Turkey Photo Album

Finally (finally!) got all my photos from last summer organized, edited, and uploaded. And it only took me six months, ha ha. This latest album is for my trip into Turkey for the second time, in the summer of 2014 (I also went in 2013). Turkey is just amazing, and I had a blast, as usual! Included here are photos from Izmir, Sirince, Ephesus, Cappadocia, a hot air balloon cruise, and Antalya.

Link to the public Flickr album, here:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/laurentivey/sets/72157650068942269/

  

Fire her up! Hot Air Ballooning in Cappadocia, Turkey. July, 2014.

Morocco Photo Album

Finally getting around to organizing and editing the rest of my travel photos from 2014. I'm trying to finish them all by the end of the year this time. Included in the Morocco album: Essaouira; Marrakech; Fez; Chefchaouen; Tangier; a side trip across the Strait of Gibraltar to Tarifa, Spain; and Casablanca. Also, some photos of the Beat Generation/literary hot spots I hit up in Tangier. And yes, I went on a camel trek. It was just amazing! Here's the link to the photo album: 

Morocoo Flickr Album:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/laurentivey/sets/72157647651082563/

Now, on to finish up all the Turkey photos. Wish me luck!

Neverland

The eyes always get you, those faces staring

from supermarket posters, the missing children

plucked off streets, vanished into forced labor,

begging gangs, prostitution; some maimed,

some recovered, some gone forever.  Once,

on a train to Shenzhen, a teen boy, dressed in rags,

one eye, half his chin missing, entered our carriage,

hushing the chatter, singing like an angel for coins,

and I mean like Bocelli, or Pavarotti, our car filled

with ear-melting Italian opera, rocking and swaying

through the Chinese countryside, the closest we,

in our economy class hard seats, would ever get

to La Scala, or the Bolshoi, if we even knew what

those were, and the boy finished to utter silence,

our open jaws and wet cheeks, his good eye

scanning the crowd,  and for one second it rested

on me, this otherworldly eye, this eye of the stricken

universe, and I am ashamed, but I looked away, as

did the others, ruffling their newspapers, pretending

it never happened, in that uneasy air, before the boy

moved on to the next car and beyond, to be lost

among the billions. No one spoke, all of us

aware of the sticky business of childhood in Asia,

knowing that the eye had seared itself into us;

an open wound that would fester within for years.

~ Lauren Tivey

*This poem originally appeared in the debut issue of The Verse (August, 2013), which is now defunct. Editor Dan Navarrete wrote of the poem, "A call to take action, excellent depiction of the reality surrounding impoverished youth in China. Truly a piece that sinks into our hearts and refuses to let go, just like the imagery". Sorry to say The Verse didn't last, and the website's now gone. I was lucky to find a copy of this, hidden in my email files, as I'd lost the original in the expansion drive crash, and the only other copy was on the website which closed. 

Japan Photo Gallery

Finally, I've got my photos from the trip to Japan last August edited and organized. Included in the album: Tokyo (Meiji Shrine, Harajuku and Yoyogi Park, Shibuya Crossong, Love Hotel Hill, Shinjuku, Kamata, Odaiba); Kyoto (Fushimi Inari, Pontocho, Kinkaku-ji, Philosopher's Path, Arashiyama, Sagano Bamboo Forest); and Nara (the bowing deer of Nara and surrounding area). This album's huge--I can't believe I took so many photos! But I fell in love with Japan, which is just amazing and magical in so many ways, Now, on to the Morocco and Turkey albums. You can link to the photo gallery, here: Japan Flickr Album.

Fushimi Inari Shrine, Kyoto, Japan

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

...and balloons, and boats, and camels, and many other means of transport. That's what this summer was about--MOVEMENT. My fiance and I covered so much ground, I think we must've broken some sort of record. Check this out: Shanghai to Istanbul; Istanbul to Izmir; Izmir to Istanbul; Istanbul to Cappadocia; Cappadocia to Antalya; Antalya to Istanbul; Istanbul to Casablanca; Casablanca to Tangier; Tangier to Tarifa, Spain and back (x 2); Tangier to Chefchaouen; Chefchaouen to Fez; Fez to Marrakech; Marrakech to Essaouira; Essaouira to Casablanca; Casablanca to Istanbul; Istanbul to Shanghai; Shanghai to Tokyo; Tokyo to Kyoto; Kyoto to Osaka; Osaka to Shanghai. Whew! We did all that in less than two months! Talk about covering some ground, eh? And, all this in-and-out of Istanbul tells me something: The city's strategic location may be a factor in future employment considerations (but that's a topic for another day).

