They say you can’t know Turkey or understand anything about its people without having your job threatened by management or by getting fired. Today I just learned the latter Turkish lesson as I was fired today from my job at the Turkish Daily News. At first, it stung. That was pride fucking with my head,…
Tag Archive: Istanbul
Resentment
I realised yesterday that the reason my pregnant boss is punishing me by preventing me from working is because to her not working is a punishment! This is a lady who is almost 7 months pregnant, works in a high pressure high negativity atmosphere of a news room with a little boy in her belly,…
I am Lester Burnham
The blow-out with Pregnant Boss, the subject of the last few blogs and my recent copy editing exile status, was caused by my pointing out to her the extreme double standard that the Turkish Daily News works under. Certain people, for a variety of reasons, do not get edited. Even if their article is an…
Punishment
Today I was punished at work for talking back to my pregnant boss last night and got to spend the entire morning reviewing editing guidelines. I maybe read three articles all day, when normally I would have read dozens, maybe tens of dozens. Right now, we are in the middle of crunch time and I…
A Sinister Sunday
Sunday’s are no longer a day of quiet leisure and relaxing with my secret pleasures of ‘The OC’ and ‘One Tree Hill.’ In lieu of catching the only work shuttle to the Hurriyet Media Tower where I wile my days away trapped on the top floor like the princess I used to imagine I was,…
Why?
Why do the countries with nuclear arsenals think they can tell other countries that they aren’t allowed to have nuclear weapons? Why do insecure people have to be so arrogant and mean? Why do girls who get super girly dolled up with painted mask face and stiletto boots end up looking like drag queens? Why…
iPodified poetry
singing seems to helpa waiting soul-feb. 14, 2007 **** my own personalangel-feb. 13, 2007 **** i guess i was born,naturally borna hoochie coochie woman.-feb. 11, 2007 **** my first night at fight clubwish you were here-feb. 9, 2007 **** i can kick it, yes i canso move, bitch,get out the way.-feb. 9, 2007 **** the…
A Surreal Sunday
I am writing from my temporary desk in the offices of the Turkish Daily News with a gray view of the concrete wasteland that is Istanbul. It is Sunday. There is something very unnatural about being at work on Sunday, especially since my bus to get to work leaves at 830 AM and no one…
Fairy Tales Can Come True
In typical Arian fashion, I have (and do have) loads of dream jobs whose importance will shift depending on various factors in my life. It was always a dream to work at the UN, and while I didn’t get paid for my work I had that dream job for almost three years. I always wanted…
How Cell Phones Have Changed the World and Why This Is A Bad Thing
You are sitting on your lunch break, or someone’s lunch break, having a nice visit and out of nowhere, “Toodle doodle doooooo. Toodle doodle doooo.” Yes, the insistent ring of the cell phone which people seem loath to not answer. We are not far from Pavlov’s Dog these days, no siree. They answer the phone…
So This Is Home
After two unsuccessful attempts to post this, I am hoping the third time is the charm, as they say. So, HAPPY NEW YEAR to all y’all! And I say “y’all” the way Sri Lankans say it, not how Texans say it, just to be crystal clear. Yes, back in Bakirkoy and back here. It has…
The Fortune-Telling Rabbit and Other Turkish Delights
The Fortune-Telling Rabbit Not just any rabbit, mind you, a White Rabbit with blue eyes brimming with wisdom. The wrinkled old keeper of the Rabbit told her my name, she looked me over and chose my fortune. It was on a piece of cream colored paper and outlined the very problems I had been experiencing…
The New Life, a novel by Orhan Pamuk 1997
My experience with The New Life began with a hiss as I walked through the bookshop holding it in my hands. I’ve been hissed at for lots of things, but never for the mere act of a book in my hands, and the emotions that arose in me at that moment were not unlike the…
Thankfulness is…
*waking up to a new day full of possibilities, wonder, magic and joy to be found around every corner. *a beautiful family and incredible friends, feeling love flowing to and from me to all corners of the globe. *having found my true love and although there is no happily ever after in real life, I…
The Real Turkish Delight
A man hissed at me today, but not because of what you may imagine. He hissed at me because I had a copy of Orhan Pamuk’s novel The New Life in my hand. Mr. Pamuk is this year’s Nobel Laureate for Literature and hails from my hometown of the moment, Istanbul. He is both loved…
Monthly Mourning
The Lakota believe that when a woman is on her period it is her time of monthly mourning. That her body knows the potential for a new life will be lost and on a very deep and primal level, she mourns that loss. This is their explanation for menstrual mood swings and all of the…
WolfWoman and the Four Bears go to the Visa Office
WolfWoman awoke in the loving arms of her Mate, but she was uneasy. There was a feeling in the pit of her stomach telling her the days to come would be strange, but she did not know why. Today was the day when she and her Mate would finally get started on the legal residence…
what a difference a day makes
oh, yes, the sort of more sane people won back the House! three cheers for Nancy Pelosi! hip hip HOORAY! hip hip HOORAY! hip hip HOORAY! congress belongs to the Democrats once again and let us pray that they use their power well. i would start with the impeachment trial of George W. Bush. if…
the tanked girl
so i completely tanked my english class today. or maybe it tanked me. the jury is still out on that one. i spent three hours planning my four-hour lesson yesterday and all the bad memories of forced enrollment into a TEFL course come flooding back. lesson #471: don’t let other people bully you into doing…
it's the little things
i think it must be a combination of the mercury retrograde and my budding friendship with starlight shannon, but i have been feeling very accomplished of late. the mercury retrograde for most everyone creates miscommunication and muddles, but since i was born when mercury was in retrograde motion, i always feel the best when his…
early morning missings
i had a nightmare a couple hours ago and couldn’t get back to sleep. it’s 630AM and still dark outside. they just called the prayers a little while ago. steve is snoring away. what is it about browsing through myspace that can be so comforting? looking at friends pages and their friend’s pages, finding people…
every thorn has its rose
technology has hindered me from posting and maybe it was for the best. september to november are rough times for me, every year since wendy died and i have been feeling a pervasive sadness coupled with the night terrors that come with recurrences of post-traumatic stress disorder. i cannot beleive that it will be 6…
what’s it all about, alfie?
