IZMIR – (THIS) IS MIR
Just a month before the start of this festival we received invitation from Turkey. There was little hesitation wether to accept it or not, because it was a short week during the autumn school break, so accepted it, they accepted me, off we went. I had no time for preparation as I was in the middle of administration and accounting of 12th BuSho, which lets no other tasks to focus on paralell, so little blindly I flew to this city of West-Turkey of 4 million. Beautiful bay, floating boats, palm trees on the streets, order and noticable cleanness, even in the local Bazar. Well at least in downtown. But if you leave the city, you’ll see what originally expected, but hey… just don’t leave it.
Upon arrival the support of the council and the city was clearly visible. The wonderful Kordon (H)Otel, French institute nearby as well as the Izmir Sanat with its unique technical background all astonishing the visitor. The event is advertised on billboards, promoted on all possible platforms throughout the city, even the Pegasus Airline’s on-board magazine made a mention of it. The opening ceremony had it all: red carpet, staff members in costumes, official ceremony and a local Jámbó Zimmy look-a-like concert, all these with waitresses running around to take your order. Same thing was repeated 2 days later in the city hall where we were overwatched by Ata Türk himself who followed the event from a picture hanging on the wall. The BuSho presentation with Hungarian shorts and Turkish subtitles (with not just a little help of my Friends from the Hungarian Cultural Center of Istanbul) went all well, next year we will host Izmir Kisa Film Festival representatives with Turk shorts. Exciting!
