As long as the sage continues (looks like nobody in this country knows what really is going on) several people are trying to find out what is going on. And why the ban on wordpress is still there.
One of them is Erkan. Here some points.
Looks like a lot of people are still suffering with no access...
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Anti-Americanism
There are so many people writing around, full of anger, full of hate, with one goal: create a hysteria about the USA. Anti-Americanism flourishes on Turkish soil. I will write in detail why and how.
Is there a law that protects 'Americanism'?
Is there a law that protects 'Americanism'?
More about Wordpress
Why Wordpress.com was banned in Turkey- reason unveiled
Aug 20th, 2007 by turkishdigestEdit
As many of you may have heard, last Friday the 17th, it was revealed that access to all Wordpress.com sites from Turkey was banned. When I first heard about it, I asked my friends to check my own website We are the Turks hosted by Wordpress, to determine whether this was true. They told me the following was coming up on the screen:
"Access to this site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2007/195 of T.C. Fatih 2.Civil Court of First Instance"
I did some research and did not find much over the weekend regarding the reason, but finally this morning the mystery curtain was lifted.
Matt Mullenweg, the founding developer of WordPress made this announcement, where he's asking the opinion of Wordpress community as to what they think should be done?
Apparently this is what happened: the attorneys of the cult leader Adnan Oktar aka Harun Yahya, a 51 year old former interior design student known in Turkey as "Adnan Hoca", who founded in 1990 the foundation known as BAV (Bilim Arastirma Vakfi-Scientific Research Foundation), had applied to Wordpress for removal of what they described as "unlawful statements regarding their client". "As most of our attempts were unanswered" alleged the attorneys, they applied to Turkish judicial courts "to stop the defamation executed through Wordpress services". Hence, by the decision of Fatih 2nd Civil Court of First Instance, number 2007/195, access to Wordpress.com was then blocked in Turkey by TTNET, an Internet network that covers all Turkey.
We learned that the sites which Adnan Oktar's attorneys wanted removed are run by an Islamic Reformer Edip Yuksel, who wrote an article criticizing Oktar and his movement where he seems to be trying to expose Oktar and his followers as a fundamentalist movement with dark secrets. Edip Yuksel published this message of rebuttal.
Started as a religious cult that preyed on wealthy members of Turkish society, the BAV has appeared in lurid media tales about sex rings, a blackmail prosecution and speculation about its charismatic leader. But if BAV's notoriety has been burnished by a sensationalist Turkish media, the secretive group has earned its reputation as a prodigious publisher of inexpensive ideological paperbacks. BAV has put out hundreds of titles written by "Harun Yahya" (a pseudonym) on various topics, but most of them are Islamic-based attacks on the theory of evolution. His book, Atlas Of Creation, decrying evolution is now aggressively promoted well beyond the borders of Turkey to the Middle East, Europe, and even the United States. The book is turning up, unsolicited, in the mailboxes of scientists and members of the US Congress, and at science museums around USA. In France, the Harun Yahya book offensive led the government to issue a warning for schools to be on the look out for the "Atlas" before it makes it into their classrooms. Meanwhile, the increasing European activity of BAV, as well as of Christian creationist groups, recently prompted a committee of the Council of Europe – a 47-nation group that acts as a kind of continental watchdog – to issue a report strongly warning about its dangers to education.
The lavishly illustrated 800-page book is one of the most significant creationist challenge to Charles Darwin's theory, which Yahya calls a feeble and perverted ideology contradicted by the Koran. The books are slick, but BAV has had plenty of help. Creationism in Turkey got key support in the 1980s and 1990s from American creationist organizations, and BAV's Yahya books resemble the same sorts of works put out by California's Institute for Creation Research. Except in Yahya's books, it's Allah that's doing the creating. Unlike fundamentalist Christian creationists, Oktar does not claim the earth was created only a few thousand years ago. Instead, he argues that fossils show that creatures from millions of years ago looked just like the creatures of today, thus disproving evolution. Also, Oktar's brand of creationism is not only religious, but political and even messianic, seeing most of the world's ills – terrorism and fascism among them – as stemming from Darwin's theory of evolution. In 2001, Science magazine called BAV "one of the world's strongest anti-evolution movements outside of North America".
