In a two-part interview with Career by Choice, a blog run by expat career coach Megan Fitzgerald in Rome, this week I talk about the lessons of Expat Harem in forging my expat writing life. Answering questions about personal branding and career success abroad, I explain how writing about my life overseas and editing Expat Harem connected me to a worldwide band of peers, and gave my career and conflicted expat mindset a new cultural context. Part one Part two
Three Word Goals for 2009, a la Chris Brogan: Project. Realize. Live.
Chris Brogan asks what our three word goals are for the year ahead. Mine: PROJECT - project myself into my communities, raise awareness for the work I do, foster meaningful connection to others
REALIZE - a combination of 'execute' and 'achieve excellent results', materialize dreams
LIVE - breathe deeply, take chances, do new things I might love and old things I still love, get rid of stuff that slows me down or doesn't reflect who I want to be, embrace my health and opportunities
From The Mailbag: Writer Notes Expat Harem Offshoots Of Community & Education
Thanks for your message Monika Jones! "As a writer with experience in both project management and book publishing, I'm captivated with Expat Harem and the exciting offshoots of the book. What gorgeous intersection of literary works, community engagement, and education."
And thanks too, for your review of the book:
"After an intense experience living in Istanbul for three months, I sojourned back to the U.S. to catch up with family and friends. One afternoon on my way to a bookstore to buy a copy of Expat Harem (which I'd been meaning to read when I was in Turkey after meeting one of the editors) I met my cousin for coffee. Immediately, he handed me a book. The book: Expat Harem! I was thrilled. His mother-in-law had read it with her reading group and wanted me to have it. It was so serendipitous! I started reading and the stories spoke to my experiences as a foreign woman in Turkey - right down to the smells, awkward interactions with pseudo-relatives, and observations on popular culture. Since I've lent it to friends and family, and found it is a way to share my experiences with them in an accessible format. What I appreciated the most is the lyrical, lovely writing and honesty of the works."
From The Mailbag: Bryn Mawr Alumnae Bulletin's Coverage Of The Book Sends Couple To Turkey
A message from one of the Expat Harem writers in Istanbul about a couple she met in Istanbul: "A couple visiting from NYC came to Turkey because she, a Bryn Mawr alum, had read about you in the Alumni newsletter when the book came out. She does not know you, but was intrigued enough to read the book, loved it, and insisted that they spend several weeks in this country on their way home from a trip to Ukraine, where she had been living for a few years."
Going On Record As A Travel Writer With Rolf Potts' Interview Series
Excerpt from a travel writers interview by Rolf Potts at his Vagabonding site, 2006. View the full interview here. How did you get started traveling?
My fascination with a wider world cropped up early.
As a toddler in countercultural Berkeley, CA my favorite pastime was "French Lady", a tea party with Continental accents.
I began traveling even further when I learned to read -- comic books.
Instead of poring over Archie & Veronica, perky storylines that revolved around characters who never graduated from high school nor breached the border of their staid hometown, I was entranced by the global expanse of history and people and culture revealed in the Belgian-made graphic adventures of Tintin.
Tracking a drug-smuggling ring in Egypt, discovering a meteorite with a Polar research vessel, surviving a plane wreck on an Indonesian island -- this was life!
Tintin's travel tales, and many others after them, remain reference points. Last fall at a museum in Nazca, Peru one long-haired, head-banded Incan mummy stirred a pleasant flashback to "The Seven Crystal Balls", as well as the awe of my twelve-year old self. It's no wonder I pursued a degree in archaeology.
How did you get started writing? AA: In the early '70s I kept a journal on childhood road trips where I recorded preferences for the wildness of Baja's bumpy sand roads and discovering the mother-lode of sand-dollar graveyards in San Felipe to a sedate spin around British Columbia's Lake Victoria and a fur-seal keychain from the gift shop.
Later I was a correspondent, trying to explain my own culture to teen pen pals in Wales, Northern Ireland, and Malaysia, while I searched for clues about theirs hidden in precise penmanship, tarty vocabulary, and postage stamps with monarchs -- some butterflies, some queens.
During a slew of 20-something media and entertainment jobs I wrote and edited for years, whenever the opportunity presented itself, for a book packager and literary agency in New York, and for television, theatre and film producers in Los Angeles.
What do you consider your first "break" as a writer?
AA: Reviewing Pico Iyer's essay collection Tropical Classical: Essays from Several Directions for the Far Eastern Economic Review in 1997. The newsweekly magazine based in Hong Kong was equivalent to TIME in Asia. I was living in Malaysia and devoting more attention to my writing career, so it was a breakthrough to write for a major publication and huge audience about subjects which mesmerized me.
What is your biggest challenge in the research and writing process?
AA: Calling up facts. Seeing the larger story. Sitting down and doing the writing!
What is your biggest challenge from a business standpoint? Editors? Finances? Promotion?
