On the picturesque island of Buyukada in the Marmara Sea about an hour’s ferry ride from Istanbul, tourists climb a steep track through pine trees to peer through locked gates at the decaying remains of an old Greek orphanage.
A pretty garden and a table laden with cheese, ham and good bread: a typical summer evening scene on the Prince's Islands, a popular haunt for wealthy Istanbul residents.
An irreverent novella in Tbilisi has provoked a culture war that has Georgians fighting over the limits of individual freedom.
The work, titled Saidumlo Siroba (Holy Crap), takes swipes at the Georgian Orthodox Church, Georgian patriotism and Georgian mothers. It has become a William Burroughs-style bizarro bestseller, generating more shock and outrage than literary acclaim.
They have tried threats. They have tried PR. And now, 22 years into the search for a Nagorno-Karabakh peace settlement, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Russia are turning to the power of faith.
Recent political changes in Kyrgyzstan have not tempered a brewing social and cultural quandary in southern provinces. An increasing number of citizens of the South are becoming practicing Muslims. For working women in particular this is creating a dilemma, forcing some to choose between their faith and their careers.