Edezu'scomment to Matt's post, really sums the man and his works:
Greetings.
I'm writing from Turkey and thought that some info on this person may be helpful.
Adnan Oktar is a religious zealot who launched a campaign against the Darwinian theory of evolution, maybe a decade ago. He has written a number of books, which, despite being worthless and even funny by scientific standards, attracted the attention of religious people. In those fundamentalist circles, he is revered as the "destroyer" of evolutionary theory as the majority of islamists consider Darwinian evolution as a refuted theory thanks to his books.
As expected, his books and the ideas in them are worthless, mistaken, false, consisting of arguments refuted even by Darwin himself 140 years ago. Alas, he is a wealthy and powerful person, thus capable of reaching many people, by sending free copies of his huge books to every school, teacher, and university. Sadly, as the public he tries to reach is mostly uneducated, his words are taken to be the truth.
As a result of this, Turkish intellectuals and those of us lucky enough to get a secular education, with an understanding of what science is, and what an argument is, are giving his ideas what they deserve. He is respected in religious circles, but ridiculed in the Internet.
This person's current strategy is to block all the sites which attacks him and his ideas. A few months ago, he made a similar move and blocked "eksi sozluk", an open dictionary which is, in my opinion, a bastion of free speech in Turkish online media, with more than 10.000 writers and about 2.000 entries each day.
Adnan Oktar is taking advantage of the gaps in Turkish laws on the Internet, which are sadly on their infancy, to silence all the voices against him. Internet poses a real threat to people like him, where ideas are exposed, and people read them!
As a philosophy graduate who take active interest in evolution-creationism debate, and as a Turkish citizen with the ideal of freedom in the online world, I suggest NOT to cooperate with this person.
We will reach our blogs anyway
All similar fundamental movements are run by extremely wealthy men, which leads to
speculations as to the source of their wealth. Another such character is Fethullah Gulen, but we'll look into his activities in another post. Incidentally, all these Islamic fundamentalist movements gained importance after AKP came into power. More reason for secularists like myself to worry about the future of Turkey.
Aug 20th, 2007 by turkishdigestEdit
As many of you may have heard, last Friday the 17th, it was revealed that access to all Wordpress.com sites from Turkey was banned. When I first heard about it, I asked my friends to check my own website We are the Turks hosted by Wordpress, to determine whether this was true. They told me the following was coming up on the screen:
"Access to this site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2007/195 of T.C. Fatih 2.Civil Court of First Instance"
I did some research and did not find much over the weekend regarding the reason, but finally this morning the mystery curtain was lifted.
Matt Mullenweg, the founding developer of WordPress made this announcement, where he's asking the opinion of Wordpress community as to what they think should be done?
Apparently this is what happened: the attorneys of the cult leader Adnan Oktar aka Harun Yahya, a 51 year old former interior design student known in Turkey as "Adnan Hoca", who founded in 1990 the foundation known as BAV (Bilim Arastirma Vakfi-Scientific Research Foundation), had applied to Wordpress for removal of what they described as "unlawful statements regarding their client". "As most of our attempts were unanswered" alleged the attorneys, they applied to Turkish judicial courts "to stop the defamation executed through Wordpress services". Hence, by the decision of Fatih 2nd Civil Court of First Instance, number 2007/195, access to Wordpress.com was then blocked in Turkey by TTNET, an Internet network that covers all Turkey.
We learned that the sites which Adnan Oktar's attorneys wanted removed are run by an Islamic Reformer Edip Yuksel, who wrote an article criticizing Oktar and his movement where he seems to be trying to expose Oktar and his followers as a fundamentalist movement with dark secrets. Edip Yuksel published this message of rebuttal.
