A quick update

Istanbul and the rest of Turkey has settled down greatly.  Protesters have found that they can meet in small groups without being bothered, so meetings in local parks in the evening have become common.  Occasionally, larger protests will break out in Taksim, but the police response has been toned down after the international scrutiny.  This is not to say that the protest movement nor the government's harsh response has lessened.  Erd and his cronies are scanning through all the Gezi and protest related tweets and arresting anyone they deem is a terrorist, after all, these protests were of course the work of terrorists, according to Erd.  They are also demanding that Facebook release all information on their users.  At the moment, Facebook is refusing.  Most likely, Facebook will either be blocked or they will end up relenting.  Out of this social media surfing, a conservative newspaper accused the American teachers at our school for not only bringing students to the protest, but also intimidating those students who refused.  An absurd accusation with not surprisingly, no evidence except for a tweet from one of our grads telling fellow alums to come to Gezi and a picture of a group of our students marching down the streets in Istanbul (not even in Taksim where the protests have occurred) without any sign, shirts, anything showing that they might be protesting.  No teacher was in the picture.


I am officially done with school.  These last few weeks I have been busy attending meetings, my final classes, graduation, and the last good-bye meals for our departing colleagues.  I was able to sneak away for a quick weekend in Buyukada, an island just a short ferry ride away.  In a few days, I head to southern Turkey with my great friend Linda to hike the Lycian Trail.  Then back to the great U S of A for three weeks.  Then back to Istanbul for one more year of teaching.

Gezi Park

Before I get into the latest of Turkey, I want to let you know there are few changes to my blog.  The leader of this "democracy" will now be called by his first three letters of his surname, Erd.  I have also removed all mention of the place I work for.  Although I am acting and speaking completely independently, I don't want the governing party to have the opportunity to disregard that fact and use anything I say against my workplace.  I am also going to be a little less forthcoming with giving my opinion.  I will try to give you all the information you know and let you come to your own opinions.

On Saturday, I headed out to Gezi Park with several colleagues to see it all in person.  Although clashes between the police and protesters have been and still are occurring all over Turkey, in Istanbul the police have completely pulled out of the protesting areas leaving the city fairly quiet and peaceful.  The five of us took the metro, which is once again running as normal, and emerged in the center of the transformed park.  It was an amazing sight to see.  Tent after tent stretched in all directions.  Tired college students dozed in front of signs advertising Free Hugs and Marijuana Permitting Tents.  For some of my older colleagues, the entire Gezi scene reminded them much of the protests of the 60s.

For a country that has not impressed me by its organization, I was astounded by what these protesters put together in less than a week.  In the center stood a large First Aid Tent and a Supply Tent, doling out blankets, toilet paper, and such.  Occupiers were coming up to it as we walked by, turning in their blankets they had used for the night.  Other supporters were donating supplies.  As we continued to walk, we came upon a road block that was covered in half used bottles of vinegar, whole lemons, and a several bottles containing a cloudy substance, all items used to fight the effects of tear gas.  Written in big letters on this road block is "Eczane" or "Pharmacy."   

A little further down, we came to the Gezi Vegetable Garden.  Dedicated gardeners were already at it, expanding the garden with what must be donated plants from more supporters.  We then came to a Children's Drawing Tent, where kids were busy making their own pieces of art.  We saw the famous Gezi library which was not much more than some donated book shelves and books.  I was happy to see the donations still flowing in.  I was even more happy to see some of the occupiers perusing the books.

The most fascinating part of the experience was actually talking to the protesters.  We talked to the gardener who was a very well-spoken and intelligent young man.  He talked a little about how it has been occupying the park the last few days.  After the police left, he said the park started to become like a festival.  Musicians were coming and performing regularly.  This happened for a few days until the leaders of the Gezi protesters decided this was not the kind of tone they wanted to set and asked them to leave.  He talked openly about the fact they don't know exactly what they want.  There is no leader for them to back.  They don't believe Erd is willing to make the changes they are demanding, but have nobody to turn to who will.

