Istanbul

Istanbul

a blog in three parts:

Istanbul

The main page which will exist in the “Posts” section.

Which I hope to "hang around" sketch books from the time - try to get the chronology right.

(1^st) Archaic Note Book.

Turkey, July – October 1988

5^th July 88, (from accompanying note book)

Arrive Izmir 4,00 hrs.

Noisy hotel room overlooking station & wide road with pretty hectic traffic. And very hot.

6^th July, arrived Sigacik via Seferihsar.

Near Archaic site of Teos. (Archaic period: around 700 B.C)

The 18yr old girl who we were looking after for a fortnight decided to sit out in the sun on the beach for hours and got very bad sunburn / stroke, had to be continuously sprayed with water in order to cool her down. A hectic night full of vomit & dioreha. The illness stayed for the rest of her time in Western Turkey, not helped by the fact that she stopped eating.

9^th July, First visit to Teos.

Inside Cover:

10-7-88 Maltepe.

Very cheap Turkish fags

12^th July Cesme.

13^th museum visit which closed just after our arrival. On getting our ticket money refunded, the police arrived – an artefact had been stolen. Although not suspected we were detained for a couple of hours. They left with a couple we had been talking to earlier, provisionally to fill in forms - - -

They happened to be in the museum when the theft was discovered. I've read that there are severe penalties for crime to do with antiques in Turkey.

14^th July. Took Melanie to hospital in the morning for drip feed trace elements.

vines

14-7-88 Cesme.

view from a balcony.

17^th July

Erytrai via Alacati/Sifne and the Ildiri, hitching.

We had a cup of tea & made enquiries as to the whereabouts of the site – whereupon the man who looked like the investigative policeman introduced himself as the “museum” guide. His straight front quickly dropped and he sang in the Hellenistic amphitheatre, gave us herbs and prattled on in German. So, at least we got to the Archaic stuff straight away (ish).

Archaic stonework,

view over the bay, 

Anne snapped shots and I took two sketches of the wall and the view. 

We made our way down to the village and Anne ate pine nuts with the grandmas and I taught the kids how to make underwater monster noises in the sea - - - meanwhile Melanie had been semi molested by the creepy hotel owner. Apparently she screamed the place down – so that did the trick!

18^th July.

Stale Breakfast in town with the waiter making all the mistakes you see idiots doing in films (whilst they cleaned the drains next to us)

Izmir and a taxi to our old hotel, where M. crashed out. Fed up, we went to the museum then to the harbour with a very cheap bottle of wine (after a couple of beers). Staring at the chocolate water and fighting off various vendors I realised that I couldn't actually hold the plonk down. “I can't even get drunk!” I exclaimed.

Got a taxi to the airport at three in the morning with Melanie, all the while moving like the living dead. And saw her off.

19^th July.

Left for a hotel with a quiet, pleasant garden. Quite a peaceful haven for the city – with rooms and balconies all around the garden.

Old Smyrna pottery.

Old Smyrna plans.

Erythrae plans

--- list of site photos.

20^th July.

22^nd July.

Urla, then small bus back to Iskale. Looked at a couple of small sites whilst trying to trace Dr. Guvun Bakir (and his missing team of diggers) and took a trip over to a little island in the bay, then finally found him ( a very high powered gentleman), his assistant and two two Dutch chaps, digging on the Island.

23^rd July.

Back to the island, The place is full of possible digs – mainly Hellenistic and Roman (a bit too late) The Dutch chaps have discovered an urn-like object which they call their U.F.O. - it certainly is a bit of a mystery.

There is a constant battle between archaeologists & builders constructing hospitals and holiday camps on the island. Last year a builder took a pick axe to a mosaic to see if there was any gold underneath it.

24^th July.

