The beautiful south

I'm in Mamallapuram or Mahabalipuram and have just arrived from Chennai, or Madras. It all depends on who you speak to, or which signs you take notice of.

Whatever the case, the south is a different country.

Mamallapuram is a small village about two hours' drive from India's fourth biggest city. It's a beautiful location, the site of many rock carvings and a couple of extraordinary temples dating from the seventh century. The golden beach is wide and long, and overlooks the Bay of Bengal.
The village sleeps and wakes to the gentle tapping sound of chisel against granite; the sculptors here are known across the world and stalls line the streets advertising their wares. Thousands of statues of every size and shape are lined up for inspection. A garganutan Ganesh reclines next to a eight-foot Shiva behind which peacefully gazes a serene Buddha, and the sculptors are happy for you to sit and stare in amazement as they go about their daily business.

I've come to Mammallapuram with good intentions.

I've checked into my hotel which will be home for the next couple of months. At present I am the only guest, and so have the place to myself. My spacious room sits on the second floor - big double bed, desk with a bookshelf (already full), a very large and very clean bathroom. The outside balcony is enormous and, if I stand on my toes, I can just spot the sea.

I'm now dividing my time between the school and orphanage, helping out where I can and, for the first time in a while, experiencing culture shock. It's going to be huge learning curve, but with countless smiling faces that surround me, I'm settling in quite nicely.

So I'm going to take my leave, and won't be updating the website for some time.

I'm feeling very content, and very relaxed.

See you in a while.

James x

That certain je ne sais quoi

Last night, perched high on a rooftop bar in Beyoğlu, Aslı and I lounged comfortably and talked fondly of favourite lady, Istanbul.

Kebap enjoys hıs Sunday sleep in.

Aslı knows the magic of Istanbul better than most, and if like all Turks she can note the disadvantages, hassle and annoyances of living in this great metropolis, she's also one of the first to say something positive about the place too. She asked me, not for the first time, what it is about Istanbul that keeps me here.

Well, it's not the weather. My only real complaint about Turkey is that winter is too long. As I've written earlier, Istanbul is grey, really grey, in winter. And since weather dictates my mood then I pass long periods of doubt and gloom from November to April.

Many years ago, during a course on Middle French, I read the lines of Chretien de Troyes in Yvain the Knight of the Lion:

Car parole est tote perdue, S' ele n' est de cuer entandue.

To understand something truly you must feel it within your heart. Old French eloquence and my awkward translation aside, Istanbul can only be experienced once you begin to breathe it. And then, I'm afraid, it has you in its hold. Of course, any subject or person for which you have feeling excludes impartiality and most certainly rational thought.

Aslı's question must remain unanswered for the time being since I am incapable of dealing with this city with uncluttered, straight-thinking Cartesian clarity. I intend to come back to the issue when I've been away long enough to view it through different eyes. For now there's no other place I'd rather be. Corny, it's also the truth.

Since the sun shone today I awoke to a flood-lit bedroom. Kebap was happy to continue sleeping while I showered and I dropped him off in the neighbourhood mosque garden while I scouted around for a barber. I bumped in Lieve who lives at the opposite end of the street. As a career diplomat, she's just received news of her new posting to Amman.

We chatted about summer vacation plans, how stunningly beautiful the Teke Peninsula region of Turkey is (see Lycian Way entries from April), about the possible catastrophic development of Kaş and the complete non-Turkishness of Ölüdeniz, among other things. I love summer conversations because work is far from everyone's mind. A little while later and freshly shaved I started a slow walk to Ortakoy. Kepab was courting some cheap little tabby tart under a car as I passed my apartment building, but I left him to it, crossed in front of the mosque and down into Kabataş.

Tomorrow is a national holiday, Gençlik ve Spor Bayramı. Commemorating Mustafa Kemal's landing in Trabzon in 1919 and the beginning of the liberation effort to free Anatolia from foreign rule. Atatürk inaugurated Youth and Sports Day during his first term as the new republic's president. I mention this as the Turks can always be relied upon to unfurl the flag on balconies, display it from windows and indeed drape entire buildings in the Star and Crescent. what must perhaps look like fervent nationalism in to the untrained eye is, in my opinion, a fierce pride in secularism and the founding values of the nation. Kabataş was parading in scarlet and so too were the supporters of Bolu Spor and Eskişehir - Turkish football fans love to wear their team colours and everyone was passed was draped either in red and black or red and white. Apart from the police of course who were more soberly outfitted in blue with riot shield accessories.