Started as a religious cult that preyed on wealthy members of Turkish society, the BAV has appeared in lurid media tales about sex rings, a blackmail prosecution and speculation about its charismatic leader. But if BAV's notoriety has been burnished by a sensationalist Turkish media, the secretive group has earned its reputation as a prodigious publisher of inexpensive ideological paperbacks. BAV has put out hundreds of titles written by "Harun Yahya" (a pseudonym) on various topics, but most of them are Islamic-based attacks on the theory of evolution. His book, Atlas Of Creation, decrying evolution is now aggressively promoted well beyond the borders of Turkey to the Middle East, Europe, and even the United States. The book is turning up, unsolicited, in the mailboxes of scientists and members of the US Congress, and at science museums around USA. In France, the Harun Yahya book offensive led the government to issue a warning for schools to be on the look out for the "Atlas" before it makes it into their classrooms. Meanwhile, the increasing European activity of BAV, as well as of Christian creationist groups, recently prompted a committee of the Council of Europe – a 47-nation group that acts as a kind of continental watchdog – to issue a report strongly warning about its dangers to education.
The lavishly illustrated 800-page book is one of the most significant creationist challenge to Charles Darwin's theory, which Yahya calls a feeble and perverted ideology contradicted by the Koran. The books are slick, but BAV has had plenty of help. Creationism in Turkey got key support in the 1980s and 1990s from American creationist organizations, and BAV's Yahya books resemble the same sorts of works put out by California's Institute for Creation Research. Except in Yahya's books, it's Allah that's doing the creating. Unlike fundamentalist Christian creationists, Oktar does not claim the earth was created only a few thousand years ago. Instead, he argues that fossils show that creatures from millions of years ago looked just like the creatures of today, thus disproving evolution. Also, Oktar's brand of creationism is not only religious, but political and even messianic, seeing most of the world's ills – terrorism and fascism among them – as stemming from Darwin's theory of evolution. In 2001, Science magazine called BAV "one of the world's strongest anti-evolution movements outside of North America".
Edezu'scomment to Matt's post, really sums the man and his works:
Greetings.
I'm writing from Turkey and thought that some info on this person may be helpful.
Adnan Oktar is a religious zealot who launched a campaign against the Darwinian theory of evolution, maybe a decade ago. He has written a number of books, which, despite being worthless and even funny by scientific standards, attracted the attention of religious people. In those fundamentalist circles, he is revered as the "destroyer" of evolutionary theory as the majority of islamists consider Darwinian evolution as a refuted theory thanks to his books.
As expected, his books and the ideas in them are worthless, mistaken, false, consisting of arguments refuted even by Darwin himself 140 years ago. Alas, he is a wealthy and powerful person, thus capable of reaching many people, by sending free copies of his huge books to every school, teacher, and university. Sadly, as the public he tries to reach is mostly uneducated, his words are taken to be the truth.
As a result of this, Turkish intellectuals and those of us lucky enough to get a secular education, with an understanding of what science is, and what an argument is, are giving his ideas what they deserve. He is respected in religious circles, but ridiculed in the Internet.
This person's current strategy is to block all the sites which attacks him and his ideas. A few months ago, he made a similar move and blocked "eksi sozluk", an open dictionary which is, in my opinion, a bastion of free speech in Turkish online media, with more than 10.000 writers and about 2.000 entries each day.
Adnan Oktar is taking advantage of the gaps in Turkish laws on the Internet, which are sadly on their infancy, to silence all the voices against him. Internet poses a real threat to people like him, where ideas are exposed, and people read them!
As a philosophy graduate who take active interest in evolution-creationism debate, and as a Turkish citizen with the ideal of freedom in the online world, I suggest NOT to cooperate with this person.
We will reach our blogs anyway
All similar fundamental movements are run by extremely wealthy men, which leads to
speculations as to the source of their wealth. Another such character is Fethullah Gulen, but we'll look into his activities in another post. Incidentally, all these Islamic fundamentalist movements gained importance after AKP came into power. More reason for secularists like myself to worry about the future of Turkey.
