Georgia

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back on the chain gang, black white and grey, choices, don't get me wrong, epidemic, hegel, non-fiction, pandemic, pandemic of thoughts, the state of the world, the world, thoughts

Georgia

Yes, I got Georgia on my Mind because it’s significant and the song plays in the background as the US election results painfully unfold. So slow, so unnerving, but we must bear, and the winner will be announced before the next century.

This is where we have arrived now, the most powerful nation on planet Earth cannot decide who is the winner, while the grapevine grows and spreads words of conspiracy… Stealing, winning, losing, suing, etc.

Amid a worldwide pandemic, human or otherwise caused, we are at a standstill, waiting, waiting as to how our fates will unfold.

Hegel says, “thesis, antithesis, and synthesis.” White, black, and grey. We are familiar with the whites and blacks, but who is in the grey area? Who will win? The blacks, whites or the greys? Everyone knows the blacks and the whites. No one knows the greys, made up of all they agree from the synthesis of the whites and blacks. A little bow to the left and some to the right, while making their own synthesis. Will this work? Probably not, because people would rather think in black and white, than try to understand the shades.

Sorry America, sorry the World. We need to learn more, but it will take ages…Meanwhile, Back on the Chain Gang ….

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Bob Dylan wins 2016 Nobel Prize for Literature

Tags

bob dylan, lyrics, nobel prize for literature 2016, poetry, protest songs, visionary

A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”

Oh, where have you been, my blue eyed son?
Oh, where have you been, my darling young one?
I’ve stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains
I’ve walked and I’ve crawled on six crooked highways
I’ve stepped in the middle of seven sad forests
I’ve been out in front of a dozen dead oceans
I’ve been ten thousand miles in the mouth of a graveyard
And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, and it’s a hard
And it’s a hard rain’s a gonna fall

Oh, what did you see, my blue eyed son?
Oh, what did you see, my darling young one?
I saw a newborn baby with wild wolves all around it
I saw a highway of diamonds with nobody on it
I saw a black branch with blood that kept drippin’
I saw a room full of men with their hammers a bleedin’
I saw a white ladder all covered with water
I saw ten thousand talkers whose tongues were all broken
I saw guns and sharp swords in the hands of young children
And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard
And it’s a hard rain’s a gonna fall

And what did you hear, my blue eyed son?
And what did you hear, my darling young one?
I heard the sound of a thunder, it roared out a warnin’
Heard the roar of a wave that could drown the whole world
Heard one hundred drummers whose hands were a blazin’
Heard ten thousand whisperin’ and nobody listenin’
Heard one person starve, I heard many people laughin’
Heard the song of a poet who died in the gutter
Heard the sound of a clown who cried in the alley
And it’s a hard, and it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard
And it’s a hard rain’s a gonna fall

Oh, who did you meet, my blue eyed son?
Who did you meet, my darling young one?
I met a young child beside a dead pony
I met a white man who walked a black dog
I met a young woman whose body was burning
I met a young girl, she gave me a rainbow
I met one man who was wounded in love
I met another man who was wounded with hatred
And it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard
It’s a hard rain’s a gonna fall

Oh, what’ll you do now, my blue eyed son?
Oh, what’ll you do now, my darling young one?
I’m a goin’ back out ‘fore the rain starts a fallin’
I’ll walk to the depths of the deepest black forest
Where the people are many and their hands are all empty
Where the pellets of poison are flooding their waters
Where the home in the valley meets the damp dirty prison
Where the executioner’s face is always well hidden
Where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten
Where black is the color, where none is the number
And I’ll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it
And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it
Then I’ll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin’
But I’ll know my song well before I start singin’
And it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard
It’s a hard rain’s a gonna fall

Göbeklitepe, Potbelly Hill, The Oldest Temple in the World

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Father of Göbeklitepe, Göbeklitepe, Klaus Schmidt, Potbelly Hill, The Oldest Temple In the World, Turkey, Şanlıurfa

The Birth of Religion “We used to think agriculture gave rise to cities and later to writing, art, and religion. Now the world’s oldest temple suggests the urge to worship sparked civilization.” http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text

 

 

ŞanlıUrfa(Shanliurfa), Southeast Turkey, 1994

 

When Professor Klaus Schmidt of the German Archaeological Institute arrived in one of the oldest towns in the world, he believed he could find something unique to improve his understanding of the Neolithic era. Perhaps, something to make this town, where Prophet Abraham was supposedly born, inspire interest again. Buried at Göbeklitepe, about twenty kilometres away, he unearthed evidence that might prove his theory that the thinking of the modern archaeologists and anthropologists was probably not quite right. He had worked in the area together with a team of Turkish and international colleagues, and discovered many sites related to the Neolithic Age. This fertile land, between the rivers of Euphrates and Tigris, the cradle of civilization in Anatolia, he knew held all the secrets regarding the progress of mankind. Does it begin with Sumer or is it even older?