One month after the start of Ramadan there is a sacrificial festival, in Kashmir it's called Id and here we are in Turkey for it. Morning back to the school for relevant information from the site assistant – unfortunately not an awful lot of Archaic stuff. So we decided to go for a beer – it is a holiday! After our first beer and chips, they dragged the ram out and slaughtered it just five yards away, so we stayed for another four and went to bed for the afternoon.

26^th July.

Bus back to Seferhisa.

27^th July.

Selcuk.

28^th July.

Visit to Ephesus.

Walked and hitched and arrived at about half past eight, an hour before the tour buses of often rude sightseers (ushering people out of the way for their v. imp. Photos) A marvellous place, but unfortunately (again) too late for Anne's period.

Saw the Artemis in the evening (ex 7^th wonder) And visited Ali Ba Ba's pub in the evening. With a name like that, we couldn't afford to miss it!

First heard Ozdemir Erdogan here in Seferhisar.

More very cheap Turkish fags

Pamukkale Collage (b of b)

Priene,

Didyma,

Milas,

Bodrum.

Illustrations from British School in Ankara.

The first set of illustrations I made for "Achilles Shield"

Inspired by conversations with John Percival and Prof. Peter Walcott from Cardiff Uni. We worked out that the shield would have to be 30 ft tall to hold all the designs as described in the Iliad.
Also heavily influenced by the various Archaic sites we visited.

- old and young folk guarding the city walls.

Originating from the site at Teos by Sefherisa, close to Izmir.

Two scouts were stationed some distance from that army,

waiting to catch sight of sheep and short horned cattle.

Then he set on the shield a herd of straight horned cattle,

with cows crafted out of gold and tin.

They were lowing as they hurried out from farm to pasture land,

beside a rippling river lined with waving reeds.

Simple herdsman.

the herdsmen walking with the cattle, four of them,

were also made of gold.

Nine swift footed dogs ran on behind.

Originating from the Archaic site at Smyrna, north of Izmir, from on top of the tepe.

Then the famous crippled god created there a pasture

in a lovely valley bottom,

Link to fuller set of illustrations:
http://umphries.blogspot.co.uk/p/achilles-shield.html
Highlight this link and right click to visit this far away page!

---and fought along the river bank.

Hotel Manager - Foca. A family place with a large communal kitchen and a beautiful garden. A lovely place to be, until the disco next door kicked off after dark.

8-10-88

Scala Erresos.

*

Diary notes.

Bunch of doodles - Landscape / shield.

First impression of Istanbul.

17-10-88.

 Istanbul. Dirty, noisy, wet, cool and troublesome.
A cross between London and Calcutta (two other delectable holes!)
It's blind man's buff with the taxis and "no, I don't want any perfume, would you like a bacon sandwich".
The price range on everything is incredible and coach tours of Europeans a menace.
They mislaid our passports in reception last night but they have returned & now we can have free showers.
I wish our neighbours wouldn't urinate on the toilet floor & people would make shady deals on the street & not on the stairs.
The extra blanket in our room makes a fine blanket on our broken concrete floor.
It's a pity the light switch is outside in the corridor.
We left our old hotel because there was no hot water and their fresied attempts to fix it left greasy soot everywhere leaving one with the opportunity of getting dirtier on leaving the bathroom than on entering same.
I'll be back before you get this,
Mart
----- how come I ended living there for three years then!?

Brown Book, Istanbul.

Jan, 1990.

Early Days

Before my father died, maybe foolishly, I set up three exhibitions in Wales. I thought they would keep me occupied whilst grieving.

They nearly finished me off.

By the time the third one came around, I had already been back to Istanbul – I had had enough.

I have Marega Palsa to thank for helping me and being about for all these shows. One of which we shared - “ For a Colourfool “ at Charlie's frame shop – Pontcanna, Cardiff.

Anne was already ensconced in Sultan Ahmet and I found myself arriving in a pretty well established scene. All the same, we pretty well immediately took off on a crawl along the Black sea coast, starting with Sile and ending with Trabzon.

