My buddy Ali and I investigated the rotten trash of Istanbul one night. Ali is a writer and a trash sorter. I am a writer too. We were curious about what the trash would reveal.
Ahbabim Ali ve ben bir gece Fatih'in çöpüne düstük. Ali yazar ve geri dönüsüm isçisi. Ben de yazarim. Ikimiz meczupuz. Merak ettik. Çöpte ne var diye arastiriyorduk.
Ali told me he couldn't wear plastic gloves when he sorted trash.In explaining why he could never wear plastic gloves when he sorted trash Ali told me a story:
Years ago Ali had worked as a painter of skyscrapers in Ankara, Turkey. He liked the climb up the ladder, the walk on the narrow wooden board to his place on the side of a huge building. Ali would paint for hours, loving the sunlight and breeze and fresh air.
Then one spring day when the wind was soft in Ankara, Turkey and the sun beat down, Ali looked up and saw a helicopter coming out of the distance over the flat Anatolian plateau. Ali watched the helicopter change from a tiny dot in the sky to the nearing swopswopswop swing sound of the helicopter blades over the countryside, then over the city and coming closer, closer... Ali felt like he was meant to - at this moment - see this moving floating object coming toward him.
Finally it was right up close, flying around the skyscraper he was painting. The helicopter flew in a few circles around then stopped dead in the middle of the air, floating, watching him, staring at him. In that moment of the staring helicopter the ground of Ankara flew up, made Ali dizzy and he suddenly realized where he was, so high from the ground on a tiny twig of a wood board... Ali clung to the side of the building he was working on. He dropped his paint roller and it fell, fell, fell down and Ali thought he should call down to warn any passerbys below that the paint roller was coming their way but it was too late. His voice would never reach the people before his paint roller did.
The paint roller crashed down below making a small explosive sound as it hit the ground and missed two workers. All Ali could do was move centimeter by centimeter along the narrow board, gripping the side of the building. Finally he was by the ladder. Very slowly Ali climbed down.
Ali "fell into the trash" after that job. He couldn't do his old work. All that was left for him for years was trash sorting and learning how to write. Ali says that for him to wear plastic protective gloves when he sorts through trash would be the same as seeing that helicopter again come out of the flat horizon. If Ali wore gloves when he sorted trash he would be forced to see how society judged him as a trash sorter. And he could never sort trash again.
Istanbulite artist Ahmet Günestekin explains his new piece "The Doors Which Are Opened to the Sun." In this video/blog my old friend Ahmet exlains the import of his multicultural Mesopotamian background on his art.
Istanbullu sanatçi Ahmet Günestekin yeni eseri 'Günese Açilan Kapilar'i anlatiyor. Bu blogda eski arkadasim Ahmet köklerinin Mezopotamyali oldugunu açikliyor ve Mezopotamyanin kültürünün sanatini etkiledigini anlatiyor.
My friend Metin and I talk about nightlife and what the Taksim district in Istanbul means to Turks... Then I'm drunk in a bathroom speaking foolishly... Dear viewers this is a grand video if you've been in Taksim drunk and muttering bullshit to yourself...
Arkadasim Metin ve ben Türkler için Taksim öneminden bahsediyoruz... Sonra barda bir tuvalette abuk sabuk konusuyorum... Sarhosken Taksim'dayken Tuvalet'e girip abuk sabuk kendinize konusursaniz eger bu videoyu gayet güzeldir...
I made this first blog post-video a couple of weeks ago in front of St. Antoine's Catholic Church (1913) when I first got to Istanbul. Not more than 24 hours in Istanbul and I was already waxing whimsicle about what I was seeing. Something about the church's courtyard impressed me. It was quiet and somber.
Bir kaç hafta önce Istanbul'a ilk geldigimde (1913'te yapilmis) St. Antoine Italyan Katolik Kilisesinin önünde bu video-blog postasini yaptim. Kilisenin avlusuyla alakali bir sey beni etkiledi. Sakin ve hüzünlüydü.
I’d say that grief is like a tai-chi energy stream. It is all around. When relaxing into a mediation, grief is a ball of liquid wide open and across one’s chest. You hold that energy’s weight and see that the weight itself is weightless.
In younger years I wondered how I would “deal” with death. I strove to understand it. I read the right authors. I traveled to the Holy Land; went to Egypt and stood on pyramids. I tried to touch death like a dog pissing on electricity. Late at night I played with fire; embraced a fear-filled Kurdish girl in Istanbul and a sabotaged mid-western chica in New Orleans…
And…
While those experiences smashed me across the face they weren’t “death.” Death came soft.
I heard about it three years ago. I was at a gutted school in New Orleans’ 9th Ward. All around me young volunteers from Vermont and California chirped away. I was in New Orleans for only a few months, helping to rebuild after Katrina. I had a plane ticket purchased to return to my old life in Istanbul.
And then a funny thing happened. On a break in the gutting of the school my father called me.
Dad’s voice is normally smooth and rich like well aged bourbon. It is the kind of voice which covers you and holds you tight. But that day his voice was quiet on my cell. Mouse-like. All of its magic was gone. He said, “Your mother.. Your mother.. we just came from the doctor’s office. Your mother has ovarian cancer.”
NEW ORLEANS | At Voodoo Fest on Friday, October 30th, 2009, I officially reached middle age. In the fading dusk of a rainy Friday I found myself standing with a collection of high school sophomores watching a twenty-something “mega” band. I feel like the oldest person on the planet. The band is Silversun Pickups and the music sounds overly produced and slick.
Sheets of rain fall from the sky in a downpour. I squint to find a smiling face. The audience around me is too callow, too lost, too full of disinterest. The driving rain covers our clothes with a smell of wet skin and sweat. Our individual stinks mix together and hang in the turgid air.
It is year 11 for the Voodoo Music Experience, and this is the biggest festival to date. The entrance is pricy ($75 dollar per day, $180 for the weekend). Not cheap for an American economy in recession. Yet, the recession has tended to keep travelers regionalized. This year, instead of a cross country trip to Burning Man many Gulf Coast residents will opt for the Voodoo Fest experience.
NEW ORLEANS | At Voodoo Fest on Friday, October 30th, 2009, I officially reached middle age. In the fading dusk of a rainy Friday I found myself standing with a collection of high school sophomores watching a twenty-something “mega” band. I feel like the oldest person on the planet. The band is Silversun Pickups and the music sounds overly produced and slick.