Category: Writing

Virtual Stress

Posted on Posted in Creative writing, Photography, WritingTagged , , , , , , 3 Comments

I’m feeling overwhelmed and I’m only at the beginning of a ten week, ten point, OU photography course. As always with the OU there are forums and because I’m looking out for locals and trying to get the best learning experience I’m reading most of the entries. We all strive to slot ourselves into place in groups, in this case to find where we are on the scale of photo duffer to Cartier-Bresson and having looked at lots of other students work, I feel comfortable enough with my abilities at least.

The course hasn’t even really started yet and already there are 2300 photos on the website and so I’ve given with the national community to concentrate instead on the group of eight that I’ve been placed in, in theory only around eighty photos. We’re all supposed to comment on a few and as there are about fifteen comments on mine I’ll have to try to return the favour. In between that there is a Facebook group for this course, one for a mixed arts group and one for the course I begin in February.

I should, no I hope, to be able to learn how to use the software they sent me instead of my usual bumbling around, guessing how things work and then never being able to repeat a particular way of editing a photo. And these ten weeks are my best hope.

Guess what I’d really like to be doing? I want to be writing my blog, I want to write Lake, Music, Boat as prescribed by Denny Lesniak, and I want to write up a travelogue of Ephesus and another of Cappadocia, to say nothing of reading the blogs I’m subscribed to.

My inbox is groaning under the virtual weight of unread mail and an hour of tonight was wasted on internet banking trivia. It’s 21.07 and I think I’ll have to crawl into my nest (still no time for eyebrow tweezing) and hope that not too much happens in my virtual world before I get home from my real world at 8pm tomorrow!

Three Words from a Crazy Polish Woman

Posted on Posted in Creative writing, Three Word Challenge, Working world, WritingTagged , , , , , , 1 Comment

My crazy Polish friend gave me my three words today. She’s a very intelligent woman who is slowly inventing a new language sprinkled with dedeeeee type sounds, and I’d hoped that she would come up with some inspiring choices, or even specially invent some, that I could help to define and progress. But no, she gave me some dull accountancy type ones and I thought twice about whether to bother writing from them.

Walking home in the sunshine I started thinking about the thirteen months I’ve been in this job. I work in a finance office in a large NHS foundation trust, a very small bee in a vast hive and it gives me a real buzz. Unlike previous jobs I’ve had, I don’t carry it home and there is zero stress. My colleagues are a diverse bunch who for their own safety, would probably be best permanently contained in the rabbit warren we inhabit for thirty seven and a half hours a week. We have the class clowns, the stroppy mood swingers, the mother hens, wannabe Romeos and the enfant Perdue’s, they’re glorious and I love watching them act out their roles.

The work itself isn’t challenging and many would think it sounds incredibly boring doing credit control for a big part of each day. The thing is, it’s about working people – quickly assessing how to handle everyone you call to get the best result. With some it means being quite firm and assertive, most just being genuine and once in a while – especially with the Welsh men – a touch flirtatious. And then there’s the call centre in Mumbai, renowned for the difficulty in communicating, but I just sit back and enjoy their accents and dream about being in the heat of India. It’s always about building relationships over a period of time, and I think because I’m quite good at that, I’ve been able to make a difference in my job, when the payments reach the bank as promptly as possible.

I’ve had more responsible jobs in the past, ones that would keep me awake at night thinking about those three words my crazy Polish friend gave me, depreciation, overheads and capital, but those are boring and I’m happy being unchallenged. I have two windows beside my desk, I can see trees just outside and the distant hills. I can drift away with lots of sky and birdsong. Other people can do accountancy, I’ll stick to people persuading for as long as they’ll have me, and find my challenges in other directions.

Tafadswa

Posted on Posted in Creative writing, short story, WritingTagged , , , , , , , , 3 Comments

Things looked good when we met in 1995. I was on a three month placement in Zimbabwe, working as a veterinary nurse, when one morning a sandy haired guy burst in with his arms around a tiny, injured lion cub. The cub was bleeding badly and we didn’t think it would make it. Once it was patched up, we watched it through the night, and in that time we didn’t stop talking. He said later that he decided there and then that he would never let me go. If only I’d listened to him instead of just hearing what I wanted to hear. I spent all my free time with him in the following weeks, and on my last full day he brought me here to Vic falls, the most romantic place in the world. With the rainbow over the Zambezi and the sound of Mosi oa Tunya, the smoke that thunders, in the background, he proposed.