A string of beautiful places possibly all the more pertinent because it was done on a shoe-string. So we were sharing family pensions with relatively local people who were also on a “few days out”.

In an easy way, we were learning a bit of Turkish – maybe just enough to be welcomed for having the balls to try to fit in.

We got a boat back.

Maybe the first of this bunch, painted on very thin brown paper with very cheap paint.

We quickly ended up with the Coskun Bazaar being the hub of every day activities, Sophie's as the centre of the ex-pat community and the Arasta Bazaar, where people tried to make money.

Kades im - Mehmet.

http://www.iamistanbul.tv/haber/sogukcesme-sokagi.html

The road where we first stayed (as it is now)
High light and right click to make the link work!

We took a little room with the Coskuns and apart from terrible sinusitis, I started painting in earnest.

Albeit, without too much depth. A little bit of scraping of the surface.

The three Coskun “boys” were marvellous, they taught me all the Istanbul slang I know.

Murat was in his element, he loved all these “yabancis” about. Took us out for pide, sweet chicken breast pudding and other treats.

It was a lovely, but tiny room overlooking the cobbled street outside. A very low first floor window, I could sit on the sink and spread the artwork on the double bed which took up the rest of the room.

Black sea village

The aeroplane (and pick-pocket) with Zaffa and Andrew. But at Sophies, not the Komeni.

We also discovered the Flower Passage and in particular, the Komeni Restaurant, where they had gypsy music played later on in the evening. Everyone would get up and dance “the aeroplane” (my definition)

Sunday afternoon market at Ortakoy

But the infamous port of call was by the cistern on the other side of the drag up to Aksery – where all the Romanian traders plied their wares. Looking up toward the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque.

A handful of bars that were decidedly funky – watered down beer in half pints. But cheap and if you got enough down or stayed up half the night – we all got stoned.

There were two particularly grubby places we used to frequent:

Primarily the Yoruk which at times hosted a wealth of Romanian and Russian whores, and a host of backwater “Magandas” - poor, dirty, slovenly, bigoted, uneducated, male chauvinist pigs.

The other was the Tunnel, which was as the name suggests – a bit more local, quite a community in fact. I remember the beginning of spring one year – the day when you know that “spring is here”. The party atmosphere was fantastic.

Or the day of the glass fight – how no-one ended up in hospital I will never know. The guy that took my full glass of beer and hurled it at the enemy was profoundly apologetic the next day as he had wasted my half pint.

     .   ..   ..

EMINONU

First Impression

Down to and around Eminonu existed most of my practical life. From buying rare disposable nappies by Galatta Bridge, or illicit tobacco outside the Egyptian Market, paints, inks and brushes from the cluster of stationary shops

Claustrophobia rules O.K.

.But, then again, these corner towers exist in a swathe across central Istanbul and Ankara for that matter.

An echo of an earlier empire.

tower, with Miss Marples (at the top) 91

I got into Gaudi eight years later, maybe that was a flamboyant flush, moving onto something lighter.

*

Not forgetting Demir Belli.

Another of the important people in my life.

Of Armenian ancestry

and a very profitable man of carpets.

Who loved (and still does) to hold small dinner parties.

Demir's place, overlooking the Bhosphorus.

• slowly, it took us years to really trust each other, but he was always there.

Inside cover of the brown sketch book, with caption from Sara in the form of a Christmas card.

like spokes in a wheel pointing out from it.

Not the best of kitchens, but, at times there were five cooking in it. (for dinner parties) - the only way to have dinner parties.
With trousers from Mudo.

So Anne finally got an apartment, mainly by having enough Turkish to be chatty and getting it from the street.

We moved in and Sara O'Donnell moved in with us. A sparkling Kiwi who had decided to settle in Istanbul for a bit.

First taste of tiles

We were blessed for a while, the girls went out to teach English and I decorated this exciting flat.

