Disko Pakistani

yine Islamabad

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Thu, 2 Apr 2009 10:06:00 +0500

Uzun zaman oldu. cok da degil hani. en son Aralik ayinda buradaydim. degisen seyler var. ayni seyi tekrarlayip duruyorum belki; Islamabad Ghost City olmus. Insanin disari cikasi, bisey yapasi gelmiyo. memleketin hali bi degisken. ama Seferaz, Zargul, Refik Sab, Amjad felam hep ayni. Muson yaklasiyor, hazir olmali.

re-connected

noreply@blogger.com (sema genel) — Mon, 1 Sep 2008 02:43:00 +0600

yes, reconnected but the sea, the sun, the laziness is never enough, is it?... kerem and i had our share of the beautiful blue and the green on the motorbike - a honeymoon that will last a lifetime! louella was the highlight of the holiday with her little feet in the clear glittering waters of datca...

yigit, burcu and pinar: hope you all had a great R&R cuz there seems to be loads going on in other parts of the world that need our attention...

kabul manzarası - kabul view

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Mon, 4 Aug 2008 16:09:00 +0600

yesterday i had lunch with lovely friend Naveed, who is ex-STL and DKH staff and Cehangir at Kabul's one of the most luxury restaurant. Both guys are so nice and cordial here is the view from that restaurant.

kabuli

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Mon, 4 Aug 2008 15:12:00 +0600

this is the kabuli dish.

kabuli pilaw, kabuli kebap, salad and mantoo.. delicious..especially sweet kabuli pilaw with sweet orange and grape pieces.. yummy..

what a welcome!

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Mon, 4 Aug 2008 15:01:00 +0600

I don't have words to describe my trip in Afghanistan. It is amazing! Kabul welcomed me very well. People in here bit freaky but lovely no doubt. here is pics of nice friends from Italian restaurant...
Me, Ahmed from Afghanistan and Kemal from Bosnia. (thank you guys)

Silence at the F6/4 ....

noreply@blogger.com (Gokhan) — Sat, 2 Aug 2008 00:22:00 +0600

Well, after all we have spent a month together (dipdibe) and now felt a little bit left behind like the youngest of the family who has no permission to go out with his elders. Today we had dinner as usual with Feyyaz and Sarfraz but this time it was so quite :-)

The usual work schedule continues from 9:00 till midnight and this time more running around Islamabad to find a new location for our office. Every time we enter a house it gives a hint about the life styles of Islamabad people. Well, one of the shocks was to realize that almost all the houses have a servant's room and almost all were in a terrible condition compared to the rest of the house.

The good news is that I have found a couple of houses which looks like malikane (manor). I have placed a picture of one of the houses above. I will continue running one sector to another tomorrow in search of the perfect Diakonie / STL party house....

another planet Afghanistan

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Fri, 1 Aug 2008 20:15:00 +0600

I felt great when i m going to Islamabad Airport to fly Kabul. I said goodbye to everyone in Islamabad office and take the car with Sefraz.

Passengers in Islamabad Airport have to pass through almost 4 security checks to get in da plane, so i did. Islamabad Airport had one magazine stand before a year ago, (yeah i do remember, there was) i was searching something to read such newspaper at international flights “waiting room” but i couldn’t find and the thick and serious books that i bought in Islamabad did not look attractive to me at all. Anyway i was waiting patiently when flight to Kabul was delayed for 30 min.

Well.. then i get the last seat in the plane which is nice because if you are hungry the you will be the first one who get the first meal and drinks so i had the first meal. heyyo. Farida, who was sitting next to me in plane, is journalist and we started to talk about Afghanistan. I had lots of questions because i couldn’t study my lesson this time. Anyway, Farida said “in last two, three years everything getting worse and worse in Afghanistan. People lost their trust to government as well as Taliban.” Then we talk about hope and hopelessness, elections which will take place in 2009, youth unemployment and Karzai. She highlighted independent media as best progress of Karzai government. Afghanis established several media channels since Karzai came into government. no doubt as a journalist she looks from her own aspect.

i was looking at the mountains that we passed so close when we were landing. I thought that i could be so easy to blown up the plane with a missile from that mountains, so no surprise Carsten, who is good friend and good looking ☺ journalist, mentioned the same thing when we met later on. “Landing to Kabul is hard!”

When I went out from plane to walk arrivals I was feeling great under the sun. Air (hava) was so dry (opposite of Islamabad). I always feel excited to go new places. Hallelujah! While I was waiting for immigration at the end of the huge line a police man approached me smoothly and asked my name and my passport. I was like “oh! Shit! Then what..” and I answered accordingly. He gave his mobile telephone to me and he said “this call for you”. I was shocked. When i answer the phone I realized that the person, who is trying to reach me, is our dear friend Mansoor then I get some relief. This was Mansoor’s welcome to me at airport’s international zone :) Then police get my passport and stamp it in a second without waiting in a line.. strange..isn't it?