Turkey bans Wordpress blogs
Turkish Internet users have been blocked from accessing sites on the Wordpress.com hosting service after a court in Istanbul ordered the site be blocked after lawyers complained that a number of blogs hosted by Wordpress were libellous of Islamic creationist author Adnan Oktar.
Here more.
Here more.
Monday, August 20, 2007
Teach your Children well...
Sunday, August the 19th, late at night:
I had an interesting conversation with a German acquaintance of mine. He is in love with the most beautiful girl in the world, according to him, and she is the most lovely person he has ever met. And she is Turkish.
Lots of comments at home in Germany. From his family, his friends, and schoolmates. But he follows his intuition and his feelings and is still planning to marry her.
I congratulated him since I am married with a Turkish woman as well.
Suddenly he asked me how Life in Turkey would be for him, as a German. I told him as a Dutch: 'Es ist bis zu Ihnen', up to you! This is German language btw, but I am Dutch..
Suddenly, he threw a question on the table, which was so striking:
'Hans, you are from the Netherlands, you can help me...'
My friend continued: 'When I was in xxxx, I asked my love, "why is the military so powerful in Turkey?", and she replied to me: "Because the Greeks wants to invade us". "We have to be strong against the imperialists".'
Take a breath...
Yes, I know that down here in Turkey, children at the age of 6 are taught about the 'internal and external enemies'...Only, is this the way how you raise up your kids?
I had an interesting conversation with a German acquaintance of mine. He is in love with the most beautiful girl in the world, according to him, and she is the most lovely person he has ever met. And she is Turkish.
Lots of comments at home in Germany. From his family, his friends, and schoolmates. But he follows his intuition and his feelings and is still planning to marry her.
I congratulated him since I am married with a Turkish woman as well.
Suddenly he asked me how Life in Turkey would be for him, as a German. I told him as a Dutch: 'Es ist bis zu Ihnen', up to you! This is German language btw, but I am Dutch..
Suddenly, he threw a question on the table, which was so striking:
'Hans, you are from the Netherlands, you can help me...'
My friend continued: 'When I was in xxxx, I asked my love, "why is the military so powerful in Turkey?", and she replied to me: "Because the Greeks wants to invade us". "We have to be strong against the imperialists".'
Take a breath...
Yes, I know that down here in Turkey, children at the age of 6 are taught about the 'internal and external enemies'...Only, is this the way how you raise up your kids?
Sunday, August 19, 2007
The court order, ban, fatwa, whatever
What I simply don't understand is why nobody knows why this court decision is made. Looks fair to me that when a court makes a decision, it issues also a statement why the decision is made...or am I wrong? Now leaving so many people in limbo, it also creates space for speculations, conspiracy theories and gossip. I think that after 5 years, I still have a lot to learn about how Turkey is ruled, but this court issued rather a fatwa than a decision...
The latest news about the fatwa...on wordpress
Below a message of a person who claims that everything is alright...
His claim is false. His claim is put on the blog of Matt of wordpress.
There are a lot of smart ICT people out there in Turkey, but with this kind of fake advice, they are burning themselves up. ... wordpress is not available in Turkey at the moment.
This is a bad joke.
Hi,
As we have stated here in Turkish:
http://www.fazlamesai.net/?a=article&cmode=nested&sid=4674#30986
the issue is about some government officer (military related) spreading some information. This critical situation led to a fast court order and the district attorney issued a written order to TTNet, the main Internet and ADSL service provider of Turkey. They had to obey this legal order but some inexperienced technical employee blocked the whole wordpress.com domain in the DNS servers which led to this mess. In a few minutes a technical middle manager realized the situation and took required action. Within a few hours the wordpress.com domain was available (except the problematic blog which is still being blocked due to legal orders). The inexperienced employee is about to leave the job.
This is the situation now, provided FYI.
His claim is false. His claim is put on the blog of Matt of wordpress.
There are a lot of smart ICT people out there in Turkey, but with this kind of fake advice, they are burning themselves up. ... wordpress is not available in Turkey at the moment.
