Malan Barkir

Malan barkir lê lê

Houses loaded

çûne waran lê


gone to the summer place

Dînê lê dînê lê Dînara min


Crazy crazy, my madness

Goştê me xwar lê lê

Our body was eaten by

mişk û maran lê


moles and snakes

Keçê lê rindê lê bermaliya min


Hey girl, hey beautiful, rock of my house

Ez sewî me lo lo

I’m an orphan

ber desta me lo


I’m under the hand of strangers

Delalo delalo delalê min


Beautiful, beautiful, my beautiful one

Brîndar im lo lo

I’m wounded

bê xwedî me lo


without god

Hevalo hevalo hevalê min
 


Friend, friend, my friend

Malan bar kir lê lê

Houses loaded



koç bi rê ket lê


the people are taking the road

Dînê lê dînê lê Dînara min


Crazy crazy my madness

Dilêm eşiya lê lê

My heart had pain

agir pê ket lê


It caught fire

Keçê lê rindê lê bermaliya min


My girl, my beautiful, the rock of my house

Jana te ya dil jana min e lo


The pain of your heart is my pain

Delalo delalo delalê min


Beautiful, beautiful, my beautiful one

Ger min nedin ne

If I didn’t see my journey

gunehê min e lo


It’s my sin

Hevalo hevalo hevalê min

Friend, friend, my friend…

Obama's Speech in Turkey: Kutsal Saçmalık (holy shit)

I expected that Obama was going to do some kind of linguistic hootchie kootchie about the role of Turkey in history and the state of its human rights situation today, but I wasn't prepared for him to bend over and bare his ass to Turkish Nationalism. Or for the utter wimp out on the G word.

Text of Obama's speech to Turkish parliament
By The Associated Press

A few excerpts with translation into "reality speak":

This morning I had the great privilege of visiting the tomb of your extraordinary founder of your republic. And I was deeply impressed by this beautiful memorial to a man who did so much to shape the course of history. But it is also clear that the greatest monument to Ataturk's life is not something that can be cast in stone and marble. His greatest legacy is Turkey's strong, vibrant, secular democracy, and that is the work that this assembly carries on today.
This future was not easily assured, it was not guaranteed. At the end of World War I, Turkey could have succumbed to the foreign powers that were trying to claim its territory, or sought to restore an ancient empire. But Turkey chose a different future.

(Um, yes, it chose to massacre and exile its "minority" populations and force everyone else to pretend to be Turkish).

You freed yourself from foreign control, and you founded a republic that commands the respect of the United States and the wider world.

Translation: you became the fourth largest arms customer of the United States and we are happy to profit from sales of helicopters and jets which enable you to destroy the villages of your Kurdish citizens. We are willing to say anything to keep the cash flowing. Sometimes when I read the words of an American President,and this one is no different, I am not sure what world I'm living in:

"Now, of course, Turkey has its own responsibilities. And you've made important progress towards membership. But I also know that Turkey has pursued difficult political reforms not simply because it's good for EU membership, but because it's right for Turkey.
In the last several years, you've abolished state security courts, you've expanded the right to counsel. You've reformed the penal code and strengthened laws that govern the freedom of the press and assembly. You've lifted bans on teaching and broadcasting Kurdish, and the world noted with respect the important signal sent through a new state Kurdish television station."

Wouldn't it be nice if all that were true? Wouldn't it be nice if article 301 was abolished. If Kurdish was actually legal:

for instance, this from Info-Turk

154 Inmates on Hunger Strike in Erzurum

Rights activists called on the Ministry of Justice to act, stating that the health of four inmates in Erzurum prison, who are on hunger strike since 23 February, is deteriorating. Cihan Alkan, Bozo Açlan, Aydın Atalay and Abdulvahap Karatay are among the 154 inmates who went on hunger strike in turns, to protest right violations in the prison.

Allegedly, books and publications in Kurdish aren't allowed, the inmates' right to exit to courtyard together is obscured, they aren't allowed to talk to their families in Kurdish on the phone and arbitrary disciplinary punishments are given.

In a joint statement, rights defenders Esra Çiftçi, Yüksel Mutlu, Murat Çelikkan, Yusuf Alataş, Ataol Behramoğlu, Adil Okay, Ahmet Telli, Baskın Oran, Ercan Kanar, Gün Zileli, Hicri İzgören, Metin Bakkalcı, Nihat Behram, Oral Çalışlar, Şanar Yurdatapan, Şükrü Erbaş and Temel Demirer requested an immediate end to such practices.

