Turkey: Who Will Blink First?

Turkey: Who Will Blink First?
Image Courtesy of the Financial Times
Image Courtesy of the Financial Times

As a rainbow of protesters re-occupies Taksim Square after it was once again cleared with tear gas and water cannon by the Turkish police, how will it all end? I hope for the best but fear the worst. Prime Minister Erdoğan’s increasingly paranoid nonsense about foreign devils and domestic subversives attempting to wreck the Turkish economy may play well to the party faithful but global capitalism has no morals and abhors instability. As foreign investment takes flight to safer climes, he may be forced to eat his words as the crisis starts to hit his big business cronies where it most hurts – in their pockets.

In the meantime, some people may be put off by what they’ve seen and heard and are rethinking their travel plans. Please don’t be. Despite the troubles, Turkey remains one of the safest holiday destinations around. Tourism in free fall will hit the livelihoods of countless small family-run businesses that rely on the summer rush to see them through the whole year. It will cause genuine hardship and won’t make one iota of difference to the shiny suits in Ankara. If Liam and I weren’t already booked for sunny Spain, we would be parachuting in to Bodrum to show our support.

Much has been written about the events as they have unfolded but none has made more sense to me than an article in the Guardian by Şafak Pavey called ‘Why the Turkish protests matter to the west.’

Putting Me Out of My Misery

Putting Me Out of My Misery

Recycling1I’ve had jolly good fun sparring with Norwich City Council about the farcical recycling service we’ve endured. This is the very same council that was the “winner of the gold award for ‘delivering through efficiency’ in the public sector Improvement and Efficiency Awards 2013,” and was “highly commended in the ‘most improved council’ category of the Local Government Chronicle Awards 2013.” Blimey. How bad were the also rans?

The volley of emails make for an amusing read which I thought I’d share.

Me

I rang your call centre on Friday 3rd to inform you that, once again, my recycling had not been collected. Your agent told me it would be collected today. It wasn’t. This is now the fourth time the blue recycling bin and glass box (that I share with my neighbour) have been missed. The refuse collectors simply walk past them as if they weren’t there. Really, I have better things to do than spend my money ringing the council and my energies wheeling the bin up and down the pathway to and from my flat. Exactly what am I paying my council tax for? What do I have to do to get your contractors to do their job?

Them

Your property is currently not down as a recycling collection, you currently received a weekly black sack collection. To change this we will need to put you on an alternate weekly collection, meaning one week will be general household waste and the next your recycling with a weekly food collection. Do you have room for wheelie bins?

Me

I would be grateful if you actually took the time to read my message. Obviously, I already have a blue recycling wheelie bin and a green glass box which were here when I moved into the property last June. I share them with my neighbour on the ground floor of XX St Georges Street. I have never used a black sack collection service. I faithfully wheel our bin out each fortnight on the designated day. Sometimes it’s emptied. Sometimes it’s not. If by putting the property on some internal council recycling list means that my large bright blue wheelie bin is no longer invisible to the eye of the bin men who pass by then please add this property to that list.

Them

As the crews use pda’s to tick off each property when a bin is collected, your address needs to be on the system for a recycling collection, that way they will know to collect it or we will know if it’s been missed. I will change your property to an alternate weekly collection and send a calendar to yours and your neighbour’s address.

Me

I’m fed up contacting the Council to get my recycling collected. It was missed again last Friday (24th May). I rang (again) and was told by XXX that someone would call me back. Of course they didn’t. This has been going on for nearly a year. When will my recycling bins be emptied?

Them

There are a number of properties on your road changing over this week to alternate weekly collections, this means one week your household waste and the next recycling, I did send a letter to your address last week explaining this and giving you a calendar for collection days. Was this received?

Me

No, I have not received a letter from you. The last letter I received from the council was a couple of months ago advising me that our collection day was moving from Tuesday to Friday (alternate recycling/general waste). The manager of the council call centre rang me yesterday to tell me that I’m now on the ‘list’ for recycling and it would be collected alternate Tuesdays. XXXX rang me today to ask if my complaint had been dealt with. Who knows? Frankly, I’m still none the wiser. Is it Tuesday or Friday for recycling, general refuse or both? Perhaps you could put me out of my misery.

Them

I apologise for all the different points of contact, I will confirm your days in writing and supply you with a calendar tomorrow. I will also hand deliver to make sure you get it.

This was the first apology I’d received. Did I get the promised hand-delivered note? Actually, I did.

Post Script: Alas, despite my best hopes and my faithful compliance with the glossy collection schedule I received, my general waste was left rotting by the wayside.  It’s enough to make a vigilante of an honest citizen.