The year we were apart crawled by, we spoke several times a week and emailed daily. If I didn’t reply within a few hours he would get anxious and impatiently ask me where I’d been. I’d tease him and most times he’d laugh, but sometimes he’d get sulky and make an excuse to say goodbye.

My family weren’t overjoyed when he flew across for the wedding. They didn’t like him, a white African farmer was different from anyone they had ever met and they couldn’t bear that I’d be moving 5000 miles from home. He kept on trying to please them, only expressing his annoyance when we were alone. One time I heard him shouting down the phone to someone, he was shaking with anger when he came outside to join me. I’d tried to take his hand but he brushed me off. He always apologised though.

In my new home I struggled to get used to other people looking after the house, cooking and cleaning. I remember holding a white t shirt up and finding a stain hadn’t come out in the wash, he snatched it from me and went to the laundry room.  Hearing a shout, I ran to see what was wrong and saw a girl around thirteen run screaming from the house, he drove off without saying a word and didn’t come back that day.

Each year things got tougher for white farmers, and as political tension increased so did his. I felt more and more trapped, he said it was too dangerous for me to go anywhere, if I went alone I could be kidnapped; if I took a houseboy he might kidnap me. I didn’t argue, I rarely did anymore and besides he was probably right, the workers would probably take me hostage as revenge for the way he had treated them, the younger ones often had bruises. He didn’t hit me, he could always find another punch bag, but I’d learnt to censor my words and when it was best to turn away.

A neighbouring farm was raided and torched as part of Mugabe’s ‘Land reform’, and it was then that he made plans in case we had to leave, but at the same time he wanted to stay and fight. One day he called me to the basement to show me where his collection of guns and ammunition were locked safely away. He made me practice loading and aiming at targets, just in case.

The kitchen girl came in late sometimes, she was only nineteen but had a couple of children of her own, so I’d make a start on dinner. He was livid when he found out. That’s when his fist landed on me. I’d never felt such pain. He apologised and tried to make it better, but my heart was numb and my jaw felt like it was broken. I said I had to go to bed and looking remorseful, he agreed. I slept for a while, but woke needing pills and went to the medicine cupboard. I could hear thumping and shouts so in case we were being raided, I took the pistol from his bedside drawer and crept downstairs.

The kitchen door was open and what I saw made me gag, he had the girl spread-eagled on the table with her hands tied and her clothes shredded. With his hand over her mouth he rammed himself into her rigid body until she saw me, then he turned. He eyes widened with shock as he saw the gun.

And so here I am back at the most romantic waterfall in the world. Mary, the kitchen girl is with me, waiting for the last train to cross the bridge for the night. My bag is packed; I’m hoping to make it to Harare and then a flight to a new life. First though, Mary and I have a task to carry out.

‘I hear it coming Mrs’ she said. The smoke from the train gets mixed up with the smoke that thunders, but the steam train smell, which I’ll never forget, is distinctive. As soon as it disappears over the bridge and into Zambia, we pull the body along the tracks until we are clear of the gorge. It was easier than I thought, one good shove and he was gone, like a bungee jumper into oblivion.

In case you wondered, the lion cub made it but couldn’t be released into the bush. Tafadswa – we are happy – as she is called, is in a zoo in England.

In My Dreams

Posted on Posted in Humour, WritingTagged , , , , , , 4 Comments

I turned into the campus this morning and slap bang in the middle of the forecourt of the Peninsula med school stood Gok Wan. I’d been expecting him since the last series and he hadn’t showed, but at last there stood this cute, quirkily dressed hero waiting to sort out my image for the new season. No cash management department for me today, Gok was going to whisk me away in the sleek yellow beast I’d just passed parked on Barrack Road.

It was going to be some serious shopping and he was just the man to help choose the very best colour, shape and style to fit my . . . ahem . . . curves to a treat, for every occasion for the next six months. Oh yes he could surely make me look stunning.

I hoped he would agree that purple is me, I love purple, it’s one of the things that makes winter tolerable – oh and magenta, deep red, sapphire blue and orange. All colours I don’t wear in summer but winters drawers on, and they’re a must have. Maybe he can find me some sexy knee high boots, Italian leather in black and purple with bags to match. A sharp black dress with some discreetly visible cleavage and heels, the shoes that is not the dress, and a wrap or something in silver silk? If he could teach me to layer my day clothes like other people seem to manage then that would be good, leggings, tunicy things and I’m sure he’ll like that I do scarves.

