Here´s a recent article in Science News about brain cell death. It seems that about a minute after the blood supply to brain cells is cut off, an electrical charge buildup is released, resulting in "an eerie shudder of activity". This doesn´t address the difference between halal slaughter and the Western practice of using a knocker but it´s an interesting, if morbid, article at least.

The link is:
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/332665/title/Wave_of_death_may_not_be_a_last_gasp

That may not work for everyone, as Science News requires subscription registration for some articles, so the full text is:


Almost a minute after a rat’s head is severed from its body, an eerie shudder of activity ripples through the animal’s brain. Some researchers think this post-decapitation wave marks the border between life and death. But the phenomenon can be explained by electrical changes that, in some cases, are reversible, researchers report online July 13 in PLoS ONE.

Whether a similar kind of brain wave happens in humans, and if so, whether it is inextricably tied to death could have important implications. An unambiguous marker could help doctors better decide when to diagnose brain death, knowledge that could give clarity to loved ones and boost earlier organ donation.

In a PLoS ONE paper published in January, neuroscientist Anton Coenen and colleagues at the Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands described this wave of electrical activity in the rat brain occurring 50 seconds after decapitation. The Nijmegen team, which was exploring whether decapitation is a humane way to sacrifice lab animals, wrote that this brain activity seemed to be the ultimate border between life and death. They dubbed the phenomenon the “wave of death.”

But neurologist Michel van Putten of the University of Twente in Enschede, the Netherlands, wasn’t convinced. “We have no doubt the observation is real,” he says. “But the interpretation is completely speculative.”

In the new study, van Putten and colleagues devised a mathematical model of how a nerve cell would behave if its oxygen and energy supplies were suddenly cut off. The model consists of just a single cell with three kinds of channels that allow charged particles to flow in and out. The spaces outside and inside nerve cells have unequal electrical charges, a difference that allows neurons to fire the impulses they use to communicate.

After an abrupt halt of energy and oxygen supply, the channels stop functioning normally, causing a buildup of positive charge outside the cell. This buildup prompts a big discharge of electrical activity about a minute after starting the simulation — the wave of death.

Study coauthor and physicist Bas-Jan Zandt, also of the University of Twente, says that the simulation closely matches what is observed in the rat brain. Such cell behavior could be the start of a damaging process, he says, such as cell swelling, but there’s nothing about the actual wave that means the nerve cell is going to die.

“It doesn’t cause damage to the cell,” Zandt says. “In principle, it is a reversible process.”

The observed brain wave may represent an event on the way to death, but probably isn’t death itself, says clinical neurophysiologist Kevin Nelson of the University of Kentucky in Lexington. Coenen, coauthor of the earlier study, says he was happy to see the modeling experiment. “It nicely shows what we already expected,” he says of the study’s finding that the wave is due to a massive change in cell membrane charge. Yet he still thinks that this wave may be an irreversibly damaging process, and he and his team plan to test this.

alameda, there is no way to commercially raise meat animals without some suffering on the animals´ part. No bull calf, for instance, is going to enjoy being cut but it´s not practical to have a herd of bulls rather than steers, hence the bull calves get cut. There are similar practicalities for other procedures.

My friend, who I buy my beef from, is a small operator too, not quite a hobby farmer but certainly not a full time rancher. It´s nice to patronize people like this, but most people in the world will have to get their food from large corporations or do without. We should just encourage humane treatment by everyone.

I´d just like to thank Stumpy for his posts and add that, as someone who has also been around ranches and slaughterhouses, I can confirm that all his points are correct.

Last week, I helped a friend with branding and cutting his bull calves last week and can say that this causes much more distress than slaughtering either by halal procedures or by using a knocker. Ranching practices are not always kind to the animal, even though they are necessary. All the ranchers I know do their best to minimize their animals´ suffering.

I did a Google search and found an e-bay seller:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/KURDISH-ALEVI-LAMENTS-2CD-2011-ZEMAREN-KURDEN-ELEWI_W0QQitemZ300557082750QQcmdZViewItemQQssPageNameZRSS:B:SILF:GB:102

The good news, such as it is, is that a magnitude 8.9 event can´t happen on faults like the one that threatens Istanbul. The North Anatolian fault is a strike-slip fault, where slabs of rocks slide sideways along a perpendicular edge between them. Think of two floor tiles lying next to each other and one sliding along their common edge while the other remains still. It turns out the biggest earthquake you can get with a system like that is perhaps M8. The San Andreas fault is a strike-slip fault and is remarkably similar to the North Anatolian fault. On the San Andreas, the 1906 San Francisco earthquake was M7.7 to M7.9, depending on how you estimate it. That´s about the biggest that one could be near Istanbul, which would without doubt be a staggering tragedy because of the number of people affected.

