Desert Safari

I thought that my first post should be related to the region where I am living!

If you come to Dubai for a holiday or for any other reason, you shouldn't leave without doing a Safari :) With a licensed driver and a specially made Toyota Cruiser 4x4 with capacity for 7 persons, you will be taken to a place where you might think you are on Mars or something, or in one of those Indiana Jones movie screen shots :-)


Most of the hotels' concierge would help you with your Safari reservation; 180Dhr (49$) per person including food and drinks for a full 7 hours trip. I suggest not to fill your stomach too much, in case :) Generally around 15:00 hours, you will be picked up from your hotel lobby and taken to Oman-Hatta road. Before the Safari can start, they stop for taking the air out of the car wheels.

After riding up and down like on a slide at a theme park, but with a bit more fun (which is called 'Safari Bashing'), you will stop on top of the mountain to watch the sunset... Think that you may not see those mountains or valleys again tomorrow..

Afterwards you will be taken to a desert camp in the middle of nowhere, and if you want, you can ride a camel and get your photo taken...


Or you can dress up like a local emir with a disdas for men and black abaya for women ...
Or you can get a henna tattoo within 2 seconds on your leg, arm or back, wherever you like, made by an Indian woman. After eating a selection of Arabic food and drinks, come the belly dancer and a bit of Arabic music. Then you will be taken back to your hotel by 9:30pm.



You will definitely enjoy it for sure :)

With Love from Dubai

I have been following 'Internations Musings' for a while now. Hans has the greatest interesting subjects on his blog and we do not only get to know many people through his blog but also get informed as well. Well, when Hans asked me that humble question to join as co-author I said 'Yes'!

I have been asked to describe myself: I am Turkish, with full Turkish mother and Cypriot Turkish father, educated with hotel and tourism management background. As you understand from my surname, I am married with a British/German, well more like world-man really, as he has been out of his country since 20 years. We have 2 daughters, Isabella Aleyna 9, and Victoria Asya 7. We have been around the world due to working for international hotel company; 8 countries and 12 cities within 14 years, yes, it is time to slow down and settle down a little bit for the sake of the kids' schooling.

Have a lovely day, greetings from hot, sunny and humid Dubai!

Derya Lount

New co-author: Derya

Today Derya Lount, a Turkish woman, currently residing in Dubai, will join this blog as co-author. She has her bilingual own blog as well.
So we're now with 5 persons: Myrthe, Yasemin, Vassilli, Derya and me, Hans. I expect another co-author from Cyprus to join us soon.
Derya will introduce herself. Her surname doesn't sound Arabic or Turkish at all...the screen is for her to explain..)

On the same page...

An interview with the Armenian Patriarch of Istanbul, Mesrob II, read it here.


..and an article about the folksinger İsmail Türüt who is praising in his last song (lyrics by Ozan Arif) the people that killed Dink and Father Andrea Santoro, an Italian priest in the Black Sea region. Read it here.
Interesting to start your day and week with...racism...

Iraq

There is a lot of news about Iraq lately.
In general: another suicide bomb attack. How courageous.
But for the real life stories from Bagdad read the blog of Mohammed.

My first trip to Egypt

I was 17, 30 years ago, if I remember myself well..)) Made my first trip to Egypt. In fact, we, my friend Han and I, bought an inter rail ticket, which means: one month free traveling by train in Europe. But we already had our plans; straight to Athens, and then check how we could go to Egypt.
We left on a sunny Saturday morning from Utrecht, all the way to Athens, where we arrived the next Monday, late at night. Two and a half days by train...


After we checked in at a hotel in downtown Athens, we looked for a flight to Cairo.
We knew that IPEC (a student organization by then) offered one way tickets to Cairo from Athens. But, both of us were no students then. Anyway, Han 'seduced' the front office employee of this organization and we got our tickets: 25 USD each...

Our first visit in Cairo was of course to Gizeh.

See the pictures.


One of the most interesting part was 'climbing' in the pyramid, all the way up to the Kings' Chamber....



It is still a mystery, how this could be built....

More about my trip later...

