from the Dead Sea
I left Turkey on a high note after bicycling along the hilly southern coast of the Sea of Marmara past windmills and farms. When I left Istanbul, I crossed the sea on a ferryboat and arrived in a small port town at sundown where crowds of men were chanting and waving flags in the street and lighting things on fire. At first I thought there was a protest but quickly learned it was about a soccer game. It wasn’t safe to camp outside so I tried to find a cheap hotel but there was nothing I could afford. Overhearing my plight, A bellboy ran out after me and said I could stay at his place and he would stay at his parents’. I agreed since there were no other options. I slept on the neon-flowered carpet in a small studio with nothing but a TV and couch and a horrible mold smell. In the middle of the night the bellboy came pounding on the door crying out my name. I answered and had a very strange conversation that began aggressively and then wound down to a young man telling me how sad and lonely he is and how he secretly writes a science fiction book but has no faith in it and no one to share it with. Most conversations with people who try to ensnare me in someway end with their cry for help rather than my own. There are many lonely people in this world.
The next night I camped out on the deck of an abandoned summerhouse by the sea and showered outdoors in freezing water.
I ran into a young man at the university. He was planted in front on the ground with a big red flag with painted black letters. I smelled protest. He said he was kicked out of school for a month for his communist views and for resisting an inspection at the university gate. He has sat every day for 30 days protesting his treatment, refusing to leave. This day I found him was his last day. He will return to study law so that he can come out to try to smash the system and assist his fellow activists.
He said he gets his power in the belief that someday, the people will rise up, rise up against the police repression, the censorship, the violence.
Although most people I spoke to and saw seem very content to allow the waves to crash over their culture, to be hummed to sleep by brands and convenience.
When the action in Turkey was hot in the 60s and 70s, police came down hard and it's a tremendous effort to recover from something like that and start again. But it only takes one spark to make a wild fire.
I ran into a young man at the university. He was planted in front on the ground with a big red flag with painted black letters. I smelled protest. He said he was kicked out of school for a month for his communist views and for resisting an inspection at the university gate. He has sat every day for 30 days protesting his treatment, refusing to leave. This day I found him was his last day. He will return to study law so that he can come out to try to smash the system and assist his fellow activists.
He said he gets his power in the belief that someday, the people will rise up, rise up against the police repression, the censorship, the violence.
Although most people I spoke to and saw seem very content to allow the waves to crash over their culture, to be hummed to sleep by brands and convenience.
When the action in Turkey was hot in the 60s and 70s, police came down hard and it's a tremendous effort to recover from something like that and start again. But it only takes one spark to make a wild fire.
Turkey:
This all looks like so much fun; it's pure in so many ways.
ReplyDelete- Brian