No delight here: Tyler Boyd loaned to Sivasspor from Besiktas

Better a darker-skinned person than a Christian of certain varieties and backgrounds, all regional enemies and even then they tend to get on extremely well as individuals, though never communally: e.g. they don't like Armenians and Greeks, but they do like Georgians, although Georgians don't like them at all.

 

The most difficult religion to be in most of Turkey is female.

I hate to generalize, but I've travelled the world over with my ladies and they felt by far the least safe/most aggressively hassled/groped/leered in Turkey, esp Istanbul and the countryside.

Coast down to Kas/Fethiye is pretty chill.

 

Turkey is a complicated and diverse country in many ways. it has definitely taken a religious and authoritarian turn under Erdogan (Er-da-wan for those who wanted Turkish pronunciation). Izmir is the most European leaning city in Turkey by far (Smyrna is the Greek name). Visiting Izmir is not much different from visiting any European city on the Mediterranean. Other cities along the Mediterranean also have a very European style and outlook. When you head further east, the country takes a definite middle eastern turn. Urfa and Antep for example are much more like Syria than they are Naples. The income of the country also reflects that. Salaries in the coastal wealthy cities in western Turkey parallel that of Europe. Those in southern and eastern Turkey are far less.

Istanbul is one of the world's great cities, but also very diverse and complex. Despite the news of the recent CBP election victory in Istanbul(more secular party of Ataturk and one of the four major political parties in Turkey's parliament) , it had been held by his AK political party for years. Of course, Erdogan is making them rerun that election. Sad and I hate it for Turkey. Turkey also has very complicated relationships with its neighbors for a wide variety of reasons, but many of them dating back to being the imperial power over its neighbors during the Ottoman period. I definitely agree with some of the challenges facing women in Turkey, especially the further south and east one travels.

That said, the Turks I lived among and with throughout the entire country were some of the friendliest folks in my 12+ years overseas.

 

UPDATE: the CBP candidate won the Istanbul mayoral rerun election today. A major blow for Erdogan.

 

He has a chance to continue raising his stock by being a USNT regular starter or even standout throughout the Gold Cup. Could get a couple showcases against the likes of Mexico and Costa Rica. So he'd be best served not putting pen to paper until the tourney has ended. May stumble onto a more attractive opportunity than Besiktas, which he'd be receiving off his breakout performance for a lesser team in the same league.

 

Turkish football twitter, which is a thing I follow now for some godforsaken reason, is full of rumors today that MLS teams have come in with a bid of 3.5 million.

1142549166838734848 is not a valid tweet id

1142787607123890177 is not a valid tweet id

Google Translate of that second one:

SPECIAL NEWS / For Tyler Boyd, who is on the transfer agenda of Beşiktaş, Guimaraes Club received an offer of 3.5 M € from Portland Timbers, USA team.

 

totally OT but this is huge. Turkish economic issues gonna trump Erdogan's nationalism if he's not careful.

Good news for Istanbul. Imamoglu seems really sane, rational and smart. Might have to plan a trip over to catch a Boyd match... gonna need to find some Besiktas Outlaws to go with, though!

 

Wow, from one extreme Theocratic state to another... yikes!

 

If I were him, I'd push for one of the Turkish teams playing in Europe this season, even if it's a bit less money. It's obviously early to draw firm conclusions about him based on his USMNT play, but he strikes me as a guy who can be a useful player in one of the better Euro leagues. He's more likely to get there by having a good season or two at a club like Besiktas than a club like Portland.

 

Besiktas is in the Europa League next season and also played in it last year, being eliminated at the group stage. Here are the teams Besiktas played in European competition in 2018-19:

B36 Torshavn (Iceland)
LASK Linz (Austria)
Partizan (Serbia)
Genk (Belgium)
Malmo (Sweden)
Sarpsborg 08 (Norway)

 

Would suck if he ended up in MLS

 

Last summer before Boyd blew up but was coming off a nice loan to Tondela, I was told one club in MLS was sniffing around. So one club has been doing its homework

 

Wonder who the German interest is from.

For me he’s a Bund level player.

 

He wouldn't be subject to the allocation order. MLS updates that list pretty regularly, and he isn't on it. Just google "mls allocation order" and you'll end up in the right place. It's an odd list. Aron Johannsson, Julian Green, and Rubio Rubin are on it, but Wood, McKennie, Boyd, Brooks, etc. aren't.*

An allocation list that's so nonsensical suggests that maybe, just maybe, the allocation system shouldn't exist anymore.

* - edit: Junior Flores is on it too. What the hell!?

 

what's your evidence?

 

He said “for me”. Does an opinion require evidence now?

 

My bad. I overlooked the "for me" part.

 

Funny, my wife said the exact opposite thing. She went to the Greece, Greek Isles and Turkey and said the percentage of gropiness was directly correlated to the amount she traveled East.

 

um... do you mean west, cause Turkey is pretty much more east than Greece, saved few isles. The creepy groping in Turkey was mostly very sneaky stuff (or not so sneaky, like rubbing an erection on my wife in a packed trolley car as she placed herself between the guy and my D.) But I'm not going to condemn an entire country on one family's experience. Truth is, creepy, groping men exist everywhere, and it may have been the 5'7 blondness (even under the scarf they wore everywhere) that got my kids more attention than other places.

Trips to Turkey were, however, the place they learned that traveling in modest clothing isn't just Dad's old-man uncoolness, but actually a good idea (and respectuful.) But we digress...

 

I brought my Polish GF to TJ and Mexicali this past January and she was wearing typical cleavage clothing haha and she got so many stares. She didn't seem to mind though. I mean only stares or leering but nothing creepy or groping but thought I'd mention that its crazy how blonde hair attracts men in many places. I've heard weird stories featuring foreign blondes in Italy.

 

So, does anyone have an interview featuring him? I'm curious of his accent.