On Life & Everything — Hakan Altun
Latest
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Measured
The fourth-floor elevator button had been sticking since spring. People usually pressed it more than once. He did the same and went up with two men from statistics who were talking about football.
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It Was Not a Question
“Do what you want,” she said. “Go wherever you like.” He said nothing. “İyi yıllar.” She hung up. The invitations had arrived in December, and they had arrived for two people. A rooftop in Kadıköy. A thing in Cihangir that was never fully explained.
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The Lines Between Us
Emre came to Kaş because of Cem. They had been friends for ten years. Cem had spent the first of those years in an office in İstanbul and the rest of them...
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Michi
Sora counted seventeen umbrellas at the foot of the first gate. It had rained in the morning, the quicksilver rain that came and went before the vendors had finished arranging their charms....
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It Will Be
Rain runs down the café window. The three men sit at the table by the window. A newspaper lies open between them. The street door opens. Two women come in under one...
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Thinking Is for After
Shadows stretch across the walls. Her mother’s plates form stacks on the table. Newspapers rest beside them. Crates cover the floorboards. Mara spreads a newspaper flat. She lifts a plate from the...
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Written in Ink
In Bologna her mother handed her the tablet across the kitchen table, in a white box with the lid still creased. The tomato sauce moved in folds on the stove and the...
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Let’s Have Some Cheese
I have never been good with weddings. Still, I went. I went because Esra, the bride, was a dear friend. We had not seen each other in years, and there are friendships...
First time here?
Three doors in.
- For essays On Lying
- For fiction The Lines Between Us
- For the book The Fragments
Another way in.
Enter the houseFurther back
Notes
“And what’s your name?” “Wait, it’s on the tip of my tongue.” That is how it all began.
— Umberto Eco, The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana, trans. Geoffrey Brock
I just love these opening lines.
Words with Stories
bosh (n.)
influence (n.)
quarantine (n.)
nightmare (n.)
Rosetta stone (n.)
broadcast (v.)
boycott (v.)
maverick (n.)
guy (n.)
deadline (n.)
algorithm (n.)
robot (n.)
candidate (n.)
disaster (n.)
companion (n.)
desire (n.)
consider (v.)
kiosk (n.)
noon (n.)
curfew (n.)
ostracism (n.)
vaccine (n.)
malaria (n.)
school (n.)
magazine (n.)
horde (n.)
turquoise (n.)
algebra (n.)
lunatic (n.)
pupil (n.)
salary (n.)
assassin (n.)
sabotage (n.)
bank (n.)
eavesdrop (v.)
farce (n.)
idiot (n.)
inaugurate (v.)
juggernaut (n.)
lecture (n.)
melancholy (n.)
nostalgia (n.)
rival (n.)
trivia (n.)
utopia (n.)
window (n.)
X-ray (n.)
yacht (n.)
zero (n.)
bankruptcy (n.)
serendipity (n.)
mentor (n.)
quixotic (adj.)
decimate (v.)
emoji (n.)
muscle (n.)
lens (n.)
camera (n.)
climate (n.)
museum (n.)
gossip (n.)
apron (n.)
pamphlet (n.)
dunce (n.)
tulip (n.)
biscuit (n.)
silhouette (n.)
petrichor (n.)
All the words
Trivia
Instruments
A fullscreen clock, a blank page to write on, a teleprompter, noise and rain, today’s twilight—18 instruments for work, calm, and focus.
See them all