Borders 1 and 2….

a lot depends on whether I stay in Turkey or not……

if Turkey I’m leaning more and more towards covering off the “gecekondus”. These are the overnight towns that were thrown up on what was once the outskirts of the city of Istanbul – 30 years ago a city of 10million, it’s now got a population of 20 to 25million and the skyscrapers and city limits stretch beyond these shanty towns – open sewers, electricity siphoned off from electricity pilons running nearby and water from stand pipes….. they’re semi-slums where the residents pay no taxes, no rent and no money for facilities.

The city council is gradually evicting everyone and pushing them to out of town sky-rises where they are “given” a 20 year mortgage and now pay for all their facilities……the women who no longer sweep dirt floors or carry water love it; the men now have to support what are for them huge monthly outgoings and they have an extra 2 or 3 hours of journey time to and from work daily………… it’s off to Turkish classes whilst I do this for certain; although myself and a British journalist who speaks fluent Turkish are discussing teaming up to cover this…

this would be a long term project........i really want to follow this through over a long duration.....

Borders 2......
the other potential is sports. I’ve just covered a Turkish Muay-Thai club in central Istanbul. In one small dingy room they have produced the European Muay-Thai (similar to kick-boxing) champion. I spent an hour with them last night as a journalist friend here interviewed them for the expat section of a Turkish English language daily.

This has set me thinking. As I travel around I’m feeling it would be really interesting to cover sports which have been adopted outside of their traditional borders……..


Muay Thai in Turkey,
Deutscher Cricket Bund - the cricket team in Germany
German National Rugby team
American Football in the UK
Bulgarian sumo wrestlers
Gaelic football in Luxembourg

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