We also ran into a group of college students sitting under tents advertising "Chapulcu School."  He says they lay out mats on the floor and bring out a white board to start the instruction.  We offered to help teach and he laughed, saying he has over 20 teachers, but only 4 students and instead offered to teach us Turkish.

As we headed out of the park towards Taksim, we saw a huge stage that had been set up.  In a smaller stage, a man with a microphone had caught the attention of many and a group had gathered around him.  I wish I could tell you what he was saying, but just as I did many of the protesters' signs, I cluelessly walked by.

As we got to the edge of Taksim Square, the first signs of the protester and police stand-off became evident.  Several police vehicles which had been left by the police were damaged and covered in graffiti.  A small building which had been burned (you may have seen it on TV), now was covered in graffiti.  Nearby in an unharmed small building, a chapulcu museum had been started.  Inside the little two room building, pictures and slogans, some with little explanations, were covering the walls.

We continued to inch our way towards Taksim Square and Istiklal Caddessi, the long pedestrian walk famous to tourists and locals alike for food, shopping, and entertainment.  Life seemed a little more normal here.  Shoppers were going in and out of shops.  The normal vendors were on the streets.  That being said, the protesters had and still were making their mark on this famous area.  Groups marched down the streets.  Whereas the Gezi occupiers all seemed to fit a similar college student mold, the protesters on the streets showed more of the diversity of the movement.  Covered women, older couples, and children were all together marching down the street.  They marched by the graffitied walls (although the store fronts were largely untouched) and Ataturk paraphernalia-selling vendors.

Right now, this Gezi Park I described from Saturday is much changed.  This morning, police went into Taksim with water cannons and tear gas.   The police stayed out in Taksim Square, leaving the park and occupiers alone (although not without scaring them).  On TV, it appears the police found a group of rioters in Taksim who wanted to fight back.  These masked protesters were wearing helmets and throwing things back at the police.  The leaders of the Gezi movement have come out and said that these people were not members of their own group.  Many say that the "rioters" are in fact undercover police, an attempt to undermine the movement and give it bad publicity.  I will let you come up with your own opinion on that.

This afternoon, police invaded a courtroom and arrested lawyers who were announcing a press release for the Gezi Protests.  Over 50 lawyers were arrested.

As we approach the end of the week...

One week ago today, some Turks set up camp at Gezi Park to peacefully protest its demolition for yet another mall.  That next morning, Turkish police woke them up with tear gas and water cannons and forced them out, then rounded up their belongings to burn.  Little did they know what they were starting.

One week later, the country of Turkey is still erupting.  Cities all over Turkey have joined in the fight.  Scenes of water cannons and tear gas, as well as police beatings and other brutality can be seen via Youtube in over a dozen Turkish cities.  In the Mediterranean city of Antalya, the municipality did not allow the police to hook up their hoses to their hydrants, leaving the police without their water cannons. In the Prime Minister's hometown of Rize, supporters of Erd clashed with the protesters.  As of today, three protesters and one policeman (who fell off a bridge chasing protesters) are dead, their deaths all occurring outside of Istanbul.

Meanwhile, Istanbul has been comparatively quiet, but that isn't to say that it has not been busy.  Protesters are still taking to the street in just as big of numbers.  It's just their resistance, the police, has backed down.  Police are no longer stepping in.  Gezi Park and surrounding Taksim has become a big festival.  Musical groups perform.  Yoga classes take place under the saved trees.  A library out of cinder blocks has started in Gezi Park, with book donations pouring in.  A massive fundraising effort to raise money for a full page ad in the NYT was started.  They reached their goal easily, and money continues to pour in. Trade unions have joined the protest, calling strikes for their workers.  They have embraced the name chapul (after Erd called them this meaning looters) and made it into a popular youtube video for the movement (if you do watch it, the penguin clip in the middle comes from CNN Turk when they broadcast penguins instead of the protests over the first weekend).