And perhaps Obama would like to send a card to some of these journalists who are currently in prison... this is also from Info-Turk:

18 Journalists and Columnists Meet Year 2009 in Turkish Prisons

Let’s Send to Imprisoned Journalist A Card For New Year

Many journalists and columnists meet year 2009 in prisons in Turkey and all over the world.

We, as Solidarity Platform With Imprisoned Journalists, celebrate new year of all journalists and columnists who are imprisoned in our country and in the world, and wish they would be free as soon as possible.

Imprisoned journalists and columnists were arrested because of the fact that they defended freedom of thought and expression, freedom of press and information right of people.

We can act with solidarity by sending new year card to 18 imprisoned journalists and columnists.

Cancel Law No. 301 and Anti-Terror Law Which Block Freedom of Thought and Expression!

Freedom for Imprisoned Journalists!

We present names and prisons in which they are imprisoned of 18 journalists and columnists imprisoned since 29 December 2008 to the information of press, public, sensitive people and institutions…

Ali Buluş, Karaman-Ermenek M Tipi Cezaevi
Barış Açıkel, Kandıra 1 Nolu F Tipi Cezaevi, KOCAELİ
Bayram Namaz, Edirne 1 Nolu F Tipi Cezaevi
Behdin Tunç, Diyarbakır D Tipi Cezaevi
Erdal Güler, Amasya E Tipi Cezaevi, İstanbul
Erol Zavar, Sincan F Tipi Cezaevi, ANKARA
Faysal Tunç, Diyarbakır D Tipi Cezaevi
Füsun Erdoğan, Gebze Özel Tip Cezaevi, Gebze/KOCAELİ
Hatice Duman, Gebze Özel Tip Cezaevi, Gebze/KOCAELİ
İbrahim Çiçek, Tekirdağ 2 Nolu F Tipi Cezaevi
Mahmut Tutal, Urfa E Tipi Cezaevi
Mehmet Ali Varış, Metris Cezaevi
Mehmet Bakır, Bolu F Tipi Cezaevi
Mehmet Karaaslan, Karaman-Ermenek M Tipi Cezaevi
Murat Coşkun, Adana Kürkçüler F Tipi Cezaevi
Mustafa Gök, Sincan F Tipi Cezaevi, ANKARA
Sedat Şenoğlu, Edirne 1 Nolu F Tipi Cezaevi
Ziya Ulusoy, Tekirdağ 1 Nolu F Tipi Cezaevi

Solidarity Platform With Imprisoned Journalists (TGDP)
29 December 2008

CONTACT: Necati ABAY-TGDP Spokesperson, GSM: 0535 929 75 86, Fax: (0212) 514 68 77
e-mail: tutuklugazeteciler@mynet.com


Speaking during a press statement, Democratic Society Party (DTP) MP Hasip Kaplan criticized the conditions in prisons as "worse than the 1980 coup period."

Human Rights Association (İHD) chair Öztürk Türkdoğan said that they have repeatedly warned and informed the authorities about the severity of the situation and they failed to act.

Turkey's Human Rights Foundation (TİHV) chair Metin Bakkalcı noted that currently there're 108 thousand people in prisons across the country. "If the situation isn't improved, hunger strikes will result in deaths." (BIA, April 2, 2009)


AND THEN OBAMA SAID THIS:

Another issue that confronts all democracies as they move to the future is how we deal with the past. The United States is still working through some of our own darker periods in our history. Facing the Washington Monument that I spoke of is a memorial of Abraham Lincoln, the man who freed those who were enslaved even after Washington led our revolution. Our country still struggles with the legacies of slavery and segregation, the past treatment of Native Americans.
Human endeavor is by its nature imperfect. History is often tragic, but unresolved, it can be a heavy weight. Each country must work through its past. And reckoning with the past can help us seize a better future. I know there's strong views in this chamber about the terrible events of 1915. And while there's been a good deal of commentary about my views, it's really about how the Turkish and Armenian people deal with the past. And the best way forward for the Turkish and Armenian people is a process that works through the past in a way that is honest, open and constructive.

