BACH - OBOE CONCERTOS

“I worked hard. Anyone who works as hard as I did can achieve the same results.” - Johann Sebastian Bach
 

Music Saturday today features the oboe and oboe d’ amore concertos of Johann Sebastian Bach, BWV 1055, 1056, 1059R, 1053R and 1060 with Christian Hommel, Helmut Muller-Brühl and the Cologne Chamber Orchestra.
 

These concertos are reconstructions from the manuscripts of Bach’s harpsichord concertos, BWV 1052–1065, which are concertos for harpsichord, strings and continuo. There are seven complete concertos for a single harpsichord (BWV 1052–1058), three concertos for two harpsichords (BWV 1060–1062), two concertos for three harpsichords (BWV 1063 and 1064), and one concerto for four harpsichords (BWV 1065).
 

Two other concertos include solo harpsichord parts: the concerto BWV 1044, which has solo parts for harpsichord, violin and flute, and Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D major, with the same scoring. In addition there is a nine-bar concerto fragment for harpsichord (BWV 1059), which adds an oboe to the strings and continuo.
 

All of Bach’s harpsichord concertos (with the exception of the Brandenburg concerto) are thought to be arrangements made from earlier concertos for melodic instruments probably written in Köthen. In many cases, only the harpsichord version has survived.

FOOD FRIDAY - CREAMY HEARTS

“Love is not finding someone to live with; it’s finding someone you can’t live without.” - Raphael Montañez Ortiz
 

Happy Valentine’s Day! Just for the occasion, a sweet idea for lovers to share. A classic French dessert, made with cream cheese and strawberries.
 

Coeurs à la Crème

Ingredients
350 g cream cheese, at room temperature
1 and 1/4 cup icing sugar
2 and 1/2 cups very cold, heavy cream
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon grated lemon zest
Seeds scraped from 1 vanilla bean
Strawberry and Grand Marnier Sauce (see below)
Sweet biscuits, crumbed
A little butter, molten
Strawberries for decoration
 

Method
Beat the softened cream cheese and icing sugar with a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment on high speed for 2 minutes. Scrape down the beater and bowl with a rubber spatula and change the beater for the whisk attachment.
 

Pour a little cream into the cream cheese mixture and stir to mix well. With the mixer on low speed, add the remaining heavy cream, vanilla, lemon zest, and vanilla bean seeds and beat on high speed until the mixture is very thick, like whipped cream.
 

Strawberry and Grand Marnier Sauce

Ingredients
1/2 punnet strawberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup strawberry jam
2 tablespoons Grand Marnier
 

Method
Place strawberries, sugar, and 1/4 cup water in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer for 4 minutes. Pour the cooked strawberries, the jam, and orange liqueur into the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade and process until smooth. Chill.
 

To serve
Line a 20 cm sieve with cheesecloth or paper towels so the ends drape over the sides and suspend it over a bowl, making sure that there is space between the bottom of the sieve and the bottom of the bowl for the liquid to drain. Pour the cream mixture into the cheesecloth, fold the ends over the top, and refrigerate overnight.
To serve, discard the liquid, place the cream mixture into two 10 cm heart-shaped moulds, press down and then upend onto a plate, on which you have put a base of buttered, biscuit crumbs. Decorate with sliced strawberries that you have made into hearts. Serve with the sauce on the side.

This post is part of the Food Friday meme,

and also part of the Food Trip Friday meme.

VALENTINE'S EVE 2014

"I'll love you, dear, I'll love you till China and Africa meet and the river jumps over the mountain and the salmon sing in the street." - W. H. Auden
 

On Valentine’s Eve, lots were drawn for Valentines in Northern England and Southern Scotland.  Equal numbers of maids and bachelors assembled together and each wrote their name on a slip of paper. The girls names were put into one bag, the boys in another. Each boy then draws from the girls’ bag and each girl from the boys’ bag. At the end of this, there is a choice between two Valentines; generally one prefers the name one draws to the one that has drawn them.  However, if the same names are drawn by a couple, then surely they will marry.
 

Alternative means of prognosticating a potential mate is to write each candidate’s name on a slip of paper and roll each slip of paper in a little ball of clay.  Put the clay balls in a basin and pour water on them.  The first to rise to the surface will contain the name of your Valentine.
 

The ancient Romans began to celebrate the week-long Parentalia Festival on this day. This was a commemoration of one’s dead ancestors, especially one’s parents. Temples were closed, marriages were forbidden and people spent the day visiting tombs of ancestors. They hoped to placate restless ghost and spirits hovering around the graves by leaving offerings of milk, wine and flowers. Unless these remembrances were adhered to the ghosts of the dead would haunt the living.

POETRY JAM - DANDELIONS

“I was a dandelion puff...Some saw the beauty in me and stooped quietly to admire my innocence. Others saw the potential of what I could do for them, so they uprooted me, seeking to shape me around their needs. They blew at my head, scattering my hair from the roots, changing me to suit them. Yet still others saw me as something that was unworthy and needed to be erased.” - Nicole Bailey-Williams
 
This week, Poetry Jam is featuring dandelions: “When you look at a field of dandelions you can either see a hundred weeds or a hundred wishes. Wishes or weeds? What do you see?”
 
Taraxacum officinale, the common dandelion, is a common flowering herbaceous perennial plant of the family Asteraceae. It can be found growing in temperate regions of the world, in lawns, on roadsides, on disturbed banks and shores of waterways, and other areas with moist soils. T. officinale is considered a weed, especially in lawns and along roadsides, but it is a useful plant, sometimes used as a medicinal herb to treat many ailments and in food preparation as a green vegetable (we often use it as such).
 
Dandelion wine is a traditional brewed drink prepared from the flowering heads. You can find a recipe to make it here. The common dandelion is well known for its yellow flower heads that turn into round balls of silver tufted fruits that disperse in the wind, which are called “blowballs” or “clocks”.
 
Here is my poem:
 
Harvesting Sunshine
 
The suns of dandelions bloom again,
Shining like golden medals amongst the undergrowth.
They promise rich harvests
To busy bees and ants at work,
As they negotiate the intricacy of divided petals.
 
Delving into the depth of each flower
One finds style, stigma, stamen: A microcosm of functionality;
The magic and mystery of pollination
Swelling seeds in burgeoning ovaries,
Spring’s fecundity magnified in minuteness.
 
