Welcome to the drum history podcast. I'm your host Bart van der Zee and today I am joined by my friend Cezar Inca Olu all the way in Turkey at the Istanbul Agap Factory. Cezar, how are you? I'm good man. Thank you. It's great to be here. Awesome. Yeah, this is really cool We're gonna be talking today about the full history of Istanbul Agap symbols Which I don't know a lot about I know it goes way back and there's a lot of obviously rich Symbol heritage in Turkey. So I'm excited to To learn this and I gotta give a big thank you to our mutual friend Afonso Pene in Brazil Who set us up from delta percussion who is just a great friend of the show. So he's how I how I met you Yeah, yeah, he's a good guy. I know him From the industry. Yes. Thanks to him. Yes. And now we're here. So Yep, awesome. And yeah, we got a big time difference. It's 9 a.m. 9 20 a.m. Where I am and it's 5 15 p.m Where you are so on on that note because you want to go home Why don't we why don't we start uh start rocking here and per usual with the show? Why don't you go back and just take us to the beginning of the company and run us through The history of the company. Oh, definitely First of all, I would like to thank you Bart to give us this opportunity to be on your podcast page. Thank you. It's a great honor I want to start with Our founder mr. Aghub Tomerjuk, you know in the istanbul aghub brand name you see this aghub name He is the founder of istanbul symbols back then and then changed to the istanbul aghub Our founder aghub tomerjuk is his surname Was born in istanbul turkey in 1941 And as he was growing up in a place called samathya neighborhood of istanbul He followed in the footsteps of his older brothers oxen and garbis By beginning to work as an apprentice symbol smith at the age of nine At the only symbol factory in turkey. It was the old k factory. Yeah, because back then The the zidjin family had already moved to states, but there was only the old k factory And aghub had started there at nine At the age of nine to work there like just giving some giving water to the workers, you know carrying stuff all day So here he learned and later helped to refine every aspect of the symbol making process Becoming a master at every process and eventually becoming the chief symbol smith at this factory Until the company ceased production of the of making symbols in turkey in 1977 So he was feeling like a fish out of water when the company when the factory was closed down And after a little over a year spent working various odd jobs He became to be determined to continue the turkish tradition of handmade symbols on his own because it was the only thing He knew back then and he wanted to continue to do it With a little bit of asking around he was able to locate and buy up Much of the equipment and tools he used at his previous company And he rented a small small workshop In a place called bakur köy area of istanbul He began to experiment and produce some symbols with the help of his dear wife uskui tomurgic so after that In 1980 aghub officially found that his company with the name of istanbul symbols So thinking about this it's just really interesting how in that in that in that area Obviously zilgen being so very very old. Um, and I can direct people. There's a zilgen episode, but um About how I know they'd already moved to america like you said and then I believe it was the the cousins of the zilgen family were still operating the k Factory so so it all stems from that so that that's such a great, um place to grow up Working what it what an awesome opportunity. I mean that's so cool Yeah, that that was the only school to learn how to make symbols and aghub was in that school and he carried that Heritage yeah after that Cool. So so in 1980 That's it he forms istanbul symbols not istanbul aghub. It's istanbul at that point No, the first name was actually the first name was zilgiler. It means symbol makers But because this name was very close to zilgen. Yep And uh, he he of course decided to change it and he he called it istanbul symbols Cool. So, uh, he made symbols in this Workshop and he was you know talking to the turkish drummers in istanbul and he was Selling his symbols to the stores in famous stores in istanbul And then he had some connections in the states. Uh, he decided to Send his symbols to the states for the first time. So in 1982 aghub sent the first symbol Symbols to the nam show Wow in los angeles It it is the it is a time where meluvis Seen these symbols and he said something very very important and everybody still remembers today. He said they are back What he meant by this that the the handmade traditional handmade turkish symbols were again in the market because as we know In the states The traditional turkish Made symbols hand hammered symbols They didn't do it that way back then. Yeah, so again because aghub continued to do this heritage Those kind of symbols were in the market again So it was the It was the moment that istanbul symbols started to be famous In the world. Wow, so no one else was doing it at that point because obviously Symbols were being zildans were being