Mr. President, excuse me? The TERRIBLE EVENTS? I thought a terrible event was when your appointments haven't paid their taxes, or you get snippy in a press conference. But obviously Obama just had a major wimp out moment. Everybody thought Obama was going to be the Santa Claus of human rights... not me. Business will go on as usual.

The Errorist

This made me laugh so hard, but at the core its very serious:
Click on the link and it will take you to a website where you can upload a picture of yourself sticking out your tongue. I think its one of the most appropriate responses to the absurd treatment of language I've ever come across.




The ERRORIST

Our medium is our message!
errorist wanted

„With a single glance at the underside of my tongue the teacher would control if I had spoken the forbidden language at home. When I was a child I still spoke my native tongue“ H.K., Diyarbakir

To stick out your tongue is more than a universal sign of disobedience.
The Errorist project is centred on the search for failures. Its art project „qwx - show ur lingua“ aims to counter the politics which homogenise the subjectivity of people living within the boundaries of Turkey, people who have a variety of ethnic and cultural identities. By prompting people to upload images of their tongues sticking out „qwx - show ur lingua“ aims to create a space of resistance.

Within Turkish society subjects who resist and who live in opposition to the politics of homogenisation are regarded as traitors and are demonised by the Turkish state and by society at large. This demonization is not only a recourse to a mythical being to shape the political and historical perception of the other but also a symbol embedded into everyday language that invokes the unknown, the threatening, and the unintelligible.

Oh, this will solve everything:

FROM THE INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIBUNE:

Turkey to issue Kurdish version of Quran


ANKARA, Turkey: An official says Turkey's government will issue an official version of the Quran in the once-banned Kurdish-language.

Speaking and publishing in the language became legal in 1991 when Kurdish versions of the Quran appeared in bookstores.

Mehmet Gormez, the deputy head of Turkey's state-run religious affairs directorate, says the official version would be an improved interpretation of several existing Kurdish translations.

Today, the language is still barred in schools, parliament and other official settings on the grounds that it would divide the country along ethnic lines. Kurds make up about a fifth of Turkey's more than 70 million people.

When Turkish people proclaim that the Kurdish language is legal in Turkey, they forget that its ilegal in school, in any official setting, in any broadcast done by actual Kurdish people (as opposed to the AKP channel TRT6), that there are no translators for non Turkish speakers (for instance, many Kurdish women, forced from their villages by the Turkish government, their husbands either dead or in exile, do not speak Turkish and they encounter great difficulties in hospitals, police stations or any other government office which does not allow the use of their language. The letters QWX are still ilegal, and that people are still being prosecuted for speaking their own language. Below is an excerpt from the Eurasia Daily Monitor:


In January 2009 the state-owned TV channel TRT 6 launched 24-hour broadcasting in the Kurdish language. Erdogan spoke Kurdish in his welcoming message to TRT 6. Even Justice and Development Party (AKP) parliamentarians appeared in various programs of Kurdish TRT, speaking in Kurdish and singing Kurdish songs. On February 21 Erdogan went to Diyarbakir and revealed his plan to open Turkey's doors to the famous exiled Kurdish singer Sivan Perwer (Aksam, Radikal, Taraf, February 22).

Perwer's story is another example of irony in Turkey's long-lasting Kurdish debate. Perwer was forced to flee from Turkey in 1976 just for singing a Kurdish song. Since 1976 he has lived in Germany. The name of the song that that led to his exile from Turkey was "Mihemedo." A TV producer was sentenced to five years in prison in 1999 just for playing "Mihemedo" on his local TV station (Yuksekova Haber, December 30, 2008). Ironically, "Mihemedo" is a folk song telling the story of a soldier from the Kurdish city of Diyarbakir, who joined the Ottoman Army in World Ward I and lost his life for his country. The same song that caused Perwer to flee the country was the opening song of TRT 6.

TRT 6's 24-hour Kurdish broadcasts and Erdogan's few sentences in Kurdish asking Kurdish singers to return to their country received applause from various segments of society. On February 24 Ahmet Turk, the Chairman of the Kurdish nationalist Democratic Society Party (DTP) stated that "The prime minister is speaking Kurdish. In fact, all people should speak freely in their native language. There should be no problem speaking Kurdish under the roof of parliament. Thus, today I will speak Kurdish in our party session in parliament" (Zaman, February 25). When he began speaking Kurdish, the state-owned TRT 3 TV channel, which televises parliamentary sessions live, stopped broadcasting and issued a statement saying, "The Turkish Constitution and the Law on Political Parties only allow speaking Turkish. In the political party meetings, speaking any other language is not permitted. Therefore, we have to stop broadcasting" (TRT, February 24).