The sun is mirrored in each blossom,
As stalks stretch up, carrying the golden flowers skyward.
They tender invitations to be picked,
Captured to be brewed and bottled
Giving a golden wine – liquid sunshine for Winter’s days.

THE PLEASURES OF A GARDEN

“If you wish to be happy for a day, get drunk; if you wish to be happy for a week, kill a pig; if you wish to be happy for a month, get married, but if you wish to be happy forever, plant a garden…” - Chinese proverb
 

This morning it was cool and perfect for going out into the garden to have our breakfast. Sipping a cup of coffee, munching on some toast and listening to music on ABC Classic FM was delightful. One could really wind down even before the day started, while looking out on the flowering backyard. The summer roses were blooming, the last of the summer annuals are putting on their best show and the jasmine was full of its fragrant white blooms. The birdsong in the background was a perfect counterfoil to the Vivaldi concertos playing, while the rich aroma of the coffee mixing with the heady smell of blossoms created a perfect combination.
 

Here are the Viola d’ Amore concertos by Vivaldi to enjoy.


This early and tranquil start to the day was not to last long as certain “jobs” in the garden had to be done and done they were! We went out a couple of times and purchased some mulch as the garden needed a top-up and the hot weather was certainly causing the plants to suffer. The mulch makes a world of a difference and while preventing weeds growing ,it also keeps the moisture in the soil, conserving water.
 

We found some rocks close to home as the gas company is replacing gas pipes and there are gaping holes all over the place where they have excavated. Our suburb lies on top of an ancient lava flow and there rare rocks galore underneath the soil. The excavations had exposed quite a few of these and as they were to be discarded, we took them home to adorn the garden. Backbreaking work, but worth it in the end.
 

Not the least of the jobs to be done were the lifting of some statuary and their elevation on plinths, such that they became more visible above the plants that surrounded them which had rendered them almost invisible. We fortunately found the right plinths close to home and at a reasonable price. The statues were erected on their new plinths and our little piece of paradise was once again a cotton-wool insulation against the harsh realities of the world outside our gate. Happy are we that are able to enjoy such luxuries and live a life that is so generous with us

MOVIE MONDAY - BOOKS vs MOVIES

"Never Judge a book by its movie." - J.W.Eagan
 
OK, easy-peasy question: What do these films all have in common?

Get Shorty; LA Confidential; Trainspotting; Picnic at Hanging Rock; The Remains of the Day
; Schindler's List; Fight Club; Harry Potter and many more…
 
Yes, they are all films, I told you that! But also, they are all films that have been based on novels that pre-existed them. Film adaptations of books can be better than the book, as good as the book, or absolutely terrible and would better not be associated with the book under any circumstances. There are the die-hard literary buffs that maintain that no film is better than the book, but in my experience, some mediocre books have been made into extremely satisfying films.
 
This is a topic that has generated a great deal of debate and here are some links that give you an idea of what has been said about this issue:

“Guardian” (UK newspaper) news story:
 
“The Age” (Australian Newspaper) news story:
 
Amazon Online (US):
 
One of my favourite film adaptations is of Joan Lindsay’s novel “Picnic at Hanging Rock” by Peter Weir (1975). This is a lush, period piece redolent with atmosphere and mystery. The movie has been lovingly cast and each of the principal actors is extremely well-suited to the role. The music contributes greatly to the mystery that the film creates and the cinematography is fantastic. The novel was written in such a way that it seems to be based on a true story, but as Joan Lindsay has said, it is a work of pure fiction.
 
The book/movie concerns three students and a schoolteacher that disappear on an excursion to Hanging Rock, in Victoria, on Valentine's Day, 1900. Hanging Rock is a marvellous locale and should not be missed if you are visiting Melbourne, Australia – it is only 80 km to the North of the City. Failing that, you can always get a copy of the book and have a read of it, and then see the movie too!
 
The scenario or screenplay is the raw material that the director has at his/her disposal to create the film and together with the cinematographer fleshes out this piece of writing to get the work of art that the film becomes. A good screenplay is difficult to write, especially if one has the unenviable task of adapting a well-known and well-loved piece of classic literature. But it can be done!
 
What do you think of film adaptations of works of literature? What is a favourite one of yours? What film adaptation of a novel hasn’t worked at all?

ART SUNDAY - FRANZ MARC

“It is just like man’s vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions.” - Mark Twain
 
Franz Marc (born February 8, 1880, Munich, Germany—died March 4, 1916, near Verdun, France), was a German painter and printmaker who is known for the intense mysticism of his paintings of animals. His childhood was spent in Munich, then the capital of the Kingdom of Bavaria. His father, Wilhelm, was a professional landscape painter; his mother, Sophie, was a strict Calvinist. In 1900, Marc began to study at the Academy of Fine Arts, Munich, where his teachers included Gabriel von Hackl and Wilhelm von Diez. During his twenties, Marc was involved in a number of stormy relationships, including a years-long affair with Annette Von Eckardt, a married antique dealer nine years his senior. He married twice, first to Marie Schnuer, then to Maria Franck.
 
Franz Marc was a founding member of Der Blaue Reiter (“The Blue Rider”), an association of German Expressionist artists.  Marc’s early works were painted in a naturalistic academic style, but after discovering French Impressionist painting in 1903 he adopted a more modern approach, using simplified lines and vivid colours. During a trip to Paris in 1907 he encountered the work of the Post-Impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh, whose vigorous, emotional brushwork profoundly influenced him. Van Gogh’s effect on Marc’s style is especially evident in “Cats on a Red Cloth” (1909–10).
 
In 1910 Marc met the Russian-born painter Wassily Kandinsky, who was a member of a group of Expressionist artists known as the Neue Künstlervereinigung (“New Artists’ Association”). Marc joined the group in 1911 and worked closely with another member, the young painter August Macke, whose idiosyncratic use of broad areas of rich colour led Marc to experiment with similar techniques.  Marc and Kandinsky split from the Neue Künstlervereinigung in 1911, forming a rival group of artists named Der Blaue Reiter. Together they edited an almanac of the same name, which was published in 1912.
 
Having long been interested in Eastern philosophies and religions, Marc responded enthusiastically to Kandinsky’s notion that art should lay bare the spiritual essence of natural forms instead of copying their objective appearance. Kandinsky and Marc developed the idea that mystical energy is best revealed through abstraction. Marc believed that civilisation destroys human awareness of the spiritual force of nature; consequently, he usually painted animals, and he was also passionately interested in the art of “primitive” peoples, children, and the mentally ill.
 
