This week is my final week in Gaziantep. From Aug 24 onwards I have an internship at the archeological site of Pergamon. The modern city of Bergama with its archeological site of Pergamon is 50 km away from Ayvalik. In order to get there, set the mosaic studio up in Ayvalik and be ready for work on Monday early morning, I have to leave Gaziantep on Thursday Aug 20. It is so absolutely crazy to try and do everything at the same time.  But I really want to work in Pergamon and  so I will try to do the crazy thing to work there and on the mosaic in Ayvalik. Not sure how this will work out. Here in Nusret’s atelier we have finished almost all figures for the floor. It took 4 weeks of two full time workers and one part timer to set up the workshop, build the frames, collect some of the stone material and produce 5 mosaic designs. Only one big fish is not finished yet. He seems to be sad …

A special post needs to be written about the collection of lime stones at the banks of the Euphrates. During all the days in Gaziantep and in Nusret’s atelier we were discussing the material for the background of the mosaic. It should be of a beige or cream color. I wanted to use the marble that we are also using for our kitchen floor in the  Ayvalik house in order to have continuity in color and material. But Nusret really dislikes the structure of the marble and keeps telling me that there is a beautiful lime stone at the bank of the Euphrates river that would be excellent material for the background. I can not decide for a long time. Partly I feel Nusret is right, the marble crumbles quite a lot. But I have it in the Atelier, waiting to be cut – so easy. On the other hand it is also very attractive to go out and find stone – and even more to find it at the place where maybe the stone …

This week is all glueing stones onto the canvas and let the fishes and other sea creatures come alive! We also drink arab style coffee and eat freshly made lachmanchun for which the filling is made by Nadide, Nusret’s wife and which is then being baked in the neighborhood bakery. Lachmanchun is a very thin dough topped with a thin layer of minced lamb that is mixed with spices and herbs. This with fresh ayran, the salty drinking yoghurt is the best lunch you can have in extremely hot Gaziantep summers. This week I have moved from the hotel to Ayse Gultekin’s home. Ayse lives in Gaziantep and offers me the room of her son who is on holiday with his father. Her spacious flat really reminds me of eastern Germany with the tram rattling by on the street outside and its parquet floor and double french doors. In the past years the Ministry of Culture of Turkey has opened 12 regional conservation laboratories to take care of conservation of state owned cultural goods in …