The March 11 Japan quake was on a thrust fault where one slab of rock is sliding under another. Think of our floor tiles, with one on lying top of the other, and the bottom one sliding under the top one. There would be a lot more friction than in the strike-slip example and that friction is analagous to earthquake energy. Big thrust faults are found only at subduction zones, where one slab of oceanic crust is being forced underneath another slab. They can be M9+, with the Japan quake estimated at M8.9, last I heard.

By the way, terrestrial-caused quakes, on no matter what sort of fault system, can in theory only go up to about M10, because even the strongest rock, with absolutely no flaws, would not be able to store enough stress to cause a stronger event. A meteor impact could cause a bigger event, though. The Chicxulub impact that wiped out the dinosaurs would have caused an earthquake that has been estimated at 11+.

500 years is not very long for DNA extraction. A partial sequence of 40,000 year old Neanderthal DNA has been recovered:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/05/100506141549.htm

Alcohol-free wine is fairly common in U.S. supermarkets and shops.  It´s not the same as grape juice since it has been fermented, which changes the chemistry and taste a lot as the sugar has been converted to alcohol, which is then removed.  I believe a vacuum process is used for the removal but I´m not sure of that.  You can get alcohol-free beer too.  Alcohol-free beer and wine don´t taste exactly the same as the true products but they´re similar.

Both the wine and beer are marketed to people who like the taste or want to blend into social situations but don´t want the effects of alcohol, whether because it´s against their religion, they´re planning on driving or operating other equipment or because they´re alcoholics.

I spent a day in Erzurum a couple of years ago, just looking around, and enjoyed the place.  There are a number of historic old buildings and the town was interesting for itself, being very much more Asian than European.

It certainly is conservative, with what seems like a cami on every block.  I encountered no  English speakers but people were friendly enough and I had no problems getting by with only rudimentary Turkish.  Nobody bothered me at all except for a few small children at  Üç Türbe, who demanded money to pose for pictures.  They were annoying but scattered quickly enough when I glared at them.  It´s not a warm place but it´s not Antactica either.  You want to dress conservatively there anyway, with long sleeves and pants legs, and a jacket might come in handy.

I liked Erzurum and would recommend a visit to it.

That´s condemning the poor thing to a rather horrible lingering death. It´s much kinder to kill it as quickly as possible.

Personally, I prefer to stick the point of a knife between the fish´s eyes and push it into the brain. The fish writhes for a few seconds, then goes limp. It´s not a pretty thing to do but there is no way to make killing a warm and fuzzy activity. A quick and, if possible, painless death is the best you can do.

Also thanks to Vineyards for the child´s poem. I find it charming.

It´s not in my Redhouse as such, but I was told that one of the Turkish names for ladybug is lucky bug.

I was talking with some friends in eastern Turkey when I spotted a ladybug on a concrete walkway where it was in danger of being stepped on. I got it to crawl onto my hand and put it in some bushes. My friends (most of whom spoke little English) seemed to respect this quite a bit and one of them told me that it´s name was lucky bug and it was good that I had rescued it.

They wanted to tell me more but we couldn´t communicate well enough to share further details.

Me too. The weddings I attended in Turkey were such happy affairs. My sympathies to the victims and to their survivors.

That´s a nice, conciliatory thought. Except...

He edited the October 15, 2007 publication date out of his cut-and-paste, thus very strongly implying that it was a current story. That´s dishonest. That´s the sort of thing trolls do.

Later on in his cut-and-paste, he edited the November 31, 2007 date out of the event schedule, demonstrating that he is not only dishonest but not especially bright. Thirty days has September, etc.

"American Facism Awareness Day" was a hoax. In 2007, some college students wrote and distributed a rather unclever flier  on "American Facism Awareness Day" which set off a minor furore at their campus. The perpetrators came out with an immediate retraction/explanation.  For anyone wanting details, including the retraction, check out some of the links at:

http://www.theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/islamo_fascism_awareness_week/

Only a dedicated troll would post this sort of inflammatory garbage on this forum at this late date.

In the runup to Obama´s visit, Turkey has been getting a lot more news coverage than usual in U.S. news media. Yesterday I heard a little piece on Efes on National Public Radio and today a quite long BBC piece on the graves excavations in the Southeast and the related political controversies.

