Sam's Salad with Cherries, Goat Cheese, and Pistachios

Cherry Season in Istanbul!

I can't get enough of them.

Turkey has such a vibrant and local agricultural industry. Seems like everyone is a locavore here. I can't think of anything that might be flown in other than bananas and processed food. In the springtime, I felt such overwhelming anticipation for the peach and cherry season - the season couldn't start fast enough for me - I was like a kid waiting for Christmas.

Now cherry season is winding down, but just in case there are cherries available where you live, I wanted to share the recipe for this salad. The recipe comes from the beautiful food blog of one of my readers.

Here's my shout out to Sam @ My Carolina Kitchen for her salad of cherries, goat cheese, and pistachios. All three of these ingredients are magnificently produced near Istanbul. As soon as I saw it, I knew I should make it to celebrate the fabulous bounty of Turkish farmers. Go to Sam's blog for the recipe. It was delicious!

Hearing "Tales from a Female Nomad" in Person: Rita Golden Gelman

Rita Golden Gelman

Author, "Tales of a Female Nomad"

and over seventy children's books

It struck me today as I was sitting having lunch with author Rita Golden Gelman how ironic that was. If there is anything Rita Golden Gelman is not - it is a 'lady who lunches.' Pinch me! I was meeting one of the exciting role models of my last four years as an 'Empty Nest Expat'."

I got to meet Rita, and by arriving early, have lunch with her at the Professional American Women of Istanbul (PAWI) meeting in Istanbul which I attended for the first time. Rita was the guest speaker! The women in attendance were also captivating, happening ladies making their dreams happen here in Istanbul.

Rita Golden Gelman is the author of the acclaimed book "Tales of a Female Nomad." I read her book as part of my vagabonding journey these last four years and was absolutely riveted. The blogging universe exposes us to all kinds of people living lives different than our own these days, but Rita Golden Gelman was a true pioneer in choosing a different path than the American dream of a house with the picket fence.

Rita lived the American dream, actually. She was married - a dutiful wife of an interesting man and mother to accomplished children. She lived with them in Manhattan and Greenwich Village, New York as her children grew up. Eventually, her husband's work took the family out to the film industry in Los Angeles in California. Rita didn't identify with any of it. Her marriage eventually fell apart and she decided to put the anthropology she had been studying in a PhD program at UCLA into practice by seeing the world. By then her children were grown. She sold everything, stuck the house money into savings without spending a dime of it, and has spent the last 27 years living without a permanent home and traveling the world.

She told such incredibly inspiring stories from her book which I won't share here because they are hers to tell. "Tales of a Female Nomad" inspired a whole community of readers to email her with their travel adventures (including the sublime recipes they collected along the way). Rita organized some of their tales into an anthology called "Female Nomad and Friends: Tales of Breaking Free and Breaking Bread Around the World."

Random House paid her and her 41 contributors an initial payment of $55,000 for the book. All of the money goes to support children of the lowest castes in India with vocational training. Guess what's on your Christmas list, family! What a legacy. And what a gift to give to her community of readers - the chance to be part of that legacy.

Risk-taking, trust, and serendipity are key ingredients of joy. Without risk, nothing new ever happens. Without trust, fear creeps in. Without serendipity, there are no surprises.
~ Rita Golden Gelman's quote on Starbuck's tall cup #31

There are cultures where overseas travel is really celebrated. The Netherlands and Isreal come to mind, for me, as two countries where citizens have enough time off, a lack of fear, and the willingness to hit the open road. America is not one of those cultures. Rita is interested in changing that and has a plan to do so.

At age 75, Rita is starting to feel her age for the first time. She wants to go home to spend the next two years in America working on her legacy. She is frequently invited to speak at universities about her global travels. She always asks the university to set up a talk at the local high school as well. Gentle readers, do you know of students that would benefit from hearing Rita's inspiring tales? Why not suggest her as a speaker to your favorite lecture series committee?

