Choti on Holiday!

Dear Choti Writer Readers,

Please kindly be informed that i will be going on a summer vacation for 3 weeks as of tomorrow. I will try to check my blog time to time and follow other blogs as well on each occasion i find net connection, however i don’t think i will be able to update my blog this often!

A friend of mine just reminded me that it has been a year now since i started this blog…Time is flying away so quickly that i even couldn’t realize it has been that much…I plan to write 1-year celebration post on my return with flashbacks through the past evaluating what i have been going through the whole year with the support of all my readers and commentators

Ah! I should keep this post short as i have still a lot to do before i start my journey (i have a long checklist )…

Please do take care of my blog and don’t make her feel lonely while i’m away And of course miss me!

 

RAINDROP…

If you can’t be a shining sun-ray

sparkling on me,

At least be a grey rain cloud

and let your drops fall over me,

Shower my heart,

Refresh my spring…

Even if i can’t feel the heat of your love,

At least i can chill within your cold arms!

Aşk by Elif Şafak…

I am a big fan of Elif Şafak. I read almost all of her books till now but when i saw her recent novel “Aşk” (Love) on the shelves of bookstores, i was a bit disappointed and felt reluctant to read it because just assessing the title and the book cover (all in pink with a light pink heart on the front cover), i just thought that it is another classical love story prevailing on the shelves lately.

So many people around me read the book within months, so many people were still reading it around me on the bus or the underground, so many people were carrying the book in their hands or handbags while passing by me. And last week suddenly i just went to bookstore and bought the book to find out what was there attracting so many people’s attention. I read the book in 5 days (415 pages) and i read it slowly on purpose in order not to see “the end” and i came to see that all i had was prejudice against the book as it was totally different from what i had thought!

No need to flatter or glorify the writing skills of Elif Şafak as it is already well-known especially in Turkey and she is considered under the same category with Orhan Pamuk who has already a nobel prize. And again in this book she was just excellent. The storyline, the characters, the choice of words, the decriptions, everything was just outstanding carrying the trace of perfection. I usually draw/mark the lines that i like in a book but i didn’t/couldn’t in this book because each and every sentence was just an excellent quote.

The topicline of the book is LOVE as suggested by the title. But it is not just a earthly love occuring between a woman and a man; it is rather about a holy love under islamic mysticism/sufism. And mostly the eartly love is interwoven with the mystic love.

There is a novel within the novel so two different stories are processed at the same time going on at different time points and at different places. One is talking about the present, about a married woman with three children living in Texas, about her searches for love, and her struggles to get rid of the vicious circle in her entire life, and the other tells us about the past, about Mevlana and his soulmate Şems living in Konya. And these two stories are just to be intersected by a mysterious writer (A. Z. Zahara) teaching the reader the most basic elements of love, even proving that the two people can love each other without seeing or hearing one another at all.

Unfortunately i don’t have the book in English version, and in fact i’m not sure whether it is published in English or not yet. Still i want to share some passages with you which i loved, however i will provide the translation myself at least to give you some slight idea of the meaning:

Aklın kimyası ile Aşkın kimyası başkadır. Akıl temkinlidir. Korka korka atar adımlarını. ‘Aman sakın kendini’ diye tembihler. Halbuki aşk öyle mi? Onun tek dediği: ‘Bırak kendini, ko gitsin!’ Akıl kolay kolay yıkılmaz. Aşk ise kendini yıpratır, harap düşer. Halbuki hazineler ve defineler yıkıntılar arasında olur. Ne varsa harap bir kalpte var! (Page. 95)

The chemistry of mind and the chemistry of heart are just different. The mind is just cautious. It moves with hesitant steps. Always warns ‘Just be careful’. But what about the love? Only thing love advices is ‘Let it go!’  The mind is difficult to demolish. However, love overwears itself, falls into ruins. But the treasury is found among the ruins. A devasted heart worths anything!

No matter how much i try to describe the book, no matter how much i try to translate some lines, no matter how much i sound enthusiastic about it, i am just unable to render the true and the exact power of the book. What can i say?! The love is hidden between the pages…Just go and get it!

Cyborg Girl/Cyborg She/My Girlfriend is a Cyborg!

Jirou Kitamura, a young boy feeling so much alone on this crowded earth despite so many human beings without being aware that his loneliness is to be ended by a robot sent from the future….

