Positive signs

A lot of people are understandably worried about recent events in Turkey and there has been a lot written in the British press, some of which is incorrect or at best vague.  There was indeed an attempted coup on 15 July but it was carried out by a relatively limited group within the military and was quickly overwhelmed by the majority who opposed them. 

The government believes the plot was led by supporters of Fetullah Gulen, an Islamist scholar who lives in the US but has remained active in Turkey through his network of schools and universities and his large following. Incidentally, until a few years ago the ruling AK party and Gulen were allies!

Now, afraid that he is controlling things from afar via a “parallel state” consisting of his followers, they have removed 50,000 people they believe to be “Gulenists” from their jobs in education, the judiciary and other areas.

Last Wednesday a state of emergency (SofE) was passed by the government with the stated aim of restoring democracy.  While a SofE can be declared by any country in response to a major threat – France introduced one following the Paris bombs and has just extended it to January 2017 – the specific areas covered may vary.  So what does the SofE in Turkey cover and how will it affect expats and holiday-makers?

The president and the deputy PM have said that the SoE will be exclusively used to repair the damage of the coup attempt to the Turkish system and they aim to reach their targets within “45-50 days”.  The state of emergency declared in Turkey includes increased rights to search people, vehicles and property, an extension of the police detention period, censorship of media and the right to close businesses.

The President has stated that this situation will not affect the lives of everyday citizens and it is even less likely to affect any foreign citizens here.  The only thing that residents should make sure to do is carry some form of ID (note: this has always been compulsory for Turkish citizens).  This can be a passport, a right to reside or e-visa, or a good colour photo copy.

There have been some positive elements to come out of the turmoil.  The anti-coup protesters who took to the streets even before the Presidents’ call for action came from all classes and political groups. Similarly there have been signs of reconciliation between the Government and opposition.  When the opposition CHP announced its intention to hold yesterday’s pro-democracy rally, the Government supported the move and even extended free public transport.  It helps to remember that Turkey is going to be doing its best now to improve its image and regain the confidence of foreign visitors and foreign investors and that means making people here feel relaxed and welcome!

Turkey deserves better

I was going to write a happy blog about the lovely time Kaan and I had in England – but recent events are too significant to be ignored.  I will write about the serious stuff now and save our holiday stories for next time.

What happened on Friday night/Saturday in Turkey is a tragic sign of how divided this lovely country has become.  There are all sorts of theories about who actually initiated the ‘attempted coup’ (including one that suggests it was the work of the President himself – Turkish people love all conspiracy theories) but regardless of who is right, the fact is that it has strengthened his position and pushed competing elements of society further apart.  It achieved nothing and, honestly, never stood a chance of achieving anything.

What we need is something or someone who can bring society back together and get the country back on track; after all, very recently it was a high performer on the world scene.  Consider these figures:

·         Turkey’s world trade total increased from $82 billion in 2000 to $389 billion in 2012.

·         Foreign Direct Investment in Turkey jumped from $1.8 billion in 2003 to $16 billion in 2012

·         Following the outbreak of the Arab Spring, Barack Obama telephoned Turkish PM Erdogan more than any other world leader except Cameron  (all Soner Cagaptay “The Rise of Turkey”)

And now?  The economy is stalling, investment has of course fallen and we are the pariah of the world.  One of our lovely guests sent me a mail checking how we were and put my exact feelings into words:  “Turkey deserves better”.

However, I can reassure you all that as far as Poppy and Calis are concerned, life continues fairly unchanged.  The sun is still hot, the pool is still sparkling and that first sip of Efes still tastes as good.  There have been no signs of the trouble elsewhere, though one of the guests thought they heard a tank rolling past – it turned out to be the rubbish lorry!  The pound, which fell due to all the shenanigans in the UK to about 3.7 is now back to about 4TL. The only difference is that there are more empty sunbeds than usual at this time of year – both at Poppy and on the beach.