JACK THE HACK: Advice to all you expat writers: Publish and be damned!

More irrelevant writing advice from me. This time on the publishing lark.

The Displaced Nation Team's avatarThe Displaced Nation

JACK THE HACK _writingtipsJack Scott is back with his monthly column for all of you wannabe authors who are hacking away at travelogues-cum-memoirs (or cum-novels?). For those who don’t know, he was a Random Nomad for the Displaced Nation way back when we started this site. After an expat experience that was literally something to write home about, he and his partner, Liam, have traded in the dream for a less pressured existence back home in the UK.

—ML Awanohara

After months of burning the midnight oil, neglecting the sprogs and denying your long-suffering partner their conjugal rights, your memoir masterpiece is finally done and dusted. Whether you’re pleased with the result of your hard graft or just relieved, pop a cork. It’s quite an achievement.

So what’s next? Well, obviously you want to launch your labour of love onto an unprepared world—but how?

Essentially, you have four choices:

1) The big boys—the…

View original post 988 more words

Carry On Nurse

Carry On Nurse

IMG_20130429_105333Continued from Carry On Doctor.

The day of my arterial re-bore arrived and I packed my nightie just in case I might have to stay in overnight. With all the terrible press the NHS receives these days, I was a little concerned. Added to which, I’ve never been in hospital before so it was a uncharted territory. I needn’t have worried. The process went like clockwork. I was robed, bar-coded  and wheeled around like a kiddie on a ride at Alton Towers. Matron made me pull on a nasty pair of paper panties which were ripped off by a male nurse as soon as I was horizontal without so much as an introduction. My nether regions were painted in Domestos and deadened with a large prick. The keyhole procedure took a little under two hours and, as it was done under local anaesthetic, I was awake the whole time. The doctors poked about like a couple of boys from Dyno Rod, tracking their route in the monitor that was plugged into the enormous (and presumably very expensive) scanner. I chatted away to the delightful nurse who was charged to keep me amused and mop my sweated brow. When she asked me what I did for a living, I gave her chapter and verse about our Turkey tales and the ensuing book. The lengths I go to make a sale. It must have worked as she went away with ‘Jack Scott’ written on her arm.

Liam stayed around the whole time, peeled me grapes and provided a copy of the Independent to keep my mind off the tiny silicone plugs in my tender loins. I avoided cracking a joke just in case I popped like a Pattaya cabaret artiste. He was most attentive and I milked it for all it’s worth. After a few hours in an observation ward I was discharged, a little sore but otherwise in fine fettle.

I’m not really into the whole Turkey versus Blighty thing. Never have been, never will be. Chalk and cheese in my view.  I’m rather fond of both but for different reasons. I know people who’ve received wonderful medical care in Turkey and I know people who haven’t in Britain. All I can say is that my personal experience of the NHS has so far been exemplary. Even the receptionists were helpful. And what of the pharmacy of drugs I was prescribed by my Turkish quack? I now take aspirin a day to keep the stroke away (so no danger of erectile dysfunction for a few years yet) and a statin to control my cholesterol. As for the arterial bypass; that involves harvesting a vein from my arm. Sounds like a ghoulish Frankenstein tale and is a story for another day (unless I expire on the slab, that is).

Turkey Troubles

Our former foster home is covered in a veil of tear gas. What began as a peaceful campaign against the destruction of a city centre park to make way for yet another shopping centre has spread to a wider national protest against the creeping authoritarianism of the current Turkish Government led by the charmless bruiser Erdoğan. Watch out, my Turkish friends, he’s not exactly noted for his listening skills. Is the ruling AK Party determined to implement Islamism by stealth? I don’t know. But telling women how many babies to have, branding all drinkers as alcoholics and demanding that the Dutch Government removes a baby from a lesbian couple (because “homosexuality is contrary to the culture of Islam.”) isn’t liberalism either. Erdoğan is the most popular leader in recent Turkish history, freely elected. Democracy may be a flawed political system but it’s probably the best we have. A word of warning, though. Be careful who you vote for. It might not be quite what you had in mind. This image says it all:

Image courtesy of Occupy Gezi on Facebook.
Image courtesy of Occupy Gezi on Facebook.

