welcome to istanbul -- watch yr back

at present sitting in the lobby of world house istanbul pleasantly sated on pilaf and looking at a fruit stand selling fresh fruit juices (including pineapple) through the open patio window where a couple sits playing backgammon, and fore to them a triplet of italian girls drinks turkish coffee and gesticulates under a wallboard portrait of a woman with red lips wearing a bathrobe against a brickwall background, washed out colours and her done-up-but-let-back-down black hair.

up the spiral staircase done in stone, going up to our eight-bed dorm, there is a map showing tourist attractions and someone has marked "sundance" on in pencil, near olympos. there is a sign in block lettering warning not to go with strangers to bars. the backgammon board smells like cigarette smoke and wood varnish.

istanbul has different kinds of businesses tucked into the nooks and crannies of the city. today we seemed to be wandering in the hardware store and machine parts district where little shops put floor models of huge industrial air compressors on out display in the already crowded sidewalks. there is a clothing district, the bazaar district, the leather district, the scuba district. our hostel is in the music shop district -- every other store has violins, ouds and tanburs on display.

evening now and it is cooling down.

very different than when i visited last. bustle in the streets, especially fruit vendors. fresh orange juice for a lira. sunny today and so hot that cats and dogs co-existed peacefully and sleepily in the limited shade. as well i am little bit able to get by in turkish. i know all the words on the vocabulary factoid card and then some, and i proffer them easily. people tell me my turkish is excellent. it is half bluff, but only half.

tea and toast

final breakfast in sundance. a day for them like any other: wiping, humming, the cats sleeping.

they have brought me a cup of tea made with herbs that grow on the hillside. i offer a toast :

to a hard life
and a glorious death.

tonight a midnight bus. onward to scene three: göreme.

<< aren't you a little short for a stormtrooper? >>

it is coming to the end of my time at sundance.

my time abroad has been extended by one month which puts us square in the middle of this story. it is ten weeks now that i have been gone, and as of today i have been away for longer than i have ever been away before (again).

this has been an amazing, and an unexpected stay at sundance where the sounds of nature just about drown out the sound of the prayer call from the nearby town. it is pretty here and still, and everything waiting there for me to just discover it, and a lot of it i did. many days i prayed for rain so i could stay in the dining hall, MSN'ing or putzing, instead of being out in the world trying sometimes too hard to "discover" it. i stood ambivalent on top of turkey and was very pleasantly surprised in dug-out little churches with faded paintings. some days i overnapped. i hiked. i walked. i trudged. i chased the chickens.

i learned the words: honesty, hope, faith, courage, integrity, willingness, humility, love, justice, perseverance, vision, service. daily i fed the black cat a bit of cheese even though i know i probably should have not.

i had the hugpounce emoticon sent to me -- these two yellow smiley faces, and one creeps up behind the other, pounces and hugs. crazy kids these days and their fancypants animated smileys, but i did appreciate it. i am far from home.

i did little things that are good for my soul and my karma, i really did, but i feel i deserved to be bitten by that dog. leave it at that.

and i have healed. and although i was so swollen that for a while i had no lefthand knuckles, i have healed now and i have learned a new song on the little blue guitar and it is very much fun.

and littler things. like being able to ride the highway buses, and when it it time to move on i will be able to buy my own ticket, orient myself, and make my way to the cave cities of cappadocia.

i have acquired a taste for creamyrich halvah, but you still can see my bottommost ribs. that is how i like it.

the flowerbeds have been upturned by hand and shovel now and the earth is wet. today you can see the water running off the land, through the tall grasses and over the feet of the contented ducks, into the creek that flows to the sea but runs backwards when the moon is rising. it is close to nature here: you can see the actual cycles. i am a little sad to be leaving.

yesterday a bird flew smack into the window of my cabin and was stiff and motionless on the ground when i went out to see what had happened. she was tiny and very fine, soft feathers, on her back in the wet leaves. i sat over her for a long time wanting to do something but of course there was nothing to be done. this morning her body was gone when i checked again. maybe she was just severely stunned. maybe the cats got to her. anyways time for me to leave sundance now, and what i have done here i have done.

a hemingway's breakfast

this morning Edith Piaf came singing through the glass windows of the kitchen into the dining room as i ate breakfast with the cats.

sounds

ruchan's girlfriend produced and shared a big bag of sunflower seeds and for half an hour you could hear people crunching them.

now the sound of rain.

jigs, double jigs, hornpipes, reels and airs.

be reminded

gentle creature, be careful with your heart

<< i know where i can find you :
in someone else's room >>

today i am sad.

evidence of cyclicality

yesterday the dining room doors open and butterflies sunning themselves on the leaves of the plants inside the windows. today, evening comes, soft rain over sundance.