I am a REDHEADED person

"Hans, since u are a christian man married to a Muslim woman, then u actually do not know what u're talking about!! this marriage is not right according to both Islamic and christian rulings, which means that u don't respect neither ur religion, nor the other's religion.Hans, do u believe in justice, and freedom ,or u're like those redheaded in turkey?!! '

I made a comment about the Muslim Brotherhood on Sondos' blog, and got this (anonymous) reply back. When I first saw it, I thought: wow, how nice. Then, I saw that this person writes Muslim with a capital and Christian without. The hate over there in Egypt against Christians (especially Copt) is obvious.
Although I think that 'Sondos' is a witty and intelligent woman, she defends the Muslim Brotherhood as they are like some kind of peacemakers. And in the meanwhile, she defends that violence against the 1948 'invaders' (read Jews) are legitimate. In my humble opinion: The Arabs invaded Jerusalem!
Sondos, I have Turkish Muslim friends who are married to Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Jews, Protestants, Bahia's, Atheists, Armenian Orthodox and Buddhists. Do you have them as well? Or are the MB and Hamas their racist ideology your only guidance?
Ever notice that a civil marriage is legal?

Sondos: Do you want to convert Julius Cesar and Shakespeare to Islam too?.....Oops, I get emotional, but insults and stupid comments like the one above are not for us, we, me.
And don't use Turkey as an example a proxy for your blood hunt against everything who is non Muslim.

Pasta in the news

Today we have a "shopping strike" in Italy: nobody is supposed to buy pasta. Not only uncooked pasta, but the consumers are invited to stay away from the bars where it is usual for most Italians to have their morning croissant and lunch, which is usually some kind of pasta. The consumer associations urge us to show our disapproval of the expected increase in the price of pasta, bread and milk this autumn. Italy is the country where the consumption of pasta is the highest in the world. An Italian cannot survive two consecutive days without eating his pasta. The Italian families have just survived the expensive shopping period for school materials these last weeks, and they had enough of the rumors and news about the price increase in their beloved pasta. I wonder if this strike will have any effect on the decisions of the government, I have my doubts..


By the way, I once made the longest pasta with a Norwegian friend in a longest pasta making competition (!) in Bergen, Norway. Look at the photo above (the girl on the left is me). And can you believe that this photo was on the front page of Bergens Tidende, a daily Norwegian newspaper? And not only that, it was news that began on the front page and took half of the third page as well. In Norway there is something called "agurk nyheter", meaning "cucumber news", news that is quite stupid and unimportant but is published because it is summer time and the journalists do not have much to do. Yes, I was in a cucumber news article in Norway, with my longest pasta.... :-)

The languages we speak

The four of us, Myrthe, Yasemin, Vassilli and I are all raised up in a country other than the one where we are residing. We all speak several languages. To give you an idea about which languages we speak fluently (one or some of us) here is the list:

Fluent:

1. English
2. Russian
3. Greek
4. Italian
5. Turkish
6. Dutch
7. Norwegian
8. Armenian
9. French
10. German

and Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese and Abase, moderated.

If I am wrong, the co-authors themselves can correct it...

The AKP watch and Wordpress

Sean, who is living in Lower Saxony sent me a link. The creepy involvement of these idiots is scary. Here is the link.
Wordpress and the lawyer of this Adnan O. boggy guy, are not twisting in courts, it's a status quo: no solution expected soon.
After almost four weeks, no progress is made and I don't expect any solution soon.
Unless the Ombudsman, which was proposed by the AK party, but vetoed by former
President Sezer, becomes a law, then... only then, we can maybe expect something. And I am sure that the AK party has to show its true face.
It's now up to the AKP government to show how genuine they are...

Shopping

Shopping in a Supermarket in Harare, Zimbabwe.

Fake ID's on Internet

Posing as a reputable company on the Internet is incredibly easy. In fact, building a seemingly legitimate corporate Web page can be as straightforward as copying and pasting from the real thing.
As a result, companies in the USA and West Europe are increasingly falling victim to fraudsters that are using "spoofed" e-mails and Websites to trick their customers into sharing credit card numbers and other personal information. These kinds of corporate identity attacks undermine customer confidence and loyalty, ultimately costing a business dearly in customer service issues, bad publicity and lost revenues.

But what about people acting on Internet using a fake identity?
The Dutch Minister of Justice, Mr. Ernst Hirsch Ballin announced earlier this week that there will be a new law in the Netherlands, which makes using a fake identity on Internet, with the sole purpose of having sex with children, illegal. Especially people who are in a chat box to seduce minors. In October it's expected that the EU will adapt this law for all the countries within the EU. But what about dating services, interactive (sex)blogs etc.? Curious what the next step will be.

What will happen with Brussels, the EU, Nato..))