the stray cat saga continues with the witnessing of some supremely grotesque behaviour. there is a tomcat i have dubbed Mr. Toad because he is eternally horny (=horny toad=Mr. Toad), following the girls around and mewling to get their sexual attentions. today, when i came home i heard a very distressed kitty noise coming from…
curiouser and curiouser
you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone is the gift that keeps on giving. when i lived in france with my parents, backdropped with the jura mountains all fresh air, trees and snow, i enjoyed every moment of it because something told me it would be a long time before i got to…
yesterday the devil appeared here, and it still smells of sulfur
kudos to the venezuelan president for his recent speech at the UN, where he aptly referred to george dubya as the devil and noted that the smell of sulfur remained even 24 hours after the idiot president stood at the same UN podium. kudos because most of us with half a brain can smell the…
to speak or not to speak
the pope is in the news today because he quoted a byzantine christian emperor’s idea of who Mohammed the Prophet was and what his teachings extolled, that islam is a religion of violence and it is to be spread by the sword. this was taken from a lecture he has been making on religion and…
is it safe?
just a few hours after my last blog, written very early this morning, we found Tommy outside our kitchen door, bleeding. his throat has been almost torn out. for the last few hours we have been trying to feed him, we made him a little bed in the kitchen, and tried to comfort him as…
war of the worlds
our stray cats, have been warring. Tommy, the tabby cat who is so beat up and has made his new home curled on a chair on our balcony, was attacked by Saucy (formerly known as Mama Cat) over the Territory of the Balcony. it was the crack of dawn, quite literally, when i heard Tommy…
too many things, too many things
we had some firsts since i last wrote…our first hailstorm, our first visits from the Stray Cats on the balcony calling me for food, and our first bomb blasts in istanbul. the bomb blasts were on sunday night and apparently went off just before we got in our dolmos to get home…i was pretty freaked…
better living through chemistry is a lie
with my unending mood swings and a whole host of other horrifying symptoms i will not even begin to go into, i have just discovered that it is not only me but hundreds of other women who are taking the birth control pill YASMIN… i am beginning to feel there is no better living through…
the illusionist in istanbul
we went to see ‘the illusionist’ today. wow. just, wow. go see it! i love watching movies in their original language. there was just not enough of this in spain and here it is more common than not that films in the theatre are in their original version. blessed be the Cinema Gods. after many…
friday, i'm in love
friday is sunday in muslim countries. it is the holy day, mosque day, but in istanbul, unlike more radical muslim countries, life goes on more or less as usual. there is just no work. it is very quiet and the workers in the lot in front are off today. how nice! fridays are such a…
first friends in turkey and hollywood goes to iraq
my life as the elephant man continues and i have one more day to sleep upright before i go back for my follow-up appointment. this has kept me housebound and i have been trying to get caught up on emails, some of which have been pending since the wedding! i love having internet at home…
i am the elephant man lost in translation
when i saw ‘the elephant man’ i felt i was him somehow. someone who never quite seems to fit in with the sea of people around him and someone who is always obvious no matter what he does to hide the fact. today after going to see a wonderful doctor who diagnosed my Middle Ear…
pirates, princesas, and we are not in kansas anymore
after quite a grueling two days in madrid in which my ear infection compounded by a hundred after the freezing cold ride on the granada-madrid bus, we have made it to istanbul. madrid would have been a nice layover if i had not been so wretchedly ill, but we did get to see two very…
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