End of time in 2006

Wow! Some time has passed since I wrote the last comments on my life... Do I have to apologize? Well, I'm not quite sure as nobody really accused me for being negligent in blogging. But nevertheless for those of you visiting my page at least irregularly I feel ashamed. A little.

Anyway to start with, I hope that everybody had perfect days of joyful celebration and inspiring being-together wherever on this globe. in this regard I was happily surprised to receive Christmas post not only from different parts of Germany, but also from Portugal, Sweden, Turkey, Greece, the United States, Australia and Marocco! Thanks to all of you!!!

For myself, I'm still having wonderful days with my family at home in Ingolstadt where we celebrated the Holy Eve (on 24 December) and the following two days. On that evening my grandma came for a visit, we sat around the Christmas tree, glittering lights and brilliant decorations (bowles, stars, and figurines made of silver and gold, glas and wood) being reflected in our eyes. For me, it was a special moment when I recalled last year's Christmas evening that I spent with Martin (I hope you're fine, man!) in a pleasant restaurant in Beyoglu/ Istanbul where some Christmas traditions seem to be adopted by the Turkish culture, i. e. Noel Baba comes to give presents to the children although this happens in New Year's morning.
Despite the fact that this was also nice evening with Martin, I realized then the very core of Christmas: it is a ceremony that is made for the family, a holiday whose aim is to reassemble all family members at one place - a goal which is for me, saying with last year's experience in my mind, even more important in our days when moving quickly between time and spaces is easier than ever before. Now that I stood in front of the Christmas tree, together with my parents, my brother, my 90-year old granny, I became aware of this feeling again.
I hope that this year's Christmas - or any similar holiday : Hanukka, Eid al-Adha or other ones - feed all of you with the same feeling of not being alone.

Well, let me conclude briefly with some more stories. Our Christmas evening went on with having a absolutly delicious feast prepared by my mom: we had fine shrimps with salads as starter, being followed by a hare and roe roast with Spätzle (impossible to find a English translation or explanation) and pear (hmmmm!!!), and finally two desserts: hot apples with almond ice cream and mousse au chocolat with cointreau-oranges. It was a firework of indulgents, believe me!!! The last days I spent reposing, reading, sleeping, watching TV, meeting friends and relatives - probably similar to your own schedule, dear reader!
Tomorrow I will participate as a driver in a hunting drive organized by my dad and my brother who are hunters each. It will be about nine hours of walking in fields and forests shouting strang sounds (like "Huraxdax" or "Hoshoshos") to make the animals start to run and to be shot (and hopefully duffed) by the hunters. Then, on 30 December my brother, a friend and me will go to Hamburg to celebrate New Year together with our cousin.

And then ... well, let say the only thing that happens for sure will be the start of a new year. Things may change or remain the same, nobody - or God - knows.

Keep hope, love, and trust! Best wishes for 2007!

Sincerely yours
Lütfü

Heimat

Heimat in German means something like the place where someone is at home. It's not just the country or town where one lives, neither the so-called fatherland in English, la patrie in French or anavatan in Turkish (which is, by the way, interesting since it means motherland - in comparison to the English fatherland it's something more feminin and maybe fertile obviously). Well, to be honest, this all is not a linguisticly totally tearproof definition of the term Heimat, but it reflects my own thoughts about it. Maybe it's even not the place where someone is at home, but a place where someone feels at home.
And now that I had quite a lot time to think about my state of being (but, unfortunately and "excusingly" without having to have enough time for writing more on my blog), I might say that there could be several places where someone can feel at home. With all the new and interesting friends in Istanbul, all the places that I got to know and all the situations that I was in, I felt like having found some kind of spiritual Heimat there. And currently that I'm back with my family, my elder brother, grandmas and relatives, and of course the friends I knew from former times, I had a similar feeling again. Of course, it was a little different, too, but to which extend I can't say.