made in america um, yeah I guess in it would be 80 82 Sabian was just being kind of formed after the separation of the the brothers So and that's not made. I mean, that's canada That's canada. So this is at this point The one of the only you know turkish symbol brands that's actually reaching america If not the only and um Wow, that's really cool Yeah, it's the only company because in turkish. There was no other symbol factory symbol anybody who could make symbols It was only only aghub Got it. Yeah So in 1984 aghub's eldest son And now company co-president sarkees tomorjuk officially joined the company There was a growing demand for the symbols and it was difficult to even fill the order. So he needed people So he asked his eldest son and two years later In 1986 aghub's younger son and now company co-president arman tomorjuk officially joined the company And they helped their fathers by Doing some hammering on the symbols or the lating On the symbols they actually worked and made symbols with their father and now they are running the Company, Istanbul aghub company is run by Arman and sarkees tomorjuk like today today. It's run by him. Oh, yeah, cool. Yeah aghub's sons are running the Company now. That's great. So from 1986 until 1996 Istanbul symbols continued to grow considerably and gain the recognition and admiration of many of the greatest Musicians many of whom visited the factory from all parts of the world during this era Elvin johns billy heart, tony williams, denny gotlep, jack the jonette, art blackie, cindy blackman and many others came to visit The factory and these names actually were endorsed by istanbul symbols back then because they really wanted to play the Original turkish handmade symbols Wow. Yeah, and and as we know having a roster of big, um, I guess in this case western musicians would be It's obviously that's how people see it. So that's that's that's really cool. And I mean, it's those are some great jazz guys So were they seen traditionally as like jazz symbols or would they be more all around? Um, you know, we're rock guys using them. Um, or were they specifically just jazz at that point really? Yeah, that's the point actually istanbul symbols were always known to make the best jazz symbols And still people know that istanbul symbols istanbul agop symbols are doing the best jazz symbols That's true. And this is the the area that we are best at But we just wanted to add something to this. That's why i'm going to explain in a bit, but that's why we are also making some sort of symbols which are very Which have modern Sounds and are made in the modern by the modern technologies because the the world demands not only jazz symbols, you know So we need some symbols that have modern sounds To meet the needs of the other other drummers as well. Yeah other than the jazz drummers great So, um in 1992, uh, arman completed his education in england and returned to istanbul In 1993 he attends The music message retro in germany frankfurt and helped to expand the company's distribution to 30 countries worldwide He's the younger son of agop Who is who is the co-president of the company now? Yeah So After oxen's retirement saris became the chief symbol smith in the company And unfortunately after a tragic c-accident the company founder agop domerju passed away in 1996 After their father's death the two brothers quit the old factory Where they had worked for 16 years and formed istanbul ziljiler In 1997 and further distinguished themselves with the istanbul agop brand name And adopting a more progressive approach towards sounds and designs So the company to the tradition the company kind of split then so then it was there was istanbul agop And then there was istanbul How do you say it mehmet? Oh mehmet. Okay. That's where that happens that so that's where that ends So there was no real bad blood between the family. It was just so the father So agop passed away as you said. Yeah, and then they decided we're gonna switch gears and do a more progressive kind of Uh style which is really similar to the other, you know lineage of some some famous symbol companies that have split I guess that's a common Yeah, I was gonna say that actually actually mehmet This this person was partner of agop because agop when he started to continue this business He needed a partner with some financial help So he was mehmet also was the co-president of that company And when agop passed away he himself wanted to leave and open his own company with the istanbul name And uh istanbul name actually both sides had the right to use istanbul name. So yeah when mehmet left agop's sons two sons decided to move with the name of istanbul agop And they adopted more progressive approach towards sounds and designs, but also stayed true to the Just tradition Sure. Yeah, I was gonna say like how does that work because it's it's I mean, it's the same basic logo. It's the same basic name minus the the um The agop and the mehmet. So um, yeah, so that's cool I was I've always kind of been curious about that. So it's it's just a different technique of making them. Is there Um, is there like bad blood