Turkish Robinson lives on dam lake island

TUNCELİ

A 83-year-old man has been living on an isolated island on the Lake Keban Dam in Turkey’s east, with the locals calling the lonely elderly “Robinson,” likening him to “Robinson Cruseo,” the fictional novel character by 18th century English author Daniel Defoe.

Ziya Abay, known as “Robinson Ziya,” spends all day looking after apple, pomegranate, grape, cherry and quince trees.

He planted the trees in memory of his wife who passed away years ago.

In time, the transportation between the island and his house in the Pertek district of the eastern province of Tunceli exhausted him.

He eventually moved out of the city life and started living on the island to look after the trees 24/7 a few years ago.

“Every season in the island is beautiful. But you have to see the island in the spring. All plants and trees blossom and the island turn into a multicolored place,” he told state-run Anadolu Agency.

“Like you, people come to see me from the surrounding provinces of Elazığ and Tunceli,” he said and added: “Once, 70 people from [the southern province of] Adana came to meet me.”

Ziya also recommends nature enthusiasts to visit the island in the fall. “You see all shades of yellow in the fall on the island.”

Robinson Crusoe was first published on April 25, 1718. Epistolary, confessional and didactic in form, the book is presented as an autobiography of the title character, a castaway who spends 28 years on a remote tropical island near the coasts of Venezuela and Trinidad.

The book led many readers to believe the fictional character was a real person.