Marc’s philosophy can be seen in works such as “The Large Blue Horses” (1911; Walker Art Center), in which the powerfully simplified and rounded outlines of the horses are echoed in the rhythms of the landscape background, uniting both animals and setting into a vigorous and harmonious organic whole. In this painting, as in his other mature works, Marc used a well-defined symbology of colour: Blue, yellow, and red each stood for specific emotional qualities. Blue was masculine and spiritual while yellow was female and joyful. Red was a colour of brutal materialism, a force of nature.
 
In 1912 Marc’s admiration for the works of the French painter Robert Delaunay and for the Italian Futurists made his art increasingly abstract. He began to use the faceted space and forms of Delaunay’s brightly coloured Orphist compositions to express the brutal power and timorous fragility of various forms of animal life; an example is Tyrol (1914), a work that approaches abstraction. Marc joined the German army in 1914; he was killed in combat two years later.

MUSIC SATURDAY - LA FOLÍA

“Beauty and folly are old companions.” - Benjamin Franklin
 
La Folía (Spanish), also folies d’Espagne (French), Follies of Spain (English) or Follia (Italian), is one of the oldest remembered and recorded European musical themes. The theme exists in two versions, referred to as early folia and late folia, the earlier being faster.
 
Over the course of three centuries, more than 150 composers have used this theme in their works. The first publications of the folia date from the middle of the 17th century, but it is probably much older. Plays of the renaissance theatre in Portugal, including works by Gil Vicente, mention the folia as a dance performed by shepherds or peasants. The Portuguese origin is recorded in the 1577 treatise “De musica libri septem” by Francisco de Salinas.
 
Jean-Baptiste Lully, along with Philidor l’Aîné in 1672, Arcangelo Corelli in 1700, Marin Marais in 1701, Alessandro Scarlatti in 1710, Antonio Vivaldi in his Opus 1 No. 12 of 1705, Francesco Geminiani in his Concerto Grosso No. 12 (which was, in fact, part of a collection of direct transcriptions of Corelli’s violin sonatas), George Frederick Handel in the Sarabande of his Keyboard Suite in D minor HWV 437 of 1727, and Johann Sebastian Bach in his Peasants’ Cantata of 1742 are considered to highlight this ‘later’ folia repeating theme in a brilliant way.  Antonio Salieri’s 26 variations, produced late in his career, are among his finest works.
 
In the 19th century, Franz Liszt included a version of the Folia in his Rhapsodie Espagnole, and Ludwig van Beethoven quoted it briefly in the second movement of his Fifth Symphony. La Folia once again regained composers’ interest during the 1930s with Sergei Rachmaninov in his Variations on a theme by Corelli in 1931 and Manuel María Ponce and his Variations on “Spanish Folia” and Fugue for guitar.
 
The “Early Folia relies in the application of a specific compositional and improvisational method to simple melodies in minor mode. Thus, the essence of the “early Folia” was not a specific theme or a fixed sequence of chords but rather a compositional-improvisational process which could generate these sequences of chords.
The “later Folia” is a standard chord progression (i-V-i-VII / III-VII-[i or VI]-V / i-V-i-VII / III-VII-[i or VI7]-V[4-3sus]-i) and usually features a standard or “stock” melody line, a slow sarabande in triple meter, as its initial theme. This theme generally appears at the start and end of a given “Folia” composition, serving as “bookends” for a set of variations within which both the melodic line and even the meter may vary.

In turn, written variations on the “later Folia” may give way to sections consisting of partial or pure improvisation similar to those frequently encountered in the twelve-bar blues that rose to prominence in the twentieth century.
 
Here is Arcangelo Corelli’s (17 February 1653 – 8 January 1713) version of the “later folia” for violin and continuo, taking the form of a suite of variations (from the Op. 5 Sonatas). It is a lively and inventive interpretation of this theme. One of Corelli’s famous students, Geminiani, thought so much of the Opus 5 Sonatas that he arranged all the works in that group as Concerti Grossi.

FOOD FRIDAY - COOL DESSERT

“Anything is good if it’s made of chocolate.” - Jo Brand
 
The weather in Melbourne is very hot with the temperature reaching maxima around 40˚C for a few days. The heatwave will continue through February, and hopefully we shall start to see some lovely Autumn weather in March.
 
Lots of cool water to drink, salads to eat and ice-cold desserts will keep the body temperature down! Here is a rather rich and filling dessert, which nevertheless is quite cool and goes down easily after a very light meal such as a salad during these hot Summer days.
 
BLACK FOREST MOUSSE  (for 4 people)
Ingredients

4 slices of madeira or butter cake
4 tablespoons cherry conserve
4 dashes Kirsch liqueur
Griottines (cherries macerated in kirsch, common in Fougerolles, Haute-Saône, in Franche-Comté, eastern France
Enough standard chocolate mousse to fill your receptacles of choice
Lashings of whipped cream
Slivers of toasted blanched almonds (can substitute with chocolate cookie crumbs)
Grated dark chocolate
 
Method
Mix the cherry conserve well with the Kirsch and wet each of the slices of cake in the mixture.  Cut the cake into small cubes and put at the bottom of your serving bowls (parfait glasses are good).
Spoon the chocolate mousse mixture on top of the cake, alternately with some griottines, filling your receptacles.
Top with whipped cream, grated dark chocolate, chopped almonds (or crumbed cookies) and a cherry on top!
 
This post is part of the Food Friday meme,
and also part of the Food Trip Friday meme.

ON INFORMAVORES

“Which of these activities occupies more of your time: Foraging for food or surfing the Web? Probably the latter. We’re all informavores now, hunting down and consuming data as our ancestors once sought woolly mammoths and witchetty grubs. You may even buy your groceries online.” - Rachel Chalmers
 

Each year the Macquarie Dictionary names a Word of the Year from a shortlist of words that have made a valuable contribution to the language. And it has declared 2013 to be the year of the “infovore”. The Macquarie defines an infovore as “a person who craves information, especially one who takes advantage of their ready access to it on digital devices”.
 

The term infovore or informavore (also spelled informivore) describes a person that consumes information. It is meant to be a description of human behaviour in modern information society, and the word is formed in comparison to omnivore, as a description of humans consuming food.
 