The New York Times has an intersting editorial today at:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/04/opinion/04sat1.html?ref=opinion

The text of the editorial is:

Mr. Obama and Turkey

President Obama has wisely decided to visit Turkey during his first official trip to Europe. The United States needs Turkey’s cooperation — in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as with Iran and efforts to broker Middle East peace. But there are also very worrying trends in Turkey’s relationship with Europe and its internal politics.

Mr. Obama must do all he can to help reverse those trends and anchor Turkey more firmly in the West.

The Justice and Development Party scored an impressive re-election in 2007 after pursuing market-oriented policies that brought economic growth and more trade ties with the European Union. That conservative Muslim party also expanded human rights and brought Turkish law closer to European standards.

Those reforms have since stalled — partly because of opposition from civilian nationalists and generals who still wield too much clout. (The trial of 86 people accused of plotting a military coup is a reminder of the dark side of Turkish politics.) But Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan also seems to have lost enthusiasm for the European Union bid and the reforms that are the price of admission. President Nicolas Sarkozy of France has been especially unhelpful, making clear that he will do all he can to keep Turkey out of the European Union. Mr. Obama must persuade Mr. Sarkozy and others that admitting Turkey — a Muslim democracy — is in everyone’s interest. And he must persuade Ankara that the required reforms will strengthen Turkey’s democracy and provide more stability and growth.

We are concerned about Mr. Erdogan’s increasingly autocratic tendencies. His government’s decision to slap the media mogul Aydin Dogan with a $500 million tax bill smacks of retaliation against an independent press that has successfully exposed government corruption. Ankara’s willingness to help rebuild schools in Afghanistan is welcome. But the situation there is dire, and NATO also needs more troops and needs access to Turkish military bases to facilitate the transport of American soldiers and equipment into Afghanistan and out of Iraq.

Ankara has played a positive role, mediating indirect talks between Israel and Syria. With Washington’s encouragement, Mr. Erdogan could also use his relationships with Iran, Sudan and Hamas to encourage improved behavior.

Turkey’s cooperation with Iraqi Kurds has vastly improved. There are also reports that Turkey and Armenia may soon normalize relations.

We have long criticized Turkey for its self-destructive denial of the World War I era mass killing of Armenians. But while Congress is again contemplating a resolution denouncing the genocide, it would do a lot more good for both Armenia and Turkey if it held back. Mr. Obama, who vowed in the presidential campaign to recognize the event as genocide, should also forbear.

The Bush administration’s disastrous war in Iraq fanned a destructive anti-Americanism in Turkey. Mr. Obama’s visit is likely to soothe hostile feelings. But he must go beyond that to secure a relationship with an important ally and an important democracy in danger of backsliding.

It can be very difficult to find a downed plane in rough terrain, especially in the bad weather being described. Sometimes it takes months. The uncertainty and dread must be tearing the family members to pieces.

I feel very badly about the victims of this accident. In my mind there is a constant image of the poor reporter with a broken leg who is freezing to death while waiting for help. I know nothing of the politics or history of the people  in this crash and I am sad for them all. I don´t understand those who feel no sympathy or compassion for victims of an  accident like this.

There was a plane crash in my city last Sunday: no survivors. Seven adults killed, seven children killed. Three families wiped out. Perhaps this has clouded my thinking on the subject.

My knowledge of the subject is very much second-hand but since nobody else is stepping up here, I´ll give it my best shot. Perhaps one of our Turkish members will confirm, correct or clarify my information.

A guy, and friend, who worked for me in Turkey had to leave work for a few months to fulfill his obligation so that is the basis of my information. Assuming your friend is a college graduate, he should face much the same situation.

As a college graduate, my friend had the option of putting in six months as a private soldier at no pay or putting in two years as a paid officer. Since he had a wife and young child, as well as a steady job, he chose the six months.

He had to go to the regional center one day in October for testing and evaluation. On the basis of this, he went off to his service in mid-December. He took no leave during his service, as that would have  extended his time, and actually put in just a bit less than six months. The evaluation day and departure day were the same for all military inductees in the country; the dates are not staggered.

A Turkish man living abroad can also pay to have his military time cut down to only three weeks, as discussed in this link:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080216161236AApFYbX

It´s not a cheap way to get out: sums of 5000 to over 7000 Euros are mentioned in the discussion.

They´re known as Rocky Mountain Oysters where I live and are greatly prized in some circles. There´s even a yearly festival featuring them:

http://www.testyfesty.com/

The festival also features a lot of drunk people, drunken fights etc. so I´ve never attended it. Years ago I used to help rancher friends at branding time and sometimes was in charge of cutting the bull calves. Some of the old guys were very fond of them so we saved them and gave them to them. They claimed that the best way to serve them was diced and cooked in scrambled eggs.

