Dumping Digiturk

We’re busy planning our repatriation to Blighty. We’re not actually leaving until June but it pays to start early. As my project guru, Liam has drawn up a long list of ‘must do’s’. Top of the agenda? Ditching our account with Digiturk, the national satellite TV broadcaster. We won’t miss it, not because it’s a bad service per se, but because more often than not we watch British TV through our VPN.

Liam rang Digiturk’s all singing, all dancing English Language call centre to cancel. The rude little runt on the end of the line was having none of it. Liam was given a cock and bull story about ‘applying’ to close our account by fax to Istanbul. We would need to provide another photocopy of my passport together with a notarised copy of my grandmother’s bra size. ‘You want to complain? Tough. My manager doesn’t speak English.’ Was the rude little runt having a bad day?  Maybe he was fed up dealing with rude little emigreys. Liam rang a second time – different rude little runt, same rude little script. Digiturk’s tone deaf one-stop shop for expats seems to have developed two left feet. Liam kept his cool and thanked the brick wall for his help. There’s no point losing your rag with the hired help.

Eventually, we managed to close the account via an exchange of heated emails written in English and translated into Googled Turkish. Liam kept the message simple ‘I am moving to England. I am cancelling my service. You can’t stop me.’ It worked. Tick. Next?

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The Ab Fab Impossibly Glamorous

The Ab Fab Impossibly Glamorous

impossibly glamorousI’d like to introduce American Expat returnee, Charles Ayres. Charles is funny and talented, and quite famous in his own lunchtime. He’s written for Harper’s Bazaar and Metropolis, handled the international PR for Tokyo FM’s annual Earth Day concert and popped up the big and small screen, most notably on the Japanese TV show “It’s OK to Laugh” (Waratte ii Tomo) and film “The Billion Yen Jackpot!” (Juoku-en Kasegu!)

Charles lived in the Land of the Rising Sun for 12 years and left after the 2011 earthquake. After experiencing the Big One, he moved to San Francisco to wait for the next Big One. He’s released his autobiography, Impossibly Glamorous, “The rudest book you’ll ever love,” detailing his life growing up as a raver in the American Midwest and taking over New York and Japan.

Charles has been a great supporter of Perking the Pansies, virtually from the beginning, and jumped in to help with promoting the book. He was one of the first to review Perking the Pansies

Check out Impossibly Glamorous on…

amazon.co.uk

amazon.com

Review of the Year, 2011

Happy New Year to pansy fans one and all from a stormy, rain-sodden Bodrum. In the best tradition of the New Year and all those cheap-to-make review and top ten TV compilations I give you:

Perking the Pansies Top Ten 2011

An eclectic mix of the mad, the glad, the sad and the bad, the old, the bold, the sold and the gold. It’s interesting how few of these posts are actually related to expats directly. The list represents around 20% of all hits to Perking the Pansies (out of about 500 posts). Fancy that.

  1. Amy Winehouse, RIP
  2. Now, That’s What I Call Old
  3. Are We Mad?
  4. Pussy Galore
  5. Gay Marriage in New York
  6. Expat Glossary
  7. Publish and Be Damned
  8. There’s Hope for Us All
  9. Happy Birthday Perking the Pansies
  10. Sisters Are Doing it for Themselves

I wonder what 2012 has in store?

This is in store right now.

Blighted Blighty

Blighted Blighty

 

I received a witty email from Blighty life friend, Ian. No, that’s not him in the photo. As youngish singletons, he and I cruised across Europe and beyond, seeking high jinks and low frolics. Amsterdam, Paris, Gran Canaria, Sitges, Istanbul, Croydon – nowhere was safe. These days we’re both hitched and respectable pillars of the community.

Ian wrote:

Hope all’s well in your world and you are gearing up for an uneventful Brit visit. It’s relentless doom and gloom here, of course, with a daily update of Angela Merkel’s hair-do on the News and Cameron getting redder and redder as the weeks pass. The British media are loving exploring all the Doomsday scenarios, obviously. Still, Harry from Mcfly is still in Strictly so there’s something to swoon over as we all sink into the abyss. Hope your launch is massive. The Champoo is on you!

Strictly Coming Dancing, the opium of the masses. Good old Auntie Beeb. Harry is rather fetching, though. He’d certainly keep my mind off the overdraft.

Check out my book

Perking the Pansies – Jack and Liam move to Turkey

X Factor Final

We watched the X Factor final from Wembley Arena. Polished production, big numbers, slick performances (but too many advert breaks). Commercial, manufactured bubble gum pop? Certainly. Fun and entertaining? Absolutely. Liam’s a huge fan. My first visit to the arena was way back in 1974 (I think) to watch Alice Cooper perform his Welcome to My Nightmare show. It was fabulous. I’m a huge fan.