I head to collect my luggage and I saw an US soldier next to me, I thought that it is not safe to standing next to a soldier and I smoothly swifted from that place.

Well I met with Mansoor outside of the airport and he told me that "today there is an alarm of suicide attack in airport". “oh!” was my answer to him.

I will continue to write more. Unfortunately there is no picture cos I couldn’t transfer the pics to laptop yet.. I will do it asap. But first impression about Afghanistan is multivariate. This country is like another planet.

Selam from dusty Kabul.

jusqu'ici tout va bien!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 13:09:00 +0600

that was the motto for most of the times when unexpected things occurred. however, the whole month cannot be defined like this. it always went well. everything went smooth "against all odds".

today we sent burcu to kabul. she will keep the disko updated from there. good luck and take care burcu!

the rest of the team, me, pinar and sema, will leave tonight. game is almost over and it was so much fun!

maybe gokhan will keep the disko live from F6 or any new location that he will need to find. Good luck gokhan.

Islamabad is rainy today. although i thought it is gonna take only half an hour, it is still raining since the morning. it is an interesting city, with an unpredictable wheather. but thanks for accomodating us so nicely! :)

and people who visited the site aproximately some 600 times. thank you! it was my biggest pleasure to check every morning the number of visitors and especially the variety of countries. now that we are at the end of this game, i would love to read your comments.

allah hafiz

ne guzel

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 11:15:00 +0600

Bunu dun gece “yuen klab”tan ciktiktan sonraki ev ayininden sonra yaptim.
Tesekkur ederim hepinize.lovy..

p.s çakmağımı kaybettim yine... püfff....

paella by yigit

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 22:39:00 +0600

today i got the Afghan visa. Thanks to Khurram :) After we posted the post cards to England, USA and Turkey, we went for shopping in F/7 for stinky shrimps and more stinky calamari to cook spanish style paella. Then we head to Koshar Market to get some fresh vegetables. It is really hard to find parsley in here, you could just find in Koshar Market. our colleagues especially Gokhan don't like coriander unluckily cos almost all curry dishes has coriander. (kind of Islamabad's Nisantasi) Yigit cooked, Pinar assist him. Anna visited us for dinner. Well, we had short gossip session all together. Here is the picture from end of paella supper.

We almost come to the end of the Pakistan visit. All of us bit tired cos of intensive tempo and training marathon but still smiley.

shadow-show

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 22:11:00 +0600

Last week we (Yigit, G-force, Burcu and Sema) were in Gari Dupata for health, safety and security training meanwhile Nevil and Sarah were working on comic strip project in Muzafferabad. Nights were so long and hot. Mr. Refiq was cooking delicious dishes every evening. Our only fun was eating dinner together, having some booze and watching movie.
That night we watched movie called "Into the wild". Amazing movie...Yigit the wolf and Sarah the rabbit played with shadow. here is some pics..

diday all night long.. all night long..

It is all fine on Ataturk Avenue...

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 21:58:00 +0600

The team has come together after a week. The security training is completed in Gari Dupatta at Aksemseddin school built by istanbul municipality (you seriously cant escape from that, no?). Days and nights were long and into the wild.
The return was "fast and furious". the rejoined team ran to UN Club, crashed to the turkish night. I met some kernels which was very pleasent. really! :P
saturday came with hangover and some shopping at jinnah super. barbur was kind enough to invite us to farewell party of tugba. then again i had the chance to talk some more kernels. isnt that great!! they are all lovely people with minor differences!
well, sunday, you know, veeery lazy one. but pinar conviced us to go for horse riding. this was even more tiring. now we are all prepared for a calm movie night...
cheers to all mates who shared with us, their glasses, bottles and whatever they had...
(yes there will be photos here very soon!)

Interview with Jalilur Rahman (Master Trainer)

noreply@blogger.com (pi) — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 23:56:00 +0600

here we go...

recorded by Yigit

edited by Pinar

Interview with Jalilur Rahman.mp3

It is always sunny in Islamabad!

noreply@blogger.com (pi) — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 22:33:00 +0600

Crew left for security training in Kashmir. Loek has given start to new episode. Sarfraz, Fayyaz, Amjad and Khuram are enjoying vegetable samosa and milk tea party at downstairs. After having tasted samosa, I came to the room to read new benchmarks of HAP Standard (Humanitarian Accountability Partnership) I though I was alone, then I realized that a tiny gecko has been watching couple of expired (dead) flies swimming in my mountain dew, anyways.. Accountability is the means by which power is used responsibly. Are you accountable???