When Jirou is about to celebrate his 20th birthday at a dinner on his own, a young girl joins him out of blue. Being lively, energetic, lovely and a bit crazy, this new girl looks like a perfect match for him. However, he soon finds out that the girl has some super powers and in the end discovers that the girl is a cyborg indeed sent especially for him with a special mission. Being a cyborg, the girl is totally lack of any kind of emotion or the feelings that the human beings have; she is even not able to say “I Love You”! But this bitter truth is not a hindrance in front of Jirou’s extreme love for the cyborg girl…

My readers already know that i like far east movies and i found this 2008 Japanese movie quite enjoyable and touchy as well. It includes all the items of science-fiction, thriller, action, romance and fun hence serving the audience in variety. All in all, it presents an emotional turmoil in the end getting a 4/5 from me.

Dear Diary -Day 7!

Life is so strange…Sometimes i feel that we just draw a circle and start again again whatever we do or wherever we are…a vicious circle?

This week, we moved into another office again. This was for the third time in the past few years. Packing all the stuff into cartoon boxes and then re-arranging them fitting myself at my new desk, getting used to the new people and the environment…not easy neither simple at all! But under such a recession period, i am so much thankful that i still have a job which i love!

Luckily, i am all done now. Writing the first post of July at my new desk which i decorated with lots of photos, stickers, colorful pens and pencils, cute notepads and some tiny toys…yea yea i can hear you…it is not a “kinder garten”, it is an office but what to do…there is still a child inside:)

Promise!

“Let me bring the drinks” said i, getting the permission from my guests to leave the room for a short while so at the same time getting the chance to calm down my heartbeats and come into my senses. I leaned against the kitchen table holding its edge firmly not to fall. I felt that my knees were not able to carry me any more. I took a deep breath and tried to stand strong on my high heeled shoes.

I was setting the wine glasses on the silver tray on which i was able to see my reflection. From outside i was a beautiful woman with fair skin, long brown hair, thick lips and deep blue eyes but from inside my soul was devastated.

I tried not to think any more when i put the last glass on the tray then i heard a footstep coming closer. I didn’t turn my back as i already knew who it was! He hugged me from behind hesitantly, i felt uneasy and said “Don’t” while i was getting rid of his arms. “But why?” he asked. “Someone can see us” i replied. He lowered his looks and kept watching the designs of the carpet for a while.

He looked like an innocent child needing love and care. I couldn’t  stop myself any more and this time i wrapped my arms around his neck. I could feel his accelarating heartbeats. His lips slightly touched on my hair, then my forehead. And then he put another kiss on my nose as if he was gathering some courage before meeting my lips. I took the first step and let my lips rest on his.

We were both excited feeling the love in dept and the lust on the surface. Our lips were locked into each other and our hands were seeking for a place to get hooked not to leave each other ever again.

This would not go on any more, i thought. I took a step back unwillingly and he was unwilling as well to let go off my lips. We stood face to face and i asked him “Please go!”. He shook his head. “Please go…” i repeated. I was as weak as him at the very moment but i had no choice.  He walked out of the kitchen with slow motions as if his body is heavier for his legs. From where i stood, i tried to visualise his walking in the sitting room with a fake smile on his tired face and his taking the seat just beside his wife.

I put a smile on my face similar to his, held the tray firmly not to let it go off my hands which were still shaking due to what has happened. When i entered the room and saw his wife talking about something passionately and at the same time looking at her husband with sparkling eyes full of love, i promised myself not to see him any more.

When i took my place at the table, i made another promise to myself: not to break the promises i made!

Across the Bosphorus

The office was too busy today (which has been the case most of the time)…Everyone was working like hard-working bees (including me) as if trying to make the most delicious honey or like ants as if getting prepared for winter in hurry…No matter how much work we did till noon, everyone was thinking of the lunch which would be a gathering of our department at a sea-side restaurant across the Bosphorus.

Everyone was so chic like a princess (including me) wearing her best dress to look gorgeous in the ball.

