TCF Newsletters Issue 1
NEWSLETTER 2009 ISSUE 1


Dear Friends,

As the year begins, we hope you still cherish fond memories of your visit to Turkey with the Turkish Cultural Foundation.  In order to keep you connected to the Turkish Cultural Foundation family and to Turkey, we will be sending you occasional news on the Foundation and on Turkey. We hope you will enjoy this newsletter.

Wishing you and your family a healthy and happy year!

Turkish Cultural Foundation


TCF NEWS


Turkish Culture Shop is Online

The Turkish Culture Shop is an initiative of the Turkish Cultural Foundation to promote Turkey's diverse and unique cultural and artistic products, as well as providing access to a sampling of Turkish food items. All products and materials at Turkish Culture Shop have been carefully selected by the Turkish Cultural Foundation to ensure your satisfaction.
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Share your pictures with us and join our mailing list

We are pleased to announce the launch of our new website: www.shareturkishculture.org and Yahoo mailing list. At shareturkishculture.org, you can upload, store, share, download, record, link and view file, music, photo, video, document and other types of digital media related to your visits to Turkey. The users will be able to share their own materials with us while enjoying each others pictures, videos, personal blog, interests, information about Turkey and Turkish culture.

We hope that this website develops into a community of friends of Turkey, allowing us all to continue our friendships for many years to come.

Click to visit shareturkishculture.org
Click to join our Yahoo Mailing list

Turkish Cultural Foundation completed the filming of Karagoz and Hacivat shadow theater

Traditional Turkish Shadow Theatre: Karagöz” brings to life this beloved family entertainment tradition, which was once part of social life during the month of Ramadan and on special occasions that bring together families, friends and neighbors. The Turkish Cultural Foundation is releasing a collectors’ edition of the “Turkish Traditional Shadow Theater: Karagöz,” in DVD format, as part of its Turkish Cultural Heritage Projects. From September 1st, this unique collection “Traditional Turkish Shadow Theater: Karagöz” is on sale. To order copies, please visit Turkish Culture Shop.
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Tanpınar’s novel now in English

With the support of the Turkish Cultural Foundation, Turkish novelist Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar’s book "Huzur" has been published in the United States. The book has hit shelves titled "A Mind at Peace."
The New York based non-profit Archipelago Publishing House decided to translate the novel in 2004. Duke University member Erdağ Göknar has translated the book into English. Set on the eve of World War II, "A Mind at Peace" captures the anxieties of a Turkish family facing the difficult reality entrenched in the early republic, founded on the ashes of the Ottoman Empire in 1923.
Leading U.S. literature magazine Publisher's Weekly said the following about the novel: "Tanpinar's lyricism and resonant plot will leave U.S. readers wondering why they've had to wait so long to read this exquisite novel."

Source: Hurriyet

TCF scholar Dr. Sumiyo Okumura will lecture in the US

TCF scholar Dr.Sumiyo Okumura, art historian, will visit Chicago and Washington DC in February. She will be giving lectures on “The History and Origin of the Chintamani Motif”, “The Origin of the Endless Knot Motif and it’s Use in Turkish and Islamic Art” and “The Influence of Turkic Culture on Mamluk Carpet”

Agenda:

Chicago, March 6, 2009
The Chicago Rug and Textile Society
Information: www.chicagoorientalrugandtextilesociety.org

Washington,DC. March 1-2, 2009
The International Hajji Baba Society
Information: http://ihbs.org

Seattle, March 9, 2009
“The Origin of the Endless Knot Motif and it’s Use in Turkish and Islamic Art”
The Seattle Rug and Textile Society

Los Angeles, March 15, 2009
“The Influence of Turkic Culture on Mamluk Carpet”
The Textile Museum Associates of Southern California in Los Angeles

Turkish diplomat speaks to students

Economic turmoil ebbs and flows. Political power changes hands. But the threat of international terrorism will persist for generations and should be dealt with by nations unified around the common goal of its eradication.
That's the message a Turkish diplomat shared with central Illinois high school students Friday as part of a brief tour sponsored by the Peoria Area World Affairs Council and the Turkish Cultural Foundation.
Read More >>


NEWS ABOUT TURKEY


Adventure of lifetime: Exploring Turkey on honeymoon

It was while crawling through the hobbit-sized passages of Cappadocia's cave churches that my husband and I realized why we chose this faraway land not known for romantic getaways as our honeymoon destination.
While many newlyweds choose to relax on the sandy Caribbean beaches, we knew that wasn't for us. A few years ago we stayed at an all-inclusive in the Dominican Republic, where most hotel doors were covered with signs warning of "honeymooners" sleeping inside. We didn't want that. We wanted an adventure.
Our choice of destination still came as a surprise to many friends and family members. We conducted a poll among our wedding guests to see where they thought we should go. Turkey came in dead last, right after Russia.
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International students on the US Campuses at all time high, Turkey ranks 8th.