I´m not sure what dialect of English you speak: certainly no U.S. speakers pronounce the "z" in azure the same as the "z" in craze. As Melek74 notes, the same "zh" sound is heard in leisure and measure.

Similarly, in over a year living in eastern Turkey among exclusive Turkish speakers, I never heard anyone pronounce the Turkish "j" like the sound in English jam, jar or Japan. The sound of the English "jar" would be spelled "car" in Turkish, the English "John" is Turkish "Can" etc.

I can´t speak to the British pronunciation, but Turkish "j" corresponds to the most common American pronunciation of the second "g" in "garage".

Some Americans do pronounce it with a "d" plus the "g" sound, as you hear in the last sound in the word "judge" but the first pronunciation is more common.

The Turkish "j" can also be described as "zh" as in Dr. Zhivago, which although a Russian name, is pronounced correctly by most English speakers.

The same sound also occurs as the "z" in azure.

Another way of looking at it is that Turkish "Jandarma" is pronounced identically to the French/English "Gendarme" , except for the final "a" vowel in "Jandarma", which is silent in the English.

Kemaliye today is a charming but obscure town tucked into the cliffs above the Keban Reservoir. Many of the locals still call it by its old name Eðen, which turns out to be the Turkish version of the original name Agn. The town has a historical significance far larger than its size, of which a book, unfortunately in French, has been written.

Under review: Pascal Carmont, Les Amiras: Seigneurs de l´Armenie ottomane(The Amiras: Lords of Ottoman Armenia). Paris: Salvator, 1999. 187 pages.

From the small town of Agn (today´s Kemaliye) in Anatolia´s Erzincan province, a remarkable group of enterprising and ambitious Armenians rose to the forefront of the Ottoman Empire in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. They are referred to simply as amiras (a variant of emirs) and these men who came from modest provincial backgrounds accomplished great things in almost every human sphere.

The full review is at:

http://www.reporter.am/go/article/2009-02-20-the-amiras-giving-armenians-back-some-of-their-history

In the Erzincan province town where I lived, there were a number of stray dogs, mostly mongrels with a good bit of Kangal in them. I never saw any of them being threatening or aggressive; in fact they were rather shy. Our cook fed leftovers to them almost every night, at first to a bitch and her puppies, later to a young dog which we adopted. He developed a territorial attitude toward our neighborhood and would run off other strays, although he got along with other neighborhood dogs which had owners. The local people had a generally benevolent attitude toward the stray dogs and many fed them scraps and leftovers, although few people befriended or played with individual animals.

Once or twice a year, in the summer generally, the local authorities would carry out a poisoning campaign and so wipe out most of the strays. They didn´t poison dogs with a collar so we got one for our friend Brusk. We also took him to the town vet for a checkup and distemper shots. The vet issued us a formal little identification booklet for him, complete with a picture. We used a different name for this document though, as Brusk is a Kurdish name and everyone concerned thought it best not to use it in an official document. Brusk was one of the nicest dogs I have ever known.

The concept of a spay/neuter campaign never occurred to anyone of course. Such campaigns have been very effective in keeping the stray population down in the U.S. town where I live but I don´t think they´ll be adopted in Turkey any time soon.

What lady in red said. I used a Sony Vaio from the U.S. for over a year in Turkey with no problems whatever. I needed only a plug adaptor for the charger. Rather than reconfigure the keyboard, however, I bought a Turkish keyboard and plugged it in to a USB port.

Many thanks to ZulfuLivaneli for doing this translation for me.

I have heard the very sad news that a man was killed at the mine where I used to work in Erzincan Province. I have found a news article about it and would very much like a good translation from the Turkish; I can make out the general meaning of it but there are details I don´t understand. One friend of mine is mentioned but I don´t believe he was hurt.

The problem is that the article includes a very graphic photo and I am afraid some other graphic detail might be included in the text. I therefore do not dare to post the text in the forum.

If anyone would be willing to look at this and translate it for me, please let me know and I will PM the article to you. As I say, there is a quite graphic photo so some details may be unsettling. This is a task for someone with a strong stomach only.

I would be very grateful for a good person´s help.

A better translation of the title would be "Apprentice Witch" or something along those lines.

I tried the quiz and, for what it´s worth, got 47 perfect of 50, for a score of 94% with an average error of 6 miles and total time of 585 seconds.

It´s a cute little game.

Most Americans know virtually nothing about other countries or even regions of the U.S. other than their own. Therefore, most Americans know nothing about Turkey.