After passing the stadium I started the polluted Golden Mile, one of my most frequently walked promenades in Istanbul from Dolmabahçe Sarayı, outpost of the moribund Ottoman Empire, to Beşiktaş, canton of pirate CDs and infernal transport hub. Between the two stretches the long tree lined Dolmabahçe Avenue, a wonderful walk among exhaust fumes. I'm always drawn to this area and yet inwardly berate myself for breathing in what must be an unhealthy quantity of carbon monoxide.

Beşiktaş reached, I moved on to Ortaköy where I browsed the stalls and came away with nothing. I am rarely in the mood to shop for anything other than books and so happily snacked on a almond croissant and slowly made the walk home.

When I arrived back in my neighbourhood, Cihangir, I pondered one of the things that really does keep me here - variation. Istanbul has many problems like all great cities, but the constant unknown, that you'll see some new and refreshing every time you take a walk, the fact that everything seems open for business every hour of the day and the new details you note of the old buildings and mosques. The sea and it changing view depending on the hour and the season.

Most of all, the interaction with Turks. Over the course of the day I experience what casual inquisitive yet respectful familiar friendliness that I've never experienced on this scale in a large conglomeration before. I chatted with my neighbour, a man in the mosque garden, a seller of scarfs on the pavement and played football with some boys in the street. The guys in the supermarket say hello every time I pass, as does Hamza the television repair man on my street and the rustic farmer selling artichokes from the back of his truck.

Kylie, this is my town.

Here, you're a nothing but an hyper-botoxed tourist.

It's a very small gesture and yet perhaps above all else, I love the inhabitants of this city's ability to communicate with a simplicity and genuineness that I'm yet to discover elsewhere.

I feel like I belong here. Which feels rather nice.

Bad habits.

I've a lot of these.

I am unable to quite smoking yet I know it's the filthiest habit around. To the abhorrence of my students I continue to chew and bite my fingernails. I have been known to pick sweets of the floor dropped seconds previously and pop them into my mouth. Perhaps worse still, I refuse to wear deodorant. I own two pairs of socks. And that is not a joke.

An example of people I want to maim.

Yet, if there is one habit I wish to change, it's my aversion to the mobile phone. As a normal 21st century irrational city-dweller, I've succumbed to the mobile era. For many years I adamantly insisted that I would never own the greatest intrusion onto me-time ever thrown into the public sphere. I remember listening to conversations at high volume during morning bus journeys to Central Station in Sydney and wishing I could beat the head of the phone-lover into an unrecognizable bleeding pulp.

Those people who chatted on footpaths while walking no-where in particular, oblivious to the shared public space around them, instilled such violent feelings within me that I needed to seek psychiatric help. I was elbowing anyone who came within range. The mobile phone seemed to make me even more aware of people's ignorance of those around them, bad manners became acceptable, even the cultural norm. Worse still, not having a mobile was perceived as reactionary. I am not a Luddite.

Like all wonderful invention, the arrival of the portable phone should have been a welcome step in the history of telecommunications. Instead, ownership of my cheapo Nokia has only exaggerated my sometime anti-social traits. My monthly expenditure on telephone credit is minimal. I love to talk in person but loathe talking on the phone. Unless, Mum, I'm chatting with you.

Yeah, like I bet that's a meaningful conversation

So whilst I have now owned a mobile since the day I landed in Istanbul, I'm remain unaware of current protocol regarding usage. You see, if I don't feel like answering, I don't. And this, I know, is what can only be defined as a bad habit. It's rude. I know I'm wrong not to answer but I can't.

It's time to explore the fear that dwells deep within me. I hate to disappoint, let down or otherwise be unable to assist someone when the need arises. And for some reason, if someone makes a request to me over the phone, I always reply in the affirmative. This is not healthy.

However, last week something went wrong. One of my closest friends in this fair city rang, and I didn't answer. I didn't even call back. He got angry, and rightly so. My friendship might have been lost and I would've deserved it. And this is why I love the Turks. They crave human contact more than Anglo-Saxons.

I guess this will fall into disputed territory it's got to be said; the Mediterraneans are just better at friendships than I can ever hope to be. I can't source any academic reference here, I'm going on instinct. I can go a month without speaking with my friends. A Turk cannot. And this is something I need to learn. Otherwise, I'm just bring plain rude.

How I perceive the average mobile user. Yes, it's wrong, I know, but then again, is it really?

