Mixed marriages

Mixed marriages

One of the beautiful experiences in Turkey for me personally is that people don’t condemn or judge you when you marry someone else with a different faith. A friend of mine, a Muslim, married a girl of the Jewish faith.
And earlier this year, another close friend of mine, married her sweetheart for years from Greece with the Greek Orthodox faith.
No one makes problems about this, although I got one time a Syrian on my neck telling me that ‘he was worried about the fact that Muslim women are so quick with marrying foreigners, in particular Christians. And he, himself had his wife from the USA converted to the Muslim faith. How nice.
My Turkish friend will marry her sweetheart in June in Greece, and today she is Baptized in Greece to the Greek Orthodox religion since it doesn’t allow marriages if both are not Greek Orthodox Christians.
Then, Turkey is different…

Knowledge, Imagination, Creativity and Originality. (1)

Knowledge, Imagination, Creativity and Originality.

As Einstein once said: “Knowledge is limited but Imagination is circling all over the world”. But knowledge is something rational, which you can trust upon, you can share it with people, friends, etc.
Imagination is more personal: dreaming and being fascinated by something which can be possible.
But when creative, how original are we?
How can we be with our knowledge, creative, original and still full of imagination..

Become digital or stay underdeveloped.

Bought a camera in January, a Canon 3000 at Wall-Mart in San Francisco. The only non-digital camera they had in stock. All the other cameras were digital ones.
Since I love the old-fashioned way of photography, I thought to make a good deal. The camera was only 220 USD! No way that I could buy this camera for a price like this 10 years ago.
The only problem these days is to get your films developed. Kodak is shutting down its ‘development’ stores. And where can you buy a film for this camera? Yes, in Turkey. Now it is waiting how they develop my films. I trust them. As usual.

But am I developed enough to go for a digital camera?

Cyprus and "Kurdistan"

Cyprus and "Kurdistan".

Needed a break and went in March to Cyprus. The Northern part, which is according to International law, occupied by Turkey. And not recognized by any other country, except Turkey.

The airport was cute, and little. Only flights from and to Turkey.

The first thing which reminds you of the past is that the British occupied the island for a long time; the traffic was driving on the left. And the patience when you want to cross the street: cars stopped. What a contradiction with Istanbul: you have to run for your life sometimes as a pedestrian…

Although a small country, Turkish Cyprus, with 40.000 Turkish soldiers: a Tiny small country with a Big problem.

What I also don’t understand is that in fact, when the Turkish army in 1974 invaded Northern Cyprus, to protect the Turkish population from the Greek aggression is that they were not there to resolve the order, but to stay there. And now, the Turkish Cypriots, a minority on the island, created a banana republic.
Only 60% of the people are really born and grown up in Cyprus. The rest are invaders. A flagrant violation of the Geneva Convention of 1948.

What about the minority of Kurdish people (up to 25%) in Turkey….their rights?

Many Turks have the answers, never visit their Baby-land, but for me still a question.

Read also: http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=42036

Gateway or Get-Away

In the last years many ads are published here in Turkey. Some of them to promote Turkey, some of them to promote brand names.
What made me curious was that many of the ads are copy-paste ads, using headings as ‘Think Global, act Local’, ‘Spend Global, Earn local’, 'As a Local, You can travel Global' etc.

Also the word ‘Gateway’ seems to be an attractive word for my fellow advertising colleagues…
We dream from Gateway to Gateway…into the Universe...

But I was annoyed when I saw the heading of the Turkish Daily News: "Your Gateway to Turkey on the way to Europe". Too many words and it doesn’t cover anything.
Are the Turks invading Europe again...
I don’t get it...

This week THY (Turkish Airlines) started a new ad campaign on e.g. BBC world, CNN etc.
Beautiful art, pictures, music….but at the end the pay off: "Your Magical Gateway to the World".
I want now a Get-Away.