Even those Americans who are somewhat knowledgable about the rest of the world tend to know little about Turkey. As others have noted, Americans are most knowledgable about various European countries, especially the British Isles and France, followed by the other western European countries. There is also interest in Japan and China, as well as Australia.

Turkey is almost always lumped in as a "Middle Eastern", "Islamic" or even "Arabic" country. Other than geographers, historians or those with personal connections, there is no real understanding of what these terms mean, let alone the distinctions between them.

Marion wrote a good review of Burnaby´s classic book "On Horseback Though Asia Minor":

http://www.todayszaman.com/tz-web/detaylar.do?load=detay&link=160185

I´ve been looking at the portions of this book available on GoogleBooks but after this article I may have to get an actual copy

The U.S. has had such a test for many years.

http://usgovinfo.about.com/blinstst.htm

Please, tamikadakika.

Unless you are a card-carrying member of the U.S. Republican Party, it is forbidden for you to use George Soros´ alleged support for a publication as a slur. They have established exclusive world-wide  rights to this particular gratuitous insult.

Surely you can come up with a good Turkish-origin gratuitous insult to use instead.

There is a sad (to me, at least) item in today´s news:

Central broadcasting system for Islamic call to prayer

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Tuba Karahan
Anatolia News Agency-ANKARA

  Recently adopted by the Religious Affairs Directorate, a central broadcasting system for "azhan," the Islamic call to prayer, has satisfied many citizens who used to be disturbed by its non-simultaneous broadcast from minarets.

  The central broadcasting system for azhan had been adopted in 64 provinces and 320 districts all around Turkey, said İzzet Er, deputy director of the directorate. The system had not been adopted in some other provinces or districts simply due to technical reasons or because they do not need it, he said.

  Normally, the azhan is recited by "muezzins" five times a day to summon Muslims to prayer. The central broadcasting system puts an end to non-simultaneous recitations by different muezzins whose voices might also be disturbing for many because they have not been trained about how to recite the azhan or simply because their voices are not good enough.

  �Adhan has its own musical mode. So muezzins should perform it in compliance with it,� said Er. �Because not all muezzins are trained and have nice voices, they simply could not give the call with a harmonic voice five times a day. With the introduction of the central broadcasting system, each minaret has begun broadcasting the same unique version of azhan simultaneously.�

  Citizens have been expressing their satisfaction with the new system, he said. The central broadcasting system for azhan has not only prevented inappropriate performing of azhan by untrained muezzins but also the disharmonious blending of different vocal styles in neighborhoods where the minarets are in close proximity to each other.

  Er also said Islamic sermons conventionally provided by hodjas at mosques have recently begun to be provided through a central broadcasting system in almost all provinces of Turkey. Some citizens want to listen to sermons live from a preacher; they simply do not want to listen recorded sermons, he said.

  �The number of preachers the Religious Affairs Directorate employs is only 1,280. And there are about 80,000 mosques in Turkey. So, we have to provide centrally broadcasted sermons in all mosques,� he said.

http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=113688

I am sorry that this sort of centralization is being carried out. In the town I lived in for over a year there were several cami and, depending on where you were in town, it was common to hear two or even three non-synchronized calls to prayer at once.

I found the effect to be charming. Sure, the voices were different but the message was the same and to me the different voices did not clash or compete but rather mingled and reinforced each other. When I visited in early July and learned that the calls there had been synchronized, I felt a loss.

I very much hope this will not happen in the Sultanahmet neighborhood. There, the calls from the Sultanahmet and Firuz Ağa camilar are (I hope not were) syncronized in a different way. First, the müezzin from Sultanahmet sings one verse of the call, then remains silent while his colleague from Firuz Ağa repeats it. Then the Sultanahmet müezzin sings the next verse, to be repeated in turn by the Firuz Ağa müezzin, and so on. It´s quite an impressive and moving ceremony, because of, not in spite of, its simplicity.

I admit I don´t understand the Turkish need or even desire for rigid conformity in such things. The minor dissonances produced and extra time required for seperate calls to me imply a certain tolerance, an understanding that it is acceptable for people to vary a bit in outward observances as well as inward spirituality.

And the dissonance was lovely.

For what it´s worth, my last visit to Turkey, to the wedding of two of my friends, merited a mention in the local news.

http://www.erzincan.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3795&Itemid=101

Munzur Gözelerini is a wonderful place and well worth a visit but of course my friends´ wedding, as well as being able to see many other friends, made it special to me.

Everyone I encountered was very friendly but it helped a lot that I was traveling with a group of Turkish people, including local Ovacık and Tunceli people. I suspect I would have had some difficulties had I been on my own.

We went through quite a number of checkpoints, albeit with no problems.