Anyway, I think that one reason for my newly discovered Heimatgefühl (feeling of being at home, which is, I think, something different than Patriotismus/ patriotism), is that my family and friends in Ingolstadt and Munich gave my the feeling of being warmly welcomed again. Lots of people that I didn't see and talk to for one year hugged me, were interested about my well-being and wanted to know lots of things about Turkey, Hamburg, and if my future now is going to be with them again. Especially the last question can be an indication for their honestly meant welcoming, and made me feel good being back with them.
So, I may tell my distinguish readers the reasons for not having written anything the last weeks:
First, after returning from Hamburg, I spent some days in Munich and Ingolstadt for seeing my family again. My live started to be special again on September 16, when the 176th Octoberfest of Munich, the world's biggest fair and beer festival started. Well, it's totally not something to be proud of having spent six days out of eight at the Wiesn (which is the indigenous' name for the festival) and having spent these days, let's say, intensively, but, for those of you who may have a feeling of festivals like this, my decision to go there more or less regularly might be comprehensible. For the others I hope that photos I put on my photo-page will be persuasive to deliver from my bondage.
And it might be obvious to understand why I decided to leave for a one week holiday to the Austrian mountains the other day. There, near the Tyrolian town of Kufstein, my family has a small house standing lonely in the open countryside. After two days of swimming in icy lakes, three days of hiking in the mountains, and one week totally of fooling around the other hours I was free of all Wiesn-crinkles again.
With my parents I went to Ingolstadt again, then, where I now have spent the last week, including my birthday on Tuesday, 10 October. By the way, thanks for everyone who sent joyful greetings and wishes to me!!! (The others who forgot to do may go to hell by the way!)
Here in Ingolstadt I had my days getting up late at noon, starting the day with having lunch, doing some Internet stuff, reading four books, and meeting friends for chating (and as you might expect, for partying and drinking, too).
It was some really, really joyful days, and thank God for giving me this time for relaxing and enjoying life. I may stress this point since from tomorrow on life will change dramatically: it will be the first day of this year's university winter term! Tonight, my brother and me, we'll leave to Munich (of course being equiped with clean clothes and lots of food by our mum) and we'll fear the next morning to be rainy and gray when we'll have to cycle to our seminars.

Despite these sad and almost killing news I hope to inform you about my first university experiences in my next post. Furthermore I hope that everybody's fine and keeps on keeping in touch with my negligibility.

Best wishes to everyone
Lütfü

Bavaria

It might be because of my return to Bavaria that Pope Benedict XVI. decided also to return to his Bavarian homeland. But it might be not, too - God knows.

Anyway, I came back to Ingolstadt and Munich three days ago after having finished the internship in Hamburg - and to be honest, I was quite glad to be back. I mean, although I really love to travel around, to visit new places and meet new people I now feel totally good to have my friends and family around me, to be at home, sleep in my own bed and eat the delicious food of my mum (I know, this sounds very conservative if not boring, but it is like that: I feel like in my childhood again.)
To this, I can only add that I enjoy the famous white-blue-coloured Bavarian sky and the current late-summer heat while reading thousands of pages about politics in Turkey, the Middle East or Europe that I have copied throughout my stayings in Istanbul or Hamburg. Occasionally I watch the live-streaming of Benedict's visit to Munich, Altötting (a "shrine of Europe"), and the UNESCO World Heritage Regensburg, I work on the computer or the internet.
Most important, I'm looking forward for the start of the Oktoberfest 2006, the world's biggest beer festival! (I'm sure to have told about it to everybody, but those who really can't remember anymore please go to http://www.oktoberfest.de) Beginning on Saturday, 16 September, when the first barrel of beer will be opened by the Mayor of Munich, millions of people from all over the world (especially Italy, Japan, the U.S. and Australia) will come and drink and have fun for about two-and-a-half weeks. As every year, it'll be great and (at least at the macro level) peaceful. Those of you who decide spontaneously and lustflully to come - don't hesitate to do so! It's an absolutely terrific experience!!! And for the others: Be sure to see some pictures of me and the "Wiesn 2006" on my picture page in a few days time!!!