And so I promise from this day forth:

a. to pick up the phone when it rings
b. to call back as soon as possible if I am unable to pick up
c. to feel free to say no on the phone
d. to keep my Turkish friends because they are good to me

How I still have this many hang ups (now that's a pun) at this age is beyond me.

Better now.

I sincerely love my cat. Having someone to take care of makes me feel less selfish in a life committed to avoiding responsibility and emotional attachment.

Ten days ago I returned home. Nothing unusual there, I return home every day. Well, most nights anyway. By the time I open the apartment door, nine times out of ten Kepab is patiently waiting while I unload my pack and then expects the usual hugging and free under-the-neck-and-scalp-scratching session that ensues.

Kebap makes friends. Or enemies. Not sure. Anyway, social networking.

That particular night he didn't come to the door, nor did he stir when the bedroom light was switched on and I threw off tie, shirt and trousers to change into short, T-shirt and sandals. I picked him up off the bed. He growled deep and low. I dropped him back on the bed and, as is my routine, got out the cafetiere, lit a cigarette and checked for new grey hairs in the hallway mirror. Kepab, I realised while butting out my Winston Light, still hadn't moved from the bed. Something was up.

It took me several minutes to work it out. His tail was injured, possibly broken. A journey followed to visit Alper Bey, my vet of choice because the previous one seemed indifferent to Kepab and my several hundred questions regarding the right choice of cat food for a young street cat. Alper, knowing Kepab to be rather, well, violent and a master of claw-in-the-face martial art tactics when the need arises, excused his inability to take an x-ray on the spot since other staff had left for the day. Kepab is not the kind of cute little cat that sits quietly on a cold steel table in the examination room while a vet sticks a gloved finger in places Pope Leo X enjoyed a tad too much. Kebap is 100% street feline. He don't take crap and he don't like to be touched by strangers. Alper knows this well.

Badly brought up or not, Kebap is my charge and I had to leave him overnight until staff arrived tomorrow and enough hands would be available to hold him down and x-ray his tail. I naturally inquired about his diagnosis and was informed that if the tail were broken there was a high possibility of its amputation. I didn't take the news well and slept badly that night.

Flirtatious behaviour in the mosque gardens. Inappropriate.

The following day I raced to the vet after work. Kepab lay forlorn in his cat basket. Something between Lion King pathos and Isabelle Huppert as Madame Bovary (deathbed scene).
I knew he wasn't happy. Alper had tried to telephone me without luck during the day. To be fair, what would I have known about removing a lesion from a tail anyway? He had carried out what needed to be done and told me that my baby would still be 'drunk' for the next few hours. Do we even have a specific word in English to describe the after effects of a general anesthetic?

Back at the house Kepab appeared less drunk and more just plain pissed off. Certainly in no mood to talk. He went back to the bed. I had ten days' worth of antibiotics to administer. That sounded like a lot of fun. Kepab looked comic and pathetic a la fois with his bandaged tail and purple plastic Elizabethan collar. Kind of like Paris Hilton, though unlike her my cat is not a useless slut.

Now it's Saturday, ten days post-operation. The course of antibiotics has finished and we've angrily revisited a surprisingly calm vet who had changed and re-changed an ungrateful Kepab's bandage. Today is the first day of real, proper summer weather in Istanbul. Kepab and I are in the garden of Cihangir Mosque, affording a wide view of the Bosphorus and making me fall in love once again with this metropolis. Kepab is less interested in watching ferries ply the waters than I am. He enjoys scratching his head against plants more than I do. He enjoys socialising with others of his species. I do not.

We're both happy and relaxed. It's fine time to be in Istanbul.

Kebap a la plastic ruffle. Tres chic, tres aujourd'hui. Le must de Cihangir pour le chat de votre vie.

Words fail me

It's not funny. The longer I remain in this country the more tormented my mother tongue sounds as I attempt to communicate with both native speaker work colleagues and my students of English.

Daily I bemoan the fact that both my written and spoken expression of English worsens. I've gone from having words on the tip of my tongue to an almost complete inability to cough up the mot juste as required. Extracting abstract nouns is now more often than not a chore and, more than usual, I'm avoiding conversations where opinions rather than fact are necessary. I'm tired of hesitating and stalling my interlocutor while I rack my brain to search out the words or phrases needed to complete my sentences and convince the listener that I am not in fact just a near-native speaker. For God's sake, how can this be happening?

