72d entry to the Colonel`s Scrapbook
Birthdates which occurred on November 10:
1483 Martin Luther ,in Eisleben, Germany, founded Protestantism. But ended up married to an ex nun and a complete sot1668 Francois Couperin Paris France, composer/organist (Concerts Royaux) ,so admired by the Regent Philippe II of Orlèans
Birthdates which occurred on November 10:
1483 Martin Luther ,in Eisleben, Germany, founded Protestantism. But ended up married to an ex nun and a complete sot1668 Francois Couperin Paris France, composer/organist (Concerts Royaux) ,so admired by the Regent Philippe II of Orlèans
1683 George II king of England (1727-60), who hated his son so badly he said he wished “that ass`death”, a coomon situation in the dysfunctional Hnnoverian dynasty of England
1759 Frederich von Schiller in Germany, poet/lyricist (Ode to Joy), Beethoven`s Ninth Symphony catapulted him to world fame
Deaths which occurred on November 10:
1938 Kemal Ataturk ,1st President of Turkey, dies at 57 of cirrhosis, was a real forger of the nation,and an example of a statesman
1982 Leonid I Brezhnev Soviet 1st sect, dies of a heart attack at 75
On this day...
1674 Dutch formally cede New Netherlands (NY) to English, this will be the Dutch origin of New York 1775 US Marine Corps established by Congress, “the few the proud”, what a joke for an intervention force
1928 Hirohito with his four eyes,ugly scrawny figure and alligator`s mouth is enthroned as Emperor of Japan, one of the worse things to ever happen to Japan who would have to see him parade on a white horse and after World War II have to admit he went to the toilet like every mortal
India : Guru Nanak's Day-1st teacher of the Sikhs
THE LEADERS WE SHOULD HAVE
Riots explode in the streets of Managua and other cities, while the Frente Sandinista-which has been the worse thing to ever happen to Nicaragua-tries again to make a fraud of the elections for mayors. A child was killed in fights between parties, and it seems like if we are destined only for havoc and despair. I wonder what kind of leader we have if he can even be called like that, and on a day like today I feel visited by one the memory of the man I have adored most in my whole life: Mustafà Kemal Ataturk, the gentleman who forged modern Turkey. I curl into a corner of my translator`s desk, a moment of solitude yet in the company of a gentle.clear eyed ghost with blond hair. Catalogued by ignorants as a dictator, he comes to me in the middle of a drowsy moment after I have lunched, the dessert I didn`t eat, dressed in jeans and accompanied by mu dauighter`s cat who recently died, a gentle figure asking me with a charming smile for this entry and a few cannelloni left over from lunch. IN my dreamy haze, he enters my kitchen and goes to the oven, and helps himself while my daughter`s cat entwines between his long legs and almost knocks him over. That is the reaction The Grey Wolf-as he was called by his troops- got from his followers. Even those of us who never had the inmense privilege of having a handshake with him. We are like curling cats at his feet. I don`t know if you have ever felt this,dearest reader, and least of all for a politician, because people in politics ignore that politics is the art of doing good for the community and they generally become disgusting fatsos who seek only their utmost satisfaction.
Not Ataturk. The fact that I have worshipped him is my dad`s fault,who had the knack of keeping me away from Brothers Grimm`s absurd fairy tales that so much damage cause on female minds, and his proclivity to read me as bedtime stories the biographies of great leaders or telling me in lurid details all his experiences as a soldier from the Allies during World War II. I was barely 4 years old when I heard his sobriquet Ataturk, father of all Turks, given to him after he started on a series of reforms that wouldn`t only glue the remaining pieces of the Ottoman Empire after World war I but also forge the modern republic that Turkey is. My dad would value top workers over anything in life, industriousness for him was an earthly godliness, and as such he valued people like France`s Philippe II of Orleans-the regent who held the kingdom together after Louis XIV`s death until his great grandson Louis XV grew up enough to be crowned. Ataturk was in his good books, and he often wondered what role the blond Turkish statesman would have taken if he had lived enough to see World War raging rampantly. My dad had been in 1937 in Turkey and seen the already ailing president at a weightlifting match and after having won a medal, had had the honor of getting a bear hug from Ataturk, who had been a devoted swimmer, chess player and a promoter of sports.
