SUFI DERVISHES AT HOME
Yakup Baba’s home near Fatih Camii – Yakup Baba & the Sufi Dervishes — Knows he’s being drawn—–My friend Edip, at center, was a Sufi Dervish and a successful carpet merchant. He invited me to this chicken feast at the home of the great Dervish master, within sight of Fatih Camii. These fellows at right were muezzins, and sang for our pleasure. I was honored to pray with them.
YAKUP BABA
The great Dervish master in whose home the Muezzins sang. This portrait caused awe whenever someone went through my book. Clearly I had landed on the side of the angels!
CATS & OBELISK
Ygor – Obelisk – Pinkie coming into his own – crippled leg almost well now —- September 04 in the Hippodrome built 2nd Cent AD by Septimus Severus—— who also built the Hippodrome in Rome. Every night I walked past the Obelisk. It had green Malibu lights on it. I was so damn happy to finally live in this place- makes me happy just writing this.
JUANITA FROM SPAINe
…and her beautiful bones — “Today I meet a real artiste!” —- I met her while drawing a sea view in Sultanahmet. Later we were neighbors, & she became a patron & good friend.
HELPFUL HUNK
Nevzat in Mercan: this buffed nice dude helped me buy chrome tubes to build my modular closet. Whatta bulld! —-Bayri here just looked on in awe. I carried the tubes up the hill, through the Grand Bazaar and all the way home, singing. I still have the closet- in its fourth apartment.
BURAK & THE EGYPTIAN OBELISK
Sultanahmet – Obelisk – Hippodrome – Sweet Burak doing his best to look dangerous – September 04——-
ÇEŞME AT NIGHT
A happy oasis of light in the mean Kumkapi dark——-Around the corner from my place. The dark was mean because I was living on homemade soup. I longed to join the festive crowd but had not a kurus to spare. Sitting in the shadows drawing them I felt like a ghost, but a happy ghost.
RUSTEM PAŞA ÇEŞME
Rustem Paşa Camii—— Çeşme means fountain in Turkish. This fabulous old washing-place is part of the 16thCentury mosque built by the great architect Mimar Sinan. Here are four Turks: two loafers, an old man preparing to pray, and a natty old gent wearing a Panama hat, probably from his father, under Ataturk.
SATURDAY NIGHT IN TUNEL
An October night in Taksim with Manfred, Tekin & another guy who were too busy playing backgammon to notice the gorgeous girl walking by. At 2AM walked across Galata Bridge to see the huge gold full moon caught between the minarets of Suleymaniye Camii there on the hill – they saw that ——
THE BYZANTINE SHOE STORE
15 Milyon — Shoe Store Old City – 10/04—— Byzantine columns from a bygone era rear out of the grass as people line up to buy lottery tickets and Coke next to an open-air shoe display up in Beyazit near the University. Above the columns was the enormous building housing the Electric Company. 15 million lira would be 15 lira today— but worth a whole lot less.