Carry On Doctor

Carry On Doctor

Longer-term pansyfans may recall that I started having a bit of bother walking distances while we were in Turkey. The cardiologist at the local private hospital in Bodrum diagnosed Periodic Limb Movement Disorder. Apparently, I was running a marathon every night in my sleep making my little lallies tired during the day. I was prescribed a cocktail of blood thinners guaranteed to bring on early onset impotence and an anti-twitching drug usually used to treat Parkinson’s. My condition didn’t improve and so, now we’re back in Blighty, I had the whole business checked out at the StentNorfolk and Norwich University Hospital. I’m afraid the original diagnosis was a bit off target. A CT angiogram revealed that I have arterial blockages in both my groin and right thigh which won’t get better without surgery. A double stent will unblock my dodgy groin but the problem in my thigh requires an arterial bypass. My consultant looks like Dr Green from ER. It’s a shame I’m not under George Clooney.

Continued in Carry on Nurse.

Going, Going, Gone…

Book Cover Design view size Square (400 x 400)The Bodrum Peninsula Travel Guide brought to you from the gorgeous Roving Jay is free (yes, FREE)  to download to your Kindle thingy from Amazon from now until 8am on Tuesday 4th June (Blighty time). This essential guide is a must have for anyone dipping their toes in this magical corner of Turkey. Get it while you can because when it’s gone, it’s gone (well, it won’t actually be gone but you’ll have to pay for it after the freebie period is up).

Click here to download from Amazon.co.uk and here to download from Amazon.com

Postcards from Soho

Postcards from Soho

Ian, one of my oldest friends, is the area manager of a gay ‘lifestyle’ chain (AKA licensed sex shops – don’t tell his mother). The filthy smut flies off the shelves as the filthy lucre fills the tills even during these recessionary times. Well, people stay in more and make a meal of it.  Despite his status as purveyor of porn to the Grindr generation, Ian is an off-fashioned boy with the Nineties hairdo to prove it. He shuns the modern world of instantaneous communication for a more leisurely discourse – snail-mail rather than e-mail, hand-crafted notes rather than instant messaging. Even his flip-top phone belongs in the Science Museum. He’s particularly scathing about Facebook, seeing it as the work of the Devil. I picked up this postcard and sent it to him. I wrote, “I saw this card and thought of you.”

Facebook

A couple of days later I received this card in the post. Ian had written, “I saw this card and thought of you.” Touché!

Gayer than

Pillow Talk

Pillow Talk

pillow talkI’m struggling just a little to give up the dreaded weed (okay, I’m struggling a lot). Most of the time I bear my cross with the help of nicotine patches as my tobacco crutches. But, an evening on the Devil’s brew at the local ale house invariably sees me falling off the wagon: a relapse is odds on favourite every time. It’s another bad habit I must try harder to break (along with liver-dissolving binge drinking, artery-hardening titbits and talking to myself). A word of warning to other patch addicts. Don’t wear the bloody things in bed if you want to wake up calmed and rested. Last time I left a patch slapped on my arm, I tossed all night like a tart with crabs and had crazy dreams in vivid Fifties Technicolor. I wager few people these days dream of sleeping with Doris Day. Nothing smutty, you understand; after all, the virtuous Miss Day shared a cinematic bed with Rock (leather queen) Hudson. The minute I woke up, I panicked that the sheets weren’t fresh enough for the Febreze-fragrant star of the CinemaScope screen. It’s enough to drive a restless boy into the arms of a shrink.

You might also like To Sleep Perchance to Dream.

Let’s Hear it for the Brides

Let’s Hear it for the Brides

The sun shone, the bride and bride kissed, the pansexual crowd whooped, the fizz popped and the waters trickled by in approval. After the nuptials in Islington, the wedding party was delivered via double decker to Blackfriars Pier where we joined them, all suited and booted (well, I’ve got to get some wear out of the two piece I bought for the funeral of my celebrated uncle). What started as a boozy cruise down Old Father Thames ended with a slow smooch on a riverside dancefloor and two very happy ladies. Liam caught up with old colleagues from his waged days and I got to flirt with a bone fide fire fighter. The hettie-man didn’t seem to mind any of my obvious batty-man gags about sliding down his greasy pole and playing with his enormous hose. The running buffet, bottomless barrel and limitless goodwill helped ensure our first lesbian wedding was a rip roaring success. We felt honoured to witness it.

The only blot on the landscape was our uncomfortable room at the Comfort Inn, Vauxhall, with its thin duvets, wonky fittings and tiny shower cupboard with a loo barely big enough for a five year old. Still, we were three sheets to the wind thanks to our generous hosts so we hardly noticed.

The wedding album isn’t out yet so here’s the view from the pier at the Westminster Boating Base in Pimlico where the reception was held. Liam said I scrubbed up rather well and who am I to argue?