Three Turkish Muslim Young Women

Muslim traditions vary significantly from country to country and from sect to sect within a country. Turkey is a country that, in so many ways, straddles East and West, Christian and Muslim, Europe and Asia. For the most part, over the centuries, there was a degree of  tolerance, understanding and respect across cultural and religious divides. That was until the horrific rending apart of Ottoman Greek Orthodox and Ottoman Muslim. Both saw themselves as simply Ottomans. Neither understood why distant politicians thrust division and deportation on them.

I suspect neither Christians nor Muslims outside Turkey have any realistic appreciation of the historical, cultural or religious history or dynamics that prevail in modern day Turkey. Even some Turks have a problem with these issues.

Anyway, the point of this snippet is to capture the attitude of three ‘random’ young Muslim girls wandering through the cemetery of the Eyüp Mosque way up the Golden Horn in Istanbul. I ran into them during my Turkish tour in 2008.

A Fowl Rest Area!

The Mallee lands of Australia are a vast tract of scrubland extending from Western Australia across South Australia into northern Victoria and south-western N.S.W. The Mallee encompasses almost a fifth of the land mass and comprises one of the main ecological systems that dominate the continent. It’s a multiplicity of interlinked environments, harbouring more than 700 distinct plant species, 400 kinds of birds and countless animals and insects. (Threat to Mallee Lands)

One of the threatened  species is the Mallee Fowl. There are large areas in western NSW and Victoria that have been declared nature reserves in an effort to preserve the species.

I think you must pass through one on the road to Mildura. There are signs indicating breeding areas; and there’s the one in the picture! It had caught my attention a few times as we rode to and from a couple of Ghost Town Rallies in Broken Hill (NSW), but it hadn’t been convenient to stop and take a photo. However, on my recent Big Trip North – day 2 – I made a point of stopping.

The Rest Area, of course, is one of hundreds along main highways to encourage drivers to take a break and to provide facilities for all travellers. But the announcement of a Mallee Fowl Rest Area conjured up a whole new image. Would there be artificial mounds to encourage the Mallee Fowl to breed? Or just water and seeds for snacks during a stop-over on their way somewhere? I wasn’t all that surprised not to find any Mallee Fowl at all; just a couple of motor homes and a few grey nomads.

I hope the Mallee Fowl appreciate the work that has gone into their rest area.

The Toilet Seat Dilemma

How many times do men cop it for not putting the toilet seat down? Well, this seemed a new take on the problem. This was at the National Transport Hall of Fame in Alice Springs – on the wall in the Gents. I visited the Hall of Fame on my Big Trip North. 

You’d think a transport hall of fame would be a bloke’s world if ever there was one. Why would blokes – at a truck museum of all places – have to kowtow to the expectations of the other, even if far better, half? The toilet seat would be fine left up!

Ah, well. There’s more to it. It seems they have a huge mosquito problem. The little biters must like to muster in the water in the toilet bowl. It’s not the seat so much as the lid that has to be kept down to keep the ubiquitous mozzie out. Notice the mozzies on the sign!

What is Genuine and What is Fake?

Nobody likes to buy something they think is genuine only to discover belatedly that it is a fake. All too often these days, ‘genuine’ products are passed off as such, but are reproductions or copies, in other words, fakes.

But there’s no deception or misleading of the buyer here. You know you’re getting the real thing. This guy’s fake watches are genuinely fake. That’s guaranteed. 

This was taken in April 2008, during my Turkey tour.

Is There Life after Death?

I’m sure a lot of you have agonised over this conundrum. Most, undoubtedly, assume the answer from their religious, theist, atheist, creationist or evolutionist beliefs.  Some, however, no doubt, ponder the potential answer based on their philosophical or theological beliefs, analysis, curiosity or doubts. 

Have I found the answer? Is there really no through road beyond the cemetery, no way to travel past the grave, no way out?

Essentially, what we have all been wondering, deep within us, despite our overt manifestations of our Jewish, Christian, Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, or other beliefs, is what awaits us after death.

For Christians, over the centuries, the options were Limbo (permanently), Purgatory (temporarily), Heaven or Hell (both permanently). Then, with a stroke of the pen, the Vatican ‘abolished’ Limbo. Apart from the inconvenience of the word having become commonplace in the English language (and is still used despite the Vatican edict), one has to wonder what happened to all those souls who were confined to Limbo over so many centuries. Were they shunted off to cross the River Styx in make-shift refugee boats?

If you’re a Muslim, I understand, you will be rewarded with so many virgins. Or is that only if you’re a martyr? I’m not sure how female Muslims would feel about that – especially the female martyrs. But, then, of course, there are male virgins. After all, I was one for 24 years. So the female Muslim martyrs might have something to look forward to.

I don’t know enough about the Asian religions to comment further about what their followers might expect is in store for them. 

However, let's get to get to the real point of this item, namely, where do the the civic and ecclesiastical leaders of the NSW town of Berridale stand on the eternal (or otherwise) conundrum?

Well, I guess it’s obvious from the sign in the picture. I spotted it returning from the Snowy Ride in November, 2009. It's on the northern edge of Berridale. The vicinity was once called Gegedzerick.

 If you die and go the local cemetery in Berridale, then that’s it. There’s ‘no through road’. There’s no going beyond the grave, It all ends in the cemetery – lovely bones or not!

So, it doesn’t matter if you’re Jewish, Christian or Muslim, if you die and are buried in Berridale, there simply is no through road to take you anywhere!

Sorry!

But Wait! There’s Salvation!

You don’t have to end it all at Berridale Cemetery.  Just a few miles – and a few more kilometres – up the Snowy Mountains Highway, between Adaminaby and Kiandra, there is this sign directing you to eternal salvation.

Well, that’s what I assumed.

My Concise Oxford Dictionary tells me that providence means “1 the protective care of God or nature. 2 (Providence) God in this aspect.”  It then tells me that portal means “a doorway or gate etc., especially a large and elaborate one.”

This is surely a sign pointing to the Gates of Heaven!

So don’t let yourself feel despondent by the previous item. It doesn’t have to be the end of the world.

Epilogue

I received this response from a friend and fellow motorcyclist within 24 hours of publishing:

Clare Holland House – a wonderful place staffed by the most generous and caring people. I spent time there a few years back with my friend who was dying of cancer, and whose passing was made so much easier by those wonderful people. And I knew Jenni  xxxxxxx  when she was at Dept Finance – a lovely lady. She is another incredibly caring person. I also admired the work she did there at Clare Holland. And one more connection with your story – I have a friend who is an IC nurse. She absolutely rails against patients who smoke – she finds it so frustrating to bring people back from the brink to have them disappear out for a smoke.

There, I’ve said my piece – you made a connection and I had to share.

J….

Do You Need to be Told?

I might not be the fastest bike at the track (metaphorically speaking), but climbing up the steep, tight turns to the top of Mount Hotham in the Victorian Alps, as I have done many times with fellow travellers, I have never felt the need to be told that I must keep right of the poles.  Not to put too fine a point on it, but it’s just a little obvious!  Would you really want to venture left of the poles?

In fairness, however, the road does get snow-covered in winter (it’s close to 2000m here). That’s also why the lines are painted yellow instead of white, as they are everywhere else. Yellow in snow catches the attention. Snow also tends to blur the edges of the road and the too far point of the top of the drop-off. So, it’s a useful admonition – to be well heeded – to keep right of the poles!

Slide Show

Here is a slide show of the above photos and a few more. You might like to enjoy some of them in full screen view; and see a few others that either relate to the above articles or are in the back of my mind for a future article. Click on the arrow to see the slide show; or click elsewhere on the picture to view it in full screen.