This afternoon I accidentally stumbled across the official web site of the Öger Antalya Marathon, a race which I had never heard of until today. I was surprised for two reasons: one, apparently this is the second year the marathon is being held in Antalya, and though I was most definitely here in March of last year, I certainly don’t remember any marathon passing through; two, I’m quite an avid runner myself, and have expressed much frustration in the past that all the good races take place up in Istanbul, only to be told that competitive running just isn’t that popular down in this part of Turkey. So I’m struggling not to be annoyed that I didn’t find out about this race earlier— the marathon is on the 18th, and nine days isn’t exactly what you’d call an adequate preparation period. I coulda been a contender!

In any case, you can rest assured that I’ll provide full marathon coverage here, and since we’ve now had our YouTube access restored, who knows, I might even celebrate with a bit of video footage.

And yes, I’m already thinking about the possibility of running in the Antalya marathon in 2008. At least now I have plenty of time to train.

I don’t know if the increasing spring heat is making people more assertive, or what, but there was a lot of pushing and shoving amongst the shoppers at the bazaar today. Perhaps people are irritated because they didn’t get their YouTube fix this morning. In any case, the new season’s fashions are rolling into the bazaar, and I have quite a few selections for you here.

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I’ll admit it, I only took a photo of this because I’m from Texas, where we suck on fish bones while walking cross-legged and shooting skeletons… in our hoverhats.

This has to be the most unfortunate separation of a word I’ve ever seen. The word “little” seals the deal, but “big” would have been even better.

Speaking of little and big… this is the tag inside a t-shirt. Oddly, all the giant shirts on the table appeared to be small.

The Carif Bean Sea, near the coast of Sour Hamerica. Yum.

Line 1: “living yellow summer What sort of person am I?”
Line 2: “I’m an evil anyway crossing and my father and my mother To my father and my mother”
Line 3: “To my teachers I’ a smart,but hard-hearted heartbreaker flying scholl bus anyway cosciense.”
Line 4: “will be teacher and professional with an unpredictable”
Line 5: “To most I qualify as a beautiful student.”
Line 6 and 7: “a small pleasing and up way as spring light on a lake.”

Apparently my daddy is “a distributor of superior quality genes, come workship at the pink alter for here.” I’m pretty sure that last part was intended as “come worship at the pink altar…” Wow. At least it’s an adult’s shirt. Note the double-entendre question mark.

The Trend Of Day for today appears to be a cut-n-pasted story about some singing star named Pearson (can anyone tell from the text whom they’re talking about?).

Yeah, that’s pretty accurate.

Mmmm, peace feast— I’ll have a side of sour hamerica as well, please.

Here’s to a speedy peace feast between my favourite video site and the Turkish government. Have a good evening, folks.

Well, I was hoping to find something light and fluffy to talk about today, but then I came across this article at Boing Boing, telling me that I no longer had access to one of my favourite sites, YouTube (even now it feels weird to think that you can click on that link and get to the site, but I can’t). Unlike many places in the world, Turkey is a nation whose inhabitants have tremendous personal freedom, and until today we had the luxury of looking at internet censorship in places like China as something that happens “over there.” So not being able to access YouTube today is a big wake-up call for me, especially since there was no announcement from my ISP and I had to learn about the block from an unrelated web site in the United States. It makes me wonder what might be next under the guillotine, though it does seem that the particular law that was allegedly broken is very specific in that it only sets parameters governing the public portrayal of Atatürk, and can’t be used as a blanket to censor other speech.

I’ve been told by a couple of intelligent Turkish sources that court decisions like these can be mostly for show and often get reversed quite quickly, but of course everything about this situation is still unfolding around the word “allegedly,” so I think we’ll just have to wait and see what happens. I’m not particularly interested in starting a political argument in this forum, but I will say that I am an active YouTube account holder, as are many of my friends and associates, and so of course this decision affects all of us who (A) didn’t break any laws and (B) pay a monthly fee for access to the entire internet. A few hours ago I was really wound up about the whole situation, but I’m settling down a bit now as new information filters in from various sources and things don’t seem quite as drastically doom-and-gloom as they did this afternoon. I’m hoping for a mutually happy resolution soon.

I’m disabling comments on this post for personal reasons you might be able to guess, so if you have something you’d like to say about this issue you’ll have to contact me privately.

I was lucky enough today to enjoy the spring-like weather in Belek, a golf-and-sun tourism resort area less than an hour’s drive from Antalya. Belek is known for its world-class golf courses, five-star resort hotels, and golden sandy Mediterranean beaches. Every year thousands upon thousands of tourists and seasoned travelers visit there, not only from other areas of Turkey, but also from all across Europe and even as far afield as Japan and Australia.