I have noticed that something analagous to Grimm's law in German has happened to Turkish.

Unvoiced consonants have tended to become voiced - f has beeb replaced by v or t has been replaced by d in some words. The k (unvoiced) has not generally turned to (regular)g (voiced) but rather to ğ, which is really a glottal stop.

Also the kh sound has turned into h, noticably in foreign words and names. Bach (the composer) is pronounced Bah; Khayyam (the poet) is pronounced Hayyam.

My favorite illustration of all this is the way the city of Tephrike (pronounced Tefriki) has turned into Divriği, with the t turning into d, the f turning into v and the k turning into ğ. I have noted the transformation in numerous other words also.

I don't know when this process occurred and to what it extent, if any, it has happened to other Turkic languages. My guess would be that it occurred after the split between Western and Eastern Turkish (now represented by Azerbaijani).

The tunnel has been designed to handle a major earthquake, mostly by being flexible enough to withstand shaking and at least some displacement. The BART tunnels between San Francisco and Oakland are of the same type and faced the same issues.

There are also automatic flood doors in the tunnel to contain the flooding in case of a breach but these would be small comfort to anyone in a flooded section.

I've talked to men who were in deep mine tunnels during earthquakes and they said the experience was frightening but turned out not to be especially dangerous. As long as a tunnel isn't too stiff, it can handle a lot of flex.

I haven't been so happy the past few days. I quit my job in eastern Turkey and said my farewells over the last week. I made some good friends here and it was difficult for us to part. I'll be out of the country in a few days.

Turkish friends are the best.

There are certainly no publicly funded racially segregated schools in the U.S. Public schools form the great majority of schools in the country.

I know of no privately funded U.S. schools that are racially segregated although a very few may exist.

Lady Montagu is also famous for introducing the practice of inoculation against smallpox to England and the Western world in general. This early form of vaccination had been used for a very long time in China, India and other places but it had not been formally described.

Some Turkish doctors practiced smallpox inoculation and Lady Montagu had her sons inoculated against the disease. When she returned to England, she described and helped to popularize inoculation, including the inoculation of the British Royal Family.

Edward Jenner developed the use of cowpox inoculation many years later. This became the preferred procedure, as it is safer than smallpox inoculation.

Someone might be interested in:

A Short History of Byzantium by John Julius Norwich

This is his abridged version of his three volume work. It's interesting and a useful foundation for anyone who wants to learn about Byzantine history but I find it flawed in key respects.

It's very much a history of Constantinople, especially the Emperors and the Imperial court. Page after page is devoted to court politics and hairsplitting religious disputes but there is never a mention of the basic economy of the empire or military organization or the happenings of anywhere outside the capital, unless there was a battle there or someone went into exile. Plagues,invasions, technological innovations, earthquakes and such are dismissed with a brief mention or ignored entirely.

Still this is a good book to start with, if only because there are so few books on the subject in English. The style is a bit academic and very difficult for anyone not fluent in English. Turkish friends who have excellent spoken English had great difficulty with this book.


Another one I've read is:

The Turks in World History by Carter Vaughn Findley

This is a history of all the Turkic people, from the Xiongnu on the Chinese borderlands about 2500 years ago, through the first Türk empire about 1500 years ago in the same area through the Turkic expansion through Central Asia to Anatolia.

The history of Turkey is a significant part of this book but it covers the history of the other Turkic nations, mostly independent now after the fall of the Soviet Union. There is some useful political background for many countries covering the past 100 - 200 years.

There is not a pure history; sociology is freely sprinkled through its pages, sometimes providing insights, sometimes adding to the confusion of events.

Another book that is valuable because it covers such a neglected topic. Much of its coverage is superficial, as it must be in a book covering such an enormous period of time and space.

Roswitha, I really enjoy your posts and very much hope you will continue with them.

The founder of the Seljuk dynasty was a commander from the Kırık tribe of the Oghuz who in 985 converted to Islam in what is now Uzbekistan. He and later his sons fought in a series of conquests and small wars, first for other rulers and eventually as their own host.

The clan gradually drifted west, eventually into Iran, where they set up as supporters of the Abbasid caliph in Baghdad, who gave the Seljuk leader the title of sultan.

From roughly 1050 on, the Seljuks raided and conquered much of what is now Iraq, Syria and Turkey, expanding the Turkish presence in Anatolia especially after winning the Battle of Manzikert in 1071.

I had a girlfriend who owned a pit bull and he was a very sweet dog. I have no doubt he would have defended Patty or me to the death if we had ever been attacked but otherwise he was extremely well-behaved.