This is a bad joke.
Hi,
As we have stated here in Turkish:
http://www.fazlamesai.net/?a=article&cmode=nested&sid=4674#30986
the issue is about some government officer (military related) spreading some information. This critical situation led to a fast court order and the district attorney issued a written order to TTNet, the main Internet and ADSL service provider of Turkey. They had to obey this legal order but some inexperienced technical employee blocked the whole wordpress.com domain in the DNS servers which led to this mess. In a few minutes a technical middle manager realized the situation and took required action. Within a few hours the wordpress.com domain was available (except the problematic blog which is still being blocked due to legal orders). The inexperienced employee is about to leave the job.
This is the situation now, provided FYI.
Saturday, August 18, 2007
My worst trip: Miami - Istanbul, but final destination
When I left this daily sunset in Miami behind on August the 17th, 2002, heading for Istanbul, I knew that my life would be different, totally different in Istanbul.
It's now exactly five years ago that I moved from the 'Capital of Latin America, Miami' to Istanbul; the cultural and business Capital of Turkey and of so many other things and in fact of nothing, because it still denies its heritage.
Anyway, between 2000 and 2002, I was traveling extensively between Europe and the USA and within Europe and America. And earned so many Air miles (Skymiles of Delta, Air France and British Airways), that I was able to make at least one inter-continental trip each year for free. So, my last flight from Miami to Europe was a free one. With some stop-overs, but who cares, if the excitement of going to live in another country got me head over heels.
Anyway, the free trip was: Miami-Atlanta-Milan-Paris-Istanbul.
The flight from Miami to Atlanta was a flight which I took so many times. But from there it was always Amsterdam as final destination. Now: Milan (not Malpensa). There I had to wait for 10 hrs. for a flight to Paris, from where a direct flight to Istanbul was booked for me.
The flight from Atlanta was an overnight flight: leaving on Friday at 6 PM, local time, and arriving the day after, Saturday the 18th of August at 8.00 AM in Milan. And then: niente.
Waiting, with three heavy suite cases for my flight to Paris. But... my flight to Paris was canceled at the last minute at 3 PM. So, how could I reach the people who were waiting for me at Atatürk Airport? Thanks to Air France, which allowed me to make a phone call to Istanbul for free (my credit cards and mobile phone where left behind in Miami, as you understand).
But then, more important, how could I make it to Istanbul? And again, with a lot of help of employees of Air France and Alitalia, they booked me on a flight to Vienna with Lauda Airlines. Don't think that this is some kind of charter: it's first class only. In Vienna I had to wait 2 hrs. before Austrian Airlines took off at 11.30 PM for Istanbul. An Airbus with...12 passengers...so we were all treated like Royalty...))
At 2 AM, Sunday,I landed already safe in Istanbul. An exhausting trip of 32 hrs.
He, am I bored in Istanbul? No way, life is never dull here...like my trip from Miami to Istanbul.
I think, I know
Why they banned wordpress in Turkey: because it's today exactly five years ago that I moved from Miami to Istanbul, so I get some more attention..)) Just kidding!
I found on Matt's blog (the guy behind wordpress) the following comments:
"If we’d knew the exact reason, we’d comment about it. But it’s obvious that the banning is because of an insulting or a contemning blog article about someone. (Who I guess is Harun Yahya which known as Adnan Oktar) http://wordpress.com/tag/adnan-oktar/
This person is related with previous banning of the popular sites like Eksisozluk and Antoloji in Turkey"
kahveisteyen17.08.2007 @ 4:41 pm
We, citizens of Turkey are not even worth of an explanation. Still some say we have democracy I think only the last letter is true. TYRANNY…
Hans18.08.2007 @ 4:15 am
Dear Ozkan,
Are you telling that because of one person his article they banned wordpress. (People get quick insulted down here)
It’s a court decision, and I am pondering why they don’t give a reason.