Encountering this mixture of cultures and nations always makes me wax philosophical, and the reason I’m bringing up Belek this evening has nothing at all to do with golf or beaches or tourists— rather I want to talk about a little village adjacent to Belek, a place called Kadriye. One has to drive through Kadriye in order to get to Belek, and though the tiny hamlet doesn’t have a tremendous amount to recommend it to visitors, one Kadriye landmark in particular stands out and draws my attention every time: the Garden of Religions. Here one can find a church, a synagogue, and a mosque all on the same site, each situated adjacent to the others so as to form a triangle of sanctuaries, all facing one another within the peaceful serenity of a green garden. There is only one other site in the world where such a mixture of religious worship can be found, and although you might think this would make Kadriye famous, one almost never sees the Garden of Religions mentioned in travel reviews or vacation catalogs. There are endless write-ups about Belek’s golf courses, but it seems that people who come for golfing holidays don’t take the time to do much else but traipse around golf courses. It’s a shame, because even if you have no particular interest in religion, the rareness of seeing these buildings sharing the same garden is quite a lovely thing to behold. Perhaps I wouldn’t go as far as to say it inspires hope, but… well, it’s a nice gesture, anyway. And the buildings themselves are pretty to look at. If you ever get a chance to see this part of the world, I urge you to pay the Garden of Religions a visit.

Many thanks to Habibi04′s Flickr collection for the photos.

There’s a film called Barda in theatres in Turkey at the moment, and it’s being billed as the most disturbing and violent Turkish film ever. It was released on the 2nd of February, but I just got around to seeing it today (I’m slow like that), and although there was a lot of violence and blood, I don’t think it came across as Reservoir Dogs as it intended to. There was plenty of extra room in that direction, as well— Barda is based on a true story, and from what I understand, what actually happened in real life (i.e. what the public knows via what the media reported from the trial) was much more horrendous and complicated than what the film depicts, both in terms of straight-up violence, and also regarding the nature of the sexual assaults that occurred.

I never understand it when directors aim to make The Most Twisted Film Ever and then fail to do so, especially when they’re working from a true story that’s more than twisted enough. I’m not sure what the Turkish film ratings system is like, but perhaps that has something to do with it. I guess maybe there’s also a limit to what sorts of violence a Turkish audience (or indeed most audiences) will cope with. I’ve heard a lot of mixed reviews of this film, and I understand the controversy— there always seems to be a clash when an already cloudy truth meets with an even cloudier artistic medium.

In any case, if you live in Turkey the film is currently still in the cinéma, but as far as I’m aware it’s Turkish only, without subtitles, so if you’re a foreigner like me and still need a little help with the language you might want to read an online synopsis first (and don’t forget to Google the true story while you’re at it, or have a Turkish friend fill you in). I’m sure when the DVD comes out there will be several sets of subtitles available, but until then, I’d be curious to hear from those of you who have seen Barda and have anything enlightening to say about it, or about the story that inspired it.

I saw this yesterday on the back of a city bus, and I thought I’d share it with you guys… write your own caption if you think it needs one.

Wow, I had a great time today. Spring is here! I even wore flip-flops today, and left my jacket at home. I know a lot of you are still suffering under snow and ice… perhaps it’s time for a Turkish vacation, eh?

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Well, it wouldn’t be Bazaar Thursday without inappropriate children’s clothes… there was a woman actually considering buying this shirt when I was taking the photo, until I explained to her in Turkish what the third word meant, at which point there was much brow-furrowing.

Yeah, what whatever.

At first I thought this was a suicide note on a t-shirt— “I cannot go on like this” and “I’m sorry.” But then I saw “we just aren’t meant for each other”… it’s a break-up note. I guess you’re supposed to send the shirt to your soon-to-be ex.

Rule number one of copyright infringement: if you want to appear legit, stick to stealing one trademark at a time.

This seems a little bit threatening… change of a little only.

This is the front of a pair of thong underwear— first of all, Confucius shouldn’t be saying anything from my groin; secondly, which finger is that, exactly? “You number won” doesn’t particularly bother me, because there are quite a few Confucian sayings that don’t make much sense on the surface. For all I know Confucius may have actually said it.

This is one of those items that’s nonsense no matter how you read it— I guess it’s either “pumpid,” or the car is from the Pumi Police Department.

Ah, Super Magic cotton swabs. You stick it in your ear and a woman’s face appears.

This is just baffling. The bird has a hat on, and running shoes, and a padlock around his waist, and his tail is bound with a pink scarf. Thank cat for that.

A few of you have contacted me with your requests for things at the bazaar that you’d like to buy… I’ve scouted for the appropriate items today, and I’ll be e-mailing you this evening with details, prices, and so forth. If anyone else wants something you’ve seen here or if you’re looking for another item you think I might be able to find at the bazaar, please contact me and I’ll see what I can do.