between the the two companies? Like are you guys kind of like for lack of a better term like mortal enemies or do you guys? No, no Uh, first of all, there's no relationship as a family. Yeah being being relative And there's no Bad blood, let's say. Uh, we don't we don't have any business contact separate companies totally separate companies And istanbul agop is the leading uh symbol company from turkey when we talk about the production manufacturing quantities and product range and worldwide coverage by distribution or artist roster But there's no problem. Just the name is common and by law Both parties can use the same logo Okay, that's good to know. Um, now is there a uh, is this something also, um Like the recipe and the like the formula is this something where it's it's very secret and like one person in the family knows it or is it more of a Like in the factory, it's not quite like that Like it's a little more open about how the process works. Well, actually, uh Arman sarkis two brothers and their mother still alive uskui tomorjuk They have the heritage from their from agop actually and they know all kind of Formula Of course, this is something that workers can understand and you know, also they some of them No, because the workers that work with us. They work for many years You know, we are working Even we have just a man who was there in the beginning with agop So these people of course learned from agop and then from the two brothers and they Of course, no Some parts of the formulas and have to make symbols But of course in the end it's let's say the family secret. Yep But not a hundred percent of a secret, of course. I got you. Yeah Okay, I thought it's in the factory Sometimes there's there's the discussion with other companies of like it's in a vault and one person knows it And if that person dies then it all goes away, but um Okay, so the two Istanbul's split you said that was in the 90s. That was 90 97 97, okay split. Yeah, so where do we go from there? Okay, after this split, uh, two brothers, uh, you know, they wanted to be more progressive and they wanted to Create some kind of more modern symbols, uh into the industry. So by 1998 They created another symbol series called the alchemy They created it to expand their sound beyond traditional jazz symbols And better to better suit the diverse range of more modern and higher volume music The alchemy series was the first symbol series Which are which were made by polishing the symbol Because all the symbols were actually in a traditional finish natural finish These symbols were heavier Louder and with the polished Brilliant look gave the symbol a different look and also more open sound. Yeah So this was the first time in the turkish symbol making history because yeah, you traditionally think of them as being very dark Very yeah hand hammered. So now you're looking more like a modern Symbol at that point in time. Yes. Yeah, this got more modern Players into the istanbul agop roster artists And When we come to 2004 now istanbul agop opened the first company owned office outside of istanbul in los angeles california usa To further improve our relationship with artists and drummers and further expand the availability of our instruments because You know, united states is the real arena for music and People really follow all the drummers from the united states. So you have to be there. You have to be close to the Artists to give a better service. Yeah So we opened our own place In los angeles to do the distribution from their direct to the shops And to be closer to the artists and in during this time more and more legendary and high-profile drummers joint the company like Cindy blackman santana edis mohammed james gettson lany white mike clark joye waranker. These are the Names that joined the company and Today we have about 150 endorses Wow in the states. Wow Yeah, and they're not just joining because they like the way they look they like the way they sound They're beautiful. Yeah in addition to that. So, um, that's very important For us, you know, we really want a player a drummer Whoever he or she is He should really like the sound of our cymbals because that makes more Special when they come to the family because they love the cymbals. They love the sound Yeah, I would imagine that you guys have a lot of employees who have been with the company for a very long time Like it just seems like that kind of a place where people want to work and they stay there and yeah You know, it's it's that easy for people who for for people to learn In a short time how to make cymbals and when they learn they stay with us because we Do our best to create the best possible environment for our workers And they as I can see As we all see they enjoy being here and working Making cymbals because they also understand that this is a brand from turkey Which all around the world people like and follow, you know, yeah Yeah, absolutely cool. So then so net we're into the modern day now. So so this is like 2004 in the 2000s everything's uh Everything's going great. Anything from there? Well, yeah, uh, actually By then the manufacturing