In spite of all the movement this summer (or, perhaps because of it), my creative juices were flowing, and I was able to take many incredible photos, and I also came back with a poetry notebook full of drafts. At each turn, something or other sparked my imagination, and that, I believe, is another reward of travel. Gerry and I saw and experienced some amazing things--some highlights were: Feasting on the culinary delights in Istanbul; the little mountain village of Sirince, Turkey; an anti-government protest that turned violent in Izmir; Ephesus; a sunrise cruise over Cappadocia in a hot air balloon; sailing the waters off Antalya in a schooner, plus the Umbrella Street, and the International Sand Sculpture Festival; train journeys through Morocco; wandering the medina on the trail of Beat writers in Tangier; the ferry across the Strait of Gibraltar to Spain; the Blue City of Chefchaouen; the ancient leather tanneries of Fez; the wild main square of Marrakech; a camel trek down the beach of Essaouira; Tokyo's Harajuku district; a Japanese love hotel stay; the Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto; and the bowing deer of Nara, Japan. The whole summer was a dream! The Flickr albums are going to take a long time to upload and organize, but I'll post the links once I finish. In the meantime, here are some photos and videos:

Charming Sirince Village, nestled in the mountains, and surrounded by vineyards, orange groves, and peach orchards. Sirince is famous for its wine--we even stayed in the "Dionysos Pension".

Taking a break at Ephesus, in my trusty red kicks.

VIDEO: Sunrise cruise over Cappadocia in a hot air balloon. Absolutely fantastic! A must do!

Deflating the balloon after the cruise.

Pretty Antalya Harbor, home of sailors, pirates, and salty dogs!

Beautiful skies over Tangier

One of the locals, Tangier

Cafe Tingis, Burroughs' old haunt in the Petit Socco. Spent a couple of afternoons sipping coffee here, watching the world go by. I also visited the Librarie des Colonnes, an expat bookstore, and scored a copy of Naked Lunch. Found Hotel el Muniria, too, where he wrote the famous novel.

Southernmost tip of Europe, in Tarifa, Spain, taken after crossing the Strait of Gibraltar from Tangier.

Blue doors of Chefchaouen

Bohemian wanderings, Chefchaouen

VIDEO: Early morning through the streets of Chefchaouen

VIDEO: Chefchaouen waking up for the day

Light filtering through the streets of Chefchaouen

Ancient tanneries of Fez

VIDEO: Jemaa El Fnaa, main square of Marrakech. Gets downright WILD here at night, with organ grinders, snake charmers, henna artists, acrobats, musicians, even hypnotists!

Camel trek along the beach in Essaouira, a funky little town made famous by a visit from Jimi Hendrix back in the day.

VIDEO: Camel ride on a windy beach!

VIDEO: Gorgeous Essaouira Harbor

Moroccan train travel, premiere classe

Somewhere over Tunisia, waxing moon to the left

Istanbul, we meet again! 

And on to Japan. This is the insane Tokyo subway map. God help you.

Helloooooo Kitty, ha ha. Tokyo.

Pachinko parlor in Kamata.

Tokyo: Anime Capitol of the Universe

Murakamiland. Got my copy of his latest work in this Shinjuku bookstore.

Our wish, added to the sacred camphor tree at Meiji Shrine. Shinto priests will collect and pray over all the plaques--there were hundreds of thousands of them.

VIDEO: Shibuya Crossing, busiest pedestrian crossing in the world. You may remember a scene of this in the film, Lost in Translation.

Bullet train, Tokyo to Kyoto. Just like teleportation, baby!

Umbrella lights in the alleys of Pontocho, Kyoto

Fire eater in Pontocho, Kyoto

Cutenss! Pontocho, Kyoto

Sun setting through the torii gates at Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto. After dark, lanterns come on, adding a whole other layer of magic to the place. 

VIDEO: Fushimi Inari casts its spell. Torii gates, babbling brooks, moss-covered stones, trilling birds, and kitsune (fox messenger) statues at dusk.

Bamboo Forest, Arashiyama (just outside Kyoto).

Curious little guy! One of the bowing deer of Nara, Japan.

So sweet. The residents of Nara adore the deer, which are allowed to wander at will, into shops, restaurants, etc. They are well-cared for and well-fed.

VIDEO: The bowing deer of Nara, Japan. Native sika deer, considered to be the messengers of Shinto gods, have been frequenting this park for the last thousand years or so. They're protected, and much loved by locals and visitors alike. Somewhere along the way, they learned to bow for their food. We spent an amazing day with them!

Well, sorry for such a long post. There were so many other things that happened along the way, so many other places visited, so many new friends made (both two-legged and four-legged!), but there's no way to relay all of these experiences here. I know I'll be busy for months, editing and organizing photos, revising poems, and just processing everything. I'm so grateful for these opportunities to travel, for what my life has become, and yes, I'm still completely in love with the world. Cheers, Lauren.

