The two kittens are growing up quickly and finding their feet and position in the wide world of my house and garden. Stanley, my ginger tom who has been here since November ’05 is still none too pleased about having to share the food and water bowls and the rest of the inside of the house with two eager mini cats. He still gives them a growl or hiss if they get too close but I have caught him watching them with interest on a number of occasions while they hurtle around the settee and chair backs in the evenings, he looks away guiltily and puts on his “I wasn’t paying them any attention and I don’t give a rat’s ass anyway” attitude but his cover has been well and truly blown.
Recently I have left the cat flap unlocked during the day so that they can come and go as they please, and they do please, very much. Both of them fly at the plastic flap and knock it out of the way with a loud clatter. Occasionally this wanton disregard for hinges has caused them to land right next to Aslan while he’s waiting for his dinner, or even while he’s eating it. He doesn’t seem to mind too much, apart from being a bit startled he takes it all in his stride.
Both Defne the little female and Deniz, the black and white tom have been practising hunting but so far Deniz is the only one that I’ve seen catch anything. He got a gecko that was on a wall in the house a few days ago and then yesterday caught a lizard by the back of the woodshed. Well, to be strictly accurate he first caught the lizards tail which it had shed because of its defence mechanism and left wriggling while it made its escape. That kept Deniz amused for a few minutes but he was soon back lying in wait and caught the lizard at the second attempt. I took the gecko off him and let it go which he was not happy about so when I made a move to save the life of the lizard he dodged under a table and wouldn’t let me near him.
My new patio at the south end of the house has been very nice in early mornings and evenings but for most of the day in summer it is unbearably hot. The sun’s rays reflect up from the stone too so apart from the odd half hour sunbathing now and then it is unusable. In an effort to make it a more useful place I made a pergola and intend to put movable shading on it that I can open or close as necessary.
I wanted the construction to look fairly rustic, in keeping with the rest of the house and surrounds, so I had some cedar logs delivered and then spent some time thinking how I was going to construct it. I thought the best way to do it by myself was to assemble it all upside down first on the flat car park area and then take it apart, transfer it piece by piece and put it back together right side up on the patio because of the limited space.
Here it is before the transfer. I got a bit paranoid about preventing the uprights from falling while I worked, each piece is about forty kilos and would have severely injured anyone if it fell on them. I had quite a struggle moving things around and relied a lot on levers and struts. Anyone who has read previous blogs of mine will know that I have a predilection for over-engineering things sometimes and this was no exception.
And here it is assembled on the patio.
I had a helping hand with the dismantling and re-assembly so thanks to John and I hope the leg is better soon.
It suits the place and I’m now planning to decorate it with suitably Turkish lighting for the evenings. A previous commenter (Javaid) had mentioned putting up shading and I had said that I didn’t want it then, well he was right, shading is definitely a requirement but it does need to be removable or adjustable because it is not needed all the time and also has to be put away for the winter.
Anyway it is another of my big projects that has been completed and will make a big difference here.
Had lunch aboard a friend’s gulet (traditional wooden cruising boat) in the harbour at Üçağız/Kekova a couple of weeks ago. Very nice relaxing time, his paying guests were all out on a trip and it gave him time for a little socialising. It is a six cabin gulet, very comfortable inside.
Took the dogs for a run along the beach at Andriake and caught these ducks swimming over the sunken wreck of a fishing boat in the estuary.
This Ladybird Spider (Eresus cinnaberinus) came marching across the patio. Nice colouring and regarded as endangered in UK it only exists in a secret location in Dorset apparently, plenty of them in Mediterranean coasts though.
The kittens are thoroughly at home now and running riot all over the house when they are awake. They suddenly run out of energy though and just fall asleep in seconds for an hour or so before going mad all over again. They have discovered that with their claws they can climb so have been up all over everything including humans and the scars are there to prove it.
Lovable little things though they are Stanley likes to keep an eye on them from the privacy of the top of a kitchen cupboard.
You can tell when summer comes to the village. Apart from the more regular appearance of the sun the Yörük goat herders head off, with all their goats and possessions, to their summer grounds (yayla) up in the hills where there is water and good grazing. The Çukurbağ Yaylası is about seventy kilometres from the main Çukurbağ village here and it usually takes them about three days to get there. They walk with their goats while their shanty tents and possessions go by tractor or truck. This year the ones who stay for the winter just up the road from my place here left a few days ago so yesterday when we walked the dogs we went to have a look at their empty camp site. A shrill mewing sound alerted the dogs and there, hidden amongst a pile of old boxes and clothes were a couple of tiny kittens.