India is the leading place of origin for international students in the United States with 94,563 in 2007/08 (an increase of 13% from the previous year), followed by #2 China (81,127, up 20%) #3 South Korea (69,124, up 11%), #4 Japan (33,974, down 4%), #5 Canada (29,051, up 3%), #6 Taiwan (29,001, down less than 1%), #7 Mexico (14,837, up 7%), #8 Turkey (12,030, up 5%), #9 Saudi Arabia (9,873, up 25%), #10 Thailand (9,004, up 1%), #11 Nepal (8,936, up 15%), #12 Germany (8,907, up 3%), #13 Vietnam (8,769, up 45%), #14 United Kingdom (8,367, down less than 1%), #15 Hong Kong (8,286, up 7%) #16 Indonesia (7,692, up 5%), #17 Brazil (7,578, up 6%), #18 France (7,050, up 5%), #19 Colombia (6,662, down 1%), and #20 Nigeria (6,222, up 5%). (For further details on the trends in recent years from each of these leading places of origin, go to the Open Doors website.
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The old and the new, and other contrasts in Turkey

When my husband and I visited Turkey recently, we found it to be a remarkable study in contrasts. On one hand, it has ruins of ancient civilizations at Ephesus, considered one of the best-preserved classical cities.
Ephesus is one of the few places in the world that one truly feels the presence of its ancient Greek and Roman inhabitants. The Temple of Artemis, now in ruins, was considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.
On the other hand, with a modern and vibrant move toward Western culture, it surprises visitors with dependable telephones and bus systems. English is widely spoken, and tourists feel comfortable knowing that Turkey takes its commitment to NATO seriously.
Read More >>

An enchanted land sprouting from Central Turkey's rocky terrain

They look like the homes of elves and apprentice wizards, these cone-shaped dwellings jutting across stony hillsides carved by wind and rain and flood. As the bus wheezes into the station here, you ogle the storybook spires rising behind it. And you think: Really?
Mother Nature answers back in an assuring dulcet sigh: Really.
It's time for awe. We travel for the beauty and enchantment of the exotic and alien, for new flavors and unimaginable experiences. I've been around, yet pure, virgin wonder remains a rarity.
Read More >>

The Academy Award’s foreign language committee has released the short list for nominees to the category and “Three Monkeys” directed by Nuri Bilge Ceylan was among them.

Last year, the Academy's foreign language "phase 1 committee" -- which consists of several hundred Los Angeles-based members who divide up and screen the foreign entries, with minimal attendance requirements and a bizarre vote-tabulation process -- created an uproar by failing to include two critically-acclaimed films, "4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days" (Romania) and "Persepolis" (France), among the 9 films on the shortlist from which they would ultimately select 5 nominees for best foreign foreign language film.
...
"Three Monkeys" (Turkey, d. Nuri Bilge Ceylan), a stark drama in which a dislocated family tries to block out the truth about their dark past in order to stay together, won Ceylan the Best Director award at this year's Cannes Film Festival.
Read More >>

Cash-refund point in Istanbul

Turkey’s first "downtown cash-refund point" came to Istanbul’s İstinye Park last week. The joint project launched by İstinye Park shopping mall and Global Refund Turkey will ensure that foreign shoppers are reimbursed instantly for taxes they pay on purchased items.
The system provides a full tax refund for foreign shoppers purchasing items from shops that are members of the Global Tax Free Shopping System. As of Jan. 14, foreign customers shopping at İstinye Park are given tax rebates on items purchased from member shops before leaving the country. Once the customers have been reimbursed they can take the items purchased, together with receipts, to customs where their receipts will be authorized and sent to one of the 200 worldwide Global Refund centers.
Read More >>


Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C.

This exhibition focuses on the extraordinary art created as a result of a sophisticated network of interaction that developed among kings, diplomats, merchants, and others in the Near East during the second millennium B.C. Approximately 350 objects of the highest artistry from royal palaces, temples, and tombs—as well as from a unique shipwreck—provide the visitor with an overview of artistic exchange and international connections throughout the period. From Syria, Mesopotamia, and Egypt in the south to Thrace, Anatolia, and the Caucasus in the north, and from regions as far west as mainland Greece all the way east to Iran, the great royal houses forged intense international relationships through the exchange of traded raw materials and goods as well as letters and diplomatic gifts.

Source: Metropolitan Museum


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