Any dog can be trained to be mean and most large dogs can be dangerous. A Kangal dog, for instance, that had been raised improperly could be as dangerous as any pit bull.

Like SERA, on several occasions I have passed through Atatürk while making a connection to Ankara. When both the flight into and out of Atatürk were on Turkish Air, I checked my luggage through to Ankara and didn't have to deal with it in Istanbul; it was transferred for me.

When I flew into Atatürk on Air France and then to Ankara on Turkish Air, I had to check my luggage to Istanbul, pick it up there, then check it in again on Turkish Air.

A most Happy New Year to everyone on this forum.

There have been two moderate earthquakes and many small aftershocks in the past ten days. If you like to keep an eye on such things, there's an excellent list of current +3 quakes.

Current earthquake list

Thanks Marion.

I quickly resolved when I got to Turkey not to express any opinion on any futböl team, whether favorable or not. You can be sure I'll keep the Fenerbahçe fena değil line to myself. I'm guessing forty percent of the people I work with are diehard Fenerbahçe fans and forty percent support Galatasaray, with the remainder supporting somebody else. Nobody is neutral and it's always amazing to me how vehement some people get about their team, in America too.

I'm working my way through Elementary Turkish by Thomas and find that he always uses "fena" for "bad". The people I talk to always use "kötü" for "bad" and so does the Redhouse dictionary.

Is "fena" an obsolete word or does it have some other meaning?

May she rest in peace.

I follow Delidolu on this. I will expand on her post, with apologies.

"Değil" is used to negate a statement.

To say: "Hatice is pretty.", you'd use: "Hatice guzel."

To say: "Hatice is not pretty.", you'd use: "Hatice guzel değil."

"Yok" is the opposite of "var", "exist, in existence".

To ask: "Is there fruit?", you'd use: "Meyveler var mı?". Literally, this means something like: "Fruits in existence are there?"

The reply: "Meyveler yok." literally means "Fruits not in existence."

So the key is to know whether "var" would be used in the opposite (positive) statement. If "var" would be used, replace it with "yok". Otherwise, state the positive statement, then attach "değil" to form the negative.

95% of the time, it is easy to decide which to use. The var/yok system is very basic to understanding Turkish, to actually begin to think in Turkish. Once you get the hang of it, it comes out spontaneously.

"Değil" is more like "not" in English, in particular the recent sarcastic usage, for instance: "Dave is a handsome guy. Not!"

"Değil", of course, doesn't carry any sarcasm.

As a notorious candy junkie, I can address this with some authority. In general, Turkish candy is excellent both in quality and variety and there is little available in the U.S. that does not have a Turkish equivalent.

M&Ms, say, are not found in Turkey but Bonibon Candy Beans are essentially the same thing. The only significant American candies without a precise Turkish counterpart are peanut butter cups and other peanut-based candies. In Turkey, hazelnuts (fındık)are used rather than peanuts in candies, making for a better product in my opinion.

I haven't seen fındık cups, so I guess you could bring peanut butter cups as a novelty. I wouldn't bother; they're not that good a candy.

When I come from the States and want to bring candy as gifts, I get Lindt Lindor truffles. These are among my favorite candies from any source and always seem to be appreciated. The Lindt website is at:

Lindt product list

Just to clear something up...

When you enter Turkey via Ataturk, they do NOT stamp your passport at the visa line.

Follow the signs, in English, as well as the crowd from your flight, to Passport. The first line you will come to is Visa. It is well marked. Pay for your visa with U.S. dollars or Euros, either is accepted. They will stick a visa onto one of the pages in your passport.

Then you go to the Passport line to get your passport stamped.

I'm sorry, but you do need to stand in two lines. The Visa line is relatively short, no longer than 10 minutes. The Passport line can be much longer, with waits ranging from 10 minutes to an hour and a half, depending on how many flights are arriving.

I recommend that you bring an ATM card and get your money (as YTL) from ATMs, which are widely available. Check with your bank before you leave on your trip to make sure that your password is valid internationally and to notify them that you will be getting money in Turkey.

If you use an ATM card, you never need to change money.

My Bayram experience was a bit short but I enjoyed it a lot. I'd heard about the custom of children going door to door to wish everyone İyi Bayramlar and being given candy.

This sounded like children going door-to-door in the U.S., trick-or-treating and getting candy on Halloween. When I was a boy, I really appreciated the candy on Halloween and since then I've always stocked plenty for any children who came, although the custom has declined greatly in recent years.

So here, I resolved to be generous to the children. My original thought was to give each one a 1-lira coin so they could buy their own candy. When I asked a friend if he thought that was appropriate, he suggested that, as many people are not so well off around here, I could be a bit more generous and give each child a 5-lira note.