A lot of people have been, understandably, put off by events so everywhere is quiet.  Thanks to our regulars and a few intrepid first-timers, we are doing better than some but the situation wasn’t helped by the demise last week of LowCost Travel Group.  They owe us for guests from last October and this May and June but it could have been worse; until April this year they hadn’t paid any of last summer’s money.

Happily, most of the guests who have lost their bookings are now contacting me directly to re-book their accommodation, which just shows us Brits are not easily put off!

That’s probably enough rambling for one day.  As there are no relevant pictures to accompany the above, here is a picture of the garden at Poppy to contrast with the previous picture – hasn’t it all grown well (especially my vegetable patch at the end from which  the tortoises have been banned!)

Poppy update

It’s the last day of May and the weather finally feels like summer is here, though Calis is sadly very quiet.  The annual craft fair was on last Sunday and there were some lovely things, but I don’t think business was as brisk as it has been in previous years just because of the reduced number of tourists.

New improved garden - with canna lilies in flower

This month has been alright for us and June is quite busy from the second week on.  It’s a good job it hasn’t been too mad as I have failed miserably at finding any staff and for a large part of the time it’s me – not just in the kitchen and reception as usual but also in the bar, cleaning the pool, watering the garden….!

Grass after 2 weeks

The garden is coming on nicely.  The brickwork around the new drainage channel is finished.  I had some students from the university staying and one of them is studying landscape gardening so I got him to sew the grass seed which has come up amazingly well.  And my flowers are all doing nicely – since I banished the tortoises to the back corner of the garden!  Not before one of them had laid eggs though – see the picture.  They were bigger than I expected and very round and white.  I have put something over them so hopefully we won’t dig them up (she buried them right in the middle of where I want my vegetable patch!) but whether they hatch apparently depends on heat and humidity and can take anything from 8-11 weeks.

tortoise babies!

Emre has been up and down to Ankara, had his last exam yesterday and is driving back with a friend (via Istanbul – not exactly the direct route!) tonight.  Kaan has another two weeks of school for which he is begging me to get a doctor’s report or write a formal request so he doesn’t have to go in.  Actually, as all their exams are finished, the teachers don’t turn up half the time so I don’t think it will make much difference and he is missing the last few days of term as we are going to England.

So…I have been looking for a lady to do my job while I am away but so far have had no luck at all.  I know the wages here aren’t great but some of the British people living out here complain that they can’t find a job that isn’t 15 hours a day in summer and here I am, happy for someone to work 4 hours a day and take time off if they have visitors but it seems there is no one.  Anyone want a job?!

The cleanest pool in Calis!

Poppy opens for another year

So – it’s been a while.  But I am back to announce: Poppy is open for 2016 season – our nineteenth!

It’s been a strange one so far.  Bookings have obviously been affected by the state of the world and bad publicity about Turkey.  In addition, it took us until March to get most of last year’s money from one of the agencies and all that time we were worried that they could go bust and we wouldn’t see it at all.  With this in mind, we held off doing much work on the hotel.

In the last month, though, bookings have picked up a bit and we started what we thought would be a couple of smallish projects which have turned into much larger ones.  They have also been rather last minute ones, so last weekend we had about 12 workmen in the hotel – painters, tilers, a man laying stones in the garden, another checking all the windows and doors – as well as the boys cleaning the newly-grouted pool and the poor cleaners trying to clean and keep everyone out of the rooms they had done!  My job was to feed the masses – and to keep them all in tea (no mean feat with Turkish people!)

One of the major jobs was the garden where enlarging the drainage channel ended up involving a JCB, a lorry-load of stones and another of soil.  It still isn’t finished, or even at the stage where I can do the nice bit of buying some new plants, but it is looking a lot better than it was!

The painting of a few rooms turned into painting of all rooms, plus the outside of the building at ground floor level all the way round.  The painters have been working at night sometimes – at this time of year they are cramming in all the work they can get before the summer building ban puts a stop to it – and they go home.  Ours were all young Kurdish men from the east of Turkey.  We have also had quite a few Syrian workers.

I have had new tables made for the ground floor balconies – and the boys are busy as I write sanding some chairs to go with them.  I have also changed some of the living room sofa-beds which were getting a bit uncomfortable and bought a new settee for the bar (which I am battling Poppy the cat for ownership of!)