Help me, O dear, dear prescriptive grammar

Well, this shouldn't be happening. Of course, we all suffered intermittently from tied tongues. Especially when exhausted it's often difficult to take in, let alone produce a stream of the vernacular. We've all sat through dull, pointless meetings where our train of thought has erred, only to be expected to proffer some learned opinion on a subject discussed for the last half an hour about which we have no idea. This happens to me all the time because I detest meetings. They're rarely necessary, intensely infuriating and to be honest, for the handful of people who clearly enjoy the limelight I'd be happy to let them make all the decisions regarding agenda items.

However, I digress. My complaint revolves around my loss of naturalness, fluency and proficiency when talking about the most everyday subjects. My grammar falters, nouns have disappeared almost entirely from my vocabulary and it might even be that I can no longer use irregular past simple verbs. I gived up.

Naturally, there are those of you out there who would perhaps suggest that no Australian, regardless of education or upbringing, speaks an English worth listening to. I'm often subjected to opinions regarding bad English, lazy English, inferior speech. I'm not a fan of the prescriptive grammarians nor those who think a certain sociolect exists, namely theirs, that is more correct than others.

Bad English (food).

Although most arguments claiming superiority of one English over another usually boils down to what we like to call accent. From the English-speaking arena, those originating from Australia, Birmingham, Liverpool and the Black Country in England, and probably many Southerners from the United States, will have no doubt at time been subjected to or subject of arguments regarding deficient speech that of course doesn't measure up to those bright young things graduating from Oxbridge-upon-Pretense.

Accent aside, I find that Turkish words and grammar are having an immeasurable effect on my speech and writing. I am still yet to master Turkish yet clear progress has been made over the past few months. I have learned reported speech and can form definite clauses. In short, my Turkish is becoming more flexible, more elastic, and is rarely misunderstood. My English is raising eyebrows.

Below are some recent observations.

First, I'm thinking seriously about visiting the Spain and the Portugal during the summer break. I plan to spend a lot of time idling on the beach but then heading over to the Balearic Island to catch up with friends in the Majorca. you get the idea. The use of the definite article, otherwise known as the in English is sometimes difficult to teach and for all but the upper-intermediate learner, cumbersome to employ correctly.

That said, the use of the with geographical place names is straightforward and amounts to learning by rote a few rules. Exceptions are rare. We say I'll visit Germany but I'll travel to the United States. It would be pleasant to sip a mojito on a yacht in the Caribbean but find accommodation on Lake Como. And the rules appear to have slipped out of my head. But I'm still planning to visit the Spain regardless.

A possible birthday present for those who feel the need to offer something

Next in importance is the in-creep of Turklish, a phenomenon itself divisible into the art of inserting Turkish words when English suffices and the mollifying habit of Turkifying English words. Utterances such as yani, o kadar, tamam, evet, hayır, bitti, yok ya and değil mi? have all but wiped out the equivalent so, that's it, ok, yes, no, it's finished, no way, and really? Not that big a deal I suppose but at times it bugs me.

More problematic is Turklish, most noticeable in my miseuse of phrasal verbs and collocations. I often can't remember whether I should open or answer the phone if someone calls and either turn off or close the lights when I exit a room. I'm constantly giving notes to my students after marking tests and they take permission from me to visit the toilet during classtime. I overuse nice and good because in Turkish it's almost impossible to avoid the ubiquitous güzel, an adjective used to cover every possible positive situation in Istanbul. Interesting, good, delicious, pleasant, beautiful, impressive, fascinating among other seems to be shrouded in a halo of güzel-ness. I can't decide whether adjectives are lacking or I have reached saturation point for learning descriptive words.

Obsolete forms are seeping in. Where, whither and whence have all been used in the last month. I am Charlotte Bronte. I am James Hardy. I sound like a twat. Hither and hence are likely to follow.

Bad Turkish (hair and shirt)

But phrasal verbs. That's what I wanted to mention. Turkish has them, and most of them are rendered with etmek and yapmak, to do. I do party, do my work, do my duty, and strangely, in an unusual twist of fate and lingusitcs, do myself. I even confused my head last week but it was understandable since my day had been very crowded in the school.

The list goes on. Adverbs of position confound me greater still. I cannot distinguish between above and on, below and under, behind and between, but I am sincerely over it.

Many moons ago, when I live in Paris, I told a visiting friend that I was interrogating my answering machine from a distance. Some things never change.

And by th way: These people ought to be punched. Hard.

It's all about change

Nice one. Congratulations on your offer to study at the University of Technology of Sydney says my double-sided colour brochure.

Yesterday I received my offer of admission to undertake a Masters in Teaching of English to Speakers of Other Languages. Life as I have known it for several years it about to change.