They weren’t going to survive long there so they are the new residents here. After a day of eating, drinking and sleeping they are now gambolling around the place quite happily. Stanley is taking a dim view of the new arrivals though, he is nine years old this year and has grown used to being the only cat. I don’t think he is too pleased about the arrival of a couple of babies and has hissed at them a couple of times. Well it was the same when he came, then the boss was another big ginger tom called Roy and he didn’t like the baby Stanley at all to begin with, I dare say Stan will get used to these little ones soon.
I noticed a Dragonfly sitting on a stick yesterday so here is a picture of it, not as colourful as some I have seen but still interesting.
Long-time readers of my blog will know that all my animals, (or should I say the animals that deign to live with me) are strays, or street animals as they say here. The two bigger dogs that used to live here, Wilf and Alf, were babies that I took in after a street dog delivered 12 puppies in the cloakroom of a friend of mine, Minnie joined us one day a couple of years later when they and I were out walking, then of course there is Aslan who regards my place as a hotel/hospital and comes for food and medical care but gets some gratuitous love too. Molly came after surviving an idiotic tail docking attempt by a fool in Kalkan and Stanley the cat beat them all to it by turning up in the bushes outside my house only a couple of months after I had moved in back in 2005. Well a week or so ago another dog decided I looked like a soft touch and joined in when the dogs and I were walking back from Ağullu, this time though it was a much more serious proposition because of the size of the dog.
A Turkish Mastiff breed called a Kangal is a very large dog bred to protect livestock (goats and sheep) from predatory animals such as wolves, bear and jackals. It originates from the Kangal district of the Sivas province in the central eastern part of Anatolia. Although referred to widely as sheepdogs the Kangals’ job is not to herd sheep but to act as a guardian.
Please let me introduce Pasha.
He is a beautiful big boy. I’ve found out that he is about 18 months old and spent most of that time in the local prison yard where the inmates called him Beton (Concrete in English), I guess they wanted him to be a hard man but he is one of the softest dogs I have met. Kangals have a reputation for loyalty and an innate protective nature and he seems to be displaying these qualities already. To have him living here is a delightful surprise and I will do my best to deserve his loyalty.
Here’s another photograph of him with Molly.
Talking of strays I came across another one a couple of days ago, not as big as Pasha but just as delightful. A baby tortoise, in it’s second year I think, judging by the ridges on the plates of it’s shell.
Here is a photograph of Pasha giving it a sniff, would you believe Pasha jumped back scared of it when it moved!
After a couple of busy weeks I was looking forward to a restful day yesterday. I picked up a cold virus last weekend and although it hadn’t developed into much I’d had a sore throat, cough and was now left feeling not quite 100%. I hadn’t got anything planned and expected to just cruise through the day as the mood took me. As everybody who lives here knows, that is a very dangerous frame of mind to be in because things tend to happen that you weren’t expecting, a bit like the old sayings that nature abhors a vacuum and stuff expands to fill empty spaces.
So… at around ten in the morning when the dogs started barking to signal someone coming up the drive I should not have been as surprised as I was. One glance out of the window told me all I needed to know. The new windows that I had ordered some time ago were going to be fitted this morning.
Two guys, (L-R) Arif and Osman, leapt from their truck and, as full of bonhomie and enthusiasm as only young, capable, optimistic working men can be, started ripping out the old windows. I was pleased that they had come to do the job of course, you could see the sky through the gaps between the old windows and the frame and I didn’t like the breeze on my face when I was in bed during windy weather.
The reticence I have when craftsmen come to do things here is caused by the fact that all their tools and equipment are chosen for working on houses made of stone, concrete and brick, consequently they have large hammer-drills, blunt chisels, big hammers and masonry drills. Well these things tend to be too rough on woodwork and getting out the old window frames is a very noisy and splintering kind of task. Anyway I left them to it, made a coffee and tried not to get too stressed at hearing my house being physically abused.
The work took nearly all day, they didn’t leave till after four in the afternoon. They worked well and the finished job looks fine. This summer I’ll be able to have the windows open at night and allow the fitted screens to keep out the mosquitoes. The breeze coming through the gaps in the bedroom windows has been eliminated. I had two windows done previously and there are a further four to have replaced and probably two doors as well so I’ll look forward to that with bated breath. I’ll wait for a while until the weather is warmer and may even take the remaining windows out myself so that I don’t get so wound up next time.