AA: Publishers and acquisition editors and publicists seem to have narrow expectations for travel literature so for my next book I plan to devote a lot of energy to a detailed marketing plan which will accompany the manuscript in its rounds to publishers. Jennifer and I learned quite a bit about marketing to publishers with Tales from the Expat Harem, which was initially turned down by 10 New York houses who liked it but couldn't fathom its market (Turkey's too limited a subject, they said).
We've since determined that it addresses a multitude of distinct groups beyond the basic cells of travelers, expatriates, women writers and travel writers. In fact, we found enough specific target markets we were able to fill a hundred pages of our marketing plan with actual contacts of potentially interested people and organizations, like Turkish American associations, women's and Middle Eastern studies programs at hundreds of North American universities, and specific Turkophile populations like the alumni of the Peace Corps who served in Turkey.
And the beauty of a marketing plan which breaks down readerships is that a writer (or if you're lucky, a publisher) can contact all of these people.
Jennifer and I also compiled more practical subsidiary audiences for the anthology, like multinational corporations with operations in Turkey, and embassies and tourism organizations which might use the book as a cross-cultural training tool or a promotional vehicle. We were successful enough in our initial efforts in academic marketing that the book is currently used in at least three university courses and is stocked by more than 100 academic and public libraries worldwide.
Have you ever done other work to make ends meet?
AA: Always. Often my most satisfying work has been poorly compensated. I do believe that will change, eventually! Until then I continue to be a proponent of pursuing the work you love rather than the work which pays best.
An essay about a transformational subway ride which I wrote for an obscure website in 2002 not only led me to be quoted in the New York Times and brought me my literary agent, but it also now appears in The Subway Chronicles book published by the site's creator, alongside venerated New York writers like Calvin Trillin, Colson Whitehead and Jonathan Lethem.
What travel authors or books might you recommend and/or have influenced you?
AA: Recently I enjoyed Blue Latitudes: Boldly Going Where Captain Cook Has Gone Before by Tony Horwitz for its mix of historical research, personal experience, and contemporary journalism.
Historical travel writing also connects me to the lands I find myself in, and points to the parallels which still exist.
My steamy days in Kuala Lumpur were enriched by reading Somerset Maugham, whose Malayan fiction was entirely believable. A series of historical Asian travelogues and contemporary scholarship released by Oxford-in-Asia jogged my imagination and similarly, now that I am based in Turkey, I'll be turning to the Cultures in Dialogue series at Gorgias Press, which resurrects antique writings about Turkish life by British and American women travelers and refreshes them with contemporary academic analysis.
What advice and/or warnings would you give to someone who is considering going into travel writing?
AA: Advice: Read the bulletin boards at Travelwriters.com. A lot of very fundamental wisdom there about the life and business of travel writing. Warning: Don't post a word at Travelwriters until you've read the boards for a week or two and have a good understanding of what topics have already been covered, and how best to introduce yours.
What is the biggest reward of life as a travel writer?
AA: Sharing my view of the world with others. Adding to the conversation. Having every excuse to adventure.
Expat Harem Book Tour: 49 Days, 10 U.S. States
We did this and survived to tell about it! Jennifer Gokmen and I spoke in front of more than 800 people in 10 states, including conferences, festivals, a consulate, bookstores, alumnae clubs, cultural organizations, and a cigar factory (that place smelled the best). See photos of this nutty feat.
EXPAT HAREM EDITORS U.S. BOOK TOUR SPRING 2006
--13 April, New York City, NY, 7:00PM NEW YORK CONSULATE GENERAL OF REPUBLIC OF TURKEY 821 United Nations Plaza
--15 April, Providence, RI, 1:00PM BOOKS ON THE SQUARE Books on the Square 471 Angell St.
--21-22 April 21-22, Buffalo, NY GENDER ACROSS BORDERS II Gender Institute, University at Buffalo
--April 23, Washington, D.C. 1 PM BRYN MAWR CLUB OF WASHINGTON, DC Private residence
--25 April, Washington, DC, 6:30PM CANDIDA WORLD OF BOOKS 1541 14th Street, NW
--26 April, Washington, DC AMERICAN TURKISH ASSOCIATION OF WASHINGTON DC (ATA-DC) Türkevi, Dupont Circle
--28 April, Dayton, OH, 7:00PM BOOKS & CO. 350 East Stroop Road
--30 April, Nashville, TN, 2:00-4:00PM CAO Cigar Factory 6172 Cockrill Bend Circle
--1 May, Tucson, AZ, 7:00PM ANTIGONE BOOKS 411 North 4th Avenue
--2 May, Tempe, AZ TURKISH AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF ARIZONA (TAA-AZ) Private residence
--3 May, Los Angeles, CA, 7:00PM BOOK SOUP 8818 Sunset Blvd. West Hollywood
--5 May, San Diego, CA, 6:30PM TURKISH AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO CHAPTER (TAASC-SD) (open to public) Location TBA
--6 May, Irvine, CA, 2:00PM ORANGE COUNTY TURKISH AMERICAN ASSOCIATION (open to the public) University of California at Irvine
--7 May, Los Angeles, CA TURKISH AMERICAN LADIES LEAGUE (TALL) Private Home, Beverly Hills
--9 May, San Francisco, CA, 7:00PM CODY'S BOOKS 2 Stockton Street
--10 May, Berkeley, CA, 7:30PM BLACK OAK BOOKS 1491 Shattuck Avenue
--15 May, Lake Forest Park, WA, 7:00PM THIRD PLACE BOOKS Lake Forest Park Towne Centre 17171 Bothell Way NE
--16 May, Seattle, WA, 7:00PM WIDE WORLD BOOKS & MAPS 4411 Wallingford Ave. North
--18 May, Ann Arbor, MI, 7:00PM BARNES & NOBLE 3235 Washtenaw Ave.
