October 2018

I had a big project due towards the end of October, so I promised myself that I wouldn’t travel or have too much fun until it was finished. Of course I failed spectacularly at both, leaving Istanbul for two short trips and attending as many dinner parties, concerts, and events as I would any other month. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Best Of The Month

Because most of my time in Istanbul was spent working, the best parts of this months were all the times I got out. At the beginning of the month, I went to the Black Sea town of Agva to celebrate a dear friend’s birthday— we stayed in a tiny cabin on a river and watched lightning storms and rainbows.

I also spent a day in Sofia, Bulgaria to run some bureaucratic errands, which sounds tedious, except that day was perfect autumn weather. And I really love the Balkans, it was nice to read Cyrillic and eat shopska salad and drink quince rakia under the splendid autumn sunshine.

At the end of the month, as my reward for finishing my work, I went to see my friends Natalie and Burak in the French mountain town of Chamonix. The weather got cold as soon as I arrived, but it didn’t matter— we had a few cozy days drinking red wine, eating copious amounts of cheese, frolicking in snow and rain and crisp sunshine, and generally enjoying each other’s company in breathtaking scenery.

Worst Of The Month

The work I had this month was welcome but felt endless, and I struggled to work on only one (sort of tedious) project when there were so many other things I wanted to do. But! I did it, it’s done, and I’m glad I did it, and I’m glad it’s done.

I also found out a close friend is likely leaving Istanbul soon, and that made me sad.

What I’m Loving

Reads: This is another month where I barely read a book; I blame my work schedule, but really I just need something gripping to get into. Any suggestions?

Music: I realize I’m behind on this, but SZA’s album Ctrl is DIVINE. I’ve been listening to it on repeat and loving it so hard.

And I’ve been listening to many other delightful songs too: you can listen to my October playlist here:

Movies/TV: Pesha and I have continued our Buffy The Vampire Slayer watching parties, and in Chamonix I watched two delightful frivolous movies I’d never seen before: Bridget Jones Diary and Notting Hill (yep, lots of Hugh Grant). My sister’s reaction when I told her I was watching these for the first time: “Wtf Katie, I feel like I have failed you.” No worries, now I’ve seen them!

Podcasts: I’ve been listening to The Dream, a podcast about MLMs (multi-level marketing companies). These are basically unsustainable scams, but they are legal, and many people buy into them. The more I listen, the more it seems these only flourish because people don’t want to math.

I finished the first season of Crimetown, which I’ve mentioned in these roundups before, but it’s worth mentioning again because I REALLY loved it.

I also finished the third season of The Thread, which traced nonviolent resistance back through history, with fascinating episodes about Bayard Rustin, Leo Tolstoy, William Lloyd Garrison, and more.

And a few episodes from other podcasts I loved: Bilal’s Calling from Welcome to LA, a podcast my sister recommended that I hadn’t listened to in a while, about a man with a very colorful life and a dispute over a mosque; the Frederica Sagor Maas episode from You Must Remember This about a badass silent-era screenwriter I’d never heard of; On The Edge from Radiolab, an old episode about an amazing and rebellious Olympic figure skater, and the episode from Switched On Pop called Why is ‘90’s music so bizarre?, which delves into weird maximalist nineties songs with weirder stories, like Cotton Eye Joe.

The Film Files

I started shooting for a new project I’ve been thinking about for a while at Nadas, a creative space in my neighborhood. I can’t wait to show you some of this photography project as it unfolds.

Also, the film place I’ve used to develop my film for the last 5+ years has closed. The end of an era.

Ephemera

An article Pesha and I wrote was published in the Guardian! It’s about women engineers who are working to reclaim public space in Zanzibar for women— it was a joy to report, a joy to write, and a joy to see published. You can read it here.

Upcoming

Soon we’ll run our 10K, and not long after that I go to California! It’s my annual trip home, and I’m really excited to see my family.