On September 15, 2021 our dear friend Taylan Sabuncuoğlu passed away at Koç University Hospital, where he was being treated for the last 5 months.
I say we because Taylan, Mehmet, İzzet and I started a friendship 58 years ago which never faltered.
I had just finished my military service and was 15 days late in starting my college education at Robert College and somehow the 4 of us just ended up as buddies. We studied together, had fun together and this continued even after some of us went away for a while:
That’s our graduation day picture below.
- Izzet İncekere went to Colby College as an exchange student in our junior year.
- I went to graduate school in Michigan and was away for 6 years.
- Mehmet Önkal worked in London for 5 years and in Hong Kong for 2.
But our friendship continued as if we had never been apart, upon returning to Istanbul.
I was into resistance training and running in the Belgrade Forrest during our college days, and Taylan used to say “Why are you busting your ass like this, just to live a few more years than I.”
My reply was; “No buddy its to be healthy while I live and minimize the damage from our bad habits.”
He never bought that.
As you can see from the below picture of one of our once a month lunch meeting at our alumni club (Bizim Tepe), which we haven’t restarted after the Covid-19 pandemic, Taylan had put on some weight.
In his youth he was an excellent water skier. When his mother told us to get today’s lunch we would snorkel and spear a few fish.
Taylan lost 2 older brothers and a younger sister at very young ages. Even though we never discussed “epigenetics”, I’m sure that he though his genetic inheritance of did not promise him a long life. I wish I had discussed epigenetics with him hoping that he would take better care of himself.
Please read my posts on epigenetics; to turn off your bad genes and turn on your good genes you have to do 3 things:
- Eat properly
- Move (exercise)
- Attain a calm state of mind (meditate)
May our bellowed brother rest in peace. We’ll miss you Taylan.
That’s it for now; see you all the next time.