For the past days King Albert II of Belgium has been consulting the members of the Crown Council. He is seeking their help to solve what the Royal Palace itself calls the Belgian "political crisis".
The last time the Belgian King summoned the Crown Council because he had lost confidence in the elected politicians was in 1960, during the crisis surrounding the independence of Belgium’s Congo colony.
Apart from 1960, the Crown Council has only convened on four occasions during Belgium’s 177 years of existence: in 1870 at the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War, in 1914 on the occasion of the German ultimatum to Belgium, in 1919 for the Treaty of Versailles, and in 1950 at the return from exile of Albert II and his father, King Leopold III, a notorious anti-Semitic Nazi collaborator.
Recently the conservative French newspaper Le Figaro published a column by Alexandre Adler in which Adler urged the French President Sarkozy to prepare for the annexation of Wallonia by France.
Adler said Sarkozy should not miss this historic opportunity "to govern an enlarged France". He referred to the example of former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, who in 1990 grabbed the opportunity to incorporate East Germany into the German Federal Republic.
Last week a survey in the Netherlands showed 77% of the Dutch in favor of reuniting the Netherlands and Flanders. It is becoming increasingly clear with every passing hour: Belgium will break up. The Flemish will join Holland and the Walloonies will re-join Froggystan.
And the Dutch can not make jokes about the Belgians anymore...

The same old rhetoric

Here is 'my man' again: Ali Külebi. With a bunch of allegations, and rhetoric as if he is member of some kind of Politburo. His columns are always great fun for me, simply because he is using a style and language which is so anachronistic. Like Vassili wrote in his posting of today on his blog, about the good old communists, Turkey has them as well...like Ali Külebi.
Read his article here.

A tale of two racists

In March 1996, a new politician entered the Australian political scene, her name, Pauline Hanson. Her entry into Federal politics shook the political landscape and she quickly became a person to be reviled for her racist attitudes. She declared that Australia was in danger of being "Swamped by Asians", Aboriginals who suffer from extreme poverty and tragic health problems (Australia a first world country - receives assistance from UN bureaus as if it were a third world country to deal with these conditions), also came under attack from her.
People quickly divided into those who hated her and those who loved her.

For me, her appearance was a welcome one. For years politicians from both sides of the fence would allude similar comments, nothing as overt as Pauline, but still racist. Now for the first time I could say "YOU'RE ALL LIARS, Racism exists and here is the proof." Unfortunately the discussion about racism revolved around her, so when she lost her political seat, everyone showed it as proof that Australians weren't racist.

The truth is more complex. The governing Liberal party quietly adopted most of her policies and actually implemented them. When destitute refugees tried to enter Australia, the Prime Minister John Howard actually said that the refugees were drowning their children to get sympathy so they could enter Australia. He halted the policy of engagement with Asia, which only now is changing thanks to the economic boom of China. But he still sees Australia as the White Western civilised force in Asia. As a result we saw the recent race riots in Sydney and anyone 'foreign' looking, especially middle eastern looking is in danger of being beaten up, being abused in school or the workplace.

Now in Greece I am seeing a repetition. Karatzaferis of the LAOS party looks like he will enter parliament. LAOS is based on racist attitudes, though they are not automatically self evident. To the public he will announce "It is shameful the way Greece treats refugees, they should be treated with more dignity and services need to be put into place to assist them". Now if that's all I heard, I would vote for him. Tune in however to his television channel where he talks to the faithful and he adds something else. "Since we can't treat them with dignity, we can't accept them into the country, let's do what the Netherlands is doing and discuss a cap on immigration"
Listen a bit more and one realises a bigger truth. During the live debate he quoted the Greek Foreign Affairs minister Dora Bakoyianni when she said that the fires were caused by foreigners who do not love Greece. Karatzaferis added, "If this is true then steps need to be taken".

Yes he is a racist, but one person is not the embodiment of all racism. Other people have sown the seeds and extreme racists are just following the logical path that others set. Dora's comments were just as racist, but because she does not belong to LAOS, an 'extreme' right wing party, she can make these comments without scrutiny. Other racist elements also exist in the governing New Democracy party of Greece. The Nomarch of Thessaloniki, Mr Psomiadis, (do I have to give more publicity to this clown?) made a huge issue of the fact that children whose background were not Greek were holding the Greek flag during school parades. He and the rest of the ND party also criticised PASOK for having a Greek-Turkish Muslim on their ballot during the last local elections.

Greece should use LAOS for its own benefit. Now is the time to analyse racism in ALL its forms, and should not do what Australia did and label just one person as racist. Because the fact that extreme racists exist - means that 'moderate' racists have been gaining ground. And isn't moderate racists a stupid word. Racism is racism, there is no Extreme racism - that's only the word used by racists who want to look more civilised, but there is nothing civilised about any of this.

The Master, His funeral

His daughters..


And their father...who died too young at the age of 71.

