A dead end street called Republic
It’s hilarious sometimes what strict secularists and pious Muslims can fight over. The first group is faithfully represented by daily newspaper Cumhuriyet, which excels in finding proof of how religious Muslims are slowly turning Turkey into a non-secular state. As its most recent evidence it reports how, in a neighbourhood where some religious people were in charge, …
When you interview a woman with a headscarf, as I noticed these last few days, make sure your translator uses the right Turkish word for ‘headscarf’. There are two, namely ‘başörtüsü’ and ‘turban’. The latter is not appreciated by headscarved women. It’s denigrating, has it’s origin in Arabic (and indeed, the word is not in my Turkish dictionary) and …
Grandmother tosses a piece of meat towards me. Plop! About one and a half kilos I suppose, with quite a lot of fat on one side. I put the knife on the meat at an angle. First I want to get rid of this fat. With an arching motion I throw it into a bucket. The rest of the meat I …
I passed Yeni Valide Cami today at prayer time. The mosque was full of people, the imam was giving his sermon. I heard what state religion can do – they don’t call it state religion here, but in fact the ministry for religious affairs trains all the imams and tells them every week what to focus on in their Friday
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With Ramadan about to start, I was talking with a Turkish friend about whether or not to eat in public during Ramadan. I have mixed feelings. On one hand, I want to show respect to people who fast, on the other hand, I don’t fast so why should I not eat something when I’m on the street and hungry?
My friend …
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