kindest
I found on Matt's blog (the guy behind wordpress) the following comments:
"If we’d knew the exact reason, we’d comment about it. But it’s obvious that the banning is because of an insulting or a contemning blog article about someone. (Who I guess is Harun Yahya which known as Adnan Oktar) http://wordpress.com/tag/adnan-oktar/
This person is related with previous banning of the popular sites like Eksisozluk and Antoloji in Turkey"
kahveisteyen17.08.2007 @ 4:41 pm
We, citizens of Turkey are not even worth of an explanation. Still some say we have democracy I think only the last letter is true. TYRANNY…
Hans18.08.2007 @ 4:15 am
Dear Ozkan,
Are you telling that because of one person his article they banned wordpress. (People get quick insulted down here)
It’s a court decision, and I am pondering why they don’t give a reason.
kindest
Friday, August 17, 2007
Access to Wordpress blogs suspended from I-net in Turkey
Looks like access to all the blogs of wordpress worldwide are suspended in Turkey. Get all the time the following screen shot:
Access to this site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2007/195 of T.C. Fatih 2.Civil Court of First Instance.
Bu siteye erişim mahkeme kararıyla engellenmiştir.
T.C. Fatih 2.Asliye Hukuk Mahkemesi 2007/195 Nolu Kararı gereği bu siteye erişim engellenmiştir.
Access to this site has been suspended in accordance with decision no: 2007/195 of T.C. Fatih 2.Civil Court of First Instance.
Survey on perceptions of quality of life in 75 European cities
Looks like the citizens of Istanbul, Napoli and Athens are the least satisfied.
Athens has another thing in common with Istanbul...)
Read here the full report.
Athens has another thing in common with Istanbul...)
Read here the full report.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Gizeh (Cairo), Egypt and Teotihuacan, Mexico
Reading books about history and mystics, I was always intrigued by the pyramids.
I visited Gizeh in 1977 and Teotihuacan in 1983. Just 21 years old, since they told me if you visit both, you will be part of a Golden and Heavenly triangle..))
Will put pictures of Gizeh, Asam (Egypt) and Sudan later here. And will ask a German photographer to allow me to use his beautiful pictures taken in Mexico on this blog.
I have still some nice stories about Mexico to tell.
I visited Gizeh in 1977 and Teotihuacan in 1983. Just 21 years old, since they told me if you visit both, you will be part of a Golden and Heavenly triangle..))
Will put pictures of Gizeh, Asam (Egypt) and Sudan later here. And will ask a German photographer to allow me to use his beautiful pictures taken in Mexico on this blog.
I have still some nice stories about Mexico to tell.
The Last Stalinist: read and Judge.
Mismanagement
While Erdoğan is often accused of mismanaging the presidential election process, the total fiasco of Baykal is just ignored.
By Yusuf KANLI
It must be peculiar to Turkey. Is there a similar situation anywhere else?
Sure, in a democracy people may oppose certain policies of the leader of their party. They may have a very strong position about certain practices undertaken by their leader. But I do not think there is such a widespread “Voting for my party despite my leader” feeling anywhere else. With this huge success, perennial opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal must have earned a distinguished place for himself in the Guinness Book of Records. If he was not given a place in that book, he has all the right to complain of being subjected to a gross injustice.
The Turkish electorate sent a very strong message to the CHP back in 1999 by keeping it out of Parliament for the first time in the history of the founding party of the modern Turkish republic. It received only 8.7 percent of the votes. The message was loud and clear: Change and get rid of the antagonistic mentality, conservatism, and live up to the heritage of your and the republic's founder Mustafa Kemal Atatürk by converting yourself into a progressive force. Another message was that members and supporters of the CHP wanted a rejuvenation of the party. They were against their party becoming a Jurassic park of geriatric dinosaurs.
Read more here.
My first trip to Mexico - 2
Detailed view of Pyramid of the Sun at Teotihuacan, Mexico. It is 70 meters high and is the third largest pyramid of the world! More later...
Yazidis and G.I. Gurdjieff
Yazidis are members of a small religious group. Their religion is little known to outsiders, but contains elements of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and also includes the veneration of Peacock Angel, as shown above.