Place the factory was a little bit smaller for the upcoming demands because demand was Getting bigger. So in 2007 We moved the factory From kind of city center to the little bit edge of I mean outskirts of istanbul to a bigger factory and bigger machineries But still continued to do hand hand made symbols of yes And in 2007 we moved and we had a Bigger manufacturing factory and the bigger warehouse and today In our shelves. We always have like 10 000 symbols ready to be shipped. So this was a big step, uh, you know to Meet the needs of the Music industry. Yeah, so this was 2007 and when we come Three years later than that in 2010 It was a very very important year because it was the 30th year Of 30th anniversary of the company So released our 30th anniversary symbols as an expression of our ongoing commitment to traditional symbol making And these symbols were so much liked By the people and we we wanted to make them a little bit limited But then we decided to change that idea. They are still in the market Oh, that's funny 10 10 years later the Yeah, if people like them why why, uh, you know, why keep it keep it to yourself and and just exactly So those became a part of your your your everyday line. That's awesome. Right cool So now another very important date is coming. It's 2000 actually in 2009 we created another symbol series called exist Um, this is very important because as I told you before people always knew that Istanbul symbols Only made just symbols So we wanted to change this idea and add another kind of Series after the alchemy line because alchemy was handmade too. Just a polished brilliant finish But the exist series in this series we wanted to do these symbols In in a preformed way what I mean by preformed is we preformed the symbol After the casting and everything we just On on a mold symbol mode we press and then we make the hammering on the symbol So because of that it's It's more affordable In price but still have a great sounding. Yeah, but had a More modern approach more modern look and more modern sounds to some other Modern players, you know in the industry sure and these series are very popular right now In 2013 We released this exist series with a redesigned redesigned logo And playing a perfect balance of technology and tradition to put genuine musical instruments within the reach of players everywhere Yeah, they're they're beautiful. I've seen these a lot on online so so it's the pressed metal versus the hand hammered and all of that stuff and And we can go through it, but I have a few questions too once once we get done with the actual history of maybe you can tell people So you always hear hand hammered versus like let's say non-hand hammered or pressed so With the process of hand hammering like if you get one of your like absolute top of the line Completely hand hammered hand handmade symbols That is is machine. Is that basically It doesn't get used in like like a machine isn't involved at all in the hammering any of that It's completely made by hand from start to finish. Is that correct? Or maybe you can tell us just you know Overview, what is the process of of hand making one of your like top of the line symbols? That's a great question actually Because we really want people to know And understand what is a handmade symbol means Actually, when you say handmade symbols, definitely you still use some machinery But machinery doesn't affect the sound of on the symbol So when you do the casting When you when you mix the elements like 80 percent copper and 20 percent tin You get a you get a disc we call blank Bronze disc we call it blank and after you roll it under the rolling machine and put it under the oven like eight to 12 times according to the depending on the size of the symbol you get a Bigger like kind of a pizza dough you make the metal rounder and bigger and under after this process If you just press it by the machine on a symbol mold That means you already gave the symbol profile by the machine and you didn't add complexity you didn't add a hand touch on the symbol So every symbol that you make in this way is going to sound same Because they are All made by the machine. So the handmade symbol means After you do the casting and the oven and the rolling machine when you have this round and wobbly surfaced metal when you put the bell On the on the symbol by a press of course Then you send it to the hammering. So This wobbly surface all each symbol has a different wobbly surfaces So in order to give a symbol profile a decent profile The the hand hammer masters they they hammer a symbol hammer the symbol Let's say in a 20 inch right. There's four to five thousand hammer beats hammer hits this You have to hammer it In that quantity just to give the symbol profile And because all the symbol Wobbly surfaces are different You maybe hit some part of the symbol with a force and the other part of the symbol with another force That's why the hand hammered symbols have a more versatile More complex and rich sounds in them. Yeah, because you manually give the profile So it is very important to give the profile by hand hammering. This is called the handmade symbol. Got it, but when you use the pressing modes all the symbols are going to be same And going to sound same Which if you do those then then those there's nothing wrong with that obviously But then those can be sold for less expensive and those are what I guess Of course are typically your your less expensive symbol lines And also I imagine that the machines and the the press molds and all of the molds that you're using It's not like in some you see in some american factories like a bunch of robotic arms moving around just mass producing things I imagine it's still it's not like this completely automated system even with the machinery like It's probably still You know not completely robotic and all that stuff. Definitely.  