29 October 2006

The Man

Today is a holiday - Republic Day.

[Its also the end of Daylight Saving - so we are really glad that its a holiday and we don't have to work because us West Oz people are not familiar with Daylight Saving and we get a little confused. They trialled DS in West Oz once but abandoned it because the cows didn't know when to come in to be milked and the extra sunlight caused some peoples' curtains to fade ...]

Today in Turkey we all remember that wonderful man, Ataturk, the founder of this great nation.

I don't know a whole lot about him (yet), but I definitely know what he looked like.

Ataturk

Absolutely EVERY single classroom, office, shop, restaurant, park, roadway, bedroom (?) ... everywhere there are images of him - either a photo/drawing/painting or one of these heads coming out of the wall at you. This one is in the foyer of the Dilko office in Kadikoy.

Yesterday my classes were disturbed by bugle-playing somewhere just outside, and then there was a lot of loud piped music of masses of people singing patriotic songs. This continued late into the day, with some sort of rousing political speeches and cheering. As far as I could tell, the sound was all coming from loud-speakers at the nearby railway station. I didn't see anyone paying any attention to it.

Apparently he was the good guy. You would never dare to say anything against him.

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