'Istanbul's ugly face'
Earlier this week, I was among the witnesses to an organized attack on a group of art galleries in Istanbul's Tophane neighborhood, a disheartening experience I wrote about on my personal blog, The Turkish Life, in what turned out to be one of the few (if not the only) English-
language accounts of the incident. Turkish daily newspaper Milliyet subsequently contacted me to get my take on the events, and translated parts of my blog post, along with some of my spoken comments, for today's paper. (That's not me in the photo of patrons leaving one of the attacked galleries, by the way.)
It didn't make it into the article, but as I told the reporter, I love this part of the city and though I understand I'm among the people contributing to its gentrification, I sincerely hope Istanbul can find a way to continue to develop without marginalizing long-time residents. Given what's happened in Sulukule and what's underway in Tarlabaşı, it's hard to be optimistic, though.
UPDATE: The German culture magazine Perlentaucher also linked to my post in an article about the incident. The article is in German, so I can't read it, but I'm sure it's brilliant as it's by my good friend Constanze Letsch, who also witnessed the Tophane events. (She said the editor found my link without any tip-off from her.)
language accounts of the incident. Turkish daily newspaper Milliyet subsequently contacted me to get my take on the events, and translated parts of my blog post, along with some of my spoken comments, for today's paper. (That's not me in the photo of patrons leaving one of the attacked galleries, by the way.)It didn't make it into the article, but as I told the reporter, I love this part of the city and though I understand I'm among the people contributing to its gentrification, I sincerely hope Istanbul can find a way to continue to develop without marginalizing long-time residents. Given what's happened in Sulukule and what's underway in Tarlabaşı, it's hard to be optimistic, though.
UPDATE: The German culture magazine Perlentaucher also linked to my post in an article about the incident. The article is in German, so I can't read it, but I'm sure it's brilliant as it's by my good friend Constanze Letsch, who also witnessed the Tophane events. (She said the editor found my link without any tip-off from her.)