I suppose after shopping today I’ll get the full treatment tomorrow. Full spa session, facial, nails – I wouldn’t mind eyebrows and perhaps some of those eye lashes that can stay on for weeks. He may have to bring someone down from London for my hair, I quite fancy Splinters, and going a touch lighter, but I want to stay natural. Princesshay will be doing a fashion show so he’ll come back for that and I’ll have to have the treatment all over again. Last time I was on a catwalk I was about thirteen but it will come back to me I’m sure. Of course he’ll want to tie in my big ‘reveal’ with turning on the Christmas lights in November. They will probably use that big glass front on Next.  It will be gorgeous of course, with lots of VERY expensive satin and lace.

‘Are you waiting for me Gilly’?

‘Uh, what’? Oh hi I was just . . .

‘Ogling that Med student’? He looks like that Gok bloke doesn’t he’? Quite cute.’

‘Oh, uh does he? Maybe a little. Yes I saw your bus go up and thought I’d wait for you. Thank God it’s Friday, I need a lie – in.

Gifts, Secrets, Heart

Posted on Posted in Creative writing, Poetry, Uncategorized, WritingTagged , , 2 Comments

Gifts to cherish are the gifts of the heart

beauty, both hidden, and the effervescent,

that blooms then fizzles with time.

Treasure the gift of a child, of knowledge, of a God given talent.

The joy of a souls recognition, the prize of a love shared.

Gifts to cherish are the secrets of the heart, a secret shared to a love.

A story entrusted and kept to self, withheld. A breath and then release.

A secret diary of herstory, held for a generation, now whispered.

Next, shout it loud, a tunnelling to the future, an echo.

Gifts to cherish are the gifts of faith in the love

of a heart eased of pain. No longer bloody blood red,

not shattered, but reshaped by the song of a valentine.

A soul reaches, emerges from the diary of gifts,

for-giveness through towers of forgetfulness.

Gifts to cherish are hearts that hold secrets

deep beneath distant landscape they rest.

Shout loudly, resonate, herstory – history colliding

and healed for eternity, intact.

Around the Charity in Thirty Minutes

Posted on Posted in Creative writing, WritingTagged , , , , , , , 7 Comments

There was a middle aged man sat on the ground outside the post office when I walked past on my way to the cemetery with the dogs. Scruffy, unkempt, unwashed and down and out. I made eye contact because I hate ignoring people – but maybe doing so was patronising? His eyes saw me blankly before we both looked away. He had a bottle of supermarket white cider half empty beside him, it was 9.45 am. I had never seen him or any other homeless person around my neighbourhood before but times are hard and services have been cut.

I went on into the graveyard, pulled the dogs away from the squirrel hunting spot just inside the gate and headed towards the 1887 theatre fire monument. There behind it I saw a fresh grave with the biggest, most ostentatious pile of wreathes and bouquets I had ever seen. I was instantly stuck by the contrast; our society’s caring more for the dead than the living. I did a quick calculation, there were about 25-30 lots of flowers there, some very expensive, others less so, but about £500 must have been spent. Enough to feed that guy, put him in a hostel for a month and get him some new clothes.

When I die I want a cardboard box coffin or better still a silk sleeping bag liner. I do not want anyone to bring more than one white lily to my funeral; if they want to spend money then they can give it to a charity. How do you choose which charity is most needy these days? They say that charity begins at home and if so then that homeless man and many others like him are right on the doorstep. Alcohol though, many would consider that he does not deserve charity. It’s easy to judge isn’t it? He’s brought his troubles on himself, he’s hit the booze and pissed it against the wall hasn’t he? How often do we stop to ask the cause? Who knows what despair has brought him to the gutter by Ladysmith Road Post Office?

