You are so huge, so heavy, so impersonal, but still, I have this deep urge to grab you by the shoulders. If I, one of your tiny meaningless citizens, could, I would then shake you firmly. Wake up!, I would shout in your face. Come on Europe, wake up! I giggled last week, when I […]
Busy travelling again these days between Ankara, Imrali and the Qandil mountains. And the topic that the media seem to get excited about is disarmament. Are the Kurdish movement and the government trying to make a deal about the PKK laying down its arms? Öcalan, after all, said a few days ago that a solution […]
I had already seen him at the symposium, sitting in the conference hall with a large framed image next to him. I didn’t ask him what it was, I thought that he must be one of the speakers and we would find out eventually. And yes, we did find out eventually. Right after the closing […]
Six, I think every evening when I go to bed. I should get up at six. That’s around the same time the sun rises, so I would be able to catch as much sunlight as possible and not spend most of my waking hours in the dark. But of course I hardly ever manage to […]
A friend of mine has been living in Turkey for years, but has now moved to another country. From Turkey to a country with a full and working democracy. She said that she has just begun to realize again how nice it is to live in a democracy, after which she asked: ‘Don’t you miss […]
The beards are a good example. The beards that were shaved off by men in Diyarbakir and other south-eastern cities and towns, because they feared that if they did not shave their beards, they would come under attack from pro-PKK Kurds for being ‘Islamists’ or ‘IS supporters’. Many papers published articles about it, everybody took […]
Ne zaman Kürdistan’a gitsem ve onlarla konuşsam her zaman Kürt olmak dışındaki diğer kimliklerini keşfetmeye çalışıyorum. Bir Kürt kendini Kürt olarak tanımlayan birisi ama bunun altında hangi kimlik saklı? Bu, 25 Ekim 2014’te Bilgi Üniversitesi’nde düzenlenen ‘Sınırlar Aşılırken Kürtler: Değişen Mekanlar ve Kimlikler’ isimli konferansta yaptığım bir konuşmanın konusuydu. (Read the English version of this speech here) İki […]
It was before I came to Turkey, in 2006, that I had a conversation with a friend and fellow journalist in my home country, the Netherlands. I was already thinking of going abroad but hadn’t decided yet where to go. He asked: ‘Do you have any aspirations to become a war correspondent?’ I didn’t think […]
As the battle for Kobani rages, up to 200,000 Syrian Kurds have fled into Turkey, where long-running animosities mean a suspicious reception at best. Frederike Geerdink reports from Suruc, close to the border. (written in cooperation with a foreign desk editor)
‘Life in Diyarbakir’, some Turkish media reported, ‘has returned to normal’. The curfew that applied for a few days was lifted. As I drank coffee, I heard the sound of teargas shots outside. Around 7 in the evening (every evening since a few days) a protest started in which people banged pots and pans on […]
Fréderike Geerdink
Phone:
* Kurdistan Region, Iraq: +964 75185 44190
* Netherlands: +3163 3936 375 (also Whatsapp)
Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.