This is not to say that Erd has backed down.  A few days ago, police rounded up a couple dozen protesters for tweeting "misinformation."   Plain-clothed cops are rumored to have infiltrated the protester grounds, trying to create havoc and destruction.  One group of cops were supposedly filmed destroying an ATM.  Erd is expected back today, although no one is sure when or where.  We are all holding our breath.  The peace has come from the police backing down.  Erd, though, is not one to back down.  Of course, worry about civil war is on everyone's mind.  Erd stated earlier when the protests first broke out "If this is about holding meetings, if this is a social movement, where they gather 20, I will get up and gather 200,000 people.  Where they gather 100,000, I will bring together one million from my party."  Erd still has plenty of supporters, particularly in the more conservative countryside.  We all fear the end this man might go to avoid compromise.  The clash in Rize between supporters and protesters could be just the start.

As time goes by here, I get more and more paranoid and worried about what I am writing.  All I am trying to do is get my story out there.  I want people to see my experience and my truth.  I am not trying to incite any kind of action, except for a passing on of knowledge.  As an American, this has always been a right to me.  I am seeing how it feels when that liberty is threatened.  I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about how I should have worded this that way or should not have included this.  I constantly reread my work to make sure it would not be taken to mean anything that could get me into trouble.  It's frightening and stifling being in this environment.  I understand why the Turks are "chapulling." I hope I can help get the story out there.

Ataturk's People Speak Out

I almost feel part of it.  Although I have stayed away from the protests that started four days ago, I see the bleary eyes of the Turkish youth who protested all night.  I join thousands, maybe millions, of the Istanbul residents at 9pm as we take pots, pans, spoons and clank them together outside our windows, signalling we are all together in this resistance.  I hear the protesters as they near the water, their voices swept up the Bosporus towards me.  I watch as boatloads of protesters head down the Bosporus to join the rest.  I hear the helicopter constantly overhead, which I see on the news is circling the protesters in what they believe to be an intimidation attempt by the government.

Before I get into any more, I think it is important to understand the history of the Turkish Republic.  Although it may not seem so now, it was actually a very progressive government when it was established.  After World War I, the Ottoman Empire was dismantled and occupied by the Allies.  Young Mustafa Kemal, a commander of the Ottoman Empire Army, organized what was left of his units and successfully expelled the Allies from the new country of Turkey.  Kemal, who later earned himself the nickname of Ataturk, father of the Turks, became the first President.  As the leader, he established a constitution using many Western countries as models, modernized the country, secularized the government, granted full political rights to women (before several Western European nations did), made primary education free and compulsory, and lightened the burden of taxation for the poor.  Considering this was all done in the 1920s and 1930s, Turkey was not just ahead of its time in the Middle East, but also the rest of the world.

When I first got here, I was a little put-off by the almost god-like status Ataturk received.  Statues and busts of him are everywhere.  Every classroom and business has to have at least one photo of him.  Once a group of teachers started making bets about how many pictures or statues of Ataturk there were in our school alone.  Guesses started at the upper 100s and went as high as 500.  Ataturk seemed to be everywhere and everyone seemed to love this guy.  He seemed invincible.  At least I thought.

Then, many top military officials got arrested for supposedly plotting a coup.  Other military officials resigned in protest.  Prime Minister Tayyip Erd shrugged his shoulders and found his own guys to replace them.  Turks got worried.  Here in Turkey, the people had gotten used to the system of Kemalism.  The military (where Ataturk came from) was the check on the government to make sure things stayed in balance.  When the government got out of hand, the military always stepped in and restored order.  Of course, the rest of the Western world saw the decrease in power for the military as a good thing.  I do not disagree with this.  Unfortunately, no check seemed to be left on this conservative government.

Then journalists started getting jailed.  Lots of them.  Again, Turks got worried.  Like the previous situation, though, nothing actually happened.

Then, it seemed like on almost a weekly basis, news came of another bothering story.  A famous pianist was jailed for tweeting "disrespectful" remarks about the call to prayer and heaven (after a short call to prayer, the pianist joked the imam must either have a mistress or some raki waiting, the other tweet was very similar in style). A Turkish Armenian writer was sentenced to jail for insulting the Prophet Muhammad. 