I will always give to cancer charities, like many people I have lost family and friends to the creeping devil disease. The NSPCC have benefited recently when my friend and I had a craft table at a country fair and I regularly get caught for sponsorship at work. One of my pet hates is when teenagers, some as young as sixteen are ‘raising money’ so that they can spend two weeks in a third world country to help build a school or plant a garden, you know the kind of thing? These trips usually cost a thousand pounds or so and no doubt they struggle to get the cash together – sitting in a bath of baked beans, abseiling from somewhere high or eating fifty hot dogs in an hour – but who really benefits? Maybe they realise how privileged they are, they mean well, but do they make any difference? Do they have any skills of any value to offer? Most often they come from middle class families whose middle class friends happily chip in so that said offspring can go on the adventure, but wouldn’t they do better to just send a cow? Or some seed and tools?

One of the craziest projects in recent years has to be the aid programme that decided to help the Turkana people in Northern Kenya by supplying them with equipment to fish and a huge freezing plant. The plan was to both improve nutrition locally and provide an income. The Turkana cooperative allowed themselves to be taught to fish and a new food mountain grew. It’s unfortunate that no one did enough homework to discover that the Turkana are nomadic pastoralists and DO NOT EAT FISH!

Seeing that man with his cider bottle sent my thoughts on a roller coaster, all on a thirty minute stroll through the cemetery. I might have popped into the shop and bought him a pasty, but he was gone by the time I walked back. I hope he found some appropriate help.

I Am a Writer, Right?

Posted on Posted in Creative writing, WritingTagged , , , , 6 Comments

I am a writer, right? I have a Diploma that says I can write and a blog with lots of hits that shows that real people, like you, read the things I write. But the problem is that I’m a woman of few words (some would say its better that way) and that is not the writers way. ‘Normal’ writers scrawl copious quantities of words and have to edit, chop and further edit their excesses. There was a 5% leeway for the assignments on my creative writing courses and I kept hearing how people had written double the words and were struggling to pare it down before submission. Not me. To reach the word count, I’d have to edit to find three words where I thought one was adequate. The term ‘murder your darlings’ coined by someone whose name I maybe should remember but don’t would never apply to me – I don’t have any darlings! Don’t get me wrong, I love writing words, I love language, to listen, to talk to people and to write is my passion.

At the beginning of my writing studies I bought a lovely little book, ‘Eyes like Butterflies’, a treasury of similes and metaphors, gathered together by Terence Hodgson. I read with delight entries like in the section headed ‘Nipple’:- ‘the great peach thermometer of her nipples’ and wondered who thinks of stuff like that? Joe Coomer in Apologising to dogs apparently. TH has also included Janette Turner on ‘Eyebrows’, ‘her eyebrows knitting together like offended caterpillars’ in Borderline. Is it possible to offend a caterpillar and if so how do we know that the soft centred beastie is offended? Nah, I could never dream up stuff like that.

This lack of ability to waffle on has often made me question my own intelligence but I can’t be bothered with using ‘big words’, if someone needs to go look up a word I’ve used, then it’s taken them from the immediacy of the read. This probably makes my writing seem immature, I don’t know, but I must do something right because I get quite good grades. I do know ‘big words’, lots of them, there’s ‘large’ and ‘huge’ for instance or even ‘etymology’ – now that’s one that I love!

Another thing that fellow students seem to have to do is first, second and even third drafts, in fact the textbooks say you must! Guess who doesn’t? Yes that will be me. Except for when I wrote my final assessment, I just do it, tweaking as I go, a final read through and that’s it. No endless redrafting for me. A few months ago Myslexia interviewed the prolific Susan Hill who said she only ever does one draft, sounds like my kind of woman, hooray! I must give her a read sometime, recommendations as comments welcome please. . .

The thing that I  do is  festering, I work a story in my head for months only making vague occasional notes that I can’t read when I need to, because of my dreadful handwriting. I do it anyway with the faith that the act of the scribble will consign it to my memory, which sometimes happens and sometimes doesn’t. You know as I’m writing it’s occurred to me that I should try writing books for children, that would be an excuse for not writing very much AND using little words. Um, interesting thought to hold, watch this space.