As soon as the the clocks of PCs showed the noon with their silent alarms, we rushed to cars to get on the way as soon as possible. When we reached there, it was really worth it. The view of the Bosphorus was just breath-taking. I took a few photos to share with you but they don’t reflect its real beauty in fact. Still you can have an idea at least. On such days, when i am face to face with the inner beauty of İstanbul, i can’t help thinking that it is like a living city with a soul observing all the people taking shelter under its roof…

After getting seated and served with so many delicious dishes, the delight surrounding our minds and hearts just doubled. After eating up everything to the end, filling our noses with the smell of sea, listening to the music giving  some mystical athmosphere to the environment, drinking our Turkish coffee to keep the last unforgettable taste on our tongues, the most difficult thing was to be able to go back to office to finish the incomplete tasks. But we achieved to return with smiling faces and worked happily ever after

One of those days….

One of those days…i’m waking up and you are there with me in my mind…as if being awake (alive) equals to you!

One of those days…you are with me whole day…while holding my pen (feeling your fingers in my hand), while reading a page (my eyes meet yours), while drinking water (like tasting your salty lips) or smelling the air (filling my whole being with your soul)!

One of those days…i have been carrying you with me whole day again…the sun is about to set…you are now the reflection in my eyes or the hope in my heart to see the sparkling stars in the dark sky (thinking that you might be looking at the same star)…or the slight cloud hiding the moon..or the mild breeze blowing my hair!

One of those days…i’m falling into sleep…now you are the bridge between my consicence and my dreams!

One of those days…my loneliness is doubled!

Terminator-Salvation

Fridaynight…in front of the shopping mall where hubby and me will have a dinner…Hubby said “i wana take you to a romantic movie, plz pick up one”… I thought for a second and i replied “that is such a nice offer, i have been looking forward to seeing Terminator”…he smiled and said “that is why i love my wife, she is romantic deep inside not on the surface”

After getting seated ourselves and placing our pop-corn boxes on a suitable reach to us, the usual high pitch Terminator music filled our ears which exhilarated us….

The war between machines and humans are on the peak in this part. The machines are much more developed and complicated…The humans are much more dedicated and fierce…The visual effects are so real…Only thing that was missed in the movie was Arnold himself…although they tried to compensate this gap showing a machine having some kind of fake Arnold look, it didn’t meet the needs i believe…

Still…

“If your are reading this, that means you are part of the resistance. I recommned to all the resistance to see the Terminator-Salvation which is a 5/5 action-thriller….This is John Connor!”

Wrong Path of Love!

When I met you it was a hazy day

Being so far, you were impossible, people were to say,

On this grievous experience of love

I was ready though no matter what I had to pay.

 

Opening your warm arms with a soft smile on your face,

I was totally lost in this precious embrace,

Feeling safe hearing the music of your heart

I was reluctant to believe that love was just a race.

 

I walked in darkness for so long with blinded eye,

In every step I thought I overcame the mile

After discovering what you gave me was just fake,

I was left with a heart that didn’t know how to survive.

 

The Burning Plain…

Childhood events, memories are the most influential ones affecting a whole life of a person and this movie is the best evidence to approve this truth…

It is about a girl who witnesses her mother’s cheating on her father leaving her behind together with her sisters and brothers to meet her lover. The same girl follows the traces each time their mom leaves them at home. The very same girl decides to take revenge from her mom but she never expects that the revenge will be such a catastrophe…

Soon she finds herself with a boyfriend whom her parents never approve of…she falls in love, experiences every step of love slowly but uncautiously, soon to be scared of herself and to run away leaving everything behind reminding of the audince of her mother but losing her way consiciously rather than in a blind love which was the case for the mother. And finally she comes across with her own daughter with her regrets in heart…

The Burning Plain shortly tells us about the life of a woman with flashbacks into the past and sometimes in a mixed order present coming before the past which saves the movie being a plain and an easy toy for the audience and forces the audience to follow the lines one by one…

Being a Charlize Theron fan especially after seeing Sweet November and Devil’s Advocate, i certainly liked the movie. It seemed so real and rendered the feelings so efficiently. Only point which i didn’t like in the movie was its end since  i felt as if it was incomplete.

So overall, my rate is 4/5 for the burning plain…and i hope noone has such extreme regrets in life causing the plains one’s inside to burn…

The Uninvited!

As a tradition of Friday nights, i went to cinema last night as well and guess what kind of a movie it was??!! Of course a horror movie!!! Well, the people who know me know as well that i am a coward person like i can be afraid of my own shadow at times even And no matter how many times i repeat myself that i won’t see another horror movie, on the release of a new one i am always the first one being eager to see it….