It's over three years since I departed Australia and aside from several temporary bouts of mild homesickness and constant self-flagellation at my inability to adapt to Istanbul's peculiarities, I want to stay. This city has an addictive charm that just will not break.

Thus it had become pressing to view the bigger picture.

Back to school.

I'm no longer young. I've had a checkered career which has kept responsibilities at greater than arm's length but that has perhaps not provided the self-fulfillment of which I currently feel in need. It's time to look up and think sharp. It's time to ponder life's direction. With the horns firmly in my grip, I intend to lead the bull onwards and upwards.

Teaching in Middle School has been the most rewarding experience to date. I hope never to tire of being in a classroom brimming with youthful energy and grinning naughtiness. However, I need to get more serious about what I'm doing and consider how good an educator I really hope to be.

A few months ago I became weary of administration. I realised I was becoming irritable and inflexible when dealing with paperwork, meetings and all the quite unnecessary evils that come with the modern education industry. Often I was at odds with what was being said but felt my opinions were nothing more than poorly thought-out, ill-timed and badly delivered diatribe that rarely did anything to empower me or my colleagues. There is a lot that is frustrating about teaching children. Adults are to blame for all of it.

In brief, if I want to remain in Turkey on a more permanent basis - and I do - then I need to think where I want to be in the next five years. I envisaged my travelling three months a year, working the other nine. I see a little apartment in my neighbourhood for which one day I will hold the title deeds, I'm imagining a summer house on the Mediterranean coast, I see a permanent household staff member.

My first step on the road to comfort is browsing the four-page Distant Student Enrolment Guide. Next, I'm going to have to say goodbye to shirt, tie, regular shaving and an equally reliable regular monthly income as I turn student once again and rely on an income source from private tuition.

There is much to accomplish over the next few weeks. And all of it will push my organisation skills to the limit. No doubt this issue will be featuring with great frequency in my head and on this blog.

I am feeling inspired once again. which is exactly what I needed.

Sunk.

Last year when I was in London I bout a book entitled Overcoming Depression. It was appropriately placed on a shelf and left to gather cat hair and dust.

Twelve months later I've scoured the room but to no avail. I can't locate it. Given the current state of my abode I'll be lucky to find my bed tonight, but still, I'm left feeling somewhat sullen. Something tells me I'm depressed and yet this very train of thought smacks of self-indulgence.

Neither sure whether I owe it to a strict Anglo-Australian upbringing or some other strange twist of personality, I consider depression as something that afflicts others. I don't get downcast and yet find myself at a low ebb. Quite frankly, I feel rubbish.

A multitude of reasons to be content produce themselves: I benefit from a great lifestyle in a magnificent city, I work a mostly fulfilling job, and I know there are people who genuinely care about me. I don't think I'm homesick even if the amount of time I spend poring over sites in Australia via Google Earth suggests otherwise.

There is, however, an increasing amount of anti-social behaviour in my personality. I rarely want to go out and instead prefer the company of my cat to others. Conversations only occasionally hold my interest for the briefest of periods. Books are preferable to people. I sleep long periods. My mood swings are more extreme and more frequent and I quite easily pass a weekend without talking with another soul besides supermarket staff and taxi drivers.

I think I need a swift sharp kick up the Khyber Pass.

Ire

If there's one thing that makes me angry, it's people.

As is my regular Sunday afternoon, I've been browsing the electronic press and came across an article in the Sydney Morning Herald that informs me the Malaysian government is proposing to impose restrictions on women travelling alone outside the country.

The Malaysian ruling party is debating whether or not women should provide written consent from families or employers before being permitted to move outside the country's borders. Apparently there has been a significant number of criminal cases in which female Malaysian nationals have been duped into transporting illegal drugs and at present over one hundred women are lingering in foreign prisons.

The state news agency views this as a move to counteract criminal activity but I smell religious influence. I very much doubt that Malaysia, with a population of highly-educated nationals in a vibrant, dynamic and multi-ethnic society, has any further use for the stunted minds of officials stunted by misogynistic, God-fearing claptrap.

My grandmother, mother, sisters and female friends and colleagues are living proof that the chicks are equal to men in every way except their ability to remember birthdays and every celebration date I manage to forget. I find it incredulous that once again the evil that is religion pervades even further into a society that seemed secular not so very long ago. I was last in Malaysia in 1992 and retain vivid memories gorging on chicken satays in Ipoh and belting out Country and Western ditties in a karaoke bar somewhere in Sitiawan.