Karni Mata, facing my fear

Posted on Posted in Cultural exchanges, India, Travel, WritingTagged , , , , , , , , 9 Comments

In the depths of the Thar desert, Rajasthan, stands the wonder that is Karni Mata, and bravely or foolishly we decided to visit. We had been advised to put socks on, so we obeyed and left our expensive walking sandals by the entrance in a pile of worn, grubby, flip flops. It was only 9am but the courtyard felt like a hotplate and we were grateful for the barrier the socks provided. Right away we spotted rats running along the ground. I stood still and looked around, realising there were odd ones everywhere, mainly quite still but on all levels of the temple walls, on little crevices and niches. Following the route around, I kept my head facing directly forwards, on a neck that was as rigid as the temple walls. My eyes roamed in every direction to the degree where whatever that muscley cordy thing is that stops eyeballs falling out, was hurting. I didn’t want to see them, but I wanted to know where they were and whichever way I looked I could see them. Not many, not flocks or whatever the collective term is, but a few, just going about their ratty business, dashing, pottering, sitting upright with whiskers twitching. 

The place was getting busier, mainly with Indian families, well dressed tourists, the women and young girls in colourful saris and salwar kameez, the men in smart fawn trousers and neatly pressed shirts. Judging by their appearance, our sandals probably looked less posh in the pile now.

We were being funnelled from the sun towards a cave-like entrance. Just as I was thinking what on earth is this dark hole, someone drew my attention to the walls where a series of hand prints were visible. ‘It’s the widows’ they said, ‘they were mourning and about to commit Sati . . . throw themselves on the pyre. I’d heard of this of course but having it presented to me was another matter. The rats scurrying around my feet became as nothing. How could I fear an eight inch long-tailed creature when those women had felt compelled to throw themselves onto a fire? Looking at every hand, I reached a point where the hallway turned a corner, into total darkness. My worst nightmare and I turned to look behind, meeting the eyes of the Hindi women who saw that my eyes were moist, ‘Don’t worry’ they said, ‘the practice is outlawed now, it rarely happens, keep going it’s okay’. I had to walk on and after five yards or so another corner with light at the end.

Emerging into the heat I took a deep breath and the stench registered for the first time. A bell sounded and I don’t know if it was coincidence or if the rats knew it was chow time, but far too many of them emerged and headed towards a corner area. There an elderly man had set down large metal trays of milk, which they devoured. 

I felt very queasy, but also drawn to watch, it was easier in the courtyard. It is considered very bad luck to step on or harm any of these creatures; they are revered as sacred Hindu deities. There are thousands ruling in this temple, with its ornate silver doors and marbled floors littered with droppings. Just a few are white, and I saw one, supposedly very auspicious. Having them that close made me feel really anxious. I don’t think it was auspicious for me; Karni Mata could have been where I caught the bug that made me lose three days of the journey being ill. I still can’t bear rats, but when I look back at my photos – very few because I couldn’t concentrate – and don’t have to avoid stepping on them, they look nearly, just a tiny bit cute. Apart from those tails. I’m glad I dared to visit and I’m grateful to Mugan Singh for the sock advice. 

A reluctant time traveller

Posted on Posted in Future, History, Travel, War, WritingTagged , , , , , , , 5 Comments

I stumbled across a prompt, what period of history or event would you like to time travel to? It sent my mind butterflying through the centuries and around the world, to Egypt when the pyramids were being built and then feeling a touch guilty, back closer to home and Stonehenge. I didn’t linger in either place; gruelling physical labour in either climate would have meant an unpleasant life and an early death. The story of the stones arriving from Preseli 150 miles away is known to be a myth but someone still had to shift them upright. Naturally as I would be arriving via time machine they might revere me as a goddess, but more likely they’d torture and punish me as something demonic. So, an alternative? I live in a city founded by the Romans around AD50, the arrival, overthrowing of the Dumnonii tribe and establishment of a fort overlooking the river as part of their march westward would have been terrifying to the locals. Some of them still get a bit anxious when tourists arrive for a bank holiday to drink our most expensively rated and billed water for free. Would it be worth cranking up the time machine for? Only for the wine they brought with them!

Many years ago I devoured a series of books, ‘Earth’s Children’ by Jean Auel. The heroine, Ayla manages to tame a young horse, the first step towards domestication of an animal. Since then I have often wondered about that period when other creatures started to share our lives, to mutual benefit – maybe, and carried to the extreme with the training of cormorants to fish for us. That’s quite high on my list of who, why, how did someone first think that up questions. This all takes place 30,000 years ago when the oral tradition of storytelling was probably flourishing but I’d probably miss my shelves of books and the Kindle app on my Android.