So I stocked up on 5-lira notes and inquired of a couple of friends how many visitors I could expect. Nobody could say, nobody would even venture a guess.

In the event, my stock of notes lasted less than an hour. Word spread very quickly and the kids thronged to my door. It was so nice to see the smiles on so many faces and they were so polite.

The only sad thing was running out of notes, as of course the bank was closed so I couldn't get more.

Next year you can be sure I'll be better prepared.

That was indeed a fine explanation. Thank you so much.

That's a great article. Thanks for posting the link and thanks also for your many other fine posts.

The 'ğ' is a glottal stop, an unvoiced closing of the back of the mouth. It is not a formal sound in English but you hear it fairly often in British speech and certain American groups. It seems to me to be becoming more common in American speech, where more and more people use it to replace the 't' (a dental stop) in some words.

The best example I know of in English is a Cockney pronunciation of 'bottle', which comes out something like 'boh-ul' with a little catch where the 't' sound should be.

I have seen canned bacon in U.S. stores, although I have no idea whether it's any good. You could surely bring canned bacon in your checked luggage

Serdar, thanks for the link. I've been hoping there was a page that lists suffixes.

Monday evening the young crescent moon will again be near Venus. In May, this alignment was a spectacular sight resembling the Turkish flag and this month's should be a good one too. Tuesday, they will be near each other also.



An article and star chartgives more details.

I'm in İliç, between Divriği and Erzincan, and the local shops don't carry it. Next time I'm in Erzincan, I'll look for some there.

Thanks hexagonoo. I'm amazed that I'm having difficulty finding a roll, since it's so common in the U.S. and used for repairing almost everything.

Is there a term in Turkish for 'duct tape' or 'duck tape', the heavy duty, cloth based tape that is essential to the maintenance of all modern technology? I know that 'bant' is 'tape' but I don't know how to specify duct tape rather than electrical or packaging tape.

Thanks

Turkish is a very difficult language to learn, much more difficult than Spanish for an English speaker. It's well worth the effort though.

I'm an American, a native English speaker, and while I'm working very hard at it, my Turkish proficiency is improving quite slowly. I've been at it for four months now, am surrounded by Turkish speakers, and still can't hold down a simple conversation with a waiter or shopkeeper who speaks no English.

By comparison, I visited Spain and within two weeks was able to go to a strange restaurant, understand the menu even if it had dishes I'd never seen before, order my meal and make small talk with the staff.

Except for modern words like televizyon or futbol, Turkish and English share no words or roots and the language structures are completely different.

I'm hoping to be able to hold up my end of a simple conversation within a year and things may improve more quickly after that, as I'll have a reasonable understanding of noun and verb endings, which to me is the hardest part.

I too want to encourage you to work at acquiring Turkish. I'm sure your family members and Turkish-speaking friends will help you as much as they can. Get a Turkish-English dictionary and start reading anything you can get your hands on. This site is an excellent place to begin learning but there are other sites, not to mention course books. Use them all. The Lonely Planet phrase book has been a great help to me also.

Good luck!

These are from the Dilbert comic. I download the Turkish version every day and match it with the English original.

Voice of man giggling.
English: HEE-HEE
Turkish: HİHİH

Voice of man being beaten.
English: OW! OW! OW!
Turkish: AY! AY! AY!

Sound of a punch (person hitting some one else very hard).
English: PUNCH
Turkish: GÃœMMM

Sound of typing on a computer.
English: CLICK
Turkish: KLİK

Scream of man being burned.
English: GAAA!!!
Turkish: AAAY!

Word used when feeling a small pain.
English: Ouch
Turkish: Uf

Sound of explosion.
English: KABOOM
Turkish: BOOOMM

In regards to Post 15.

It doesn't occur every year but a Venus - crescent moon alignment is not uncommon. This link will show you one from March, 2004:

http://www.roast.iconbar.com/graphics/galleries/planets/2004-03-24moonvenusmercury2320.html

Is the "caravansary with two doors" a reference to the Omar Khayyam verse?

Think, in this batter'd Caravanserai
Whose Doorways are alternate Night and Day,
How Sultan after Sultan with his Pomp
Abode his Hour or two, and went his way.

It was too cloudy to see the stars on the 19th but last night (the 20th) Venus and the moon were beautiful in the evening sky. They've moved apart but are still a spectacular sight.

They are pronounced the same but for item 1) the English word should be stake not steak. A steak is a certain piece of meat.

The stake that is used as an engineering or surveying marker is kazık. Wooden stake is tahta kazık.