long as readers shovel money upon me. I consider it better than shovelling snow, anyway.

Even better than wasting your time.

The peace of the night.

A tragedy, Mr Erdoğan is so utterly stupid

Turkey's prime minister has described ethnic violence in China's Xinjiang region as "a kind of genocide".
"There is no other way of commenting on this event," Recep Tayyip Erdogan said.
He spoke after a night-time curfew was reimposed in Xinjiang's capital, Urumqi, where Muslim Uighurs and Han Chinese clashed last Sunday.
The death toll from the violence there has now risen from 156 to 184, China's state-run Xinhua news agency reports. More than 1,000 people were injured.
Turkey, a predominantly Muslim country, shares linguistic and religious links with the Uighurs in China's western-most region.
Full BBC-article here.

This is most interesting. What happened to Armenians in the Ottoman era, thus before the Turkish Republic was founded, Erdoğan Effendi - sic! ha ha ha - would call "a tragedy", and his Magnificent Stupidity would feel insulted by those who would call a genocide a genocide.

What a ... oh, well - to be continued ...

Meanwhile you might like to read some post which are corroborating this post's title.
Cave Cihan, Mr Erdoğan!

Considerably exaggerated

Does article 301 apply to Erdoğan?

Mozart's homage to Erdogan

A statue for Gülsüm!

A cow in the village of Kadiruşağı in the eastern province of Malatya has been sent to a neighboring village because its owner feared she would be punished for the animal knocking down a statue (of Atatürk; Omnium) in the local schoolyard.

The accident caused the local education department to launch a formal inquiry into the matter, frightening the cow’s owner, Gül Kılınç, who said she had sold the animal, named Gülsüm, to a friend in the neighboring village of İnekpınarı to wait out the inquiry.
[...] "Officials came and took our testimony. Almost every member of the village was questioned"* [...].

* emphasise mine

More about this absolutely shocking incident at Hürriyet.

As Turkishness is unrivalled, I do fear this cow is a poor sow.

It might be interesting, though, to interview her and the author or journalist, Gülsüm might soon share a prison cell with.


Meanwhile, in a poll amongst cows worldwide, 99,98 percent mooed:
"A statue for Gülsüm!



Related articles (warmly commended):
Spreading Mr. Kemal's news (Part I of an exclusive interview with the late Atatürk)