Then, there were rumors that cafes on the street (in Taksim where most of the Istanbul nightlife occurs) would be shut down.  Then it happened.  There were rumors that the sale of alcohol would be limited.  Then it happened (these may seem like small changes, but if you keep in mind the conservative v secular battle going on, you can understand the intensified fears).  The track record of these rumors actually coming true scared me because each following stories seemed worse.  If this continued, up next the rule banning female students from wearing head scarves would be overturned (a political move, since Ataturk first created this ban to allow women to be equal members of society).  Then the abortion ban.  Finally, the scariest rumor yet, Erd would change the constitution.  His last term as Prime Minister is ending.  To get around this, he will change the constitution so the parliamentary system becomes a presidential one, allowing him to rule as President until 2023.

During this time, Ataturk started to become a symbol to those wanting to resist the current government.  Slowly, Erd took away the laws established under their founder.  Slowly, the public celebrations for Ataturk became less grand under this regime.  Therefore, the people in opposition to Erd tried to make Ataturk into this god.  This is what I was seeing, without understanding the full picture.  Ataturk wasn't a god to them, he was a great leader who had become a political statement.

In less than two years, I had seen enough to understand the fear in my friends and colleagues eyes.   My Turkish neighbors just needed an excuse to get together and realize the strength in their numbers.

Last Friday morning, Turkish police cleared out a peaceful sit-in, a group trying to protect the last green space of the Taksim area in Istanbul.  The police brought out tear gas, water cannons, and burned the tents and protesters' belongings.  The first  I heard of this was that Friday evening, when a friend headed to that area told me public transportation to that area had been stopped (the government was trying to isolate the problem by stopping all public transportation to the area.)  We talked about how inconvenient this was, not realizing what this was.

The next morning, I awoke to a new world.  The city seemed to be erupting.  At 5am, protesters got around the lack of public transportation by marching across the giant Asia-Europe bridge to get to the resistance movement's center of Taksim.  This bridge is usually not a pedestrian walk, but thousands of people at 5am can change that.  In fact, this happened all over the city.  Although Erd shut down all public transportation, people got there on their own two feet.  Or piled on a rented boat on the Bosporus.  Thousands met up in Taksim.  Then as their numbers continued to grow, they moved and added locations on the Asian side and closer to me, Besiktas.  I stayed at home, but observed what I could out my window and through my computer screen.  The Turkish news had stayed completely quiet on news coverage (another sign of the lack of freedom of press here), but facebook was abuzz with the latest. 

Monday came.  Over social media those in support of the movement had been instructed to wear black to show our support.  Students came to school in black, Turkish flags flying, pictures of Ataturk pinned to them.  The kids were bleary eyed, excited, and tired.  We started our Monday as we always do, with a flag ceremony, an assembly for announcements and the national anthem.  The headmaster started with a speech.  He told the students that these are emotional times.  In these emotional times, it is easy to act on these emotions.  He warned that the they must remember to act thoughtfully, rather than emotionally.  Remember to think. Without ever mentioning what was going on the outside world, he wished them luck in whatever they thoughtfully put their mind to.


So what is next?  I honestly have no prediction as to what will happen.  A major reason for this uncertainty is the uncertainty of the protesters.  Although they are demanding Erd to resign, they don't have a plan as to what would happen after this.  And to even get to this stage, why are they asking him to resign?  He was the democratically elected leader.  Has he done anything unconstitutional to warrant this demand?  I would like to say yes, but I do not know the Turkish Constitution so am in no place to say anything.  If he is in no Constitutional wrong, it seems that there is a fundamental problem with the Constitution, for this is not a Democratic country.  People must watch what they say or fear imprisonment. They are not free to peacefully demonstrate.  This weekend, Erd stated "There is now a menace which is called Twitter...The best examples of lies can be found there.  To me, social media is the worst menace to society."  Sounds like Erd has finally found a voice he cannot silence.  The question is, what will the voice say next?