My memory of the first Kilim that really appealed to me, maybe I didn't have the paints I wanted, but this was nothing like the real thing. Which Demir actually gave me for helping him sell another carpet.

The kilim in reality and as it is today. The first rug that really hit me.

Coskun Flowers

Part of a design for the inside of a souvenir shop

Ceiling light panel at the Coskun Bazaar,
Thanks Ruth.

Rough for the shop sign.

Most of it is still there, or at least it was three years ago.

The first of these types of landscape.

*

Design for a composition in earth colours.

14^th Jan.

By Galatta Bridge.

You could get down to the old Galatta bridge through Gulhani Park. The main gates being at the bottom of Soak Cesme Yokusu, - cold fountain street. Where the Coskuns had their Bazaar and home built into the old city walls.

The park is basically a thoroughfare with a small zoo and wide sweep of grass and trees running parallel with Topkapi Palace situated on top of the overlooking hill.

During the summer there used to be many various stalls and beer gardens – fun activities for all the family, that came alive at night. I don't believe it happens there any-more.

It was a joyous place, even if the fici beer was watered down, opening out at the other end directly onto the Bhosphorus where all the local ferry boats seemed to begin.

A lovely place to walk through at any-time.

You could get a ferry to many relatively local places, just put a relatively inexpensive jeton into the slot at the entrance gate and rode with the rest. We used them a lot.

Often having a sahlip en route, milk with cinnamon.

Or even a thin crispy doughnut shaped simit.

Once I was on a ferry where someone fell overboard and every body consequently crowded 

to one side what was happening. A scary moment and they certainly weren't small boats.

All around, the views of Istanbul were breathtaking.

It seemed that all life were represented within that craft and I never came across any trouble or witnessed any aggravation on board.

Indeed, Istanbul seemed to be almost crime-free, at least burglary wise. But in shops anyone was fair game.

So, it was pretty well promenade all the way to the old bridge and beyond, again, with all kinds of stuff happening there.

*

In between the parked ferries were small fishing boats selling fresh fish and grilled fish in bread sticks.

*

In between the fishing boats were blokes fishing – but they didn't compare with the fishing activity that went on, on top of the bridge itself. They filled the side of the road, side by side, hunting for their dinners.

Unfortunately, I don't have the painting these images were heading toward. I gave them to a fellow degenerate who fell out with me as I wouldn't share one of the two bottles of beer I was taking home to drink all by myself.

Poor sod got knifed in the stomach for standing up to a hardened thug outside a night club. (it didn't kill him).

*

Underneath the bridge were loads of fish restaurants, which could be a real pain, just to get by, due to the “come on in” hustle. Although, they somehow seemed to know if you had eaten somewhere else, even if it was on the other side of the bridge.

And,

there were the very cheap bars, where people sat round on two foot high wood and hemp stools. A souvenir I always meant to bring back with me, (very practical for down to earth jobs)

The old bridge was clogging up the waterways – I suppose the small arches couldn't cope with contemporary rubbish which used to build up underneath.

All the restaurants moved to the other side of Kumkapi. - - turning right as you hit the water as oppose to left.

18^th Jan.

Premonitions of what's to come

First rough for the Hagia Sophia

22^nd Jan.
The King has no clothes.

-the spire isn't straight, originally from Artvin near the Black Sea coast

Painted a little while later, maybe a year.

*

6^th Feb.

A night at the opera.

Street scene,

Busy days work, round the back of the Egyptian Market.

1^st bridge,

Early sketchbook drawing at the start of Spriggy Tokes.

Flour – Crucifix – Flour.

The flour Christ

Blue Mosque & Pond,

Spriggy walking lonely,

Bridge with Kilim.

Polite Philanthropy.

Cradeling wounded, polite, philanthropy whilst beautiful things happen all around.

Double page design comp.

*

Double page landscape comp.

*

ASSOS

5^th June.

Spriggy, Pool. Chair.