people arrive each day, as the season comes in. an avocado stone rooting in a cup of water on the marble counter.

the black cat with pieces torn out of his ear, and tiny grey hairs that poke through around his eyes. my wounded left hand healing.

most all the lip balm i brought with me now used up. only part of one stick remaining. two hair elastics lost. time to restock on chocolate.

already, summer shoes -- the ones i have now are to last me through september. blue nylon pants, which have lasted since my early days in the rave scene, wearing through now because i wear them every day here. i am going to fix them with bright yellow thread, then kill them in the desert.

songs under my fingertips. in a notebook, the word: believe.

astrid kerr who tells me now she has her burning man ticket. my playa-sister bec who writes: gentle creature, be careful with your heart.

you can call me flower if you want to (2)

my life in art

this is what the dog (not the dog that bit me, another one) thinks of my guitar playing:

mucho peynir

notice the can on the left says Beyaz Peynir, Net 17 kg.

peynir is cheese. so, 17 kg of cheese.

easter greetings

easter greetings to my loyal fans.

grandma, this one's for you :


this is the first picture you see when you go into the church of saint nicholas -- very impressive. it is painted on the inside of a stone arch about six or eight feet across. this painting is from about 300 AD -- very old. over time many of the paintings of saints have been vandalized and had the eyes scratched away. but that is life as a saint for you.

rojine, this one is for you:

overnight there was a foal born here, a baby horse, un petit cheval. horses have their babies on nights of the full moon, when there is more light. this little guy does not have a name yet. ce petit cheval n'a pas encore de nom. but he was able to walk and run as soon as he was born. mais il a pû marcher et courir depuis le moment de sa naissance. i remember when you were as tiny as this little foal. you kind of still are. this little baby horse is big enough to carry you on his back. ce petit cheval bébé est assez grand pour te porter sur son dos. that's his mom, with him.

there are about eight horses here -- you can see two more in the distance -- and there are hoofprints set in the poured concrete floor of the stables where they eat.

mehmet, my friend in turkey, is gone from sundance now but ruchan has just arrived, who i met during my very first days here. that seems like a long long time ago. the black cat here is his cat and it's very touching to watch them say hello. the cat has moved now to sleep by the stove -- he gets as close to it as he can and stretches his paws underneath the stove belly where it is warmest. then when he is warm he goes over to the cushions where it is soft.

life is good for many of the creatures here, and i hope the same is true for everyone back home. i will see you soon.

skylar

OH! i nearly forget. there is a word "rojine" in turkish! maybe there is the same word in persian, i don't know, but in turkish rojine means the first light of the day, right in the morning when the sun is still hiding over the horizon. the sunrises here are very pretty.

just the facts, ma'am (2): demre

day 2: demre, or kale.

when i got back from demre, birthplace of saint nicolas the miracle-worker, mehmet said to me, "now you are a pilgrim."

i surprised myself by answering top of my head, "dude: we are all pilgrims."

the church of saint nicholas at demre dates back to the 4th century BC. it has been wrecked, ruined, ransacked, and rebuilt. it is small and architecturally mismatched. my guidebook said it was a plain disappointment compared the the magnificent mosques of turkey.

but i did not think so at all. it was understated.

it was about faith. the church is a dim, cold little building, now mostly dug out from underground. the floor tiles are crooked. there are chunks missing from the walls, and columns that go to nowhere. it gives the impression of greyness, not colour, and stone, not precious metals. but it made me say wow: in particular the serenity of the faded colours, paint directly on grey stone and crumbling plaster.

i said to myself: unless this place was severely more impressive in the past, you must have had to have faith to come and worship here. it was humble.

faith is strange. faith can be used to keep the bottom on the bottom while the top stay on top. but you can also think of faith as being just one part of a triad -- faith, doubt and determination.

they keep the saint's earthly remains in this church. is that faith? everything in nature indicates that when you die you become food for the worms and the millipedes, and the trees that grow over you and the birds that live in them. here was this dusty grey box filled with sand and bones, with a stinking ashtray next to it.

some of the stone walls were painted, the colours faded now. to see the sad faces of the saints: is _that faith? islam does not allow icons.

there was an inscription in Russian: oh measure of faith and image of humility, oh teacher of abstinence, reveal to thy flock that which is the truth of all things. is _that faith? there is a saying here that to enjoy sweets, not to abstain from them, is a true sign of faith. meanwhile the sculptor was unfamiliar with the russian alphabet, the carving rife with spelling mistakes and malformed letters.

the walls were made with long thin red bricks and mortar spread between. there was almost more mortar than brick. the plaster was falling away although every now and then you'd see the scratched-in outline of what looked like a greek cross, and that hinted that once maybe the whole wall was painted. but mostly the decorations were simple.