It would be funny if it wasn't so true

From the Alliance for Kurdish Rights:

Turkey Bribes American Academia

The following is from: ENTOTIAN REVOLUTION:

ENOTITAN REVOLUTION IS A COLLECTION OF WRITINGS AND OPINIONS OF IOANNIS FIDANAKIS. SUPPORTING THE STRUGGLES OF NATIVE AND ETHNIC PEOPLE BEING OPPRESSED, ENSLAVED, MANIPULATED OR EXPLOITIVE BY FOREIGN ELEMENTS WITHIN THEIR OWN NATURAL AND HISTORICAL HOMELANDS.

which features an article about the massive funds the Turkish government spends to manipulate the American as well as public opinion.


NEW YORK—The Washington Post reported in its Saturday edition on the ongoing
corruption and manipulation of American scholarship by the Turkish government,
Susan Kinzie’s article “Board Members Resign to Protest Chair’s Ousting Leader
in Georgetown-Based Agency Encouraged Scholars to Research Mass Killing of
Armenians” details the most recent scandal surrounding the ITS (Institute of
Turkish Studies) founded with a $3 million dollar grant paid directly by the
Turkish government.

Beginning in the 1980s, in response to the Congressional arms embargo of the
1970s following Turkey’s criminal military invasion of Cyprus, the Turkish
Embassy in Washington DC, under the leadership of then Turkish Ambassador Sukru
Elekdag, initiated a far flung campaign in America to whitewash Turkish criminal
history. The practically non-existent ,apathetic community of Turks in America,
was reorganized with the help of millions of dollars of funding-- buying high
priced advisors to set up such Cyprus Invasion denying entities as the
Washington DC-Based “American Friends of Turkey” the ATC (American Turkish
Council) recently reorganized under the new name “Turkish Coalition of America”
,the ATAA (Assembly of Turkish American Associations) and the New York-New
Jersey-Based FTAA (Federation of Turkish American Associations) whose job was to
organize a “Turkish-American” parade to counter the decades long parade by
Greek-Americans on New York’s Fifth Avenue.

Susan Kinzie's Washington Post article goes on to describe the blatant buying of "scholarship" by the Turkish Government:

The Turkish studies institute, founded in 1983, is independent from Georgetown University, but Executive Director David Cuthell teaches a course there in exchange for space on campus.

Julie Green Bataille, a university spokeswoman, wrote in an e-mail, "we will review this matter consistent with the importance of academic freedom and the fact that the institute is independently funded and governed."

The institute's funding, a $3 million grant, is entirely from Turkey.

Quataert, a professor of history, said the institute has funded good scholarship without political influence. The selection of which studies to support is done by a committee of academics on the associate board, he said, and approved by the board, which includes business and political leaders. Never once, he said, did he think a grant application was judged on anything other than its academic merits.

He also noted that during his time there, no one applied for grants that would have been controversial in Turkey. Asked if any of the research characterized the events as genocide, Cuthell said, "My gut is no. It's that third rail."

Roger Smith, professor emeritus of government at the College of William and Mary, questioned whether the nonprofit institute deserves its tax-exempt status if there is political influence -- and whether it is an undeclared lobbying arm for the Turkish government.

A few years ago, Quataert said, members of the board checked on what they thought was an irrevocable blind trust "and to our surprise it turned out to be a gift that could be revoked by the Turkish government."

Metin Kahraman with Aynur: Seneler

Hozat'ın önünde vurdular beni.
Ölmeden mezara koydular beni.

Bir sandığım vardı,sırmadan telden.
Bir çift yavrum vardı,tomurcuk gülden.
Nasıl ayrılayım gül yüzlü yarden.
Seneler seneler kötü seneler.
Gide de gelmeye illi bu sene.

Bir yanım Erzincan vermem Dersimi.
Yıkılsın zalimin tahtıyla yurdu.
Sağolası anam beni doğurdu.
Seneler seneler kötü seneler.
Gide de gelmeye ile bu sene.

Nesini söyleyim canım efendim.
Gayri düzen tutmaz tellimiz bizim.
Arzuhal eylesem deftere sığmaz.
Omuzdan kesilmiş kolumuz bizim.