Cats for a wedding.

Five Landscape Doodles

With hindsight, I realise that a lot of the doodled landscape drawings within the brown sketchbook weren't particularly to do with anything specific.

But they were made roughly “at the time of passing” and so if anything attempt to capture the feel of where I was.

 Often, the near surrounds, the paths, rocks and undergrowth of the countryside we were walking through.

I think these five fit this definition.

I also feel that at the time of making, there was the possibility of composition in the back of my mind. - maybe combining more than one or inserting elements from each.

28/7/90
What we did on our holidays note book started.

I have included some of the diary /travelogue/ sketchbook comments (mainly from places I passed through ) As well as trying not to make the thing look like a total chronological statement – the bits I have put in, I hope are descriptive, maybe explaining how/why a picture happened. Or, funny (keeping it light) in terms of travellers yarns – thinking of “A short walk in the Hindu Kush, by Eric Newby.

29-7-90

Ankara.

Walking round the old streets.
Beautiful little coloured houses on the opposite hill, where I believe the city grew up from, during Attaturk's time.

Little boxes on the hillside and none look quite the same.

30-7- 90 Sivas. Hitched to Yildizeli, Tokat, Resadiye

31-7-90. Hitched to Yulhisar, Yaylar for a picnic, Susehri, where local women gave us loads of apricots.

1^st Aug 90. on to Zara at which point,we decided to go East and picked up a lift from a delightful family going to Erzincan.

( Without consulting us ) we arrived at their family home to meet (about) five generations worth of family and of course we were near enough ordered to stay the night. It was almost impossible to work out the family tree – and all living in one large house, divided up (family unit by unit) into smallish self contained apartments.

Our hosts were primary school teachers working in Nevsehir and currently on their months holiday. Children certainly liven a place up and who knows how old the great great great grandmother was. A lovely old stick and deaf as a post. I went out for a beer later and covered an amazing amount of ground considering his non-English and my lack of much Turkish.

2^nd Aug 90. Were persuaded, whilst eating apricots and doot on the outside rooftop to stay another day. Went in the car to Altintepe, where they bottle a lot of the mineral water for Turkey. On to some mineral baths all layed out in little walled off family swimming pools. Then to a beautiful extended family house with a beautiful garden and ate more fruit.

In the evening to another family house for supper. I drew a family group. There was a crippled girl there – so happy, but helpless, I'm sure she could be trained to use more limbs with the right treatment.

3^rd Aug 90 After a delayed start and several (very) delayed farewells we took an Iranian coach looking like the inside of an aeroplane to Dogubayasit.

3rd Aug
The border near Dogubayazit.
Hitching a lift on an Iranian coach from Erzincan. 
We met a guy who told us of the war between Iraq and Iran when they were lobbing missiles at each other's cities. He was very laid back about it. He said that they simply used to sleep outside in their gardens. I painted a large double painting in 2006 called "The war between the pages".
Directly as a follow on from this conversation

Link to that show:

http://chronologicallyours.blogspot.co.uk/p/the-green-st-show.html

The driver seemed to think it would be o.k. to take us all the way over the border, in fact seemed to think we wanted to go all the way over the border.
He seemed to get the message due to our frenzied, high pitched squeals, and kindly stopped a truck just on our side of the border who took us to a hotel in Nomansland. Where we were told, that if we left (due to high prices) we were liable to be shot on the road. However, we did manage to agree on an affordable price, due to their belief that we may just walk off into the night.

Painted in Erdington 1997

4th Aug, Van.

7th Aug. Edremit.

10th Aug, Hakkari.

11th Aug, Tatvan.

A little bridge by a little river by a fairly busy road spanned by a bedroom connecting a buiding on each side of the water, just outside Bitlis.
life goes on!

12th Aug
Bitlis.

13th Aug
Hasankeyf

Hasankeyf, notes started: 1^st Dec.

Hasankeyf.

