| Natalka
traveled throughout Turkey, keeping journals and 'dog logs'. Natalka felt that the best examples of true working dogs were
found in remote regions which were often impossible to reach without 'roughing it' with
the elements. One could sometimes be delayed for days, for often there were no roads and
the Land Rover would become trapped in mud, snow, or otherwise impassible terrain.
Creature comforts during these travels were few -- bedding down in a freezing Land Rover
not unknown; journeying to the tiniest settlements to stay for a few days, living in the
most humble of abodes, making friends and truly listening...
Natalka did not ask leading questions. She listened. She
would follow wherever a conversation would lead. She didn't approach her travels nor her
visits with her hosts with the notion of TELLING them that she looking for
"___": for if asked, her gracious hosts, no matter how poor, hosts would be
agreeable, generously accomodating and would be pleased to listen to their guest and
oblige with carried presumptions, and thus cast a bias to any information gathered.
She wrote about people, how they lived, and of course,
she wrote of the dogs. She often took photographs to keep with her notations. Excerpts
from her journals make a wonderful travelogue and some of these have been generously
provided to be shared here.
A topographic map showing a portion of Northern Eastern
Turkey which is featured in this part of the journal can be seen here.
The rugged appearance of these dogs, and the striking
regularity with which fawn and the black mask appears, all over Turkey seems to suggest
that one could be a bit more circumspect with claims . The uniformity of these dogs, their
size, and working ability speaks volumes. But is there anyone really listening?
--The pages from the journal are not in a
particular order here. Therefore, the regions described on the following pages are not
necessarily in the neighborhood of the preceding or following pages.The journals and one
'dog log' shown here have been copied from Natalka's notes with capitalizations where she
made these, some quirky abbreviations are given additional notes in square brackets [],
some places where copy is illegible to this page author, a question mark is added. --
Enjoy!
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