Murakami on a Sunday Afternoon

Quote from Haruki Murakami's magnum opus, 1Q84. I read this mind-blowing work last winter. Murakami's one of my favorite authors, and I was happy to buy an English translation of his latest, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage IN Japan this summer, from a bookstore in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo, It was kinda cool to wander around a lot of the neighborhoods and subway stations that appear in his novels, too. Anyway, glad for the Sunday lazing time in order to get caught up on some things, including the blog! 

Update, Rome Photo Album

Wow, am I behind in my blogging, or what?!? I've been so busy with end-of-semester stuff, that everything else has taken a backseat. With final exams, grading research papers, attending meetings, upgrading syllabi, helping students prep for university interviews, filing reports, etc., there's been a lot of stress to finish everything before I leave on June 30th! But, damn...I mean, I even missed a memorial post in honor of Maya Angelou's passing on May 28th, and she was one of my favorite poets (R.I.P. Maya Angelou).

Well, another week, and I'm off again--back to Turkey, then on to Morocco, and finally, Japan, before heading back to China at the end of August. An epic summer in the works, for sure! Hopefully, I can get some more writing done over the summer, and when I get back. Which reminds me...where is The Coachella Review's latest issue, I wonder? They accepted one of my pieces to appear in the Spring, 2014 issue, but that issue never materialized. They're still active, so perhaps its been postponed to a summer issue? At any rate, I've no time to worry about it now--just keeping fingers crossed it comes out soon.

One more thing: here's the latest photo album I managed to finish, from the Rome trip last year. Yes, I FINALLY finished organizing and uploading pictures! If you're interested, you can view the public photo set on Flickr, at the link below:

Rome Photo Set on Flickr

That's it for now. Maybe I'll get a chance to update from the road--we'll see. Have a GREAT summer, and I'll see you on the other side!

Cheers, Lauren

Mobli Feature of My Photostream

Awesome sauce--Mobli, a social photo and video sharing website, featured my photostream on their blog today, as part of their #WhoIFollow series. Each week, they choose a different user, then feature ten photos from the account.

I really like using Mobli, way more so than Instagram. Users are quite active on Mobli, so it's nice to get some activity on all these travel photos I shoot. Anyway, thanks, Mobli! You can check out the feature at the link below, and follow the links there to get to my full photostream, if you're interested:

#WhoIFollow Mobli Blog Feature--pyrategurrll

Umbrella ceiling display, Nanjing, China

The Prodigal Poet Returns

Sooo...I've been a very bad blogger. Seven months have passed since I last updated. What happened? Well, I went through a sort-of devastating loss--of my own making--and I'm just now getting back to the poetry (and blogging!) life. While in Rome last summer, I dropped my external hard drive, which held ALL of my writing, onto the tile floor of our apartment, and it broke. No one, not even the so-called "experts", have been able to retrieve the data. I had no backup. That's right, I was stupid, stupid, stupid. See, before I left for my summer travel to Scotland, Italy, and Turkey, I was busy and distracted, and though the thought occurred to me to "back that shit up", I never did.

When I say ALL my writing was on my external hard drive, I do mean ALL of it: my poetry manuscript, which I'd been working on for four years, and which was getting close to completion; all my poems under construction; all completed poems not part of the manuscript; all my publishing contacts, correspondence, and submission records; and the journal I'd been keeping for four years. In addition, I lost all the photos I had taken in Scotland, and half of the ones I took in Italy. I lost all my teaching materials--syllabi, course outlines, student records, resources, and more. Though I've spent the past seven months rebuilding all my teaching materials (and backing them up regularly!), I'm afraid I'll never get the creative writing or photos back. The IT shop I use here, after working on my external hard drive for two months, was unable to do anything, so they sent it off to the "experts" in Nanjing, who kept it for another month, and came up empty-handed, as well. Some business about needing an exact copy of the disc used in the external hard drive to copy the material to. I don't know...if the FBI can retrieve data off burnt, crushed, drowned hard drives, why can't someone pull some poems and photos off mine? I've still got the drive, and I'm going to bring it to my crack-IT guy/nephew in the U.S. when I go back next winter for a visit. He may not be able to do anything, either, but at least there's still a glimmer of hope.

In the meantime, I've been dealing with a lot of anger over the whole thing. I was pretty mad at the universe for DOING THIS TO ME, but really, I was angry with myself for dropping the drive (I'm such a klutz--always have been), and for not backing up my material in the first place. In fact, I was so disgusted with the whole thing that I just stopped writing. Yes, I have refused to write for seven months. Muse appears, and I turn her away, which is probably some sort of sacrilege, for which I'll probably be punished later, in some other horrifying turn of events. Instead, I turned my creative attentions in other directions--I concentrated on my photography, built a Facebook bohemian community page (almost 6,000 followers, which you can check out, here), went traveling and adventuring, etc. Things have been okay. But there has been a nagging feeling all along, that I need to get on with my writing, get over the anger, and start listening to the muse again.

