İ was often asked about what İ think about the issue of turkeys european communiy membership. people expect from me to tell about cultural difference, humen right situation and maybe economical “development”. İ was answering something about the inofficial sector, grey market and so on, İ expect to die. But know İ think different. Turkey has to com to EU, it`s essential for my live.
My friends will know, that there is nothing as important for me as coffee. But there is something really as important: butter. evryone who want`s to convince me to live vegan will have to capitulate at this issue. The problem is: butter is horrible expensive here. it`s three times more expensive than cheap cheese and about the price of sheeps meat. İ don`t know, why İ didn`t see the reason yet. it`s just because butter is indredible cheap in european community, due to high subsidies.
there are so many reasons not to like EU, but this kind of policy to make butter affordable to all İ really appriciate. But on the other hand, butter is not the same in europe and here. the market sells from blocks of maybe 10 kg. they promote it with the slogan “very tasty butter” - yes, butter has a taste, which you can`t guess, if you just know butter from european supermarkets. İt`s hard to discribe, but if you happen to come here, you have to try.

İ didn`t publishe anything for some while. The reason is: lola11 died. lola11 was my fedora system. it was very stressed by the crappy power supply. so it decided not to boot anymore. This issue is annoying me for weeks now, but Knoppix is saving me. This tiny little linux-live-cd, which is really cude. İt did not complaign abut my hardware in any way. it is just booting and opening my door to the online world. but anyway, İ`m still not able to save any data.

İ still try to install an BSD. my first attamp was Freebsd, but it didn`t like my networkcard at all und even with a “new” one - İ think it is about 5 year old - the installer wasn`t able to get a stable ftp connection. But why should İ bore you with this stuff.

Uff. So İ should tell you about the last few weeks? Yes, it was full of diskussions. Most of the time İ spent in this scene İ would like to call it alternative yuppie. İ`m playing the working class. The weekends. Those about hundred peaople coming evry friday/sturday night to spent the many they earned during the weeks by their career mostly in some “creative” job, art, media, advertising. Drinking, music and smalltalk - and living a strange idea of sexual freedom. At leat it`s quite less hetero dominated than at most places. But there is hardly any talk about sexism, just an idea of evrything goes, which is seen as the negation of morality. No talk about who is bearing the conflicts, no questioning of power in Partiarchy. Hardly any, to be accurate. the revoluton is being prepared.

Fight sexism.

An other issue. A new blog appeared and is linking me - / deutschlaender is born and talking about almancı and germany. As İ promised him, İ`ll put him on my blogroll now.

nore is coming soon

vera

blogging is a strange thing. either there is nothing in my life to report, because evrything İ do is reading in the internet, and you can do this easily by your own. or there is happening so much, that İ don`t have time to write about and when İ spend some hours at home İ don`t know any more, what İ should write about. last week İ made a trip to
saloniki, or selanik, how its called here. İ had to leave my car there, because of some strange customs rules, which allow my car only to be 180 days a year to tsay in turkey, while aurhoritıes don`t semm to have any objektion about me staying here, getting a new border stamp evry three months. Now the six months of exile for my are over.
Selanik is about 600 km away from İstanbul. There are quite strong historical links, thousands of years both of them have been important harbours, turks lived in selanik, greeks in İstanbul. however, the story changed with the upcoming of national ideas in the beginning of the 20`ies century, there was a agreement between greece and the late osman empire, people should be exchanged in order to get monoethnic countries, later force was used. İ don`t know enough about these issues, anyway, but dan diner wrote about it in his book “das jahrhundert verstehen”, maybe İ will write more about some day.
My trip to selanik was quite starnge. İ wanted to hitchhike, but İ didnt manage to get out of İstanbul before sunset. İ took some buses and arived at the border at midnight. The border is somehow like a frontier. The controls are quite normal, a little bit bureaucratic, but nothing special. but crossing the bridge is reminding you, that there is still something like war. heavily armed soldiers on both sides. İn a way it`s just a game, because both countries are in NATO and probably a war between these countries wouldn`t start by an invasion of troops over this bridge.
İ wasn`t allowed to cross by foot. so the customs officer found a truck fot me to do the 200m to the greek border checkpoint. after crossing the border İ was invited to a truckers meal. so İ found myself in the middle of the night with hardly any chance of getting a lift. But İ was lucky, somebody picked me up after checking my passport.
İn selanik İ had to learn, that the guy, who had my car, was not at home. İ didn`t know what to do, so İ went to a tavern to have a retsina. the people there liked me, so İ got a second 500cl for free - and ended up drunken. İ found a place to sleep a little sitting in a chair and in the middlke of the night İ was able to reach the guy for my carkeys. He was abgry about me and didn`t offer a bed. my car didn`t start and so İ had to spent another night without laying down.
İ have to mention, that it isn`t easy to solve any problem without any language. luckily some people still speak turkish in selanik, but a very strange accent. At the end İ got it started, but İ had to go back without any stop. For any reason İ don`t know the turkish customs sent my car to xray, where it was scanned with running motor.
all in all it was an exhausting trip, ending with sticking in the istanbul rush hour traffik for hours. but in a way i liked it.
the next days İ spent working in dogzstar. İ will write about this club later.