Rita believes Americans would approach the world with more understanding if each high school senior took a gap year between high school and college to see the world. She said high school students have three choices: university, work, or military after high school. They are not ready to experience any of these yet with full maturity. She urges grandparents to begin a $500 a year gap year fund for their grandchildren so that kids have a year to mature before starting the bigger commitments of study, work, or job while using that time to understand the greater wider world better.

She has started an organization called Let's Get Global. Her plan is to partner with a young man who is creating an American Gap Year Association and beginning an accreditation process for American gap year programs. Rita would like two people in every high school to be able to win a "Gap Year Scholarship" just to demonstrate the power of the idea to young people everywhere. Two young people from each high school nationwide setting off for parts unknown could begin to change American culture of fear about the outside world.

Rita says that fear drives one of the most common questions she gets about her lifestyle. "How can someone overcome the fear of setting out on an adventure?" She is currently working on a book of 64 tips for developing a successful mindset for global discovery.

What an exciting moment to

meet one of my vagabonding

role models!

So Westerner, ask yourself, could you give up the control Rita has over her life? It seems like control is the #1 Western addiction, but Rita just strugged her shoulders and says "I see what opportunities come to me." She rarely knows where she'll be six months from now. She has four steadfast rules 1) smile at everyone, 2) talk to strangers, 3) accept all invitations and 4) eat everything that is offered. The ability to be adaptable to multiple peoples, cultures, situations and opportunities has resulted in an incredibly inspiring life well-lived.

How Hot Is it In Istanbul? Part 2

These guys gathered a small crowd

of cheerleaders at the bottom of the stairs

News comes from America that it has been the hottest July on record. I believe it. Truly, it had to have been equally hot here in Istanbul. The heat has made animals and people alike want to move as little as possible. Only 5% of Istanbul is air-conditioned.

But what if it is your job to work outdoors in this crushing heat? These workers were moving a generator up to the 5th floor of the building being renovated on the right on one of the most intensively hot days of the summer. A crowd of us gathered at the bottom of the stairs as the guy on the lowest stair used a wood board for a lever and they slowly moved the generator up one stair at a time through team work as coordinated as a coxswain and rowers. Us office gawkers were a bit horrified at the level of intensity required on such a hot day. Add in that it was Ramazan here, and these men could possibly be fasting from sunrise to sunset. We all let out a cheer when they cleared the landing. It seemed appropriate to acknowledge the effort under such circumstances!

How Hot is It in Istanbul?

Is he alive or dead?

Cats and dogs are allowed to roam free in Istanbul. During these dog days of summer, I often find an animal in my path who is so immobile and looks so hot, I find myself talking to them just to see if they're alive. You can't always tell! Luckily, this long hair was just trying to move as little as possible in the heat.

Enjoying Hometown Friends in Istanbul

 Brian Smith and me

One of the fun parts about living in Istanbul is so many friends come through town as tourists. This summer it was my  Ames, Iowa high school classmate Brian Smith and his very fun wife Fazia Ali. So many giggles! Brian is so in love with Fazia. It's moving to see. They have been married for 19 years.

Family friend Bahar

and Brian's wife Fazia

Brian is a Pulitzer-prize winning photographer. His first magazine photograph appeared in LIFE Magazine when he was a 20-year-old student at the University of Missouri.  Five years later, Brian won the Pulitzer Prize for his photographs of the Los Angeles Olympic Games. Yes, that's right, at age 25!

Because Brian started achieving so early and for so many years people are always asking him for advice and he is happy to provide it. Here's an example from his blog where he shares Secrets of Sports Photography: his favorite Olympic Moments.  It is great storytelling of jawdropping images we will all remember.

Lately, Brian has specialized in celebrity portrait photography. I love hearing him talk about his book project "Art and Soul: Stars Unite to Celebrate and Support the Arts." The book grew out of the desire of entertainment professionals to share in a deeply personal way how they had been impacted by the arts. Truly, some of the most iconic celebrities are featured. I dare you to look deeply into Ann Hathaway's eyes in Brian's portrait and not want to say "yes" to whatever she asks for! You can thumb through 15 of the portraits on the Amazon site and vote for the ones you like. All of these portraits were also featured at the Library of Congress. The stars hand-carried the book to Congress to advocate for more funding for the arts.


