 

 

Klaus decided to stay in Urfa and rented a house. The 1960 survey by the University of Chicago and the Istanbul University on Göbeklitepe triggered his interest, and he managed to scrape together the funds to conduct an excavation there, in collaboration with the local authorities.

 

 

1995-2014

 

The following year the excavations begin. He discovers the lime-stones at the top of the mounds, dismissed as Byzantine and Ottoman in the survey, are much older. The more they dig, the more they find. Layer upon layer of stone, the technique and artistry getting more sophisticated under each layer, the oldest dating back to Stone Age, more than 11,600 years ago.

 

“There are more flint tools in a square meter or two, here than many archaeologists find in entire sites,” says Klaus, to Chigdem, a Turkish research archaeologist from his team, both with a passion for Göbeklitepe. The mutual obsession, which lasts a lifetime, sparks a romantic relationship, and some years later they get married. They live between Urfa and their house in Germany. The excavations continue, two months in the summer and two months in the winter.

 

As the head of the excavation, Klaus ponders on V. Gordon Childe’s theory that the primitive foragers and hunters settled first, then began their attempts to develop agriculture, giving rise to the need to invent better tools and objects to facilitate their lives. The settlements grew, societies advanced and religion was established. Yet, the excavations imply otherwise. Göbeklitepe finds in Mesopotamia reveal no evidence of settlements, but only rings of tall, T-shaped pillars with carvings of many animals and beasts on them.

 

Klaus closes his eyes and imagines. They look like human beings assembled in a circle around the fire, perhaps dancing, meeting or praying.

 

Totalling 200 pillars, between three layers, they range between 5-10 meters high, their diameters 20-50 centimetres wide, and they weigh between 20-50 tons.

 

“How did they erect these stones here? The mounting system for the central pillars must have been designed so well,” Klaus asks his colleague, German architect and civil engineer, Eduard Knoll.

“They hadn’t yet mastered engineering then. Perhaps they propped them up by wooden posts.”

“The lime-stone source is at least one hundred meters away. They must have cut the pieces with flint and carried them here. So far, we’ve found no domestic evidence on the site. Most probably they brought food here, as we came across animal bones, gazelle and aurochs, even stone basins that could have been used for beer.”

“The nearest source of water is about six kilometres away. How did they carry everything, without wheels or any pottery?” Chigdem asks.

“I think they must have used many workers going back and forth. Those who lived here were not inhabitants, but only staff. The visitors came to celebrate or pay their respects to a higher power. Nature, most likely. They used their imagination and created the supernatural. The creatures and beasts, as well as the gifts of nature around them, inspired this belief.”

“So you’re refuting Childe’s theory? Belief first, followed by settlement and agriculture, and civilization last.”

“This is the oldest temple in the world when human-beings were nomads. Everything is a result of human imagination. Unique in its mysterious ways.”

“And your faith in this place all these years proves your theory, my love.”

 

Klaus’s previous work at Nevali Çori, a settlement in the nearby mountains, dating to 500 years later than Göbeklitepe, exhibits the first evidence for plant domestication, at a time called Pre-pottery Neolithic. Similar T-shaped pillars with carvings of animals and beasts are also found there. Catalhoyuk, the famous Neolithic village in Anatolia, is 2000 years later than Göbeklitepe.

 

Klaus believes in the French Archaeologist, Jacque Couvin’s theory that this is “a revolution of symbols” where human consciousness imagined a universe beyond the physical world.

 

The excavations continue, the world looks at the site with curiosity. Some archaeologists and anthropologists conclude this is a discovery that could change all beliefs and theories about the origins of civilization. Others disagree and say, the fact that no settlements were found, does not prove religion came before civilization. Maybe they all came at the same time, but different aspects surfaced first in different places.

There is no definite answer to the Neolithic Revolution.

 

In the summer of 2014, Klaus passes away, at the age of sixty, after a heart attack, leaving a sad and lonely Chigdem behind.