George A. Miller coined the term in 1983 as an analogy to how organisms survive by consuming negative entropy (as suggested by Erwin Schrödinger). Miller states, “Just as the body survives by ingesting negative entropy, so the mind survives by ingesting information. In a very general sense, all higher organisms are informavores.”
 

An early use of the term was in a newspaper article by Jonathan Chevreau where he quotes a speech made by Zenon Pylyshyn of the University of Western Ontario’s Centre for Cognitive Science:

“Zenon Pylyshyn closed the conference with an apt description of Homo sapiens in the information age — Man the Information Processor, or Informavore.”

Jonathan Chevreau, “Some A1 applications wishful thinking”, The Globe and Mail, March 30, 1984
 

Soon after, the term appeared in the introduction of Pylyshyn’s seminal book on Cognitive Science, “Computation and Cognition”. More recently the term has been popularised by philosopher Daniel Dennett in his book Kinds of Minds and by cognitive scientist Steven Pinker.
 

Humans are active information foragers who gather and consume new knowledge, unlike a passive sponge that sits in the sea depths and relies on whatever the sea currents bring its way. From controlling the movement of our eyes to determining which sources of news to consult, judging the quality of alternative sources of information is a critical part of our behaviour.  Researchers are now investigating, explaining and predicting how people shape their information seeking behaviours to their information environments. Nowadays a lot of this relies  on the Web, Twitter, social tagging systems, media, etc.
 

By hunting around for reliable information that satisfies our need to learn we construct Personal Learning Networks (PLNs). A PLN is an informal structure of information sources around a learner (or informavore!), with which he/she interacts and derives knowledge from in an environment that is adapted to the individual’s own needs. In a PLN, a person makes a connection with another information source with the specific intent that some type of learning will occur because of that connection. Generally, in a PLN, individuals are involved and the interactions between them is how information is transferred.
 

An important part of this concept of PLNs is the theory of connectivism developed by George Siemens and Stephen Downes. Learners create connections and develop a network that contributes to their personal development and knowledge.
 

A Personal Learning Environment (PLE) is very much related to a PLN and is sometimes used synonymously with it. PLEs can be created independently, by building and collecting content sources from the Web, including creating content through blogs, podcasts, slideshares, etc. A natural extension of one’s PLE is the development of relationships with individuals that emerge from the process of building the PLE, which is how the PLN develops. When connections from a PLN are engaged, knowledge creation becomes interdependent.
 

In Dryden and Vos’s book on learning networks (Dryden, Gordon; Vos, Jeannette (2005). “The New Learning Revolution: How Britain Can Lead the World in Learning, Education, and Schooling”. UK: Network Educational Press Ltd), we read:

“For the first time in history, we know now how to store virtually all humanity’s most important information and make it available, almost instantly, in almost any form, to almost anyone on earth. We also know how to do that in great new ways so that people can interact with it, and learn from it.”

POETRY JAM - TRIBUTE

“Death is better than slavery.” - Harriet Ann Jacobs
 
Poetry Jam this week has invited participants to write a tribute poem to honour someone, famous or not, who is nevertheless admired and is worthy of praise. The poem below was written after I watched a documentary on serf labourers, so common in many rural situations in Europe until the late 19th century. These people were no better than slaves and their life was long struggle for survival under cruel circumstances where the bondsmen had no rights and no avenue to appeal against whatever ill-treatment they received.
 
Most of us have family trees that are of fairly ordinary wood and which include ancestors who are common people of no other distinction than a will to survive in adverse circumstances. My poem is a tribute to those forebears who have lived and survived and whose issue we are.
 
With Eyes Closed
 
With eyes closed firmly, I sit and ponder,
Thinking of you, my distant forebear;
My thoughts unhindered run and wander
Through all the common history we share.
 
Your name, your fate and date of death
Is all I know; but that for me is ample
To give your picture life and breath,
So that I draw strength from your example.
 
You had a dream, you lived your life
Battling with dragons, just to survive;
Your children to protect, your wife –
And proof of your success, is that I thrive.
 
A yellowed photograph, your tattered bible,
The names of my ancestors written there;
A wooden statuette – memories ancient, tribal,
Enough to make me offer thankful prayer…
 
I have you in my heart, and give respect,
And through the ages we touch souls, connect;
Your blood flows in my veins and I bear fruits
Proud of your struggle, my heritage, my roots.

MIRROR REFLECTIONS

“Life is a mirror and will reflect back to the thinker what he thinks into it.” - Ernest Holmes
 
Mirrors have a long history of use both as household objects and as objects of decoration. The earliest mirrors were hand mirrors; those large enough to reflect the whole body did not appear until the 1st century AD. Hand mirrors were adopted by the Celts from the Romans and by the end of the Middle Ages had become quite common throughout Europe, usually being made of silver, or of polished bronze, as a cheaper alternative.
 
A typical mirror nowadays is a sheet of glass that is coated on its back with aluminium or silver such that it produces images by reflection. A method of backing a plate of flat glass with a thin sheet of reflecting metal came into widespread production in Venice during the 16th century; an amalgam of tin and mercury was the metal used. The chemical process of coating a glass surface with metallic silver was discovered by Justus von Liebig in 1835, and this advance inaugurated the modern techniques of mirror making.
 
Present-day mirrors are made by sputtering a thin layer of molten aluminium or silver onto the back of a plate of glass in a vacuum. In mirrors used in telescopes and other optical instruments, the aluminium is evaporated onto the front surface of the glass rather than on the back, in order to eliminate faint reflections from the glass itself. This gives clearer and sharper images of astronomical bodies.
 
Mirrors are much more than accessories of vanity.  Throughout history they have been used to predict the future, believed to have been capable of capturing and transporting souls, and to have been capable of reflecting happenings at other places and times.  Mirrors have also served as metaphors with many meanings, as symbols of divinity and power, implements of distortion, and tools for self-reflection.  The mirror, in its variety of forms and applications, has captured the human imagination and is the subject of much symbolism, folklore and myth.
 
In symbolism, the mirror can point towards truth, clarity and self-knowledge because its reflective qualities represent thinking. It is also an obvious symbol of vanity. Breaking a mirror is often said to bring bad luck because it is said to be harming oneself. However, this may have to do with first glass mirrors that were made which were extremely expensive and the bad luck story may have been a cautionary strategy in order to get people to look after these precious objects well.
 
Sylvia Plath, writing in 1961, gave the mirror the role of a rather cold, dispassionate companion on life’s journey:

“I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
Whatever I see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful-
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.”