outside in the courtyard, stone carvings, broken, collected, piled up:




and this carved stone in greek:



most interesting to me were the tile mosaics in the floors:



and this unexpected pigmented motif:


all told: morbid, dusty, dim, cold. in that way it was just like churches today, just more ancient. and i don't know why anyone would risk persecution to go there and believe. except, i suppose, faith -- and that itself was impressive. the sarcophagus was not. i am not sure i'd ever want to venerate some relic, although, that said, these days i'm finding it hard to leave some things behind.

from sundance to finike to demre : sketch

demre, day trip two of three, is the other way up the highway from tahtali.

i had to change buses in a little town called finike. i sat and waited for my bus while people loaded cargo onto the bus -- plastic bags stuffed full, duffel bags, plastic crates, propane tanks, baskets, a splattered painter's radio. the bus was full, even people standing, though i imagined demre to be quite small. going down the highway the sea was to my left and the mountains were to my right. the highway went right along the water, precluding any beaches or swimming holes except one tucked under the guard rails: a small pebbley beach, a shabby looking restaurant with a new cooler that said pepsi, old pallets stacked, deck chairs and umbrellas, a decrepit looking shower. further up the mountain, power lines followed the road.

where the earth had been cut away to make space for the highway you could see the layers of soil slanting down to the sea. the stoney loose earth was reddish brown like cinnamon. the rock was white like dirty salt. most of the trees were olive trees, which i can recognize, now. the rest were some kind of bright pine with upturned needles. every now and then, a citrus orchard. the water on the other side was very blue beneath someone's very grey battleship.

the hot sun made me sleepy. i awoke in demre.

i found the town square easily, with its slightly larger than life gold statue of mustafa kemal attaturk, on a tiled pedestal with wreaths in front. there was a central traffic circle. nearby was a little tented shop that sold rubber boots, hinges, bells for cows and sheep, the metal ends of shovels, collars, bridles, tool boxes, steel clamps, iron pans, little barbeques, stove-top toasters, carabiners, metal hooks, sawblades, woodworking tools... and a double boiler of tea and bowl of oranges. there were jewelry shops with english signage.

some of the buildings in the town centre needed a fresh coat of paint. others had huge, perfect murals of attaturk in a fez on a red background.

up the brick street it became all tourist shops. a man called to me when a hexagonal nazar caught my eye. and everywhere kitschy portraits of saint nicholas in the reds and golds of orthodoxy, always with ring finger touching thumb. the tourist shops sold not only trinkets, but also sunglasses, watches, and leather hand bags.

the men wore suits, jackets, vests underneath, wool hats and leather shoes. often you heard the sound of a low-tech engine sputtering, or the sound of a public address system. many people rode bikes and a man came to get one from the rack where he had not locked it up. children all seemed to wear the same school uniform, with green crested shirts. a handful of them played volleyball with a rubber ball so light the wind would move it. men with canes walked unafraid, worry beads in hand.

love and a blue guitar

this is the little guitar i found in one of the guest houses here. it makes me happy to be able to play it. what's more, this particular instrument is very forgiving of bad technique: the strings are flabby and there is not a lot of sound, so you can just kind of thrash around the fingerboard without a lot of extraneous noise. i draw your attention to the fine quality of this metaphor, here in turkey on my scraggly quest for, among other things, the true deal with airline peanuts. i like this blue guitar. it is plucky.

<< you were the dark song in the morning / but you were also the red song in the night >>

tonight is a full moon. i have been in turkey two months.

mo is here now with ugur. yesterday he toured a carnation greenhouse and today there are pink, red and white flowers on all the dining room tables.

i have had a / the bleak moment, like i thought i might, but it was not what i expected.

one the one hand. on the other it was familiar. i suppose i did not expect to be dealing with the same dreary stuff i have dealt with already, or tried to -- basic stuff like rightfulness of speech, action, intention. stuff i've heard before.

today i found a guitar -- blue -- and i am sitting up playing it. the fire is still going; i have put on more wood. the boiler has hot water. i have chocolate. i may watch the Big Lobowski.

the black cat is here with me. there is only one animal at this campground that will fight with the dog that bit me, and it is the black cat.

the song i am learning has just one chord and a mama's little baby riff. at times it touches a second chord, although that chord is only implied and it's basically just one two three four back and forth between the bass strings, nice and steady and nice and simple. but tricky. there is a lot goes on around that frame.

just one chord: stuff i've heard before.

intoned stories about strength and fear can wait. i have more pressing and more basic concerns. i have made a seat for myself close to the fire. there is aluminum on my fingers from the guitar strings. i feel the pull of opposites in me. that's why i like the lines, in your _dreams you have sullied and murdered, and dreams do not lie.

how do you like your eggs?