Gary Graham's Blogs
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The student perspective in Turkey
One of the many benefits of our 10-day trip across Turkey has been the wide range of individuals we've had access to, from the prime minister to villagers living in dusty poverty. One day this week we spent the morning and lunch time with 15 to 20 students of Sabanci University, a 10-year-old private university about 25 miles outside the city core. In the evening, we split into groups of threes and fours to have dinner in the private home of ordinary Turks. The students were eager to discuss their country's future and the role they themselves will play. The family I visited with two of my colleagues was more subdued. The students are paying $20,000 to $25,000 a year in tuition. The family of Abidin Karabulut, on the other hand, has to survive on far less than those tuition payments. Abidin's cousin, 48-year-old Suleiman, used to be a well-paid...
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Fear not, Istanbul has Starbucks
As we approach our departure to the U.S. tomorrow morning, I thought I'd review my notes for interesting tidbits and anecdotes. -- You'll see Starbucks, Burger King, McDonald's, Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets here, but they are not as prevalent as I've seen in other international locations. Krispy Kreme announced in July that it will open 25 retail locations during the next five years in Istanbul. -- Things I've not seen here: Gatorade, bumper stickers, ice and ball caps. -- Ankara is situated on a steep and rocky hill. Istanbul's hills make it seem like San Francisco on steroids. -- The bright yellow taxicabs are remarkably clean and appear to be very recent models in most instances. -- CNN and the BBC are readily available on the hotel televisions, but ESPN is a no-show. Thank heavens for the internet and my Slingbox connection,...
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Life is grueling in a Turkish farm village
We've been busy here in Turkey. Since I last wrote, we've finished our meetings and brief sightseeing in Ankara, visited the considerably less prosperous city of Diyarbakir in the southeastern part of the country, and returned to the Armada, our home base hotel in Istanbul. It's been an agenda-filled seven days. Diyarbakir will never be confused with a tourist trap. The city was established in 2300 BC and has a current-day population of 1.4 million. But the annual income here is estimated at $1,313 per person, a reflection of the region's economic hardships. It's population is mostly Kurdish, an ethnic group that has long been ignored, mistreated and isolated. The city is grittier, the streets are rougher and the neighborhoods look much more distressed than any we've seen in Ankara or Istanbul. We encountered our first beggars here. Our group of journalists, traveling here under sponsorship of the...
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For Turkey, it’s all about their neighbors
The story of modern Turkey can be reduced to one simple theme. It's all about Turkey's relationships with its neighbor. Our group of traveling journalists met with a number of officials in Ankara on Thursday, including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the vice chairman of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), an opposition leader and energy experts. Turkey's neighbors play critical roles, whether it be Russia, which supplies more than 75 percent of the country's natural gas, the volatile situations in Iran and Iraq, or the European nations who represent potential trade and commerce partners. Erdogan said Russia sends more tourists to Turkey than anyone else. By the end of this year, the number of Russian visitors could hit four million, he said. Tourism continues to grow, a fact accentuated by the fact that even Iran is now sending one million tourists annually. Turkey has...
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Turkish newspapers appear to be healthy
Wednesday was another fascinating day in Turkey for a group of 16 journalists who are on a 10-day trip to three cities. We started our day in Istanbul and finished it in Ankara, a 45-minute flight away. Most of us were quite surprised as we flew into the two-year-old Ankara airport. I say surprised because the brown, mountainous landscape that greeted us when we came down out of the clouds was quite different than the seaside view we had become accustomed to in Istanbul. Our morning in Istanbul included a lengthy session with the Turkish prime minister's chief foreign policy adviser, followed by a panel of three journalists. We also heard from a professor and a former Wall Street Journal reporter who is now an analyst with a think tank called the International Crisis Group. All of these panels and interviews have been arranged in advance...
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History forms the context for Turkey
It's 11:30 p.m. Tuesday here in Istanbul as I begin writing this. My day began with a four-mile run at 7 a.m. today along the Sea of Marmara. I really should be trying to sleep, but our first full day here in this ancient city was so full of good experiences that I can't resist writing. I'm traveling in Turkey on a 10-day IRP Gatekeeper Editors trip organized by the International Reporting Project (IRP) at The Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington D.C. Fifteen other journalists are on this trip with me and we have a jam-packed schedule. A trip to this part of the world is a stark reminder of just how young the United States is. We think 200 years of history on our shores is a long time, but it pales by comparison to the age of...
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Good morning from Istanbul
I've just arrived here for a 10-day visit, courtesy of the International Reporting Project and Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies. I was awarded a travel fellowship along with 13 other journalists to come here to this gorgeous city by the sea to meet and interview government, military, media and academic officials, along with many others. We'll be spending time here in Istanbul as well as Ankara, the capital of Turkey, and Diyarbakir. Getting here was an exhausting ordeal. We had a six and a half hour flight from D.C. to London, then another three hour flight to Istanbul. Add in customs, visas, long lines and general airport chaos to fill out the excursion. Tuesday's agenda promises to be a good one. Among the highlights will be a working lunch with a leader of Turkey's Jewish community. For now, I'm content to look...
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