 

 

2015

 

In the Spring of 2015, Chigdem travels to Göbeklitepe for the first time without Klaus. The locals who call him Klaus Bey have organized a ceremony for the Father of Göbeklitepe.

 

She looks around with tears in her eyes and remembers the man who believed in his dream and did not miss one day of excavation during the last twenty years. From six a.m. till the end of the long day, he worked with his team. His words echo in her mind, “Twenty years ago, everyone believed civilization was driven by ecological forces. I think what we are learning is that civilization is a product of the human mind.”

 

This is based on a true story, in memory of Klaus Schmidt, a Dreamer, the Father of Göbeklitepe.

 

Video:

 

 

Stardust Fairy

Tags

ankara bombing, fairy, peri, stardust, stargazer, suicide-bomber

 

In her childhood, Peri had discovered the stars in the night sky and been a stargazer ever since. There was something mysterious and fascinating about those twinkling beams. She could not describe her feelings about the far away lights, but she knew she liked them. And there was the moon, and the different shapes it took throughout each lunar phase. She loved it when it became a luminous white ball, with a face. It moved between the buildings, as she spied it in the car, on the way home. The moon moves.

“Peri,” her mother said, “means fairy. A good soul, a magical being who is kind to everyone.”

When she began school and learned to read and write, some arithmetic to add and subtract, multiply and divide, she also learned about the stars and the planets. Stars were like the Sun, the planets, like Earth. She was told her horoscope was Libra, a constellation that resembled the shape of scales. This was a little confusing. She tried to make out the figure, but had difficulties. Scales, balance. Did that mean she was a balanced person? That would be perfect, wouldn’t it? What if the scales tipped? There was no balance? Would that be a disaster? All too overwhelming. Never mind.

If there were planets like Earth, were there people living there? Humans- or? Goose bumps. When she thought too much about these subjects while she grew up, she became terrified. Strange places with strange beings.

In composition class, she learned about something called a point of view. View. What you see from where you are. If there is life up there, in all those planets with many suns, those beings must feel the same way as I do. Frightened and curious, from their perspective. Maybe it’s not so scary, after all. Just the fear of the unknown. She still felt uneasy. Maybe it’s best not to think about these things. But they beckoned. Discreetly.

Peri wanted to go to the university and become a professional. Her mother didn’t have the chance. She had married at a young age. Peri never knew her father. Only his smiling face in the photos. He had died when she was still in her mother’s belly. She wished he were here to guide her, through her studies and dreams.

After Peri and her mother moved to Ankara to set up home, she was accepted at the high-school she wanted to attend. Big city, the capital, twinkling stars. She would make it, become a star herself. She was good at maths and physics. She had a friendly nature and was kind. Maybe she could enter the Medical School or become a teacher to help people.

That Sunday, Peri met with friends to see a movie, an Oscar winner. It was a story she didn’t know about, a fascinating doorway into the unknown and undiscovered territories. I must read about this, I must look it up. Over a cup of tea at the café, she discussed the film with her friends. Never mind what’s beyond Earth, in the universe, we know so little about things in our own world. There’s no end to learning.

She parted with her friends and decided to go home early, to contemplate on the film and her impressions, in the privacy of her own room. Maybe some stargazing, too. Her window into new worlds and stories.

Peri waited at the bus stop, dreamy eyed, thinking of her future. There was so much she wanted to do. She couldn’t wait to explore these untraveled destinations and make them her own.

The bus approached. – And there was a blast that shook the entire area like an earthquake. The noise reverberated through the buildings. A great ball of fire lit up the evening sky and she was gone. Together with thirty-five others, waiting beside her, and the passengers on the bus. Promising young people like her, middle-aged citizens, and those from all walks of life.

Though they had never exchanged a word between them, on their Earthly journey,  in that moment of time, the souls of the departed shared the same fate.

Sixteen-year-old Peri became a star, or perhaps a fairy, as in the meaning of her name, from her own stardust.

Behind A Cloud

Tags

Istanbul, suicide-bomber, the blue mosque, the hippodrome, the obelisk

 

In the old town of Istanbul, the light of a sunny morning in January bathed The Hippodrome. Under the clear blue sky, the ancient monuments groomed themselves for the important day. A warm breeze blowing from the Bosphorus dried the night dew accumulated on their domes and restored freshness to their surfaces.