--19 May, Ann Arbor, MI, 7:00PM BORDER'S 3527 Washtenaw Ave.
--21 May, East Lansing, MI, 2:00PM BARNES & NOBLE 333 E Grand River Ave.
--May 23, New York, NY 7:00 PM BRYN MAWR CLUB OF NORTHERN NEW JERSEY Private residence
--25 May 2006, New York, NY, 6:30PM MOON & STARS PROJECT'S MAYFEST Middle East & Middle Eastern American Center The City University of New York 365 Fifth Avenue
Academic Conferences featuring EXPAT HAREM contributors rather than the editors:
--30, 31 March and 1April, Valdosta, GA CHANGING TIME(S): FEMINISM THEN AND NOW The Southeastern Women's Studies Association (SEWSA) The Women's Studies Program of Valdosta State University
--31 March-1 April, DeKalb, IL 2006 MIDWESTERN CONFERENCE ON LITERATURE, LANGUAGE AND MEDIA (MCLLM) English Department of Northern Illinois University
--24-28 May, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada THE IMMIGRANT AND ARTISTIC LICENCE AICW 2006 Conference University of British Columbia
Expat Harem Talk, Candida's International Bookstore, Washington D.C.
We were pleased to be joined by journalists, travelers, culture hounds and artists including: Liz Gracon and Danielle Monosson, friends we met in Istanbul during their posting to the U.S. Consulate there; Kay McCarty, whose daughter has worked in Diyarbakir and Mardin, Turkey (a fan of Expat Harem, Kay bought her 9th, 10th, and 11th copies of the book at Candida's!); traveling an hour from Baltimore was Jeannette Belliveau, the author of soon-to-be-released Romance on the Road, a book documenting the controversial 'sex pilgrim' movement which Anastasia reviews (from an opposite stance) in the upcoming July/August issue of Perceptive Travel; Dawn, two-time visitor to Turkey for classes in the art of glasswork at the Cam Ocagi /Glass Furnace (inspired by EH contributor Diane Caldwell, Dawn may soon find herself relocating to Turkey); and Kirin Kalia, an editor at Migration Policy Institute, who brought the Bryn Mawr alumnae count on this tour to 10.
Shifting From Writing For Others To Writing For Myself, With Mediabistro's First Journalism Bootcamp
My Mediabistro alumni interview with Claire Zulkey for Mediabistro Toolbox. I took Mediabistro's first media program given by creator of the series, Victoria Rowan, in 2005.
What course did you take, how did you hear about the boot camp and why did you decide to take it?
I took Parris Island Journalism Boot Camp with Victoria Rowan, Fall 2001, eager to reinvigorate – and focus — my writing career after being laid off from a trade magazine editorship.
I wanted to make the shift from writing for others to writing for myself.
Also, like many writers who have not explicitly studied journalism or the business of writing, I knew I could benefit from a more professional approach to the craft.
Did it lead to any assignments, connections or jobs? What did you learn?
Yes. One week we interviewed newsworthy acquaintances and tried to sell the profiles. With that material I published a profile/book review/event announcement in the Village Voice — the managing editor’s hybrid idea when I emphasized the curating work my multimedia poet interviewee was doing at St. Mark’s Poetry Project, and an upcoming performance there of a new Brion Gysin book.
Thanks to Victoria’s pragmatic ‘so-what, why this audience, why now’ coaching, emphasizing these elements of my pitch set my subject at the helm of an upcoming event where avant garde artworld legends would be appearing. The right story for the right audience.
I also understood from Bootcamp that I had a time hook most appropriate for a weekly newspaper like the Voice. The editor’s suggestion entailed a lot more work but Bootcamp taught me that if an editor was gracious enough to tell me exactly what he could use all I needed to do was accept the challenge. As Victoria explained, “We’re here to eliminate the reasons an editor has to reject your work.”
MB’s Bootcamp offered operable information about writing and selling in seven genres (personal essays, travel, op-ed, business features, profiles and reviews and tone-dependent pieces like the New Yorker’s Talk of the Town).
The bootcamp also underscored the importance of astute portfolio building to get a writer where she wants to go.
I benefited most from Victoria’s deconstructive clarity about composing and selling nonfiction writing — and today it is appreciable how much I learned about piloting a writing career.