Until then I promise to make all of you be part of my prayers to the Pope and I wish you a very good time.

Sincerely yours
Lütüf

Quite late...

I think I've to excuse me. I didn't write anything in the last time although some of you might have liked to read about my life in Hamburg. But I may tell you that it was not my fault. First, I had to work for my institute and that meant sitting all day in front of the computer. So, after work I wasn't very keen on sitting, typing and writing again. (On the other side, this means that I also had enough to do at the institute now. Most of the time I was searching for information, once about the UN-intervention in Somalia 1993/94 whose conditions may be similar to those the UNIFIL-troops in Lebanon might be concerned with in the near future. The other thing had to do with Turkey and I'm quite happy with that!)

Well, and the second circumstance that made me not writing anything for the blog was that my computer had some virus problems. Eleven of these f*cking b*stards I had on my computer, fortunately they didn't destroy anything but just blocked the system. I hope that from now on working with Mozilla Firefox or Opera instead of the Windows Internet Explorer will save me from those problems!

I really hope that everybody of you is fine and enjoys life. By the way I really like to know if anybody of you also has a weblog or an own homepage. Please tell me, I'm curious!
About my state of being I may say that I enjoy my daily life in Hamburg quite well. When the weather was good I went for a lot of walks through the town, accompanied by my photo camera and taking pictures. I put some of them on my photo page.
Hamburg is a beautiful city with much water. The river Elbe divides the town into two parts, on the southern shore there is the huge harbour area (after Rotterdam Hamburg has the second biggest industrial harbour in Europe, as far as I know), whereas on the northern shore the whole urban area lies. More than the Elbe there is the Alster, infact a small river that was turned into a huge lake right in the center of the downtown. Here, the well-established have their own sailing boats and small yachts lying in harbours and sailing clubs, and so, everybody can enjoy the view on dozens of white sails over blue water fighting with and aginst the stiff wind. (And so do I when I go the work each day.)

Walking around the Alster was what I did last weekend. North of it there are a quarters of the well-established, Rotherbaum, Eppendorf or Winterhude, whereas in the west you can find St. Pauli, famous for its football club that is totally not successful but that is loved and supported by almost everyone, and famous for the Reeperbahn - a long street with sexshops and cinemas, bars and nightclubs, strip shows and brothels and lots of other places for lonely hearts and open pockets. If you want to know more, please visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reeperbahn;-)

So far so good and instead of describing more by words I think its better to do it visually by pictures. So please have a look at the photo page and even more important: don't forget to tell me about your state of being.

Best wishes to everyone
Lütfü

P.S.: By the way, above you can see my cousin Thomas and me before going to the Hofbräuhaus, a Bavarian style restaurant in Hamburg (for a Bavarian as me it's something a little ridiculous, but "the Prussians" like it...)

P.P.S.: I don't know why, but although I try to set the links to my photo page and to delete the Google News and Edit me-Links, the changings cannot be seen. Stupid! So, I give you the link to my photo page directly here: It's www.flickr.com/photos/seemecrossing .

Moin moin!

This is how indigenous people from Hamburg say "Good morning", "Good evening", "Good bye" and even "I'm fine" to each other! So far what most of the Germans already know. And they also think that every Hamburgian uses this expression day-by-day. So did I when I entered a Hamburgian bakery for first time in my life, said "Moin moin" - and of course the waitresse didn't understand!
And, dear friends, there's a second mythos I have to deconstruct: the weather in Hamburg is not as bad as everybody thinks. Infact during this week that I'm here, it was quite sunny and warm and only a few raindrops (except of the kind of little taifun that we had three days a ago).