Truly one of the experiences of my life.

November 1990, on the edge of the first Iraqi war.

Scant notes from a guide book.

---- on the left bank of the Tigris. The village takes its name from the medieval town of Hisn Kayfa, whose extensive ruins are to be seen on the other bank of the river. This has been identified as the ancient Cehfa, an important frontier post on the border between the Byzantine empire and Persia. It fell to the Arabs in 640, at the same time as Mardin, and was ruled in turn by the same succession of Moslem powers.It remained an important city throughout the middle ages, but then in Ottoman times it declined to the status of a mere village. One sees there today the ruins of the Byzantine citadel, a palace of the Artukid period, several ancient mosques, a turbe, and the impressive ruins of a bridge across the Tigris, which early travellers remarked upon as being the grandest in all Anatolia.

--- from Turkey, by John Freely.

Life in the caves

I only stayed there for two nights.

Although friendly enough, the locals didn't want us to stay there too long.

Tizmoz.

Possibly one of the worst experiences of mosquitoes I have ever suffered. Too hot to stay under a sheet but too many of them to stay outside of it.

I don't even know if it has been turned into a reservoir yet - a highly charged issue.

There are many doodles in various note books that I didn't realise were about this gorge and the dwellings within.

The place that really got me was the gorge with the cement powder floor. Inhabited by people living in caves and huts on either side.

We bought a seed bead hanging from one of the families, whose home revolved around a large four poster bed.

First rough for an eventual stained glass window. Unfortunately broken and unphotographed (that'l teach me)

The layout for a stained glass window

There was a boy on a donkey winding his way up one side of the gorge past shattered huts and under a one time triumphant arch.

Not forgetting the two large, loud, wild dogs, which fortunately stayed put up at the top.

And the squeaking, screeching birds of prey that you couldn't see high up in the empty sky above the cliff walls that snaked inwards.

*

Its hard to believe these two drawings are so similar!

I return to that place in my dreams and in my art work time and time again.

Painting from "Johnny Eidetic" 1998.

Recent "one off"collage, Aug. 15

A mothers head. (15^th Aug.)

painted  later on in Istanbul, with the aid of a lovely wooden stool, draft-board and the biggest selection of inks I am ever likely to own.

16th Aug, Mardin.

Across to Syria

17th Aug, Diarbakir.

21st Aug, Kahta.

23rd Aug,
Decided to hitch to Nemrut Dagi.

24^th Aug, Urfa.

27th Aug Gaziantepe.

29th Aug. Karatas.
(Adana, Mersin, Kizkalesi)

27th, Jan 91
Brief rehash of mosque interior, two door cabinet, Spriggy talks of old times, decorative designs traced on thin paper.
Spriggy and the book case.

20th Nov, Istanbul.
Chronological diary type notes were often not written, I suppose when things are settled and happy enough, there aint an awful amount to write about, which makes placing a lot of the paintings produced 90 - 91 difficult.

Our corner shop from out of the front window - it is not there now, neither is the Wednesday market, the whole street is full of very similar tourist restaurants.

Street Roundabout

The coolest shirt in town.

Karin & Kadir's Wedding

Anne, me, Sara and Sophie at the reception.

The thin crack between night and dawn, from a poem written by Bob Meecham, Tony Wright, John Hosking, Sue Macleod and myself some ten years earlier.

Morning Light

20^th Dec.

Why do I make Stars?

15th Jan 91

Walking Double.

Rough for a toy shop
*

18th Jan 91:

just passing

6^th Jan 1991.

Gypsy stuff.

31^st Jan.

13^th March.

Line landscape.

14^th March.

Dancing Fool.

I may be totally wrong, but I'm a dancing fool. - Frank Zappa.

13th March 91

Limana

Wedding!

An original and sincere moment.

Just after the "service" at the registry office.

The Groom.

Mehmet takes on the paparazzi.