St. Paul’s mirror metaphor in 1 Corinthians 13:12 relates: “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: Now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.” This has been interpreted as meaning that man only sees through a glass, darkly and inaccurately, and signifies man’s earthly ignorance. St Paul implies that we can only become aware of the true face of God by gazing directly at him in the next life, as opposed to our perception of God “through a glass darkly” when we are alive.
 
In “Snow White”, the Mirror plays a very important role, being a cold, honest observer of the world and functioning much like Sylvia Plath’s looking glass. The mirror is both the servant and the master of the evil queen, forcing her to act in desperation in order to make the mirror reflect again the new truth of her own beauty once she destroys Snow White.

In “Alice’s Adventures Through the Looking Glass”, Lewis Carroll has Alice travel through the flat boundary of the mirror’s glass in order to reach a magic land full of surprises and quirky creatures that represent a distorted version of reality within the depths of Looking Glass Land.
 
Catoptromancy is the word used to describe the use of a mirror to predict the future. This is a more specific term than “scrying”, which means to foretell the future gazing into a crystal ball or any other reflective object or surface. Catoptromancy can involve an oracle that scries into a mirror and foretells the future, or it can be catoptromancy in which a god or a demon is invoked and it is these supernatural beings that will proclaim the future using the mirror as portal. Mirrors have always been regarded as “supernatural” and their use in catoptromancy as a means to revelation is not surprising.
 
Mirror images have been immortalised by many artists throughout the ages. For example, Van Eyck’s “The Arnolfini Portrait”, Velaszquez’s “Las Meninas”, Johannes Gumpp’s “Self-Portrait”, Manet’s “Bar at the Folies Bergére”, Picasso’s “Girl Before a Mirror” and M. C. Escher’s “Hand Holding a Reflective Sphere”. The way in which the artist may use the mirror as means of self-consciousness, both for himself as well as for the viewer is a powerful technique in such a voyeuristic medium as the portrait or self-portrait in art. This goes back to our own infancy, when we first begin to recognise our own reflection as being “us”, and this occurs at about the same time we first master the use of the pronouns “I” and “me” (from 20 to 24 months, when 65 percent of infants demonstrate recognition of their mirror images).

MOVIE MONDAY - DENIZDEN GELEN

“For what purpose humanity is there should not even concern us: Why you are there, that you should ask yourself; and if you have no ready answer, then set for yourself goals, high and noble goals, and perish in pursuit of them! I know of no better life purpose than to perish in attempting the great and the impossible...” - Friedrich Nietzsche
 

We seem to be going through a Turkish film viewing phase at the moment as our public library has brought in some very good DVDs lately. Turkish cinema has come very far in the last two decades and film production values are of a high standard, scenarios are varied and interesting and the acting is excellent. At the weekend we watched another such movie, which dealt with a current issue sensitively and explored some problems that Turkish society is coping with at the moment.
 

The film was the 2010 Nesli Çölgeçen movie “Denizden Gelen” (From the Sea), starring Onur Saylak, Ahu Türkpençe, Jordan Deniz Boyner, Burak Demir, and Emin Gursoy. It deals with Halil (Saylak), a policeman accused of killing a black illegal immigrant. His trial hearing in Izmir is suspended pending the evidence of an expert witness. Halil decides to take some time off and goes back to his hometown of Mugla to put in order his thoughts and make sense of his life. While on the beach he discovers a small black child, Jordan, floating in the water near the shore. The boy is nearly dead and Halil saves him and rushes him to hospital where the child is looked after. Yaren (Türkpençe), a nurse at the hospital develops a bond with the child and stirs Halil’s conscience regarding not only the child, but also his whole attitude towards illegal immigrants. Together, the nurse and Halil help the child try to contact his father as his mother has drowned in the boat that was taking the family to Greece.
 

The film deals with a burning issue that is causing concern around the world. Illegal immigrants and refugees are seen with increasing frequency and in increasing numbers in most Western-type countries. Globally in 2012, 45.2 million people became refugees because of forced displacement This figure includes 15.4 million refugees, 937,000 asylum seekers and 28.8 million internally displaced persons. Between 1993 and 2011, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) resettled more than 800,000 refugees. The top 10 countries of origin were Iraq (140,367), Burma (138,751), Somalia (97,912), Bhutan (74,470), Sudan (46,748), Afghanistan, (42,989), Iran (40,875), Bosnia and Herzegovina (27,368), Dem. Rep. of Congo (25,283) and Ethiopia (24,762).
 

Political, social and economic causes are the main reasons for refugee movements across great distances and at even greater risk, such that they find a better life or avoid imprisonment or death in their home country. Countless numbers of such refugees find tragic deaths in their attempt to survive and live a better life. Turkey and Greece are a nexus for the movement of illegal immigrants into the European Union and both countries try very hard to deal with this problem in a humane way. Needless to say that tragedy is never far, with many refugees dying or living a life of slavery and working in inhumane conditions as they are taken advantage of by unscrupulous people.
 

We were thoroughly absorbed by this movie, which kept our interest up throughout and dealt sensitively with a thorny issue. The acting was very good and the little child playing Jordan did a sterling job of conveying a range of emotions and coming across as a believable character. The issue of racism and prejudice is highlighted by the plot and the range of characters involved and the transformations they go through. A couple of weaker subplots regarding father/son relationships and problems faced by single women in Turkey are not developed fully, but nevertheless find a place in the main story and support the main theme.
 

Living in Australia, the film was particularly relevant to us as one constantly hears that we are being swamped by boat people and refugees, with much negativity and adverse public opinion about refugees being rampant within the community. The number of people arriving in Australia to claim asylum jumped by more than a third last year to 15,800 people, driven by an increase in arrivals from Sri Lanka, Afghanistan and Pakistan. Australia resettles the third largest number of refugees of any country per capita, but the actual asylum seeker numbers in Australia, while politically sensitive, remain numerically small. The UNHCR says Australia receives about three per cent of the total asylum claims made in industrialised countries around the world and, “by comparison, asylum levels in Australia continue to remain below those recorded by many other industrialised and non-industrialised countries”.
 

Watch this film if you can get your hands on it as it is well-made and deals well with the issues of refugees and displaced persons.

