Clunk, Click Every Trip

The Turkish Government is blitzing the airwaves with a road safety campaign. A combination of light-hearted and deadly serious adverts are being broadcast to warn of the dangers and consequences of jumping lights without a seatbelt while yelling down a mobile phone. It will take divine intervention to break the Turkish love affair with suicidal driving but ten out of ten to the Government for trying.

Liam does all the driving in our family but will only drive in Turkey when absolutely necessary. He’d rather negotiate the North Circular during the morning rush hour than the Torba Road at any time. Our near-fatal crash earlier in the year killed his confidence. He’s had his fill of lunatic Turks and inebriated emigreys. I never learned to drive. I never saw much point in London where jumping on the Tube is by far the most efficient way of crossing the city. Liam’s lot in life is to chauffeur me around. He calls it driving Miss Daisy.

The End is Nigh

To paraphrase Mark Twain the reports of our deaths have been greatly exaggerated. I arose yesterday morning expecting the Day of Judgement only to find a day of sunshine. Poor Harold Camping, leader of the Family Radio Ministry got it wrong again. It’s a tough call. The Old Testament was originally written in ancient Hebrew and has changed down the centuries as it has been transliterated from one language to another. I doubt what we read today bears much resemblance to the original texts. Perhaps this is why the old goat can’t get his sums right. For months happy clappy Harry and his nutty band of religious doomsayers have been touring the United States in a camper van spreading the good news to the damned. I bet they feel stupid now.

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Our neighbours, Beril and Vadim row a lot in a very Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? kind of way. Evidently, she is highly strung and screams at him at full volume. He rarely responds in kind. I think he knows that she is the kind of girl who might wield a carving knife if provoked.  She’s always very sweet and giggly with us though and pops across the courtyard with plates of delicious home made morsels from her kitchen.

That’s all Folks!

Liam’s was making strawberry jam and, just as the kettle was coming to the boil, the electricity pylon blew up again. This time some poor little bird flew into it. The luckless creature exploded into bits like an old Hannah-Barbara cartoon leaving a flurry of feathers to float gently to the ground. Five minutes later, power was restored and Liam returned to his preserves.

Jam-making is the true vocation of all hardened emigreys.

Don’t Dilly Dolly on the Way

Move along the bus. Plenty of room on the roof

Charlotte and Alan invited us over for dinner in Yalıkavak. Charlotte used us as guinea pigs for her latest culinary acquisition, a lavishly produced padded vegetarian cookbook. The meal was splendid. As usual, we journeyed by dolly and, as usual, it was chock-a-block. It was a lively excursion. We were entertained by an animated row between the driver and an unseen female passenger at the rear of the bus arguing about the distance covered by an indi-bindi (short hop fare). Her loud and persistent protests were met by a robust stern-ward defence by the driver who feverishly waved about his official fare chart. Since he was paying little attention to the road ahead, he was oblivious to the small scooter carrying four individuals slotted together like Lego that weaved ominously in and out of the traffic around us. A disaster was averted by an evasive wrench of the steering wheel prompting a sudden lurch of the bus. All in a day’s work by a dolly driver.

Wacky Baccy

We thought bonfire night had come very early. For three days the electricity pylon located a few metres from the house entertained us with a nightly impersonation of a Roman candle. We feared we would be fried alive in our bed as sparks bounced off the roof. The power clicked on and off like Morse code until the fuses finally tripped. Thank the Lord for surge protectors otherwise our fancy electricals might have exploded in sympathy. On the night of the final performance I spotted arcs of lightening dance along a cable to a neighbouring house. We speculated that some dodgy local was cultivating hashish hydroponically like Brenda Blethyn in Saving Grace. Every cloud has a silver lining. The light and sound show roasted our meter. Once reset, our recent consumption has been lost for all time.

Keeping the Wolves from the Door

I’ve joined a new organisation called Expat Workforce. They have a great concept matching expats with prospective employers. You never know, someone might one day actually pay me for writing my trivial drivel. I’ll need to do something to keep the wolves from the door if the book doesn’t sell.

Words and Music

We took the dolly to Yalıkavak to lunch with friends. The once dormant village has awoken like Sleeping Beauty from hibernation and is draped in a new spring livery. The beach has been replenished with imported grit and dressed in sun beds and parasols. The tea houses along the attractive high street have been displaced by seasonal souvenir shops and postcard vendors returning from their winter pastures. Village life is in jovial mood and much improved with a new collection of smarter establishments that will give the greasy spoons a run for their money.

In some ways it’s a shame our perfidious landlord prompted us to move on. Yalıkavak is deservedly popular with visitors with a charm that eludes many of the resorts hereabouts. The trouble is winters are grim and the village is too small for city boys like us. We will return from time to time when we crave a little respite from the hassle and bustle of Bodrum.

To its credit wintering in a ghost town has given me the time and space to start Perking the Pansies. Until we moved to Turkey my writing was confined to dull business plans, strategic reports and the like that would gather dust on a lonely shelf, unread and soon forgotten. Now I blog daily, have a book in the offing and have developed previously unknown skills in web design. Also, Liam has started to write music for the first time in years. So thank you little Yalıkavak. We owe you one.

Internet Censorship in Turkey

Eurovision Song-fest fever has subsided and I need to get over Blue’s so so showing. My playful poll asking readers to vote for the least worst song of their choice was a dismal flop. Ironically, hits to Perking the Pansies went through the roof and I had my best day ever. I suspect few of the newcomers will return but I may have picked up some new pansy fans along the way.

I’m constantly amazed at the power of the internet as a means of communication. This is liberating for most but subversive to some.  I’ve read that the Turkish Government plans to compel all internet users to access the web through state controlled portals. The Government claims this will protect children from inappropriate sites. Others declare this is an attack on personal freedom because their internet usage can be monitored. Paranoia is fuelled by the Government’s reluctance to open up the list of banned sites to independent scrutiny.

No one would disagree that children should be protected. However, I have always thought this to be the job of parents. Relatively few Turkish children have direct and unrestricted access to computers. They are just beyond the reach of most. A more effective and less draconian strategy would be to offer parental control software free of charge or provide simple advice about how this can be managed through search engine restrictions.

A genuine attempt by the State to protect the young or insidious censorship, China-style? The proof of the pudding, as they say…

Mobiles and Megaphones

A short and narrow lane runs along the side of our new house leading to a modest block of flats rented out to itinerant workers. Judging by the constant throng of virile young men who pass to and fro, the building is either the TARDIS in disguise or these poor boys are topping and tailing in sardine shifts. Understandably, such enforced intimacy presents privacy problems. My enjoyment of the latest edge of seat clinical dilemma in Casualty (or Doctors or Holby City)  is regularly and loudly interrupted by a Kurd bellowing down his mobile phone outside our window. Anatolians use their mobiles like megaphones. When our new neighbour, bubbly Beril, talks to her friends she doesn’t really need to use her phone as they can hear her in Ankara without it.