I loathe religion. I detest it because I've never seen it's positive side. Whether God exists or not is up to the individual and not the lawmaker. The Western Church may have given us some rather dab painting commissions and extravagant architecture that would have otherwise never seen the light of day, but for religion to continue to interfere with the rights of the individual is unacceptable and, in this day and age, deserving of two hard smacks to either side of the face.

Equally outraged but more eloquent in style are the words of Norhayati Kaprawi, a spokeswoman for Sisters in Islam. She is quoted as saying 'It is totally ridiculous and it's a totally regressive proposal with regards to women's right to movement'. I agree.

That written permission is going to halt the transportation of A-class drugs across transnational boundaries...

God, if you really existed you wouldn't have made the human race so stupid.

And if I were a Malaysian woman I'd be after someone's head.

Another quiet day in my favourite city.

When the sun shines in Istanbul my mood becomes as warm as a Turkish bath. And although I generally work on Wednesday, the nervous ruling AKP party had, like their predecessors, preempted social uprising during May Day and sealed off the centre of the European side of the city by the early hours of this morning. School was therefore out of the question since commuting from the Taksim district where I live was supposedly unfeasible.

According to the media, 66 schools were closed in affected areas and much public transport closed down. In particular, all transport leading to Taksim Square was suspended for fear of allowing large numbers of demonstrators to gather. Enough riot police were present to fill a football stadium along with many amoured vehicles, a number of which were fitted with water cannons.

You need to understand that successive Turkish governments have been loathe to allow public demonstrations in Taksim Square since 1977 when a score of people were killed. Since the armed forces coup d'etat in 1980 permission has not been forthcoming for any demonstration, although from time to time I've seen gatherings, all of them peaceful and all attended by a gargantuan contingent of police.

So I spent the early afternoon playing improvised volleyball with a security guard at a neighbourhood mansion on my street corner, checking on the multitude of new feline arrivals in the area and sharing chocolate with Mert, a six year old happy not be be at primary school for the day.

Helicopters began to circle over head and the sounds of protesters came floating down the street. Several hundred moved slowly into view and managed to advance a hundred metres up the main thoroughfare of Cihangir before being blockaded by Robocops. It all seemed relatively peaceful though the crowd slowly dissipated and people moved silently on their way.

Half an hour later I decided to head to the local Carrefour supermarket. Arriving on Sıraselviler Street, a new scene opened up to me. Evidently, events had transpired less harmoniously here. Scattered across the street were the remains of heavy concrete pot planters, strewn in every direction. The pepper gas began to sting my eyes and I'm assuming that water cannons had also been used since rivulets of scarlet were running down the gutters. All bar my barber had closed for business and people sat aimlessly. Police everywhere, yet no real tension in the air.

Or at least it seemed like that to me. Often it's hard to comprehend events that take place in your adopted home since you haven't enough history in the place to fully understand what's going on. It reminded me of how the media reported several bombings in Istanbul last year of which I remained unaware until I read about them on the BBC website the day following the events. How a city can be rendered unsafe by a biased media that makes your family and friends wonder why you're living in such a dangerous place. Istanbul is so large that events can happen here to which I am oblivious for days on end. And yet it always feels so safe to me.

It also brought to mind the uncovering in Austria of a man who purportedly kept his daughter hostage in a caller for the past twenty-four years. How something so insidious and terrible can be kept hidden for so long, and yet now the country's chancellor is calling for an 'rebranding' campaign. It's easy for us to judge the entire nation by one shocking event so that we can quickly distance ourselves from the 'others' who might have implicitly allowed this to happen. I feel sorry for those people held captive as I feel sorry for the Austrian people as a whole. I hope we can all reserve our judgments and eventually realise that this crime was committed by an insane individual who could be found in any one of a number of places on the planet. And that this outrage doesn't taint the Austrian people as a whole.

Besides, I've a personal reason for not wanting hostility towards the heir-apparent of the Hapsburg dynasty. In Turkish, like in so many languages, Austria/Austrian and Australia/Australian are oft confused. I don't need that now.

Turkey still has bigger problems to face than allowing a full democracy to operate and therefore allow demonstrations during May Day in the heart of its biggest metropolis. A reported released on 29 April regarding Freedom of the Press summarises that the country still has a long way to until it allows its journalists to write openly and freely, and indeed in certain respects perhaps the situation has even worsened since changes to the penal code were introduced in 2005.

I hope very much to see a government elected one day that is worthy of the people in this wonderfully complex country which I choose to call home. And maybe there will be a time when demonstrations no longer bring out en masse pepper gas and water cannons.