Poetry doesn't want to leave me alone--it's made that quite clear. Whether it's waking me in the middle of the night with lines begging to be written, or sending me requests for material from editors, or asking me to judge a kids' poetry competition, or surprising me with an acceptance from a long-forgotten submission, or requesting that I write reviews for other poets, or having me help organize a poetry slam at my school (all of which have happened these past seven months), poetry has not given up on me, no matter how much I've shunned it. So, it's time to get back on with it, and start rebuilding my portfolio. I'm looking at it this way: that the loss of the manuscript and other work is an opportunity to start over, and create something even better this time. I've had my hissy fit, given poetry the silent treatment, and now I'm ready to forgive myself. As Hugh White said, "When you make a mistake, don't look back at it long. Take the reason of the thing into your mind and then look forward. Mistakes are lessons of wisdom. The past cannot be changed. The future is yet in your power". 

Wish me luck. I'm going to back up all my material now... 

Nepal Photo Set

Here's another photo set I just finished for Nepal, which I visited back in February. This was an incredible journey, one filled with new insights, new friendships, and new adventures. Kathmandu was bustling, poor, dusty, and exciting, and one of my favorite places. There, we visited the great stupa at Boudhanath, the stunning Monkey Temple at Swayambhunath, the temple and burning ghats at Pashupatinath (where I met some cool sadhus!), wandered around Thamel and Patan, got a new Green Tara tattoo, and had a kurta custom made for myself. It was fantastic. From there, we traveled by bus up to Pokhara, at the base of the Annapurna Range of the Himalayas, which was equally fantastic, in a whole other way, and where we hiked up to the World Peace Pagoda, overlooking Phewa Lake and the mountains, and I even went on an ultra light flight. You can view the complete set of my public photos at the link below:

Nepal Album:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/laurentivey/sets/72157642881726074/

Here are some highlights:

Boudhanath Stupa, Kathmandu

Boudhanath Area, Kathmandu

Prayer Flags at Boudhanath

Main Square at Patan

With the sadhus at Pashupatinath, Kathmandu

Cow at Pashupatinath Temple, Kathmandu

Monkey Temple, Kathmandu

Prayer Wheels, Monkey Temple, Kathmandu

At the World Peace Pagoda, Pokhara

Boats at Dusk, Phewa Lake, Pokhara

That's me in the back! Ultra light flight, Annapurna Range

In short, Nepal was fascinating. Interestingly, though millions of dollars pour in via tourism every year, the country is quite poor, with alternating six hour electric grid load shedding, deplorable roads, abundant litter, much begging, and lack of basic sanitation in many places. In contrast, the people we met were happy and friendly, and always ready with a "Namaste" and a smile. I met up with Nepalese friends I'd made over the internet, and had a great time with them at cafes and bars and temples. It was an experience I'll never forget, one which opened my eyes a little more to the conditions in which so many people live outside of the Western "comfort ideal". I hope to go back sometime.

Turkey Photo Set

Finally, I've completed another public photo set on Flickr. Turkey was really amazing, one of the coolest places to visit. So much so that we're going back this summer, to see some things we had to miss the first time. Anyway, in this Turkey album, you'll see both Istanbul (Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, Topkapi Palace, Basilica Cistern, the Grand Bazaar, the Spice Bazaar, Galata Bridge and Tower, Istiklal Street, Taksim Square, the Art Nouveau district, the Orient Express, and more), and the Seussian landscape of Cappadocia, where we stayed in a cave hotel, and explored around (fairy chimneys, Goreme Open Air Museum, Kaymakli Underground City, Rose Valley, Pigeon Valley, and the quaint villages of Goreme, Cavusin, Urgup, and Uchisar). You can view the complete set of my public photos at:

Turkey Album

https://www.flickr.com/photos/laurentivey/sets/72157643916313313/

Here are few highlights:

Hagia Sophia

The Blue Mosque

Ceiling of the Blue Mosque

Whirling Dervishes of the Dede Efendi Ensemble

Inside the Grand Bazaar

Overview of Istanbul from Galata Tower

Cavusin, Cappadocia

Troglodyte Dwellings, Goreme, Cappadocia

Fairy Chimneys, Goreme, Cappadocia

Amazing striations of the salt flats, Tuz Golu, Cappadocia

Turkey's just wonderful: there's so much to see and do, people are friendly, and costs are reasonable. I can't wait to go back this summer--we'll visit Izmir, Ephesus, and Sirince, and then go back to Cappadocia to fly in the hot air balloons, and do some hiking, before heading back to Istanbul for a couple of days. C'mon, summer!