ART SUNDAY - PAUL RANSON

“The purest and most thoughtful minds are those which love colour the most.” - John Ruskin
 

Paul Ranson was a French painter and designer (born Limoges, 1864; died Paris, 20 Feb 1909). He was the son of a successful local politician and was encouraged from the outset in his artistic ambitions. He studied at the Écoles des Arts Décoratifs in Limoges and Paris but transferred in 1886 to the Académie Julian. There he met Paul Sérusier and in 1888 became one of the original members of the group known as the “Nabis”.
 

The Nabis, was a group of artists who, through their widely diverse activities, exerted a major influence on the art produced in France during the late 19th century. They maintained that a work of art reflects an artist’s synthesis of nature into personal aesthetic metaphors and symbols.
 

The Nabis were greatly influenced by Japanese woodcuts, French Symbolist painting, and English Pre-Raphaelite art. Their primary inspiration, however, stemmed from the Pont-Aven school, which centred on the Post-Impressionist painter Paul Gauguin. Under Gauguin’s direct guidance, Paul Sérusier, the group’s founder, painted the first Nabi work, “Landscape at the Bois d’Amour at Pont-Aven” (1888; also called “The Talisman”), a small, near-abstract landscape composed of patches of simplified, non-naturalistic colour.
 

From 1890 onwards, Ranson and his wife France hosted Saturday afternoon meetings of the Nabis in their apartment in the Boulevard du Montparnasse, jokingly referred to as ‘Le Temple’. Ranson acted as linchpin for the sometimes dispersed group. Noted for his enthusiasm and wit and for his keen interests in philosophy, theosophy and theatre, he brought an element of esoteric ritual to their activities. For example he introduced the secret Nabi language and the nicknames used familiarly within the group. He also constructed a puppet theatre in his studio for which he wrote plays that were performed by the Nabis before a discerning public of writers and politicians.
 

Ranson’s work showed a consistent commitment to the decorative arts: Like Maillol he made designs for tapestry, some of which were executed by his wife. His linear, sinuous style, seen in works such as “Woman Standing beside a Balustrade with a Poodle”, had strong affinities with Japanese prints and with contemporary developments in Art Nouveau design; it was a style suited to a variety of media, stained glass, lithography, ceramics or tapestry.
 

Ranson tended to favour exotic, symbolic or quasi-religious motifs rather than subjects observed from nature. In his Nabi Landscape of 1890, for example, he sets a variety of obscure feminine symbols within a fantasy landscape. After his early death in 1909 his wife continued to run the Académie Ranson, which they had opened in 1908 to disseminate Nabi aesthetic ideas and techniques to a younger generation. Teaching was undertaken on a voluntary basis by other Nabis, especially Denis and Sérusier.
 

The work above is “A Clearing at the Edge of the Forest” (1895). The strong decorative elements of the work show a kinship to the sinuous forms of Art Nouveau and its colours are similar to Gauguin’s palette, and contain the seeds of Fauvism. The painting also shows a relationship to Japanese prints with the gradations of colour in sky and background behind the yellow trees that show an almost abstract silhouette, against which the trees of the foreground are placed. It is a highly satisfying work and possesses an other-worldly beauty that invites the spectator into it.

MUSIC SATURDAY - MOZART'S REQUIEM

“Our dead are never dead to us, until we have forgotten them.” - George Eliot 

For Music Saturday, the renowned W. A. Mozart, “Requiem” KV 626 performed by the Vienna Philharmonic under the direction of Herbert von Karajan. Singers: Anna Tomowa-Sintow (Soprano); Helga Müller-Molinari (Alto); Vinson Cole (Tenor); Paata Burchuladze (Bass).
 

The Requiem Mass in D minor (K. 626) by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was composed in Vienna in 1791 and left unfinished at the composer’s death on December 5. A completion by Franz Xaver Süssmayr was delivered to Count Franz von Walsegg, who had anonymously commissioned the piece for a requiem Mass to commemorate the February 14 anniversary of his wife’s death.
 

It is one of the most enigmatic pieces of music ever composed, mostly because of the myths and controversies surrounding it, especially around how much of the piece was completed by Mozart before his death. The autograph manuscript shows the finished and orchestrated introit in Mozart’s hand, as well as detailed drafts of the Kyrie and the sequence Dies Irae as far as the first nine bars of “Lacrimosa”, and the offertory.
 

It cannot be shown to what extent Süssmayr may have depended on now lost “scraps of paper” for the remainder; he later claimed the Sanctus and Agnus Dei as his own. Walsegg probably intended to pass the Requiem off as his own composition, as he is known to have done with other works. This plan was frustrated by a public benefit performance for Mozart’s widow Constanze. A modern contribution to the mythology is Peter Shaffer’s 1979 play Amadeus, in which the mysterious messenger with the commission is the masked Antonio Salieri who intends to claim authorship for himself.
 

The Requiem is scored for 2 basset horns in F, 2 bassoons, 2 trumpets in D, 3 trombones (alto, tenor & bass), timpani (2 drums), violins, viola and basso continuo (cello, double bass, and organ). The vocal forces include soprano, contralto, tenor, and bass soloists and a SATB mixed choir.

FOOD FRIDAY - SUMMER SALAD

“Life lesson: Don’t shake the bottle of salad dressing until you’ve made sure that the top is closed.” - Steve Carell
 

We are at the height of Summer now and we are experiencing some very hot days. While we enjoy eating salads year-round, in Summer they are an absolute necessity, making a full meal in themselves or accompanying something more substantial. While our garden is primarily a flower garden, there are many herbs and a few seasonal vegetables always growing here and there amongst the flowers. It is always a pleasure to be able to take a few fresh-picked vegetables and herbs and make a salad according to the bounty of the season.
 

SUMMER SALAD
Ingredients
 

4 small ripe tomatoes
2 Lebanese (small) cucumbers
A handful of tender New Zealand spinach tops
A bunch of tender purslane tops
3 small carrots
2 Spring onions, chopped
Some fresh thyme
A few sprigs of parsley
A few sprigs of dill
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
salt, pepper
1 lemon, juiced
olive oil
vinegar
 

Method
Dice the tomatoes, peel and slice the cucumbers and peel and grate the carrots finely. Mix all together in a salad bowl. Wash well the spinach, purslane and herbs. Chop the greens roughly and add to the salad. Chop finely the herbs, Spring onions and add to the salad. Mix together the mustard, seasonings, lemon juice a dash of vinegar and some olive oil. Pour the dressing over the salad and mix well.

This post is part of the Food Friday meme,

and also part of the Food Trip Friday meme.

