I will post more photos from my trip to Italy and Switzerland soon. In the meantime, here are the main stories of the past week (not counting this morning’s bomb explosion):

Ramazan

Last Sunday (24 September) Ramazan (Ramadan) began in Turkey. The main changes I notice in Mersin during this holiest of Muslim months are:

a) The drum banging (and the consequential car alarms) on the street at 3 or 4 am in the morning.

b) Work mates and other folks refraining from drinking, smoking and eating during daylight hours.

c) Businesses changing their offerings and trading conditions, particularly those in the food industry.

I hope to write a more detailed Ramazan post soon. In the meantime, you should visit the great Ramadan blog written by some Nomadlifers.

AFL Grand Final

Shortly after 7 am yesterday (30 September) morning Peter gave me a call. Unlike in 2005, this year’s AFL grand final was on Fox Sports Middle East. And it was a great game, despite the stupid 5+ minute ad breaks after each goal in the first half. Even though West Coast defeated Sydney by one point in a thriller, it still wasn’t as good as 2004’s final 🙂

Autumn Is Here

The generally pleasant weather of autumn announced its arrival with a bang. A very short but extremely heavy storm hit Mersin. I was driving in my boss’s Volkswagen Beetle at the time and the visibility was very poor. Thankfully, I got through the violent weather without accident.