Making A Home, So Far Away from Home

I have joined to sis' friends to be together for a special sunday breakfast in Polonezköy in the occasion of a good friend 's birthday

Polonezköy is in the countryside in the very north of Istanbul

ut what makes Polonezköy so special and so different than the texture of Istanbul is not only the greenery,

The history of the village is quite interestng. It was built as an emigration center to Polish in 1842. So far away from home..

Hence the name Polonezköy which means Polish Village in Turkish.

"At the beginning, the village was inhabited by 12 people, but there were no more than 220 people when the village was most populated. In the course of time, Adampol developed and was flooded by a lot of emigrants from the rebellion in November 1830, during the Crimean War in 1853, and by runaways from Siberia and from captivity in Czerkieska. The first inhabitants busied themselves with agriculture, raising and forestry. After Polish independence in 1918, many returned to Poland. Before World War II, the first tourists already began to arrive to the village. The remaining inhabitants of Adampol (Polonezköy) took Turkish citizenship in 1938."

Still the inhabitants speak the Polish language and the signs are both in Turkish and Polish

Today Polonezköy is an excellent escape for Istanbullers like us on weekends.

The spring, the unaging spring is already here. I enjoyed my short walks to take photos and caught up the birthday wishes at the end of their long wee session.

The 100th Post - Biography of A Home

This is my 100th post.
I have published 99 before.

I had a lot to say and I still have more.

In order to tell something, one has to have phrases. What makes us build phrases? What makes us share them here?

I worked so much on this post but I can not express my self as  do not know how much shall I let myself say?

I can not say.
But at least I can share some photos here.

I first started a blog two years ago on 27th of February 2008 in my mother tongue Turkish but even the first post made me realise how far I was from my dream home.

In April 2008 there was a visit to the wish-hill where we climbed thinking about our wishes and did not speak to each other.

The wish hill seemed to work out miraculously..

I remember the first day I visited this apartment

I came from the office in a lunch break, I was so sleepless, so in love, that I secretly, desperately fell asleep on the bed. I could not believe I could afford it. Then my officemate H loved the appartment and convinced me to try.

So I moved in.

Head over heels..

A story I am not able to tell. There is a hole in me that I can not put to words.

On Valentine's Day

I caught this insant this morning after leaving mom's.

"oh those women I loved, they were not there anyway

they were wearing rain as the autumn
if I were to cuddle a bit, they’d turn to be kids
if I were to leave, their eyes froggy by the fear
oh those women I loved, they were not there anyway
such a loving has not been lived


no, do not think that they stopped thinking about me
still now and then their letters get here
they were not real they were hopes each
an old song or may be a verse
oh those women I loved, they were not there anyway
such a loving has not been lived


they held my hands in my solitude
their whisper far away makes me shiver
as if they were clouds in the sky
who knows where did they fade away
oh those women I loved, they were not there anyway
Such a loving has not been lived


Atilla ILHAN
Ben Ne Kadınlar Sevdim
through my broken translation"

As for me, I have been very loyal to my very loyal lover.

From weeks ahead, I had already bought my self a lovely present and a ticket to Alle Anderen movie in the festival which I strongly recommend as I really liked this evening as a perfect deep and fun way to mull over the loving process and the reflections on the relationship.

After the movie, I treated my self with a beatiful dinner and a glass of vine in my nice restaurant.

Hope your Valentine Days are all good as mine.

I smell Lolita Lempicka.. from the gift box.

Good night.. sleep tight

Today Istanbul

I have been under the spell of Istanbul's sunset and chat with starngers and took photos near Kabatas. The best photos I have taken, I believe are the ones of those strangers that I will send to their email address that I was given and not quite have the right to publish.

If isolated from the chat with strangers,

Kabatas is ferries and rush

And keep in mind, ferries mean seagulls

Always..

Kabatas is this unique beautiful break in the sunset by the clock tower of Dolmabahce Palace

Kabatas is the parliament blue and the gold 

colors of the enlightening on monuments in the evening sky

 Kabatas means my decent meatball guy Hasan in his colorful workbench

Out of home as I read the last pages of the nice book of Aret VARTANYAN: A Breath of Istanbul

An Empty Nest

Yesterday, on my way to the farmers market, I fell on my head and back quite brutally , on the stony asphalte, at the icy end of a slope. Not only the physical pain of my head but I felt so ashamed as tha cars stopped to the incident. And sweeping my tears from my cheeks I realised I suddenly felt so uniquely alone and felt the urge to shed more tears.

I felt as if being alone is "fearful in an offending way / Sometimes one gets exhausted of living captive on a blade". This how I felt it just the way  Atilla ILHAN describes "loving" in one of his very well-known poems*. 

Now and then I am asking myself, although my home is blessed with friends, with dreams came true, joy and love like my cats jumping each other, is there an empty nest inside of me? Is it an obligation?

Does purification bring isolation?

The back of my head and my neck hurts still, but not these thoughts anymore as I am putting them down here.

* - I AM OBLIGED TO YOU

I am obliged to you, you can not know
Like a nail this is how I am keeping your name in my head
Your eyes get bigger and bigger
I am obliged to you, you can not know
I am warming up inside with you

The trees getting ready for the fall
Is this city, that old Istanbul?
The clouds shredded in the darkness
The street lights are on all in a sudden
The smell of the rain on the sidewalks
I am obliged to you, you are missing out

Loving is sometimes fearful in an offending way
One gets exhausted suddenly, on a late afternoon
Of living captive on a blade
Sometimes
His passion breaks his hands
Makes out many lives from his living
Whichever door he knocks sometimes
The sneaky whirling of loneliness at his back

A gramaphone is on in Fatih
Plays a Cuma from the old times
I wish I could listen at the corner perpetually
If only I could bring you an unused sky
The weeks crumble in my hands
Whatever I do, whatever I hold, wherever I go
I am obliged to you, you are missing out

Maybe you are the child in blue dots
Oh noone knows, noone knows you
A cargo vessel oozes away in your deserted eyes
Maybe you are taking a flight in Yesilkoy
You are soaked, you have goose pumps
May be you're blind, you're broken
The evil wind hurls your hair

Whenever I think of a living,
May be hard around this table of volves
Without a shame, without getting our hands dirty
Whenever I think of a living
I say shush and I begin with your name
Your secret seas moves inside me
No, there is no other way
I am obliged to you, you can not know

Atila ILHAN
Ben Sana Mecburum
through my modest translation