I was having a look around the Taşlıca peninsula just to the west of Marmaris last weekend with a friend and came across some delightful little bays and villages that are very unspoilt. At this time of year the only things going on there are repairs and maintenance to boats, houses and tourist equipment like sunbeds and small jetties, most places seem practically deserted. These places are so small that there can’t be too much of a crowd in the height of summer and some places are not accessible by car, only by boat which makes them very special in my opinion. I’ve always been drawn to boats, boatyards and harbours. I first learnt to sail in Cyprus in 1980 during my RAF days then had a boat of my own that I sailed around the Poole area of the south coast of UK with. The places and coast we found last weekend would be wonderful to wander around in a small sailing boat, no rush to hurry anywhere, plenty of sheltered anchorages and welcoming locals to swap stories with.
And here’s a picture of my two dogs, Molly (on the floor), Minnie (on the sofa) and the little white one is a friend’s dog, Lucky who I was looking after for a weekend a few months ago.
Aslan has been coming every day to get some food, I hide his tablets in the tinned meat that I put on top of the dried food, he wolfs it down so fast that I’m sure it doesn’t even touch the sides on it’s way down to his stomach. He’s in for a surprise tomorrow, I’ll be clipping his claws, what fun!
For the last seven or eight years I have tried, off and on, to make my own bread. I’ve succeeded with various flat breads and even made a passable pizza dough occasionally but a properly shaped country style loaf has eluded me. Many of them have turned out like small bricks and nearly as heavy. My lack of a decent bread tin to bake a loaf in has been one of the problems, all I had was a rectangular cake tin with not enough height in the sides but while in Marmaris ten days ago I was taken to a shop selling professional kitchen supplies and equipment. In there I found a small serving tin of the type used in a heated servery in a canteen or self service restaurant. Stainless steel and about ten inches long, five wide and deep. Once I got back home I tried it out, the first was a disaster as the dough was too soft and rose so far it spilled over the sides and had to be cut out of the tin. A little less yeast on the next attempt and it was perfect.
This is not to say that there is something wrong with the bread produced in Turkey. A wide variety is available here and usually very nice it is too but in winter when the rain is lashing down and I don’t even want to venture out to the next village (where the baker is) the ability, knowledge and desire to make my own is something that I value. The dogs like to get the end crusts too. Another plus is that I can make a good bacon and egg sandwich, most of the Turkish bread is not the right shape for a proper sandwich so I’m winning in more than one way. Now the only thing I have to do is adjust the recipe a little so that I can use the flour ground from the locally grown wheat and I’ll be really happy.
I think I’ve said before that I had been introduced the conception of a bonus day during the winters here, well today was certainly one of them.
About two years ago I started the process of applying for a Turkish driving licence.
Yes two years ago and I am ashamed to say that although things sometimes move slowly here this time it has been entirely my fault. Anyway three weeks ago I had my mind jogged about it, picked up where I left off and got the rest of the application necessities done in two days. Today I visited the traffic police department with Ayşe a Turkish friend and neighbour of mine in my village who is also a registered translator of English and French helped me through the process. We visited the Court offices to get a certificate that showed that I’m not a criminal, the population office for a certificate showing my address and the Notary’s office to get Passport translations notarised then we submitted the application, to find that it was accepted and the licence printed and issued to me in only a couple of hours!
I will not complain again. Actually while visiting these various offices it became apparent that the transition to computerisation is forging ahead and making a great difference to administrative processes here.
Another bonus to my day occurred later in the day. Aslan, the dog I have mentioned a few times in recent posts, had been conspicuous by his absence for the last week. Previously he had been staying at my place because I was feeding him and treating his Leishmaniasis, I put a folded up carpet on the floor of my woodshed and he slept there in relative comfort. Well I had started thinking that he had succumbed to the disease but this afternoon while outside I noticed a white tail wagging behind my car. Since Minnie’s tail is brown and Molly hasn’t got a tail I looked to see who it was and Aslan came out on three legs holding the fourth up because his paw hurts. Obviously he had found himself somewhere else warm and dry and stayed there during our recent cold wet weather. So I gave him a big bowl of food laced with medicine and a few kind words of encouragement. I’m glad he is (relatively) ok.
The third bonus today was the weather. During a break at lunchtime while we waited for the licence to be printed we had a coffee in the Noel Baba tea garden in the square. We sat at a table in the sun and the and the temperature on the large digital thermometer was reading 19C. It was warmer in the direct sun and it made even the most mundane administrative task a pure pleasure. There were a lot of people out to enjoy the beautiful day and seeing the smiles on peoples faces was a real treat.
Definitely a Bonus Day
HAPPY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY AND PEACEFUL NEW YEAR TO EVERYONE, MAY YOUR GODS SMILE UPON YOU.
