The other night, I joined friends at a birthday party at Wanna in Beyoglu, a new Asian fusion restaurant (low lights, dark rough wood, heavy black patent leather chairs, neon art) that turns into a bar/nightclub at midnight. The food was OK, not fabulous, prices actually weren’t bad — $15-20 an entree. Endless very slim […]
One of the rites of passage of living in Turkey as a foreigner is to apply for a residence permit. There are many things that can trip you up. You need insider knowledge without which your two-or-more hour wait on line will have been for nought. You can be rejected for not having an official […]
Istanbul never ceases to stun me. Today I was walking along the Bosphorus at Akinti Burnu where the strait makes a turn and around the corner came gliding the largest ship I have ever seen. The blood-red tanker blotted out the sky and the other coast and just seemed to come on and on without […]
This blog is meant to contain (and scatter) the confetti of my thoughts as I spend the coming year in Istanbul, Turkey, on a research grant. I’ll be looking into political issues, nationalism and Islam in particular as these are developing in Turkey right now, but also gathering impressions and ideas for my Kamil Pasha […]