Right now I'm sitting in my office at the German Institute of Oriental Studies, it's Monday afternoon and before leaving for the afterwork party I decided to set a small post.
When I turn to the right and look outside the window I can see the southern part of the Alster, that is, let's say, the Golden Horn of Hamburg, with lots of white small sailing ships on it, surrounded by both beautiful historical buildings and more or less modern office complexes. (In the end of the month probably I will put the most beautiful and interesting pictures on my photo-page.)
Concerning my work, I may say that I'm not doing too much. This is due to the fact that 1. it's holidays now so lots of scientists who are usually working at the institute are not here; 2. my boss himself, Prof. Udo Steinbach, who is working on Turkey, is on holidays until 15th Augst and so I don't get any work from him; and 3. I still do not yet know about my final thesis' subject in detail so I cannot really start with the literature research. But I'm sure that this situation will change with each week more that I'm here, and anyway, I though have more time for getting to know and enjoying the city.
I'll tell you more, soon!

Best wishes, moin moin!
Lütfü

Welcome!

Dear friends from whereever you are from and whereever I met you! Welcome to my new webblog that I designed for the post-Erasmus, post-Istanbul, post-Turkey part of my life (or at least for an uncertain period of it)!

I'm proud of telling you that welcoming you warmly on this page means that you managed to enter the V.I.P. lounge of my mind and remembrance! Truely, when I left behind Istanbul and Turkey on 19 July 2006 I terminated a period of unique experiences that I made with people from different places from all over the world. The fact that you are now here to read what has happened and will happen to me after this time, means that I want you to keep on being part of my life despite the spacial and temporary distance that is between us. That's why I just can repeat: Welcome! Welcome to my world!

Infact it is this moment of welcoming that brings people together. Now that I'm back in Germany, back to my family and my old friends I feel of course good and comfortable. But this time of being back is something else than the moment of coming back, of seeing a person for the first time again after a long period of being separated. This moment is special since it may be filled with true and honest friendship or life. Do you know this feeling?

I just may tell you about my return to Germany - or first and foremost about my leaving from Istanbul since it is once again necessary to thank to Can and Dimitris who took me to the airport in order to say goodbye. Isn't it a good feeling when you realize that a Turk and Greek wanted to do this together??? Vaybe, let's praise the new era of intercutural peace!

Well, and as I'm asked quite often since I came back I now want to give a public answer to the question how I felt when leaving: Yes, I was sad. When the plain took off Sezen Aksu's Sen ağlama and İstanbul hatırası that I was listening to at the same time helped me crying some silent teardrops.

Anyway, I was taken from the airport by my brother Georg and a very good friend Alex who I know since we were at high school. Now after having graduated at Munich University he will start to work as a communication consultant in Frankfurt/Main. I was very surprised and happy to see him since he will leave Munich and me soon! Together with Georg I went home to our parents' place in Ingolstadt, about 70 km north of Munich. I stayed (and of course very enjoyed) some days with them and some relatives and friends until going to Munich for some more days for swimming, joining the beer gardens and occasionally the summer party of the Oriental Studies Institut that I stady at. You can imagine how I enjoyed this evening drinking cool Efes beer and eating some sigara yaprak while sitting on kilims in the grass and listening to Turkish music! Let's say, I felt like being at home...

Since a couple of days I'm now back again in Ingolstadt with my parents, Georg and some friends. The weather is hot but a mix of blue sky, clouds and rain. At the moment my main task is to read a lot about Turkish politics - information that I will need for the internship that I'm going to start on Tuesday, 1 August. It will be at the Orient-Institut in Hamburg for four weeks, and believe it or not, I'm looking forward to go there, to see new places, meet new people and be at the seaside again.

It will be from Hamburg where I will tell you next time about my state of being. I very would like to read some comments on my blog and this post. You can write to me by e-Mail or at the end of this post. Finally I hope that everything is fine for everyone and that I soon get news from all of you!

Best wishes

Lütfü