A September Update

There is a young woman sitting next to me on the tube. She is in a grey Islamic coat and black headscarf. She has an innocent face but not very beautiful. She is reading Glamour – a women’s monthly. “Why?” was the first thing that came to my mind. Who is going to benefit from the fashion and beauty tips you are reading? What’s the use of knowing this season’s colour in eye shadow when you don’t put on make up?

That was about Aldgate East. By Farringdon it hit me… All my life I’d been reading these magazines (even if not very frequently) for others…to put on a more beautiful and attractive show for others! Men I suppose. The irony is that I don’t really follow most of those tips cause I don’t think they’ll work for me…I must have felt such a lost-cause!

The young woman in headscarf, on the other hand, is perhaps the ultimate example of someone who puts on shows for her benefit alone (she looked like a single woman to me); the ultimate example of someone who loves herself and someone who doesn’t feel the need of approval by others..or perhaps just a wannabe of a different sort.

I am not going to cover my head over this. And I doubt if many of those who do think about it this way. But I sure had a revelation that morning…yet another example of how many secrets I am capable of keeping from myself, or rather perhaps, what a surprise I am to myself. I am sure I am not alone in falling into my own traps.

How funny that this happened on the 27th anniversary of the 1980 military coup in Turkey (12th September)…I didn’t think of it all day. There are hundreds, perhaps even thousands, who must be remembering it every day…

Recently, I can’t even remember what the date is most days. Life is so fast and furious. How does that Chinese curse go? “May you have exciting times”? Did I upset a Chinese person? No, I think things that have been waiting on the sides, ideas that I’ve been harbouring for years are finally coming to fruition. “Enjoy the ride” I keep saying to myself even if it’s hard to relax enough to enjoy a white knuckle ride!

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After finishing this, I watched Michael Palin travel through Edirne, Istanbul, Ephesus and Capadoccia for his current documentary about Eastern Europe. What a great episode and I like his positivitiy and realism about Turkey and the Turks…and about his future revealed to him from a coffee cup…Ne demisler fala inanma ama falsiz da kalma (don’t believe your fortune told but don’t go without it being told either).

Small miracles do happen…

I’ve been struck down for four days now with the bug that’s going around these days…Someone said this was the time of the year most people got ill because the schools start and children exchange bugs etc….Hmmm why is it that then all single or childless people I know are ill and the parents are well?

I would have fought it if I wasn’t so tired from work and other things. Despite the tube strike in London I went to work on Tuesday from 6 in the morning till 8 in the evening. It was the day we were due to complete on the lease of our new office. By the end of the day it wasn’t complete but still the landlord’s agent agreed to release the keys to me – which apparently is close to a miracle as our solicitor said in disbelief…

About three months ago I started working with a business coach. One of the first things I did was to set out my personal goals for the short, medium and long term stretching from 1-3 months to 3 years. I don’t want to spell these out for fear of jinxing them but all I wanted to say that most of those goals I wrote down I’ve already accomplished or am on the way to do so…even those I could not resolve for years…even those I had given up hope…When I think about it logically, I realise that writing my goals down made me more open to signs that would direct me to them or give a chance to people previously would not have featured in my life…But when I let go of the logic, I am amazed by the miracle that’s happening around me.

I was negotiating with a potential business partner last week. The day after I thought we agreed that my company would lead on a bid and they would sub-contract to us, he wrote an email implying that they would lead. I spent that night restless with my trust in people and their word shattered a little more…I woke up to find that not only he’d written the bid document (and very well to boot) but also he’d responded to my email reminding him our agreement saying he couldn’t remember what we’d agreed and hence his ambiguous email, but he was absolutely happy with us leading. His quick turn around and doing the work for me when I was ill is truly nothing short of a miracle.

I got driven home by a lady black cab driver the other night who asked me if I was Turkish. I asked her how she guessed and she said “Turkish women speak English with this soft voice in a sing song tone”. How sweet. It turns out she had lived in Istanbul in the early 70s having married a Turkish man. Despite divorcing since, she’d kept his surname and expected everyone else to make the effort to pronounce it correctly. This gave me renewed energy to carry on demanding the same rather than giving up using my surname whenever I can avoid it as I’ve been doing lately. If she can carry it so indignantly so can I. This is not much of a miracle but made me happy nonetheless.

Then there is love…now that’s the biggest miracle of all…and, yes, I think it’s here.