I understand many of Ataturk`s decisions because we share something in common more than our love for hard, honest work: the need for solitude. Perhaps that is why his marriage lasted only 3 years and there was no issue. Later on he would adopt 7 girls and one son, as he needed children around him. Many of his best hours were spent curled up with a book, or watching his animals come and go.he adored horses, as well as the famed Angora cats that have been a symbol of Turkish beauty. He wrote poems, too. He was a really privileged mind from whom we learn what a good habit of reading can do for us, something we so urgently need in my country. Those who read know that knowledge is power, and with power in your hands and knowing what rights assist you, nobody can swindle the results of an election. We need someone like him in Nicaragua, so that our ravaged and war-torn country can finally lift its forehead and proudly get to work.
Many years ago, I published an article on Ataturk`s life. As a historian, I knew how important he had been as a patriot,the forger of a new country, the liberator of women who had up until then just been receptacles of pleasure and brood mares only. It is now in that Indian Summer of my premenopause, while my lifeblood slowly trickles out of me, and I stare appalled at what political violence can do to us, that I get to understand Ataturk better. Now I see why many clocks in Turkey still fix their hands on 9:05 am. The hour he left this world only physically. I comprehend the hero worship that many Turks still have of this guy. If he was Muslim or a Jew-as has been speculated recently- I care not, because I have never been a bigot or superstitious. I love him for his perfection-Kemal- which was put upon him by his math teacher. I love him for his beauty-inside and outside-his elegance, his enlightment, his constant desire to always move forward and offer his best. The patriot I am still has an everlasting crush on him, the stateswoman in the making that lives on my left shoulder as a shadow admires him and has too much to learn from his example. Ataturk, contrary to his sobriquet of Kemal, wasn`t perfect as a man although perhaps this was what made him such a wise and sound ruler. He died at 57, still being a workaholic and an intellectual. He disappeared only physically. The results of his procedures, reforms and laws are still everywhere in his country. The respect and dmiration we feel for him is not limited for his countrymen, and now, in the middle of turmoil, between one translation and another, he has come to me in a dream to remind me that Bertholt Bretch, the German playwright, was right:”There are men who struggle for one day, and they are good. Other strive and fight for many weeks ,months or years, and they are wonderful. But there are those who struggle all their life.Those are the utmostly indispensable, the necessary ones.” Ataturk was definitely one of the greatest crown jewels of Lady History.
1759 Frederich von Schiller in Germany, poet/lyricist (Ode to Joy), Beethoven`s Ninth Symphony catapulted him to world fame
Deaths which occurred on November 10:
1938 Kemal Ataturk ,1st President of Turkey, dies at 57 of cirrhosis, was a real forger of the nation,and an example of a statesman
1982 Leonid I Brezhnev Soviet 1st sect, dies of a heart attack at 75
On this day...
1674 Dutch formally cede New Netherlands (NY) to English, this will be the Dutch origin of New York 1775 US Marine Corps established by Congress, “the few the proud”, what a joke for an intervention force
1928 Hirohito with his four eyes,ugly scrawny figure and alligator`s mouth is enthroned as Emperor of Japan, one of the worse things to ever happen to Japan who would have to see him parade on a white horse and after World War II have to admit he went to the toilet like every mortal
India : Guru Nanak's Day-1st teacher of the Sikhs
THE LEADERS WE SHOULD HAVE
Riots explode in the streets of Managua and other cities, while the Frente Sandinista-which has been the worse thing to ever happen to Nicaragua-tries again to make a fraud of the elections for mayors. A child was killed in fights between parties, and it seems like if we are destined only for havoc and despair. I wonder what kind of leader we have if he can even be called like that, and on a day like today I feel visited by one the memory of the man I have adored most in my whole life: Mustafà Kemal Ataturk, the gentleman who forged modern Turkey. I curl into a corner of my translator`s desk, a moment of solitude yet in the company of a gentle.clear eyed ghost with blond hair. Catalogued by ignorants as a dictator, he comes to me in the middle of a drowsy moment after I have lunched, the dessert I didn`t eat, dressed in jeans and accompanied by mu dauighter`s cat who recently died, a gentle figure asking me with a charming smile for this entry and a few cannelloni left over from lunch. IN my dreamy haze, he enters my kitchen and goes to the oven, and helps himself while my daughter`s cat entwines between his long legs and almost knocks him over. That is the reaction The Grey Wolf-as he was called by his troops- got from his followers. Even those of us who never had the inmense privilege of having a handshake with him. We are like curling cats at his feet. I don`t know if you have ever felt this,dearest reader, and least of all for a politician, because people in politics ignore that politics is the art of doing good for the community and they generally become disgusting fatsos who seek only their utmost satisfaction.