Nothing new under the South European Sun

This kind of pictures scares the hell out of me. I thought that we were living in the 21st century. Fanaticism is still 'acceptable' in Turkey, sorry to say that.

Xenophobia on the rise among Turks, say experts. Read here the story.
But also in Greece, nationalism is gaining ground. Which doesn't promise good things for the future. I still get upset when I see ultra-nationalistic groups such as this, preaching hate.

Read here the story why Greek nationalists are doing well in the polls.

This part of the world can do much better if they settle their disputes. And we have to understand that (ultra) nationalism is a disease.

Who is she?

Some of you may know about me from my comments on this blog or may have even been reading my blog The Armenian Odar. For those who don't I'll just tell you a bit about me.

Like Hans, I am originally from Holland, and like him, I left my native country and ended up living on the other side of Europe, in Armenia in my case. I moved to Yerevan almost three years ago, after traveling back and forth between Holland and Armenia for over four years.

I guess there's something I like about the country and the people, otherwise I wouldn't have stayed and made my home there. ;-) This doesn't mean that I am not critical about Armenia, its people, its leaders and its Diaspora. There is lots of room for change without the country losing its character and culture. But that's for later posts.

When Hans asked me about my profession to put in the sidebar, I send a text message back: That's a good question: What IS my profession? I work part time at an international IT-company, this is the job that pays the bills and that I would trade in any time for something more interesting and less brain-killing. I work part time at an NGO in Yerevan that works on women's (rights) issues as a program manager, website-administrator and general IT-savvy person around. This is the job that I do because I love it, the people are nice, the work is interesting and I learn things and new skills. Finally, I teach Dutch to private students, which is something I rolled into by accident, but I ended up enjoying teaching. I guess Hans picked the right one (even though I am not a practicing lawyer), as that is the job I like best and that is in the direction of what I really want to do for a living.

When Hans asked me to join him, Vasilli and Yasemin as co-blogger, it wasn't hard to say yes. But at the same time part of me was thinking: "What am I getting myself into?" What with all the problems and the history between Turkey and Armenia. I am sure sensitive subjects or discussions will sooner or later come up, but I am not here to impose my opinions on anyone, let alone spread hatred. I just want to share with you pieces of life in Armenia, the way I see things here and issues that are 'in the news' here. Things like that.

So, I hope you'll enjoy my posts here.

How I settled down in Turkey

When I filed for a work permit in the USA in May 2002, my lawyer in Miami told me that it would be difficult. Especially since the USA was heading towards a recession and the 9/11 attacks made the USA more careful. So he told me to go on a long holiday in the Netherlands (you always have to pick up your work permit - if granted - in your country of birth). I made flight reservations for Miami-London-Amsterdam on June 1, and back Amsterdam-London-Miami for the 6th of July.
Since I didn't want to stay for 5 weeks in the Netherlands I booked a trip to Istanbul for mid June as well, since a girl wanted me to come over 'maybe you can help our company'...
So, on the 10th of June I flew to Istanbul and this girl showed me the first 4 nights Leila, Reina, Sunset and a Mexican bar/restaurant in Etiler. I was shocked! In a culture shock! So different than I expected...and I extended my trip twice - Turkey was playing in the World Soccer Championship...so Istanbul was INTO that, and me too - no need to go back to the Netherlands.
My planned trip of 5 days became a holiday of 14 days. In the end, I didn't have to go to Turkey since the USA granted me a work permit after 10 days...which my Brazilian girlfriend by then, announced me while I was in Turkey...
Anyway, this girl who asked me to come over to help her company 'seduced' me with all these nice restaurants and places. You can find her here...))
Yes, I had to go back to Amsterdam and pick up my work permit and I flew back to Miami in July, where I made the decision to 'emigrate' to Istanbul. Where I married on June 7, 2003 in Ciragan Palace...with this girl, who in fact kidnapped me from my nice place in Miami..))

If you ask me: 'Do you like Turkey', I will say: 'I love it'. People are relaxed but are not aware of the treasures of this country. Yet, I don't like some die-hard Kemalists and ultra-nationalists who are sickening this country all the time, giving Turkey a bad name.

But when being abroad, I am always looking forwards to go back to Istanbul, my last and ever Love.

New co-author

Next to Vassili, an Australian Greek living in Athens, and Yasemin a Turkish woman in Italy, Myrthe a Dutch living in Yerevan, Armenia will be the next co-author on this blog.
More opinions and more direct insights from various countries will make this blog more colorful. In my opinion. The next and probably last co-author will be a friend who is living in the USA. His father is a Turkish Cypriot and his mother a Greek Cypriot...

Enjoy!