This fall Brian will have a new book coming out called "Secrets of Great Portrait Photography: Photographs of the Famous and Infamous." Along with instantly iconic photos like this cover shot of billionaire space entrepreneur Richard Branson, Brian shares the stories behind the photographs and how he connected with his subjects to create such unforgettable images.

I admire my classmate's work and his willingness to mentor so many young photography professionals coming up. Brian gives speeches all across America on photography topics but also on just getting started as a professional. I enjoyed the storytelling in this webinar: "Stop Waiting for Your Big Break." He frequently is invited to share on this and other topics in person.

After coming to Istanbul, Brian and Fazia went on to Athens. I LOVE this photograph he took of her there.

"My Goddess Rocks the Acropolis"

Brian Smith on Twitter: @briansmithphoto

Brian Smith on the web: http://briansmith.com/

Bravo David Černý! You Have Europe Giggling Again. This time with your Red London Double Decker Bus doing pushups!

Longtime readers of the Empty Nest Expat blog know I am a huge fan of Czech artist David Černý and his very Czech brand of irreverance and black humor. His sculpture created to see if Europe could laugh at itself, "Entropa," certainly provided entertainment for me and my Czech friends when he created it in 2009.

"Entropa" was the official art chosen by the Czech Republic to represent itself when the Czech Republic held the Presidency of the European Union. It seemed only Czechs got the humor. I loved it.  I was so grateful to have seen it myself in the flesh when I went back to Prague a second time. By then it had been moved from Brussells to DOX Contemporary Art Museum in Prague.You can read more of my posts about him here.

This time I don't see how he can fail to make the whole world smile. Look at what he has created for the London Olympics: a bright red London double decker bus doing push-ups!

How can we not smile?

Iconic bus doing iconic exercises!

No, it really does do the exercises!

Černý built in hydraulics to make it happen.

I love seeing tiny Czech Republic,

with a mere 10 million citizens

represent itself so above 'its weight class'
at the Olympic games

with their irreverant humor.

I believe Černý's bus will delight worldwide!

What do you think of David Černý's bus

named "London Boosted?"

Does it make you smile?

Is there an artist you have discovered in your travels

you think the whole world should know about?

Who is it?

Click on this wonderful Daily Mail article to see more photos of David Černý

assembling his bus and to see the video of it in action!

You might also enjoy these posts:

Who will be the Czech Jamie Oliver?

It's David Černý Appreciation Week at the Empty Nest Blog

Following Eve Ensler's new play debut "Emotional Creature"

Looking back on my participation in "The Vagina Monologues," I can not be more proud of myself for having done it. Eve Ensler is trying to challenge the entire globe (the entire planet!!) to think more critically about how humanity tolerates physical and sexual violence against women, to call it out when it happens, and finally, do something about it.

This week Eve premiered a new play in Berkeley, California called "Emotional Creature." I found Jane Fonda's post about it so inspiring that I wanted to share it with you.

If you are a woman and aren't yet familiar with Eve Ensler's work, there's an opportunity coming up this February. She is asking the entire planet to rise up and dance together to let the entire world know that we stand together saying "this is not acceptable." You can check the hashtag #1billionrising on Twitter for more information too and be inspired by people all over the world who are doing the same.

If you are a man, we especially need you to participate. Eve Ensler asks good men in the "Vagina Monologues" play "where the hell are you?" It's blunt, but sometimes blunt is needed. Wherever you live on this big ball, can you help be part of #1billionrising in February 2013? Organize a dance, go to a dance, sell tickets to a dance? We need good men to help shift this paradigm.  Indeed, in someways, you are needed most.

One of the most satisfying aspects of being in the "Vagina Monologues" was doing something rather than just complaining about something. The future is now. Let's move humanity forward.  Here's Jane Fonda's post to inspire you too!

Here's the story of our Vagina Monologues production in Istanbul. The oldest post is at the bottom.