A blushing bride

further evidence of the existence of the aeroplane dance. Celebrations after the event.

Husband and wife team out walking



My Part as a mother.

We decided to have the baby at Shipping Hill. In part, after a visit to the local hospital, where we walked down a long corridor with no windows and lit with tiny light bulbs.

There were queues of people waiting outside every door, seemingly.

Shipping Hill.

We only stayed a few weeks at Shipping Hill and returned to our apartment quite swiftly.

Anne had built up some good teaching jobs, with good students. (The longer you stay - the more the pay) Not being particularly greedy, we settled for less hours and to a certain extent, continued to live the life.

I basically became mum for a few hours a day, often in the evening, then taking the baby with us we would go out relatively later on to our favourite haunts.

Comparative to Britain, men in Turkey are fantastic with babies and toddlers. On our return to Blighty, he used to quite frighten some blokes, by simply jumping on their laps, or the like.

Anyway, what the heck -

It doesn't matter to a baby whether it gets up at six or eleven in the morning!

Trapped by an embroidered cushion - a birth present from Demir.

The Black Hand Gang protects my baby boy.

Happy times, with Dianne, Anne and Tina.




Lucky



 My painting in general loosened up and spaced out a bit - maybe I wasn't so anxious to succeed in everything I produced , as I went along.

Although, I did start to reflect on the "bigger picture" and started a series of drawings for the large "Carousel" with Joni Mitchel's seasons they go round and round very much being the musical backdrop.

I painted it on thin canvas in Turkey, brought it back to Pembrokeshire, re stretched it on panels and finished it off. The start of my realisation that I am quite connected with the term "eidetic"

 

The painted ponies go up and down, captive on a carousel of time.







With looking after a toddler I was worried about output initially, I thought that everything would grind to a halt.

Sinclair Bell, an old chum of mine, reassured me that 50% of previous output was still possible, with that as a goal, a lot of the work ethic frustration was removed.

Maybe that 50% was more precious!

*

Dianne was with Boris, he was from Croatia, and living pretty much hand to mouth. Maybe he had known that the shit was about to hit the fan in Yugoslavia and got the hell out just in time. He was a bit of a bum, but there was honour amongst thieves. When he stayed with us he was part of the team, part of the family and quite a character.

When I worried about Serbia's involvement in Croatia, he said "forget that - wait for Bosnia, that's when the trouble is really going to start." He was working his way to go and join his father in Sydney.

We spent our last days in Istanbul with them.

(So many deep relationships that were built up over those years - Dianne from the start)

Boris allowed us into another side of life in the (so called) expat arena.



SORRY!

Old man Coskun sang from the little mosque tucked in between the two great places in Sultan Ahmet. His can to prayer was soft and melodious, it made me feel good.
He wasn't that old - younger than I am now, but I used it as a term of respect. He helped me on one occasion - walked two miles with me to behind the Egyptian bazaar to pick up four armfuls of pipe for our "soba" stove.
I was close to being part of his family.
The only time he ever commented on any of my paintings, was the horse and his boy. He said, briefly "I like this".
It was good to see him again, relatively recently.

Design for a cupboard door

Dalyan

Meltem Garden.

Homes for dead people

*

Toll Gate, run by the "Cooperative"

Boats at the bottom of the garden.

On the waters by Dalyan.

Sometimes I get scared

Four years that I lived to the hilt, and then, on passing did nothing with - no shows or anything.
They were done.

Mehmet

This has been a journey of discovery as much as a memoir write-up. Nothing much happened with much of what was produced - Folders and Books filed safely away.

But, this period of time without being shockingly cathartic, was in fact quite a smooth start to quite a number of things.

I suppose four years is quite a fair time not for change, but for overhaul. I wasn't after an imminent goal, just reacting to where I was, improving my craft skills - always something to say, something to react to. But at the same time building up a stock of "stuff". It was also a period of time where various projects started to slowly evolve.