Take a quick step forward. I’ll disembark from Viator, as I’ve named my time machine, to the industrial revolution, the nineteenth century and the wonder of the first railways. To be among the first people to travel on, to be propelled from place to place, by a beast of a machine belching steam with a smell that I can conjure in an instant. Suddenly machines were making farm workers life easier, productivity increased and many moved to cities and factory jobs. Would I want to be there? Child labour abounded, workers were exposed to dangers appalling to our health and safety conscious society, exposure to toxic chemicals, I don’t think so.

The end of World War 2 in 1945, elation, sorrow, grief and loss. Children without fathers, women without husbands and mothers without sons. A time to rebuild and move forward with hope. What was there for women? To make way for the return of the troops they were forced into a backwards move to hearth and home, to being the housewife scrubbing the step instead of making ammunition and aircraft. Making do with food rationing for another decade and for those able to work the inequality of being paid at a lower rate than men for the same job, a situation my daughter couldn’t imagine, but was still in place when at 15 I had my first Saturday job. The joy and relief of peacetime would quickly dissipate under the daily struggle.

History is littered with war, destruction, misery, brutality, with a sprinkling of beauty and creativity for the rich, usually the perpetrators. If I’m correct in believing that I’ve been round a few lifetimes already, than I’ve experienced enough of history and I don’t think I want to travel to any past life anytime soon. Can Viator please take me to the future? The future of beauty queens where there is world peace and no-one is poor, hungry, at war or living with oppression.

Twinset and Pearls at the Golden Horn

Posted on Posted in Istanbul, Old age, Photography, Travel, Turkey, WritingTagged , , 2 Comments

I’d wondered what sort of person books a ‘Grand tour of Turkey’ and kept my eyes open at Heathrow. Sitting at the departure gate, I got a glimpse of my first pair. ‘Oldies’ travelling friend called them, they must be mid seventies, and I said ‘That’s not old and anyway I like old peeps, I hope to be one someday.’

I asked the Mister if he was indeed on the Grand Tour and he replied ‘Yes hopefully, pleased to meet you.’ Hopefully? Does he think he won’t make it? Maybe he knows something that I don’t. There had been terrorist bombs in Istanbul in recent weeks, so I’d been informed by my colleague, who warned me to be careful. ‘I’m not going to worry about things like that’ I reply, ‘If my numbers up that’s all there is to it.’ ‘Just be vigilant’ he says. I am touched by his concern, check the reports and find there had been a bomb in a tourist market, just the sort of place I head for.

Missus Twinset is actually wearing a Persil washes whiter blazer, embroidered with pastel coloured daisies and she is very ‘Keeping up Appearances’. I wonder if this holiday is going to be quite me. I’m more the trekking trousies, hoodie and vest and my concession to dressing for the evening, are flip flops with sequins in case I have the energy to join in with any belly dancing opportunities. Missus makes me feel scruffy, I wouldn’t ever want to dress like that, but …ladies of her ilk usually leave me feeling a tadge grimy, like I’ve bought all  my clothes at Oxfam and have been under canvas for a week. You get the picture don’t you? Because when I’ve said this to other people I’ve been told that I always look ‘well turned out’, ha! Like a Peter Pan collar over a hand knitted navy blue cardy? The briefing meeting will be interesting, if they are all fogeys I’ll have to try to ruffle them up a bit.

At the arrival meeting we sit beside the above crusties, Frank and Betty – yes really! And are joined by Dave and Lesley, more our age.

We walk with them along Istiklal Caddessi towards Taksim Square, a lively area, pedestrian except for the odd tram carving a path through the crowds. There were fabulous shops, but apart from buying water really cheaply, I was in too much of a daze to soak it up. I’d just been told that breakfast would be at six because we leave at seven-thirty, meaning I would have to get up at five because I’m slow. I didn’t go to bed the night before. Instead, my body had fought against being asked to settle, on the Red Eye, with my head against the cold window, brain whirling with excitement.

We found dinner and sat outside the café with a spinach crepe and an Efes beer for around £8. The beer was just what the doctor ordered to help acclimatize in the sizzling heat, the food just so-so and the Crusties – hilarious!

The room at the Grand Halic (Halic means horn)  http://www.booking.com/hotel/tr/grand-halic.en-gb.html?dva=0  was pretty good for a City hotel, but I woke, God only knows how in my depleted state, several times in the night because the noise was dreadful. Do you know what? I really didn’t care, I was right beside the Golden Horn in Istanbul, a place I’d wanted to visit for years.