Archive for
May 27th, 2006

   

Stories

Turkey is Typing….

A small portrait of the translator Deborah Ann Dilley · 23:20 · Middle East & North Africa

It has been a busy week, news wise in Turkey, the continuing dialouge about the Islamic fundamentalist who killed a Turkish judge (reported on GV last week) and the fire at the Istanbul airport has been foremost in the news….but the bloggers seemed to be fairly quiet this week (..that or I am becoming way too dependent on my RSS feeds and need to reach outside of my box). So I thought that I would ramble a bit and tell you about some of my favorite Turkish blogs out there.

ISBN 976-08-06 is written in Turkish, but with the high volume of art videos and project links that this site puts up, language should never be an issue. Along the same vein as ISBN, visit Buzdolap (refridgerator in Turkish), again this site is in Turkish but the nature of the project makes itself fairly clear. One of my favorite food blogs is Yogurt Land, which has posts in English and Turkish. Other good food blog sites are Zen in the Kitchen and Portakal Agaci.

Of course if you want the master list of Turkish blogs, the place to go is Blog Kardesligi, recently featured/interviewed by Turk CNN as shown on Metroblogging Istanbul. Till next week…

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What Salvadoran bloggers are saying — violence and generals

A small portrait of the translator Tim Muth · 20:05 · Americas

The high levels of violence in the country continue without solutions. Much of the violence is tied to gang activity. Blogger Hunnapuh notes that pressured by the business sector, which fears that foreign investment will avoid a country with high levels of violence, president Tony Saca has finally recognized that the situation is not improving. Long forgotten is his campaign promise to make El Salvador the safest country in Central America (currently it has the highest murder rate).

Ligia at Que Joder writes about the violence that:

The police don't have a formula to stop this, nor the psychologists, nor the family. Firm hands, helping hands, workshops, talks about values — these interventions don't work because the causes are not the same or simple. For the moment, that's all we know.

Meanwhile, El Visitador is incredulous that the left-wing opposition FMLN wants to change the government's current anti-poverty program, Solidarity Net, so that funds go to municipalities to use as they wish. The FMLN is also blocking approval of international loans necessary for the improvements in health and education infrastructure that are part of solidarity Net. The opposition party wants improvements in pensions and minimum wage in return for its vote on the loans.
(more…)

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