And if you want to know what else we have done…..you will have to come and see!

By the way, the weather has been completely mad, switching from hail storms, thunder and lightning to bright sunshine in half an hour.  It always seems to do that as soon as we fill the pool.  The first hardies have actually been into the pool, though you won’t catch me in there until …oh about July!

Refugee crisis and Turkey

For the last week, I have been reading myself into a fury so I hope you will forgive me a bit of a rant.  I usually avoid any controversial topics and I am still not planning to give my political views or my personal take on the problems; I just want to put some facts out there.

As of March 2016 there are 2.7 MILLION SYRIAN REFUGEES IN TURKEY.

To compare, up to December 2015, JUST UNDER 900,000 Syrians had applied for asylum in all 37 European countries reporting to UNHCR.

There are a further 300,000 refugees in Turkey from Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan.

This makes Turkey THE BIGGEST REFUGEE-HOSTING COUNTRY IN THE WORLD.

About 280,000 refugees are housed in 25 camps, many in solid trailer accommodation though more recently it has been necessary to build tent camps.

I am quite aware that living in a refugee camp would not be anyone’s choice BUT…

…the camps in Turkey have paved roads, street lights, water (private bathrooms in the trailers, shared in the tent camps), electricity, schools and clinics, cleaning and maintenance staff and police and private security.  Laundry is done free-of-charge (residents volunteer in the laundry) and food is purchased at supermarkets with debit cards given to residents (80tl per person per week for food).  There are also hair salons, sewing rooms, playgrounds and other amenities.

The remaining refugees live outside the camps.  Once registered they have access to healthcare and education, though they are not currently able to work legally. Many are working in the informal sector – I have had dealings this winter with several Syrians working in construction.  I have heard some complaints about the refugees, especially in places like Istanbul and Ankara where the streets are full of families begging, but I would say the majority of the population are sympathetic and accepting.

And this acceptance, despite the fact that Turkey has so far spent an estimated $7 BILLION on the Syrian refugees, yes - $7,000,000,000.

By contrast, Turkey has so far received total international assistance of approximately $400 million, not even half a billion.

Turkey has actually received praise for its response to the crisis from official sources, including the UN refugee agency.

But the popular press, with its usual negative attitude to Turkey, makes it sound as though Turkey is both heartless – closing the Syrian border and allowing refugees to drown in the Med – and mercenary – “holding the EU to ransom” and demanding money before they will do anything.

There are certainly things that could be done better but it is wrong to ignore all the positive things. I just want to say...
…STOP talking about Turkey as though it is part of the problem; this time, it is part of the solution.

Sun and hailstorms

Mad weather – I think spring is here!  It has been really warm all this week – over 20 degrees, people out in shorts and t-shirts, doors and windows open all day sort of warm.  Then, early this morning, I heard thunder rumbling, followed by a huge storm with HAIL that is still sitting around on the ground now (9am).

We had our electric bill through from January – when we had the really cold weather – and it was more than it’s ever been – about £100 for one month.  We haven’t put up our wood-burning stove this winter (my decision because it’s smoky and dirty and I can’t light it!) so we were trying to keep the house warm with electric heaters.  The houses here are hard to heat because they don’t have cavity walls, are all tiles and marble and are basically designed to be cool in summer.  And as for the temperature in the bathroom – I think it was close to zero some mornings, not tempting when you want to take a shower!

Actually, in place of the stove, I wanted to put in an air conditioning unit, one large enough to heat our open-plan ground floor and fairly new as they are very energy efficient.  Some friends of ours who were moving house, offered us theirs (new when they moved into the old house 2 years ago) for free, so we have been hanging on for that.  Unfortunately, the house they are moving to has taken much longer to finish than expected so I finally got the a/c yesterday – now it’s too warm to use it!  Oh well – it’ll be summer soon and we can use it to cool!

somewhere between Nif and Gocek - almond trees in flower

Friends Grant and Dawn are out for a holiday.  We went for a drive the other day – up to Uzumlu, where all the almond trees are in blossom, then on to Nif and some of the mountain roads beyond.  I’d looked at the map and knew that it was fairly easy to get from there back down to Gocek so we meandered a long for a while, guessing which way to go at junctions.