Not Ataturk. The fact that I have worshipped him is my dad`s fault,who had the knack of keeping me away from Brothers Grimm`s absurd fairy tales that so much damage cause on female minds, and his proclivity to read me as bedtime stories the biographies of great leaders or telling me in lurid details all his experiences as a soldier from the Allies during World War II. I was barely 4 years old when I heard his sobriquet Ataturk, father of all Turks, given to him after he started on a series of reforms that wouldn`t only glue the remaining pieces of the Ottoman Empire after World war I but also forge the modern republic that Turkey is. My dad would value top workers over anything in life, industriousness for him was an earthly godliness, and as such he valued people like France`s Philippe II of Orleans-the regent who held the kingdom together after Louis XIV`s death until his great grandson Louis XV grew up enough to be crowned. Ataturk was in his good books, and he often wondered what role the blond Turkish statesman would have taken if he had lived enough to see World War raging rampantly. My dad had been in 1937 in Turkey and seen the already ailing president at a weightlifting match and after having won a medal, had had the honor of getting a bear hug from Ataturk, who had been a devoted swimmer, chess player and a promoter of sports.
I understand many of Ataturk`s decisions because we share something in common more than our love for hard, honest work: the need for solitude. Perhaps that is why his marriage lasted only 3 years and there was no issue. Later on he would adopt 7 girls and one son, as he needed children around him. Many of his best hours were spent curled up with a book, or watching his animals come and go.he adored horses, as well as the famed Angora cats that have been a symbol of Turkish beauty. He wrote poems, too. He was a really privileged mind from whom we learn what a good habit of reading can do for us, something we so urgently need in my country. Those who read know that knowledge is power, and with power in your hands and knowing what rights assist you, nobody can swindle the results of an election. We need someone like him in Nicaragua, so that our ravaged and war-torn country can finally lift its forehead and proudly get to work.
Many years ago, I published an article on Ataturk`s life. As a historian, I knew how important he had been as a patriot,the forger of a new country, the liberator of women who had up until then just been receptacles of pleasure and brood mares only. It is now in that Indian Summer of my premenopause, while my lifeblood slowly trickles out of me, and I stare appalled at what political violence can do to us, that I get to understand Ataturk better. Now I see why many clocks in Turkey still fix their hands on 9:05 am. The hour he left this world only physically. I comprehend the hero worship that many Turks still have of this guy. If he was Muslim or a Jew-as has been speculated recently- I care not, because I have never been a bigot or superstitious. I love him for his perfection-Kemal- which was put upon him by his math teacher. I love him for his beauty-inside and outside-his elegance, his enlightment, his constant desire to always move forward and offer his best. The patriot I am still has an everlasting crush on him, the stateswoman in the making that lives on my left shoulder as a shadow admires him and has too much to learn from his example. Ataturk, contrary to his sobriquet of Kemal, wasn`t perfect as a man although perhaps this was what made him such a wise and sound ruler. He died at 57, still being a workaholic and an intellectual. He disappeared only physically. The results of his procedures, reforms and laws are still everywhere in his country. The respect and dmiration we feel for him is not limited for his countrymen, and now, in the middle of turmoil, between one translation and another, he has come to me in a dream to remind me that Bertholt Bretch, the German playwright, was right:”There are men who struggle for one day, and they are good. Other strive and fight for many weeks ,months or years, and they are wonderful. But there are those who struggle all their life.Those are the utmostly indispensable, the necessary ones.” Ataturk was definitely one of the greatest crown jewels of Lady History.
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