They were attacked yesterday, Wednesday August the 15t by Al-Qaida, and probably the most violent attack after the fall of Saddam Hussein.
As they believe in a Supreme God, they don't believe in hell, sin or the devil.
The Yazidis' cultural practices are observably Kurdish, and almost all speak Kurmanjî (Northern Kurdish), with the exception of the villages of Bashiqa and Bahazane in Northern Iraq, where Arabic is spoken. Kurmanjî is the language of almost all the orally transmitted religious traditions of the Yazidis. Thus, religious origins are somewhat complex.
The Yazidis, perhaps because of their secrecy, also have a place in modern occultism. G. I. Gurdjieff wrote about his encounters with the Yazidis several times in his book Meetings with Remarkable Men, mentioning that they are considered to be "devil worshippers" by other ethnicities in the region.
G.I. Gurdjieff is a Greek Armenian thinker who spent some time in Istanbul in the beginning of the 20th century.
And he is most notable for introducing the Fourth Way, while he is also recognized for introducing other concepts, such as the Enneagram.
His mystic teaching influenced management theories in the last decade of the 20th century.
Gurdjieff's teaching mainly addresses the question of people's place in the Universe and their possibilities for inner development. He also emphasized that some people live their lives in a form of waking sleep, and that higher levels of consciousness, higher bodies, and various inner abilities are possible.
Gurdjieff taught people how to increase and focus their attention and energy in various ways, and to minimize daydreaming and absentmindedness. According to his teaching, this inner development in oneself is the beginning of a possible further process of change, whose aim is to transform a man into what Gurdjieff believed he ought to be.
It's sad that Yazidis, although known about the stoning of Du’a Khalil Aswad in April of this year, were victims of this brutal attack.
That French thing...
We came back from France last Thursday evening only after 10 days of touring around. I will write more about our tour in my blog, but here I want to report my first observations.
- The cities on the French Riviera are not that special except for their esplanades.
- I didn't see many beautiful French women. Are they all hiding up in Paris, or their beauty is hidden to the eye? :-P
- I don't want to hear anybody complaining about the way we Turks and/or Italians drive any more after seeing how the French are driving. They are crazy. They drive fast on highways, in the cities and, worst of all, inside the parking houses. They do not obey most of the traffic rules and if you point out their mistake they get angry and they always have a finger ready to show you where the sky is. I don't even want to comment on how the women are driving and behaving in traffic...
- If you have a SUV, stay far away from the parking houses in France, because they are made for tiny little cars. On many occasions we were afraid to enter these houses with our car since the max height was most of the time 1.80 meters (and in two of them even 1.70 meters)! Once we parked our car in a parking house but were not able to open the trunk because if we did, it would have touched the ceiling!
- You eat very well in France but you also pay quite much for what you eat. And those crepes... How much we ate.. We even looked for an open crepe shop (most of them were closed for vacation) for over an hour under rain in Lyon, waited for the girl to prepare our crepes for about 20 minutes and ate them again under the rain.. with no umbrella.
- It was very strange to find more than 90% of the churches closed. We love going inside churches, studying their architecture (not that we know anything about architecture, but it is fun) and trying to find some elements, symbols that hint the presence/influence of the Templar knights, Freemasons, Mary Magdalene etc. Do not miss out the cathedral in St. Maximin if you also like that kind of stuff.
- What is it with the French and their love for lingerie? I have never seen so many lingerie shops on one single street in my life.
- I have been stopped by people that were asking for directions many times. They thought I was French. I am not sure whether this is good or bad... that I look 'French', I mean... :-)
- All in all France is a beautiful country definitely worth many other visits. But beware: it is not a cheap touristic destination.
Now I have to pack, again, since me and by sweety are off to Austria this Saturday. We will be relaxing on the mountain in a spa hotel for a week.
- The cities on the French Riviera are not that special except for their esplanades.