A thin, young man, clad in a long jacket and faded jeans, entered the square from the main street. Dark eyes, set on his bearded face scanned the structures, as he strolled towards the centre. When he arrived at the Obelisk, he sat on a bench, facing the Blue Mosque. He took a newspaper out of his pocket, unfolded it and continued to monitor his surroundings behind his shield.

The green lawns decorated with flower beds and the atmosphere of the old structures conjured a quaint sense of tranquillity, calming his nerves. A sparrow landed by the bench and daintily skipped along, searching for crumbs.

****

The Blue Mosque spotted the red tourist buses arriving at their allocated parking area. Hey guys, it’s Tuesday, get ready for our new fans. Obelisks, German Fountain, museums and the palaces, shake off the slumber. Rise and shine.

Hagia Sophia winked at the Basilica Cistern while the Topkapı Palace alerted its guards. The Archaeological Museum, along with Hagia Irine on the Palace grounds, prepared for their show.

The buses unloaded the passengers as groups found their guides and dispersed in different directions over the historical grounds. A small party approached the German Fountain and began to take photos as they listened to the guide. The chit-chat of many languages, music to the ears of the ancient structures, filled The Hippodrome. Kings, Queens, Presidents, Heads of Religion, politicians, important businessmen and celebrities, as well as ordinary people had been its guests over many centuries.

The Blue Mosque watched the dark man as he folded his paper and shifted in his seat. Something about his body seemed odd. His chest appeared to be too large for a man of such slender frame. Take off your jacket, my child. Too warm on such a glorious morning. Enjoy the sunshine.

The young man whispered a prayer towards the mosque, as he watched a group heading for the Obelisk.

Heathens, non-believers, infidels. You and your idols should be erased from the surface of the world.

Hearing his thoughts, The Blue Mosque frowned and tried to bring reason to his wild ramblings. Son, the Obelisk before you is from Ancient Egypt, the other one, from Ancient Greece, the churches from the Byzantine times. The synagogues around the corner have endured since the Ottoman Empire. We represent all religions and beliefs here, and we get along fine. There is no need for hostility. We don’t only belong to this country, but to the entire world.

A spark of anger flashed in the young man’s eyes as the tourist group neared the Obelisk. His gaze on the Blue Mosque, he hissed, In the name of God.

What in the name of God? Destruction? What are you hiding inside that jacket? Don’t do this, my child. God will not forgive you. Taking your own life is a sin against God, but taking the lives of innocent others is a bigger sin. Don’t do it! Go back to your country, stop killing people of your own faith, as well as those of other beliefs, and stop the cruelty against your own people.

The young man rose and slowly approached the crowd by the Obelisk. Too late now, I am a soldier of God. I will go to Heaven and find peace.

You will not go to Heaven. You will go to Hell and burn. Don’t pull that thing, just leave, in the name of God.

He stopped by the group and saw the sun retreat behind a cloud. A last glance at the Blue Mosque and he hit the trigger.

 

A roaring blast rocked The Hippodrome and a great ball of fire rose by the Obelisk. The explosion reverberated through the city. As coffee cups rattled on tables, and windows shook with the shock,  a large pit burrowed through the surface of the square. The Obelisk remained intact, but woeful remains of human bodies were scattered around it.

After a brief moment of silence as the fumes dispersed, the mayhem of police and ambulance sirens deafened the ears. Blood and tears permeated the air as people in shock gathered around the square.

 

****

 

Dusk fell upon the ancient monuments. Now separated from the old town, they stood behind a barricade of tape. An eerie stillness lingered as the men in forensic suits returned to their cars. In tactical gear, a team of special forces policemen guarded the area.

Despite the golden lights illuminating their splendour, the ancient structures could not hide their sorrow. They retreated into the night, looking for dark shadows to shed their tears.

A song of lament rose from Hagia Irine, and moved down The Hippodrome to Hagia Sophia and to the Basilica Cistern, descending below. It travelled through its chambers and passed underneath the Golden Horn, reaching Galata. Echoing on the walls of the synagogues, and landing in the heart of the city, it crossed the Bosphorus and arrived at the Asian side. Along the channel into the Black Sea, in the north, and to the Sea of Marmara, in the south.

At the old Galata Lodge, the dervishes whirled, the swish of their skirts in rhythm with the holy melody coming from the reed pipe. The sound followed the night and reached The Hippodrome to console the mourners and to bring peace to the souls of the departed.