The Anatolian Cultures and Food Festival 2011 was what they all gathered for. And as they were waiting for the gates to be opened, staring at full-size replicas of statues more than 2,000 years old below an orange-colored arc, their excitement was not in English, Turkish or any other particular language. It was a universal feeling for people of many nations, including but not limited to India, Mexico, Syria, France, Armenia, the United Kingdom, Iran and Turkey as well as the United States, who, through various means and for different purposes, came to this part of the world’s sole superpower. Luckily, I was one of those who had the chance to see what this festival had to offer to its visitors for four long days from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. between Oct. 6 and Oct. 9. The corridor connecting the gate to the festival grounds was decorated with a written history of the many civilizations that lived in Anatolia, contributing to today’s Anatolian culture in many ways, and the replicas of a number of other monuments from around Turkey lined the corridor. Standing next to those monuments were teenagers dressed in the way the people who built those monuments centuries ago would have been dressed. The Ottomans -- who, just like representatives of other civilizations visitors saw along the corridor, saluted them -- were last in the line of these civilizations and came right before visitors found themselves at the edge of a vast area where dozens of booths of restaurants, gift shops, book stores, civil society organizations, media outlets and travel agencies were all calling on them. What, however, may have amazed them the most must have been the replica of Topkapı Palace, standing to their right, and the city exhibits from İstanbul, Konya, Antalya, Mardin and Van on their left. Turkish food was no less various than the origins of the visitors. Turkish ravioli was served, and a variety of kebabs, olive oil dishes and pastry filled with cheese, potatoes and ground beef were only some of the other types of food items available to people in the area at reasonable prices. What most of the visitors did as part of their day at the festival was that they would first grab some food and then take their time to enjoy all the festivities -- live music, traditional dances and the march of the Ottoman military band, to name a few -- and see what all those exhibitors had to offer them. The organizers were kind and thoughtful enough to also build a playground for the kids so that they, too, could enjoy their day. İbrahim Barlas, president of Pacifica Institute, the event’s organizer, said the aim of the festival is to encourage intercultural dialogue and to make mutual understanding the mode of conduct between people of different cultures. He believes the festival has already earned a name for just that and underlined that the festival was visited by numerous federal and local government officials every year. The festival was organized for the first time in 2009 and managed to attract more than 70,000 visitors in its first two years. The number of visitors for this year’s event has yet to be announced but his estimate points to over 60,000. The most dazzling aspect of the festival, however, was the fact that 400 volunteers worked tirelessly before, during and after this event to create a platform where people of many different countries, most of them being thousands of miles away from their homeland, came together to share the very similar joy of sharing this world as they shared the festival area and there are in fact many similarities that outweigh the differences between them. Lectures were no less enjoyable The festival also featured a number of lectures which allowed participants to hear what experts had to tell them and later participate in a fruitful discussion with both the speakers and other participants. The topics of the lectures varied from the state of Turkish-Israeli relations to the cultural legacy of Armenians in Anatolia and from how Islam preaches liberties and democracy to Turkish pastas, but what all discussions had in common was that all those who spoke were respectful of different opinions and were open to hearing ideas that disputed the very arguments they made. At the end, no political or cultural lecture offered the ultimate recipe to solve the problems the different peoples may have between them, but the ambiance the participants and speakers shared with each other showed how one can make peace with him or herself as well as with others. Whereas Kerim Balcı, editor-in-chief of the bimonthly magazine Turkish Review, who spent eight years in Jerusalem as the representative of Turkey’s Zaman daily, briefed the participants on how the relations between erstwhile allies Turkey and Israel soured in a region where all interstate relations are now reconstructed, Rabbi Reuven Firestone, a professor of medieval Jewish studies, emphasized the scriptural foundations of Muslim-Jewish dialogue and coexistence in both religions’ sacred texts. It truly was not an easy task to elaborate on the cultural legacy of the Armenians -- a disputed number of whom perished in the Syrian deserts after they were forced to migrate from Eastern Anatolia by the Ottoman Empire in 1915 -- in front of an audience including Turks and Armenians. Yet when David Minassian, chairman of the board of trustees of the Organization of İstanbul Armenians -- ended his words, Turks shook his hand just like Armenians. Differences may have remainied over how to label the mass killings almost a century ago between them, but they could talk while looking each other in the eye rather throwing accusations from distant places. Can a favor change the world? When Katharine Branning, an American author who is now the vice president of the French Institute Alliance Française in New York, started talking about her book “Yes I Would Love Another Glass of Tea,” by depicting the kind of hospitality and understanding she received in Turkey during her frequent travels to the country since 1977, her emphasis was on the fact that Turkey has gone through a substantial transformation both politically and economically, but that one thing remained the same: She always felt home in this country. That I believe is a common feeling for a lot of people given the fact that Turkey is world famous for its hospitality and sympathy towards foreigners. As a Turkish citizen, I must also admit that the reason I felt at home in the US was not only because of the food I had in that “small Turkey” thousands of miles away but also because two good things -- directly or indirectly related to the festival -- happened to me during my stay in America. Bryant Hardin is an American citizen in his 70s, living in San Diego and also a frequent traveler to Turkey. I met him at İstanbul Atatürk Airport before boarding a flight to New York, where I transferred to another flight to Los Angeles. Despite his age he was carrying a backpack and the first thing he asked was if a wireless Internet connection was available in the waiting area where we met. Not long after we started talking, I realized how deep his love for Turkey was. He actually had tears in his eyes as he explained to me how sad he was to leave it after his 15th vacation in the country. We talked about a lot of things, such as the ongoing Occupy Wall Street protests and the condition of the world economy as well as our lives. He was, however, particularly happy that he learned about the festival from me given the connection he had with Turkey and its people. We met twice at the festival area and he was kind enough to show me around on one of those days although he had no such obligation. For him, it was returning a favor from someone else in the country he deeply loves. The other good thing happened as I was returning from Los Angeles to New York. When a flight attendant came to offer me something to drink, as he was supposed to do to all other passengers on board, I was not too hungry, but I said I could have something to eat. He said “alright” but that I could only pay by credit card, which I did not have on me as I had forgotten mine in İstanbul almost a week earlier. After asking me about my final destination, he did not simply continue to serve other passengers -- which would have done no harm to anyone, including me -- but said, “I’ll be back in a minute.” He came back just as he had promised, but with a sandwich in one of his hands. “Are there still homeless children in İstanbul?” he asked, and after I responded in the affirmative, he said, “Please be good to one of those kids,” and left the sandwich with me as I was trying to understand what it really was that just happened as Branning’s book lay open on the tray table. Moments after he left to serve other passengers, I was only able to think that a flight attendant could in fact create a lasting change in this world of ours and the idea of returning a favor deserves much recognition from policy makers. Costa Mesa, İstanbul Sunday’s Zaman |
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