"everywhere taksim, everywhere resistance"

thats the slogan since day one (or two).


the past weeks i have seen and heard things myself or very close... my friend was hit in the leg with a tear gas canister (they "shoot" them at people, rather than to the ground...) - it looked bad. somebody had to sleep in the living room as their bedroom was filled with tear gas (windows to the "busy" street), someone walking to school near Taksim has the police stop her every day and check her bags...  and these are people i know. also friends of friends, like that italian journalist, were beaten up, another friend of a friend, some rich old lawyer, took it upon himself to go and protect the street barricades, recruited a couple dozen young guys to go with him, bought them all gas masks and was there, in the front lines, with a steel rod, hitting it to the ground...  i can just see this Clockwork Orange type of scene in my head, but with a past middle age lawyer with a gas mask on... lol. and so many other stories. this has connected people, which is amazing. 


(my friends leg - the tear gas canister bruise - photo taken by her)

and for something completely different:

the seamstress shop where i always go to.

one of the guys measuring the curtain i needed cut shorter. note his cigarette at the end of the desk. burn marks at the sides of tables are a common sight in turkey.