Out and Proud

Little Mix won. I’m sure they’ll do well. Personally, I was rooting for Marcus Collins. I’m not saying this because he’s a member of the brethren. I’m saying this because he’s a charming young man and a great entertainer who I suspect will outlive the usual fifteen minutes of fame. Marcus makes no secret of his sexuality. He’s out and proud. He has a boyfriend and is a fantastic role model for young gay men. It’s no big deal to anyone except, perhaps, to the producers of the show as it was never mentioned. X Factor exploits the back stories of the contestants. It’s part of the formula. They interviewed his loving family, his best friend, even the Lord Mayor of Liverpool got a look in. Where was the boyfriend? Maybe he didn’t want be exposed. If so, that’s fine. If not, that’s not fine.

Check out my book

Beautiful People

Laugh Out Loud Stuff

I took a much-needed break from promoting Perking the Pansies. I switched on the TV, put my feet up and settled down to  watch Beautiful People on BBC Entertainment. The series is from the magical pen of Jonathan Harvey, the creative comic genius behind Beautiful Thing (one of my favourite films) and Gimme, Gimme, Gimme, the deliciously wicked, surreal TV comedy starring James Dreyfus and the inimitable Kathy Burke. There’s a reason I’m wittering on about this: something interesting cropped up in one of the episodes, How I Got My Water Feature, inspired by the British national obsession in the late Nineties with Ground Force (a gardening makeover programme featuring the bouncing, bra-less breasts of Charlie Dimmock). One of the characters came out with the immortal line ‘We’re just planting perky pansies.’ I recoiled in horror. I’d never seen this episode before I started the blog. Honest, Your Honour. Will Jonathan sue me for breach of copyright? I hope not. Maybe a case of great minds think alike? Even if Mr Harvey’s mind is a significantly greater than mine.

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Pussy Galore

Continuing the pussy theme from yesterday, Liam came across this splendid little video montage of Mrs Slocombe from Are You Being Served, played by the marvelous Mollie Sugden, a jobbing comedy actress who sadly died in 2009 after a long illness. Many people will remember that Mrs Slocombe was always having a bit of bother with her pussy. Obvious, lewd and unsophisticated? Certainly. Funny? Absolutely. A bit like me. Sit back and enjoy.


Strictly Come Dancing

We logged on to the VPN, plugged the laptop in to the widescreen and relaxed with tucker on trays for an unadulterated pleasure night of British TV. We’re making the most of it before the dull hand of the Turkish censor bans our innocent fun. Top of our bill was the class act that is Strictly Come Dancing live on Auntie.  A gay boy needs his fix of spectacle, salsa and sequins on a cool autumn evening. For us, Russell Grant, the frockless fat drag queen, was the astrological star of the show. Mystic Meg never predicted that.

Liam and I were fascinated by Lulu’s fabulous facelift, so much better than the trout pout sported by Felicity Kendall last year (to who, by the way, I used to sell light bulbs to in Habitat circa 1979). You really do get what you pay for.

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X Factor Ads

It’s Sod’s Law. Just as I posted about gorgeous autumn weather in Bodrum it started to rain. And, Christ, did it rain. We’ve spent a couple of drizzly evenings watching the first two live episodes of the X Factor (that’s the British version of American Idol to those across the pond) through the internet using a VPN (virtual private network). I know, I know, it’s shallow, exploitative nonsense but it is entertaining. We plugged the laptop into the TV. It’s not the greatest picture but beggars as they say. We hear unconfirmed rumours that VPNs/proxy servers will be illegal when the Turkish Government eventually introduces its new internet controls and we’re beaten down by the heavy hand of the censorious State. If this is the case they’ll be no more British TV for us. And they’ll be no more British adverts either.

I’ve often thought that commercials are more entertaining than the programmes they rudely interrupt. Yeo Valley, purveyors of all things dairy have commissioned a costly class act for the X Factor. It’s bubble gum fun. The men aren’t bad either.

It’s not a new idea, of course. I remember the 70s Coca Cola ad that spawned the worldwide hit single I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing for the squeaky clean New Seekers (not a patch on the old Seekers).

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Ancient Caria

Socially sated from our trip to Blighty and La Belle France, we have returned to our sticky Carian idyll to revive our sauna diet. We pitched the fans stereofanically and, despite the tyrannical heat, have spent a couple of evenings watching the second series of Glee. Fortunately, our randomly malfunctioning DVD player didn’t play up (more of this later).

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