Playing chess...

Ability to play chess well shows good thinking skills ;) people in East love chess playing and Sheki is not an exception...

Here is a photo of Sheki children chess school (Uşaq Şahmat Mäktäbi) and picture of the image on its wall...

Door

Dear All,

I could not come out with any interesting commentary to this post...I believe the best thing would be just to keep silence and leave you to look at this picture of a random door in Sheki...

Have a nice day :)

Girls of Sheki...

Girls in Sheki are just like any other girls anywhere: pretty, funny, witty, shy...Summer holidays started in schools now and almost all the exams are over in the universities so young people (who don't study in Sheki) are going back to see their families in Sheki...

this is a picture of a group of school girls who are having a day out...

...people and nature...

People of Sheki always look high at mountains to see if there is still snow on their tops...if positive then it means that the weather will still have some cool or cold days. If there is a lot of snow then people worry that floods can happen when it melts...

as you see on this picture it is already July but some snow is still there...

Rivers of Sheki...

Rivers of Sheki are very strange. I will tell you why…

As you can see on this picture the river is almost dry and one may wonder why it is so wide anyway…well in spring when snow melts in mountains, rivers of Sheki start floading and people wish that the rivers were wider and deeper and the floods wouldn’t harm people and animals. But unfortunately floods happen every year…

So I would call Sheki rivers "extreme" rivers as they are either dry or flooding :)

HAT

You may wonder why the title of today's post is written in capital letters. I will explain now.

The matter is that historically in Azerbaijan hats (caps) were worn by men not only for comfort or warmth reasons. There was another importance given to hats which was pride and honour. If some disgrace happened to a man he would say "Papağımı yere soxdular" i.e. "My hat got buried" (figuratively, of course). Man would wear hats the whole day and when entering the house would put it aside with care and respect.

When first opera was put on stage in Azerbaijan in 1908 there were some funny characters who were refusing to take off their hats or they would take two seats: one for them and one for their hats :)

Nowadays although expressions and respect are left men are wearing hats only when they feel cold or when they want to...one may find of course old men (especially in the regions) who wear hats with the same manner as their fathers and grandfathers did...

This is a photo of the workshop where hats (caps) are made in Sheki...

People behind the scenes...

There are always people behind the scenes that help things to happen. Sometimes they even do more than those who are called the organizers, managers, and people in charge. Sometimes they (people behind the scenes) are very shy and modest and if their managers are not attentive enough they might never get their piece of praise, appreciation or decent pay. Well of course there are extremely wise people on Earth who do not expect praises of people but believe that God sees all and everything that goes around comes around (meaning good things and hard work you do would always come back to you and your children)…

No matter what…this post is devoted to dedicated personnel of Sheki Khan Palace who work there for many years and greet and see off numerous visitors of the Palace…

Dancing...and...national costumes of Azerbaijan...

Azerbaijani people love dancing to their national music (we love dancing to any music of course but especially to the national one). Sometimes we dance so much in the weddings that we forget to eat and return home hungry…Also we have a saying “Mahnı sümüyümä düşür” that would sound in English somehow like “My bones move to this song”. We like listening to music although this has some drawbacks as well because in some parts of the city music in shops or other public places is very loud and one is obliged to listen to it even if he doesn’t want to, another issue here is an extremely loud music in the weddings, which is very annoying to most of the guests (young people do not care of course:)...they say that one of the reasons of this loudness is that musicians are able to hide bad quality or falsely music. I would also say that Azerbaijani language is musical as well, we have letters like soft “a”, “u”, “o”, “g” and “q” in the alphabet and intonation is a bit melodic…

Here is the photo taken in Sheki Khan Palace during the art event. This is a group of dancers showing a performance. Nowadays no one is wearing a national costume in every day life or even to some special occasions unfortunately. Only dancers and performers wear them…Usually the costumes for girls are very colorful and bright with lots of embroidery which I think is quite nice...

Have a good week!

...time to gather hay...

The happiest people are the ones that enjoy what they are doing in life...just like this man who doesn't bother about safety measures and is happy to hang back (drive back if you wish:) with collected (or gathered I am not sure) hay. Well maybe he is not that happy about the work that he does in life but he smiled for the photo. I prefer to think that it is the first option though :)

Have a good day! :)

Belissimo...

I am not Italian but sometimes when I see something very beautiful and something that touches my heart and makes me think like heaven is before me I feel like saying "Belissimo!! :)" I also raise my both arms in exclamation and pleasure. :)

Looking at this picture and landscape makes me feel like I described above...therefore this post is called "Belissimo!!!" :)

Craftsmen's Street

Here is a picture of the street where many craftsmen have their workshops...it is a very good location for them since in addition to being in one of the most beautiful parts of the city they are also located close to the hotel where many tourists are staying...very nice spot for a walk...

Also posting a photo of the interior of one of the shops...not sure if all the pieces have been created by this woman...these are embroidery in silk that Sheki is famous for...very detailed and hard work...

...to do or not to do...or is there the golden mean...

One day Sheki will decide to refurbish its estates and make everything new and shiny...

I wish there was a way and I am sure there is a way to keep the spirit of for example this bridge or these houses of Sheki...so that looking at them it would be always obvious that they are old and from XX or XIX century or earlier but that people of XXI century are taking a good care of them...

Sheki

This is a kind of picture that comes into one's mind when thinking or remembering Sheki. :)

This photo, the one from the previous post and also many photos ahead are a courtesy of our Head of office, Aygen, who had a recent trip to Sheki...

Six trees...

One day a person decided to plant couple of trees in one row...when he was doing this some people supported him, some didn't. It was also tiring at some point. But he decided to accomplish his deed...

As you can see on this picture the person did the right thing...trees are turning into a beautiful example of nature...

Have a good day! :)