Happy New Year from Karagoz and Hacivat

For complicated reasons that we went into greater deal with on our other blog "The Daily Vampire," Turkey and France are not getting along well these days. For the entry on our sister blog, we sent New Year's greetings from the beloved French comic book character Asterix the Gaul. Here, we shall go with a much older entity in the Turkish shadow puppet figures of Karagoz and Hacivat, whom we believe may actually be in the public domain as Turkey has traditionally had more lax copyright laws than Europe and America.

Karagoz, the one with the beard, and Hacivat, the one with the mustache, are the lead characters in Turkish shadow puppet theatre. There is considerable dispute as to when the plays were first performed. According to Wikipedia, it was long believed that Karagoz and Hacivat first appeared during the reign of Sultan Selim (1512-1520), but there is historical evidence to suggest they go back even further in time than the 16th century.

Karagoz represents the semi-literate village dwellers while Hacivat symbolizes educated intellectuals. The plays remain very timely to this day because children can be entertained by them while adults can observe how these two characters represent the deep divides in Turkey, which exist to this very day. Conversely, Karagoz and Hacivat are the best of friends, yet they also can't stand each other.

Secondary characters in the plays, which usually run about ten minutes each, include the Drunkard, Zeybek and the old woman. The plays always conclude with Karagoz and Hacivat having a major argument. There is a similar Greek shadow puppet character named Karagiozis. In both Turkey and Greece, there has always been a concern that each passing generation will be less interested in traditional shadow puppet theatre than the previous one. And, tourists have been known to take a greater interest in shadow puppet theatre than the natives.

In Turkey, Karagoz and Hacivat have long been associated with Bursa, Turkey's fourth largest city and former Ottoman capital, before Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror came to the Bosporus shores of Constantinople/Istanbul in 1453.

Happy New Year to everyone, and we hope you keep reading this blog in 2012.


SIDEBAR: The answer to our Road Trip Quiz from last week was "C" and the answer to the Rabbit Ears Quiz question about "The Brady Bunch" was "A."

Program Reminder- "Food Party" at IFC

Since we promoted the documentary "Food Inc," which is going to be on PBS tomorrow night, on our other blog, we thought we'd promote another food-related show- "Food Party" which will premiere on IFC next Wednesday at 10 p.m.

To be honest, we aren't fully sure what the show is about, but it sounds very interesting!

The show's web-site describes "Food Party" as a 'non-reality cooking show' with host Thu Tran (pictured here) as hostess.

"Food Party" will also feature puppets as culinary assistants and a selection of 'fictitious celebrities' (like Pee Wee Herman?!).

Each episode runs 15 minutes, and two back-to-back shows will air next week.

Episode One is entitled "Thu Has a Normal Day," and the host will go down Main Street where she will apparently try to steal ingridients from a local retailer to make lunch.

Episode Two is entitled "PBJ Love" and it will feature Thu meeting up with Peanut Butter Jerry who gets stung bees.

I found this actual quote from the show: "It's duck blood. You don't like it! I've been chugging it all day. It's got a delicate flavor."

Alas, I don't have IFC, but ironically my 70-year-old mother in Colonial Heights, Va., (not where she actually resides) does!