News
July News, 2024
Dear UmAy Friends and Supporters, We hope you’re having a good summer and that global warming is not affecting you directly. We would like to briefly capture below the latest from our small corners of the world called UmAy Home. In May, we had the honor of hosting...
The Old Oak: Ken Loach’s Final Film: “When you eat together you stick together!”
In college, we never missed Ken Loach’s films, and they were always included in one festival or another, and would continue to be shown for weeks on both sides of Istanbul. I admire the power and the consistency in his filmography but I confess that it’s been a while...
A provocative and realistic talk by Eva Meijer at Pera Minoa, İstanbul
I came across the Dutch novelist and academic Eva Meijer's name 4 years ago, when my exploration of environmental humanities overlapped with Covid and ITEF's interview with her via Zoom (like all festivals in 2020). I was very intrigued by the fictionalized...
Domestic Violence amongst Syrian Refugees in Türkiye
The event where Ozlem Ezer was invited as a panel speaker addressed the outputs of a 2-year Domestic Violence in Türkiye research, produced through our Digital Space for Civil Space (DSCS) project in partnership with Belgian NGO 11.11.11, Turkish-Syrian organization...
A Moonlight Journey with a Red-breasted Robin
Happy Earth Day everyone! There are many ways to celebrate the Earth’s gifts and warn against the “gifts” that the human beings are causing to harm the planet (‘gift’ in German means poison). I will share the associations of my Earth Day below and pose the question...
News from UmAy
Dear 2024, As the owners, the co-founders and the residents of the UmAy House, we had a challenging year in 2023 as you can imagine. However, we managed to bring together a lively crowd on the Noel/Christmas Day and Night so allow me to summarize it for you (hopefully...
Earthquake Survivors’ Healing
Earthquake survivors' healing: As our supporters and friends know, we have been dealing closely with the aftermath of the disaster since February 2023. Through Cansu’s and Sevilya’s connections in the region, we have been able to reach out to survivors who need a...
International Women’s Day and A Challenging March 2023
Recently, I came across a description of women activists as "the dreamers who dare to envision and demand safe surroundings and flourishing communities; the steadfast movers and shakers who rouse endangered peoples to challenge hostile corporate interests...
Renting the Space
Spring News from Umay, 2022
Greetings from the beautiful season that refreshes us with new ideas and people who are joining us from different parts of the world. On the 10th of March we started to welcome volunteers again. Annabelle was with us during March and she generously shared her...