ENGLISH AS SHE IS SPOKEN

“If the English language made any sense, lackadaisical would have something to do with a shortage of flowers.” - Doug Larson
 

In English, poor spelling can confound meaning and perplex the reader. The reason for this is that so many words are the same or very similar in sound but spelt differently (=homophones: cf - “They’re to “their” to “there”).
 

Just to complicate matters slightly, there are also homonyms, which are spelt the same and pronounced the same, but have different meaning: “Pole” as in electric light pole cf to “Pole” – someone from Poland. Homographs are written the same way but pronounced differently – “Polish” as in “shine” cf to “Polish” as from Poland…
 

Other words for one or another reason are confused by users and they can make the reading of a document onerous or funny, or simply inelegant. As an example of some commonly misused words, consider:

• This drug will *effect* a quick cure, but will *affect* your liver adversely.
• The *brake* fluid leaked out and caused the cable to *break*.
• *By* the way, when you go to say *bye* to aunt Stella, stop *by*and *buy* some milk.
• When you *allot* the paperwork, make sure that Barbara doesn’t have *a lot* to do, she is still recovering from her hand injury.
• The grandest *capitol* is surely in the national *capital*.
• He looked at the weather *vane* and saw the West wind had started to blow, but he could feel it too as the blood rushed in his *veins*. Now all was in *vain*, he had to stop working.
• When you finally catch *sight* of the *site* that is being built illegally, don’t forget to ring me and *cite* the offenders.
• Go *forth* and be the first! Not the second or the third or the *fourth*, the very first!
• He made an *allusion* to artist’s fine technique that created an *illusion* of three-dimensional space on his canvas.
• If you have *loose* knot on that anchor, you are likely to *lose* it in the bottom of the sea.
• He had to *alter* the plans for the *altar* of the church as there was not enough space to build it.
• *Two* of them had gone back *to* see the principal, *too*.
• *Quite* a few people had *quit* their jobs at the office, which explained why it was so *quiet* that morning.
• *Where* did you put those shoes that *were* on the chair, I wanted to *wear* them.
• *They’re* here, in *their* place - I didn’t want them to be *there* in plain view.
• The *plane* flew over the flood *plain* by the Mississippi river.
• *Lie* here close to me and you can see the hen *lay* her eggs.
• He is a habitual liar, so it’s no surprise he *lied* to you about the treacherous plans he *laid*.
• Yesterday, I *lay* down a little in the afternoon as I was tired. I shall probably *lie* down again today.
• The hen *laid* ten eggs, but he *lied* and said it laid five.
• Other words for one or another reason are confused by users and they can make the reading of a document onerous or funny, or simply inelegant. As an example of some commonly misused words, consider:

FRANCIS, FREDERICK, IGNATIUS

“Poetry is a way of taking life by the throat.” - Robert Frost
 

January 29 is for Roman Catholics St Francis de Sales’ Feast Day, while the Greek Orthodox faith celebrates the Removal of the Relics of Ignatius the God-bearer (Ignatius of Antioch).
 

It is the anniversary of the birth of:
Daniel Bernoulli, Swiss mathematician (1700);
Thomas Paine, writer (1737);
William McKinley, 25th president (1897-1901) of the USA (1843);
Anton Chekhov, writer (1860);
Frederick Delius, English composer (1862);
Romain Rolland, French writer (1866);
Vicente Blasco Ibàñez, Spanish novelist (1867);
W. C. Fields (William Claude Dukinfield), comedian (1879);
Ernst Lubitsch, film-maker (1892);
Victor Mature, US actor (1915);
Paddy (Sidney) Chayevsky, writer (1923);
Abdus Salam, Pakistani physicist (1926);
Leslie Bricuse, composer (1931);
Sacha Distel, French singer/songwriter (1933);
Germaine Greer, feminist (1939);
Katherine Ross, actress (1943);
Tom Selleck, actor (1945);
Greg E. Louganis, diver, Olympic medal winner (1960);
Athena Onassis, Greek heiress (1985).
 

Begonia, Begonia semperflorens, is the birthday flower for today.  The genus is named in honour of the 17th century Governor of French Canada, Michel Bégon.  Semperflorens means that it is ever flowering, a good description for these freely blooming perennials originally from Brazil.  The plant symbolises dark thoughts.
 

Francis de Sales (21 August 1567 – 28 December 1622) was a Bishop of Geneva and is honoured as a saint in the Roman Catholic Church. He became noted for his deep faith and his gentle approach to the religious divisions in his land resulting from the Protestant Reformation. He is known also for his writings on the topic of spiritual direction and spiritual formation, particularly the Introduction to the Devout Life and the Treatise on the Love of God.
 

Ignatius of Antioch (Ancient Greek: Ἰγνάτιος Ἀντιοχείας, also known as Theophorus from Greek Θεοφόρος “God-bearer”) was born about 42 AD and died about 105 AD) was among the Apostolic Fathers. He was the third Bishop of Antioch, and was a student of John the Apostle. En route to Rome, where according to Christian tradition he met his martyrdom by being fed to wild beasts, he wrote a series of letters which have been preserved as an example of very early Christian theology. Important topics addressed in these letters include ecclesiology, the sacraments, and the role of bishops.
 

Frederick Delius (1862–1934) was an English composer of German parentage. He was influenced by Grieg and combined romanticism and impressionism in music characterized by a loose structure and richness in chromatic harmony. His best-known works include “Brigg Fair” (1907), “On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring” (1912), and “North Country Sketches” (1914). His operas include “A Village Romeo and Juliet” (1907). Here is "A Song of Summer":

On this day, the following notables died:
In 1119, Gelasius II (John of Gaeta), Pope of Rome.  George III, king of England in 1820 in London on this day. At that time he was the longest reigning (59 years) and longest lived (81 years) English monarch. Edward Lear, British poet and illustrator in 1888. Alfred Sisley, French artist in 1899. H.L. Mencken, US man of letters in 1956. Fritz Kreisler, the Austrian violinist in 1962. Robert Frost, US poet in 1963. Jimmy Durante US actor in 1980.

WHERE I'M AT

“What makes the desert beautiful,” said the little prince, “is that somewhere it hides a well…”

'The Little Prince' – Antoine de St Exupéry
 
Poetry Jam this week has suggested that we write about where we live, where we are at, telling something that people may not know. I live in Australia, the Great Land Downunder, the island continent!
 
