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Week 22 marks the end of summer and there's cause for joy and sadness for Gul

 Edited BY


G P Kennedy

 

Gul - and her man - Istanbul, Turkey

FINAL WEEKS OF SUMMER

 Life continues as usual here. August is over, we have come almost to the end of summer, and we all have the same sadness. I wish we could freeze this moment and go to a year later. An uncertain autumn and winter are so scary.

 

 The daily number of new cases in the country is reported as over 1500 every day but we assume it’s x 10. Insufficient testing in this busy summer months increased the cases and asymptomatic carriers are still spreading the virus. We hear news that there are not enough beds in the hospitals at the moment. Also idiot people hide that they are sick; there was not enough work to isolate people before its spread by the authorities. They’ve failed (again). Sadly, five doctors died this week; hundreds of healthcare workers have been infected with the virus.


Last strawberries of the summer


SCHOOL OR NOT

 School year began with distance education but this is will increase inequalities in education. Some kids are more affected than others and the crisis is hitting the most vulnerable groups the hardest. There is a part of Turkey where kids don’t access on Internet or even have a computer or a tablet. Some private schools have already started with clean & safe small sized classrooms. My two cousins have decided not to send their kids to school for now. 

 

BIKINIS WITH MASK

 Police officers have been doing checks to make sure face masks rules are being met at our beach. It’s funny that people were lying on their sun beds. It’s ridiculous! The sun beds are spread out at our beach but there’s no rule followed at the beach club next to us.

 

 Elderlies are prevented from going out after 8pm, using public transportation in rush hours, entering into crowded places in certain hours of the day, they have banned to attend social activities, like weddings. The same restrictions have also been implemented for children under 15 years olds. In addition, the travel bans for over 65 is still on.

 

ANGRY OVER UNPUNISHED OFFENSE

 This week we were very angry over the rape of an 18-year-old girl by a Turkish officer in the Kurdish town of Batman. Ipek Er had died in a hospital after attempting to take her own life, left a handwritten suicide note that explains how he had raped her at his friend’s house.

 

 Our social media campaign for the arrest of the suspect Musa Orhan didn’t work as he’s been released after a short detention. Over 350,000 tweets were posted prior to his arrest but we couldn’t manage him to get locked. Unbelievable.

 

LAWYER DIED

 Earlier on this week, we were devastated that hunger-striking lawyer Ebru Timtik has died. She was fighting for a fair trial and starving herself for 238 days. I don’t approve of hunger strikes. Unfortunately, nobody cares in Turkey and we lose good people. 

 

WEDDING ANNIVERSARY

 We celebrated our 29th wedding anniversary last night. We went to our local fish restaurant. Of course, we used our own tablecloths, cutlery, napkins etc. to be safe. All waitresses were wearing their masks.


The Happy Couple - 2020 style

 Also my cousin got married last night. We were very close to each other; I was a little sad that we couldn’t go to the wedding. It’s so strange times that instead of what we want to do, we do things we have never done in our lives. For example, we dried strawberries and made chips. Believe me they’re so delicious. I don’t know what else life will bring us in the future months. Stay safe!

Cousin married pic

 

 

 

 

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