Unusually the day has started off cloudy here and some rain is forecast for later, first time Christmas Day has been like this since I came here.
Edit, well some sun came out later so can’t complain.
A few weeks ago I updated my computer operating system to the latest version of Linux Mint (Linux Mint 16 Cinnamon), it didn’t cost me anything apart from about twenty minutes of my time and it works at least as well as any version of Windows. I’ve been using Linux in one incarnation or another for the last three years.
Why did I desert Windows for Linux? I had been using Windows XP on my old (2003) laptop, it had worked reasonably for years but I seemed to be getting more and more problems. I had reinstalled XP a number of times, at first it had helped but latterly the reinstalling had just led to other problems, I wanted really to update to Windows 7 but didn’t want to spend the money.
The idea of having a different operating system had been at the back of my mind for a while but I didn’t know anything about them other than the fact* that they were difficult to learn and didn’t run the programs that I wanted. I had seen articles in the online computing press and Ubuntu Linux had caught my eye because it was free and it seemed to be the OS that most non-Windows users installed. Getting something for nothing has always been an attraction for me, what better sales pitch is there?
Then three years ago I bought a new laptop and finally had the chance to try out Ubuntu Linux on my old one. It didn’t work, wouldn’t even load and run from the live CD* I discovered it was a make and model of computer that a lot of people had tried with and failed (Toshiba Satellite a30) so I shelved the idea. Then a friend (John) said that if I really wanted to try Ubuntu I could install it alongside Windows on my new computer and choose which one to use when I booted up. That was how it all began.
John came down to my house and we had a good chat, drank a few beers and I decided to try Ubuntu. I found the website read the instructions and downloaded the image file from which I made a live CD. I’ll admit I was scared of breaking something in my new computer, it had been a major expense for me and buying another computer was not an option, so I called John and he came down again to lead me through the installation. It went exactly as the instructions said it would, I could do a Windows installation in my sleep almost and Ubuntu proved to be just as simple.
Over the next few months I opted for Ubuntu more and more when I started the computer, it was updated, reinstalled, new programs installed sometimes uninstalled, upgraded to a newer edition etc etc. Then one day I read an article extolling the virtues of Linux Mint which tempted me to swap over to it, I couldn’t have made a better choice. I’m not a computer genius, I’m not even much of a geek, I just read the instructions and if I need help I take advice freely given on the Linux forums. It didn’t take long for me to abandon Windows altogether and have an exclusively Linux Mint computer, I haven’t regretted it. Of course there are still times that I get frustrated with my computer but not as many as I had with Windows.
I have come to realise that my knowledge of computers and Windows was learned over a period of about twenty years so changing to a different OS was bound to seem scary. I now wish I had started my Linux experience with Mint because it is so much like what I already knew about Windows.
The GUI (Graphical User Interface, what you see on the screen) works in a very similar fashion, so similar in fact that two of my friends that I have recently helped to install Linux Mint could use it right away with almost no learning curve.
One of the things I particularly like is that Linux Mint comes with over sixty programs included, from a full featured Office suite (Libre Office, which in most respects is the equal of Microsoft Office) to a powerful picture and photo editing program called Gimp. Getting used to the names of programs is probably the hardest part of the learning process with Linux. It’s also probably the only thing I don’t particularly like because the names seem to be conjured out of thin air or made up by a dyslexic child but once you get used to them it’s okay.
I don’t hate or even dislike Microsoft or their Windows products, they do a good job for a lot of people, it’s just that now I can have an up to date operating system for free with loads of programs that I can get for free. I don’t have to agree to manufacturers licences and there is no piracy issue with the software if I want to install a program I like on another person’s computer.
To anyone having trouble with Windows or who has an older computer and doesn’t want to buy a new one or pay to upgrade their version of Windows I would say “Try Linux Mint”. It’s free, you don’t really need an anti virus program and for most home and small business users it will do everything that your Windows computer will do now and more. If you spend long hours playing games or have specialist programs that you need to use then it might not suit you so check that out before you try it.
If you’re going to try it out then reading the instructions is a must, you can find out all about it by clicking the link below.
Linux Mint Website
I finally got round to writing a little guide to downloading and installing it on a USB Memory Stick on this page.
*Actually Linux is not that difficult to learn, it’s just that because you’ve used Windows for the last umpteen years and probably know a lot more about it than you think, learning something new feels scary.
* A Live CD is just a CD that you can put into the disc drive and run the program from there. You can also have a Live DVD and Live USB Memory Stick.
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