Occupying the entire continent of some 7.6 million square kilometres, Australia is the sixth largest country in the world. Its ocean territory is the world’s third largest, spanning three oceans and covering around 12 million square kilometres. Nearly seven million square kilometres, or 91 per cent of Australia, is covered by native vegetation. Although this figure may seem high, many of Australia’s desert landscapes are covered by native plants such as saltbush, albeit sparsely.
 
Australia is the driest inhabited continent on earth, with the least amount of water in rivers, the lowest run-off and the smallest area of permanent wetlands of all the continents. One third of the continent produces almost no run-off at all and Australia’s rainfall and stream-flow are the most variable in the world.
 
Human activity continues to exert pressure on the environment, land as well as marine. Pollution is the most serious problem and the vast majority of marine pollution is caused by land based activities—soil erosion, fertiliser use, intensive animal production, sewage and other urban industrial discharges.
 
Here is my poem about one of Australia’s perennial enemies – drought. Especially relevant as we are in the midst of a hot and dry Summer.
 
The Iron Sunflower
 
The sun bakes the red earth
And sky above is blue as blue bottles can be
With light streaming through them.
 
Drought, and the only noise of midsummer noon,
Is the hum of the machine and the smell of diesel
As water is pumped from deep secret caverns, below.
 
The bluebottle fly buzzes lazily, imitating the pump,
Sated on her feast of rotten thirsty carcass,
With her eggs safely secreted therein.
 
The listless children drone in the schoolhouse,
Overcome by heat, repeating by rote the lesson in chorus
Reminiscent of a dirge of Greek tragedy.
 
The precious water, hard-won by efforts of man and machine
Is stored, as treasured things are, safely locked up,
In corrugated iron tank, not to be wasted on useless things – like flowers.
 
The head of one of past seasons’ large sunflowers
With a few black, shiny seeds hangs up deep in the dark recesses of the shed,
Strung up high, safe from rodents and birds, a sad souvenir of old times.
 
The sun bakes the earth and cracks it, breaks its spirit:
No touch of green, no sunflowers this year,
And the wind blows, only to lift great clouds of red dust.
 
Fallen by the wayside an old mill-head rusts away mirroring the dusty soil.
Its sails are petals of an iron sunflower – the only flower this year.
As the monotony of the pump numbs the ear,
And the stench of petrol deadens the nose,
The rusting iron flower is a reminder of gentler times,
When machines were driven by wind, and their creaks were musical
And the air carried only the faint smell of fresh sunflowers –
Water could be spared then for useless things…

MOVIE MONDAY - GIRDAP

“Surely the hypocrites strive to deceive Allah. He shall retaliate by deceiving them.” – Qur’an 4:142
 

We watched quite an interesting Turkish film at the weekend. It was the 2008 Talip Karamahmutoglu movie “Girdap”(meaning “Whirlpool”), starring Rahman Altin, Ufuk Bayraktar and Ozan Bilen. The film was essentially a morality tale highlighting some of the problems arising out of religious fundamentalism in secular political systems. It may be worthwhile to put the action of the film in perspective by considering firstly, the politics and religion of Turkey.
 

The political system of Turkey is a strictly secular parliamentary representative sytem operating in a democratic republic. The Prime Minister of Turkey is the head of government, and the head of the ruling party in a multi-party system. The President of Turkey is the head of state who holds a largely ceremonial role but with substantial reserve powers. Turkey’s political system is based on a separation of powers. Executive power is exercised by the Council of Ministers. Legislative power is vested in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey. The judiciary is independent of the executive and the legislature.
 

As a secular state, Turkey has no official state religion with the Turkish Constitution providing for freedom of religion and conscience. Nevertheless, Islam is the dominant religion of Turkey, exceeding 99% if secular people of Muslim background are included. The most popular sect is the Hanafite school of Sunni Islam. The highest Islamic religious authority is the Presidency of Religious Affairs (Turkish: Diyanet İşleri Başkanlığı), it interprets the Hanafi school of law, and is responsible for regulating the operation of the country's 80,000 registered mosques and employing local and provincial imams. Academics suggest the Alevi population may be from 15 to 20 million. According to Aksiyon magazine, the number of Shiite Twelvers (excluding Alevis) is 3 million (4.2%). There are also some Sufi practitioners.
 

According to the KONDA Research and Consultancy survey carried out throughout Turkey in 2007: 9.7% defined themselves as “a fully devout person fulfilling all religious obligations” (fully devout); 52.8% defined themselves as “a religious person who strives to fulfil religious obligations” (religious); 34.3% defined themselves as “a believer who does not fulfil religious obligations” (believer); 2.3% defined themselves as “someone who does not believe in religious obligations” (non-believer/agnostic); and 0.9% defined themselves as “someone with no religious conviction” (atheist).
 

The plot of the film centres on Umut (Ozan Bilen), a young man in his twenties, who is accepted to study economics in Istanbul University. When he moves to Istanbul he needs to find accommodation and through a billboard at his University’s café finds two flatmates and a flat. Umut is the son of a middle class Turkish family from a provincial city, who at the very beginning of his university days has an apolitical view of the world and is relatively non-religious. The film traces his transformation to a staunch believer and his increasing politicisation.
 

Umut and his other two flatmates experience some supernatural events in the flat that they live in. Ideed, initially one may be misled into thinking that this is going to be a supernatural horror story. These supernatural experiences cause Umut to be drawn towards Islam and the neighbourhood Hodja (spiritual leader) as a way of finding answers. Umut discovers religion and enjoys this new life style of Islam, joining Friday prayers in the mosque and discussing religion with his fellows and spiritual leaders. Everything goes well for him, but stress develops in his relationship with a fellow student who finds it difficult to accept Umut’s change and the new way he wants structure their relationship.
 

His new life brings new friends and a completely new environment, which push him towards a more political religious view of the world; as a result of this, Umut’s religious life is not just limited by the Qu’ran or pure religious requirements, but rather he becomes politicised and changes to an Islamic fundamentalist. This transformation into a fanatic forces Umut to extreme behaviour and a causes a complete upheaval in his life with tragic consequences.
 

The film is a well-made cautionary tale, albeit of a moralistic tone, which nevertheless manages to drive home the point of the dangers naïve young men face when proselytised by fanatics of any sort. The story is well constructed and all events are explained in the end, even the seemingly irrelevant ones. We enjoyed watching this movie and we were interested in the way that it portrayed the relationship between religion and politics in Turkey.