NRSP-CBDRM-COs-DMCs-LSOs-ETC-ETC

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 13:37:00 +0600

It is the world of NGOs in Kashmir. You can see all kinds of NGO or UN agency signboards and EU flags around. So when it is all about NGOs, then it is full of acronyms. Names of organisations, projects, components of the projects are all composed of some letters...

We visited the project which is carried out by National Rural Support Program (NRSP). The project is called Community Based Disaster Risk Management (CBDRM). Mr. Jalilur Rahman, master trainer at the project, explains the project. You can also check the photos from the community meetings that we had the chance to participate.

Click here for interview with Mr. Jalilur Rahman. (will be online soon)
Click here for photos from meetings.

some of Gokhan's photos from Kashmir

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 13:19:00 +0600

We've been to many places, met a lot of people and seen incredible landscapes.
The mountains are high. The roads are like a maze. They are long and can be tiring. But it is worth when you reach another village in the middle of the mountain...
Even the most hostile looking faces smiles back to you if you smile.
So here are some of these landscapes and places we've been to.
Click here for photos of Gokhan.

I will add some project photos and comments later today...

sounds of Kashmir

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 01:22:00 +0600

Do you remember the frogs? Here they are.
In stereo where available!
Click here (2.5MB)

Pastoral Kamyon
Photo by Gokhan Erkutlu

exclusive from the wedding!

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 21:41:00 +0600

Click for Gokhan's photos from the surreal wedding ceremony!

sustainable horror

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 19:17:00 +0600

I guess i m bit overloaded because of safety and security issues. I’ve met with loads of people who is dealing with security issues, one of them was quite famous. lol. I don’t have word to describe those people who is dealing with security. It was quite strange to see the different humanitarian approaches at the same time, some of them with blast wall some of them have no even single security. (çeşit çeşit)

And i believe that your brain has to be work differently to reach “conspiracy theories”. C.T’s so funny meanwhile so bullshit! I had enough from “war on terror”. If you like to see when and how it started that "terror" issue, please check: UN resolution and voting on terrorism in December 1987.

I guess i read a lot! I couldn't digest, i ll never digest...Last night i had a nightmare about the buildings that people torture to other people..screams and shouts and cry... i woke up, i was sweating. “Hey Inquisitor , Inquisitor! Release me from this shackles.”
DO YOU have “best case scenario” for the world?

Fine tune for the Safety and Security is: “Bodysnatchers” from Radiohead.
“has the light gone out for you?
because the light's gone out for me
it is the 21st century
it can follow you like a dog
it brought me to my knees” falan filan...

long way to garhi dupatta

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 23:14:00 +0600

After driving for five hours and crossing the border for Kashmir (a.k.a. Azad Jammu & Kashmir) we arrived to Muzaffarabad. The team is consisted of Loek, Pinar, Gokhan, Yigit and Haci Seyfullah. After a short meeting in Muzaffarabad, we took the way to Garhi Dupatta along the Jhelum river.

It is an amazing place. Now we are at the field office, frogs shouting outside, Gokhan and Pinar preparing the pointfull HSS survey-kind of thingy.
Tomorrow we need to be on the road again to visit some community trainings where we will need to trek for a couple of hours...

PS: Pinar is desperate for tequila shot glasses among frogs and spider Osman!!

music from the sunday morning

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 10:35:00 +0600

We had a lot going on in here. Party on saturday night with musicians from Peshawar, lazy sunday in Islamabad with market and Serena. It will all be online soon.

Here is some original recording from sunday morning.
(Click here please - 3MB)

"disconnection" from last sunday 13-07-2008

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 14:31:00 +0600

Everyone left to Serena for brunch this morning; I was alone in basement floor, listening super laud music and enjoying being alone. Then I realize that I m disconnected. Once I disconnected then I establish new connection, it is global communication.

It seemed to me, everything in relation with my connection is utterly lost, I saw everything in a rush, a whirlwind.

(cassette tape: daniel striped tiger - defense mechanism)

- meeting minutes - toplantı notları

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 01:20:00 +0600

drawings from meeting...

that's the way (by kuu)

noreply@blogger.com (Kuu) — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 19:52:00 +0600

today i tried to take a rainy day picture but the monsoon has gone. sun was shining..

"smoke on the water" is fine tune for Islamabad.

Muhtar of Dubai

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 14:33:00 +0600

We had the chance to talk to Muhtar on our way to the hotel from the airport. He told us about life in Dubai and life in general.
All the muhtars of the world unite!

(Click here to listen - 1.5 MB)