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Tag Archives: Turkey
Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?
The service on the Azerbaijan Airlines flight was appalling. Having been treated to an atrocious pre-flight video, an attendant who clearly desired to be everywhere but there started thrashing around cups of weak coffee and tried, indolently, to sell stale … Continue reading
Posted in Armenia, Caucasus, Europe
Tagged Armenia, Armenian Genocide, Genocide, Germany, Ottoman Empire, Syria, Turkey, WWI, Yerevan, Yerevan Memorial
9 Comments
Notes from the fringes of the Empire: Yerevan.
Yerevan lies in a bowl shaped like the tongue of a cat, delimited on one side by the Hrazdan gorge, and on the others by steep hills, on which stand strange perches and other abstruse relics of the Soviet past. … Continue reading
Posted in Armenia, Caucasus, Europe
Tagged Ararat, Armenia, Caucasus, City, Iron Curtain, Metro, Russia, Soviet Union, Turkey, USSR, Yerevan
8 Comments
Away from the Golden Horn – what lies outside Istanbul’s centre (1/2).
Symbols you won’t find on your keyboard: Beşiktaş and Örtaköy. I turned a corner on Beşiktaş caddesi and basically run into them. Milling around on civilian buses and police vans, sitting besides the mammoth hydrants that usually turn up, at … Continue reading
Posted in Europe, Istanbul, Turkey
Tagged Ayran, Örtaköy, Büyük Mecidiye Camii, Beşiktaş, Bosphorus, Hagya Sophia, Kabataş, Lale devri, Turkey, Yahya Efendi sokak
4 Comments
The places in between: wanders through Fener and Balat.
I saw them from the above, a rare treat for a city like Istanbul, where landings seldom come from the north: huddled close together, squashed between the Golden Horn and the minarets of Ottoman mosques, were the houses and streets … Continue reading
Posted in Europe, Faith, Istanbul, Turkey
Tagged Balat, Beyazid, Constantinople, Fener, Galata, Golden Horn, Istanbul, Mehmed II, Saint Mary of the Mongols, Turkey
7 Comments
Börek, burek, byrek, byorek, bouréki: a food pilgrimage.
In 1389 a momentous event happened, something that changed the landscape of the Balkans, and of much of Central Europe, for ever. The armies of Murad I, no longer held in check by the Byzantine empire, swarmed into the Balkan … Continue reading
Posted in All things food, Balkans, Bosnia Herzegovina, Europe
Tagged çay, Börek, Bosnia, Burek, Croatia, Cuisine, Pekara Edin, pogača, sade açma, Sarajevo, simit, Turkey, Zagreb, ćevapčići
2 Comments
Stray pets.
Recently, in some of my travels at the fringes of the European continent or in the Middle East, I stumbled upon many stray domestic animals. Even though I’ve always seen cats happily going about, minding their own business, the sight … Continue reading
Posted in Asia, Europe, Middle East, Random memories
Tagged Abandoned animals, Europe, Georgia, Istanbul, Middle East, Muscat, Oman, Pets, Stray cats, Stray dogs, Tbilisi, Turkey, Vagabond
4 Comments
Hagia Sophia – a tour through an icon’s history
The Hagia Sophia museum has an entry price which is nothing short of a rip-off. Outside, you’ll be harassed by street sellers and impostors posing as guides. Inside it’ll be full of noisy and disrespectful people either yapping on their … Continue reading
Posted in Europe, Faith, Istanbul, Overlooked locations, Turkey
Tagged Ayasofya, Byzantium, Chuch, Costantinople, Dome, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Mosaics, Mosque, Museum, Turkey
2 Comments
Overlooked places – Moda, Istanbul’s Asian side
“Çai tea Çai tea…” the litany resounds from aisle to aisle in the open deck of the ship, echoed above by the tremulous shrieks of seagulls trailing in our wake. The ferry waiter, immaculate in his white shirt and blue … Continue reading
Posted in Istanbul, Music review, Turkey
Tagged Asia, Ferry, Istanbul, Kadiköy, Moda, Overlooked places, Turkey
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Beyoglu: on the trail of Istanbul’s revolts
Intrigued by my enthusiastic reviews, my boss and his partner visited Istanbul earlier this May and, as it often happens when visiting a new place whose non written rules and behaviour are unknown to us, they merrily walked straight into … Continue reading
Posted in Istanbul, Overlooked locations, Turkey
Tagged Beyoglu, Gezi Park, Istanbul, Istiklal Caddesi, Revolt, Taksim Square, Turkey
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