Well…again last night…i ate my husband’s brain to see the movie “The Uninvited”, i persudaded him at last although he warned me that i would be scared, we paid, got the tickets and seated ourselves. Everything was as supposed to be till that point, but once the movie started, i again turned into a coward cat getting smaller and smaller on my seat, holding my husband’s arm, closing my eyes at the most important scenes. Under these conditions, i could only see half of the movie:P But i can still review it

I won’t go into minute details as The Uninvited is also a classical horror movie with dead people, ghosts and villains around.  It is about a teenage girl who lost her mother in a fire accident. After this accident her psychology gets worse and she receives a treatment for a while which does not prevent her seeing illusions still! After the recovery, on her return to home, she comes to know that her father is about to get married with her dead mother’s nurse, which brings her at a threshold of losing her mind totally. But with the doubts in her heart that the nurse could be the murderer of her mom, she chooses to stay calm for the beginning…

As seen above, the topic line does not bring something new to the audience. It is also a remake of a Korean horror movie Janghwa, Hongryeon. I can say only good, different and extraordinary point of the movie is its end. It totally surprises the audience as there is no evidence hinting its end at all.

I would rate it as 3/5 and this 3 points are almost only for the end of movie itself.

P.S. I wasn’t able to sleep last night as i was scared again

Dear Diary -Day 6!

Dear Diary,

 I am quite aware and very sorry about that i could not drop even a single line in my blog the whole week due to various reasons…

Firstly, you know i have  a busy schedule at work but this week has been/will be extraordinarily busy which made me to feel exhausted and hit the bed at around 8 pm and finish the rest of the day in my dreams:P

Secondly, i am suffering from toothache for a week and i am under a treatment once in a week which also takes from my already limited time (and tortures me as i am extremely scared of dentists )

Thirdly, today is the birthday of my dearest husband so i was busy with planning and getting some gifts for him (which is the only good event within the whole day). Oh, let me take this opportunity to wish him once more from my lovely blog area as well

Hello Mr. Choti, i wish you a very happy birthday…long and healty life with all your beloved ones ME coming in the first place of the order:P Hope all your wishes come true…Oh, by the way did you open your gifts?

Over Rainbow

 

Walking on the rainbow

Pacing the colors

Last drop of rain

Absorbed under the bare foot…

Feeling fresh like a new born baby

With a blank mind

to be filled unfortunately…

Following your steps

which are about to disappear

End of the road

Black is more black now

And i don’t know any other color…

Smelling the air

Your smell carried by wind

Passing by me

To some far-away countries…

Clouds surrounding me

You are out of sight

Totally…

No color, no smell

No rain, no rainbow…

Vampires versus Vampires…

I am sure each and every visitor of my blog now knows that i became a big vampire fan as soon as finishing Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series, which introduced Edward Cullen to the whole literary world. On a small tracking, i came to know almost all of the book blogs spared some place for Edward let it be via Twilight movie or the book and i observed especially the teenage girls are enchanted by him rather than getting scared.

Soon after consuming Edward’s intoxicating vampire story, i started to look for more vampire stories as clearly it became a habit of mine being surrounded by them rather than a timepass (it is like wanting more soon after tasting the first drop of blood)

This month i read “Vittorio” by Anne Rice first. Vittorio is a teenage vampire who is turned into one by his lover Ursula unwillingly and unexpectedly. He is partially innocent yet delightful on drinking blood.

After digesting Vittorio’s sad story, i watched the movie “The Vampire Lestat” who is again made eternal by a master vampire to keep him as a company for himself. Again innocent but unable to resist to blood.

Vittorio and Lestat are more like a nightmare for human beings by both their evil sides and vampirous charm,  no matter how much Vittorio struggles to keep his purity safe and no matter how Lestat still regrets for his first hunt. As for Edward, needless to say, he is like an angel rather than a vampire, his decent character, his thirst for love, his agony for his lost soul are making him more human less vampire.

And checking at bookstores, i noticed some other books on the shelves (some are new publications of the old books, others are totally brand new put forward for the hungry readers after the popularity of Twilight) all about vampires, adding new members to the gang.

Still it doesn’t matter how handsome they are, it doesn’t matter how lovable their looks are,  it doesn’t matter they were unwilling humans once, it doesn’t matter they seek mercy losing their souls and it doesn’t matter how they differ, in the end they all drink blood!