Unfortunately, Turkish mountain roads have a habit of leading off merrily in one direction, only to twist and turn and take you in the complete opposite direction.  I had a similar experience last year trying to get back down on to the Kas road from Arycanda.  There was a short time when I thought we might have to turn back, but eventually we managed to find a road that took us down towards the sea and we came out at the top of the hill going into Gocek.  Had to stop and have lunch there to recover!

a glimpse of Gocek

Skiing in Sarikamis

The Cakir family has been away on holiday!  We had a few days in Ankara and from there we went to the north east of Turkey to ski.  It’s one of the few things that we all enjoy; even me who hates the cold and EVEN Cem who usually hates any form of exercise!

There are several ski centres in Turkey but the place we went is in the north east.  It’s a small town called Sarikamis and is supposedly the only place in Turkey that has the same type of snow as the Alps. It certainly has the best snow of anywhere we have skied in Turkey, but it is also the coldest place with temperatures generally -5 to -10 degrees in the day!  Sarikamis is famous in Turkey as the place where a large number (often quoted as 90,000) of Turkish soldiers froze to death whilst fighting the Russian army during World War I.

Unlike those poor soldiers, I was prepared with layers of thermals under my ski clothes, two pairs of socks and two pairs of gloves with hand warmers inside them and still my fingers – and sometimes toes – were frozen at the end of the day! But we had fun skiing.  Emre changed to snow-boarding, having a couple of lessons and learning quite well in a short time.  Kaan just wanted to be the fastest thing on skis – and with an app on his phone, he could check every day how fast he had gone (he stopped telling me when he passed 80kmh as he knew I would get cross!) as well as how far he had skied, gradients etc.

Kaan on ths slopes

We had been to Sarikamis before about 10 years ago (actually it’s where Cem’s parents grew up too).  There are now 4 more hotels at the ski centre (total 6, though the biggest was closed this year) but it was still very quiet.  It gets a bit busier at the weekend when some of the locals come to ski, but during the week you can usually get on the lift in 5 minutes at the most – and the boys were even complaining about this sometimes, I don’t know what they would think of the queues elsewhere!

There are several ski schools and the Turkish Ski Federation is always training children who might enter the national team.  We were chatting with a local boy on the lift whose brother is already in the national team and who hopes to get in it too.  He’s 14 and has been skiing since he was 5.  But he also wants to be an attorney.  It’s hard sometimes in these little places in the east of Turkey – the standard of schooling might not be so good and the children do not have the same opportunities.  We took his address to send him Kaan’s old school books and the boys were amazed that he doesn’t have a mobile phone.  In Fethiye, any child above the age of about 8 has a phone!

Emre boarding

We flew to Kars, which is the nearest town – and the regional centre – though it is much smaller than Fethiye!  Close to the Russian border (now the Georgian and Armenian borders), Kars was occupied by the Russian Empire for a time in the nineteenth century and many of the older buildings were built by the Russians.

Old Governors Residence built in 1883

It is famous for several types of cheese including a hard yellow cheese called ‘kashar’ that is like cheddar and a stringy, fibrous cheese that is best eaten when blue (with mould).  Unlike the UK where you can generally find everything everywhere, most areas still have their specialities and people like to buy it from the source.  Apart from anything else, though you can buy Kars Kashar in Fethiye, it is more expensive, so several people had asked us to get them some.  We went to a little shop, tried lots of cheese and bought three whole wheels of kashar (39kg) which were supposed to arrive yesterday by cargo; hopefully they will turn up today!

That part of Turkey is also known for having tasty meat – and particularly ‘Cag kebab’, which is marinated lamb cooked on a horizontal spit (with tail fat – ugghh!)  As a veggie, I obviously can’t comment on it, but the boys and Cem enjoyed it.