- I didn't see many beautiful French women. Are they all hiding up in Paris, or their beauty is hidden to the eye? :-P
- I don't want to hear anybody complaining about the way we Turks and/or Italians drive any more after seeing how the French are driving. They are crazy. They drive fast on highways, in the cities and, worst of all, inside the parking houses. They do not obey most of the traffic rules and if you point out their mistake they get angry and they always have a finger ready to show you where the sky is. I don't even want to comment on how the women are driving and behaving in traffic...
- If you have a SUV, stay far away from the parking houses in France, because they are made for tiny little cars. On many occasions we were afraid to enter these houses with our car since the max height was most of the time 1.80 meters (and in two of them even 1.70 meters)! Once we parked our car in a parking house but were not able to open the trunk because if we did, it would have touched the ceiling!
- You eat very well in France but you also pay quite much for what you eat. And those crepes... How much we ate.. We even looked for an open crepe shop (most of them were closed for vacation) for over an hour under rain in Lyon, waited for the girl to prepare our crepes for about 20 minutes and ate them again under the rain.. with no umbrella.
- It was very strange to find more than 90% of the churches closed. We love going inside churches, studying their architecture (not that we know anything about architecture, but it is fun) and trying to find some elements, symbols that hint the presence/influence of the Templar knights, Freemasons, Mary Magdalene etc. Do not miss out the cathedral in St. Maximin if you also like that kind of stuff.
- What is it with the French and their love for lingerie? I have never seen so many lingerie shops on one single street in my life.
- I have been stopped by people that were asking for directions many times. They thought I was French. I am not sure whether this is good or bad... that I look 'French', I mean... :-)
- All in all France is a beautiful country definitely worth many other visits. But beware: it is not a cheap touristic destination.
Now I have to pack, again, since me and by sweety are off to Austria this Saturday. We will be relaxing on the mountain in a spa hotel for a week.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Consensus, compromise and collaboration
Now that probably A. Gül will be the only candidate for the president vacancy in Turkey, some columnists are already stating that he is not a consensus-candidate. Yes, he is not. But is a consensus-candidate needed? With a party which has gained 47% of the votes, for sure, if there was presidential elections with a popular vote, he would win. And is Deniz Baykal a consensus and compromise like minded CHP party leader? More a dictator...
In my opinion, Turkey needs a compromise-candidate. But without any input from the opposition, how can this be achieved? The anti-government stance of CHP, in all that the AK-government is doing, brings themselves out to the spotlight and out to the true democratic decision making process. The fact that they already announced to boycott the elections in the Turkish parliament, shows only how a-democratic they are. And they will boycott all kind of events when A. Gül will be president, ensuring that there will be more tension in Turkey, paving the way for the military.
Dialogue and debate are two major pillars in a modern democracy. That's what is lacking in Turkey. If the CHP which has the word of 'republicanism' in their banner, they really must understand what Republicanism means: it's the ideology of governing a nation as a republic, with an emphasis on liberty, ruled by the people, and the civic virtue practiced by citizens. Republicanism always stands in opposition to aristocracy, oligarchy, and dictatorship.
It's time that the CHP begins to collaborate, in the true spirit of democracy.
In my opinion, Turkey needs a compromise-candidate. But without any input from the opposition, how can this be achieved? The anti-government stance of CHP, in all that the AK-government is doing, brings themselves out to the spotlight and out to the true democratic decision making process. The fact that they already announced to boycott the elections in the Turkish parliament, shows only how a-democratic they are. And they will boycott all kind of events when A. Gül will be president, ensuring that there will be more tension in Turkey, paving the way for the military.
Dialogue and debate are two major pillars in a modern democracy. That's what is lacking in Turkey. If the CHP which has the word of 'republicanism' in their banner, they really must understand what Republicanism means: it's the ideology of governing a nation as a republic, with an emphasis on liberty, ruled by the people, and the civic virtue practiced by citizens. Republicanism always stands in opposition to aristocracy, oligarchy, and dictatorship.
It's time that the CHP begins to collaborate, in the true spirit of democracy.
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