Yeah that has to be done In our way it has to be done by the hand hammering hand hand made symbol and Symbol making process. So this is important for Our heritage let me follow that up with asking you Kind of a broad question. Why is turkey? So special with symbol making and I don't know if it it's because of that that just happened to be where It you know the zillions 400 years ago or whatever kind of kicked it all off But what makes turkish symbols so like why is it so sought after and why is it mainly in turkey? I know there's chinese symbols as well, but um, yeah, yeah, what's the what's so special about it? I think you already told it because zillion had started in the turkish land back then it was the ottoman empire And this armenian family By the way, i'm armenian too. My my bosses agop sansa are many into Just information. Yeah, this family started this business by just doing As far as we know some church bells and some symbols for the ottoman army because the ottoman army when they Marched they used the symbols to Scare the enemies, you know, so it just started in this manner and then Because of the music jazz music and then rock and roll music in the states It demanded big bands and it demanded drums and then symbols And they had to do some symbols people Especially the old k factory in in turkey. They also Made more more and more symbols every day. So after that agop continued this heritage and he made symbols By the way, if agop didn't continue making handmade symbols, probably most probably today nobody would have Done done that. Yeah, because everybody in turkey the other companies Are people who learned from him or who learned from the people who learned from agop again Yeah, so there there were these people who learned from him and then they opened their own Shaps and the others learned from them and they opened their workshops. It became really a Heritage from turkey and everybody were speaking. Okay, the turkish symbols are the best You know because it all started here And it continued To be the real handmade symbols from here So that made i think istanbul turkey very famous for the symbol manufacturing.  I like that that it's kind of like a thing where you can't just go out and Um and now things are changing with technology, but it's like you can't really just start a um a symbol company Yeah, if it's going to be handmade symbols, uh, it seems like it's got you have to have that That heritage and it seems like there's a seems like there's a lot of respect for each other Obviously the the the feuding between the two, uh Other companies is kind of famous, but um seems like there's a lot of respect and love just for you know You do your thing especially with you guys with the two Istanbul companies A lot of respect which I I think is really great. Oh, yeah, thank you So on the timeline there, we were up to like the 2010s after 2010 we did redesigning of the exist series with new logo and then three years later in 2016 we in our factory we opened a special Research and development area, which is called agop atelier We are trying new ideas for sounds for symbols and we try new prototypes This is a special place for us to create new sounds to the symbol world actually and today We have in the exist series a new new series called exist dry dark which people choose Not only express them like symbols, but also sounds because these symbols are Really are made in a way to create different sort of sound and more personal More uh complex sound for the for the drummers And today we have the most musical and diverse symbol lineup Anywhere actually supported by a roster of the most influential and compelling drummers of this generation Yeah, and we are trying our best to carry this this heritage totally you guys have a very uh Heavyweight a lot of big big drummers on your roster, which just again goes to show that they they love the sound and all that stuff Yeah, so yeah, you guys are and and people probably already know this but you can you can get them everywhere at all your symbol shops and online and all that stuff and And uh, I guess so if you're going to buy one of these it's probably good to go out to a shop and actually try it Because if it's hand hammered, they're all going to be a little bit different, right? Man, you're so right We always suggest to recommend the people that uh They want to buy our symbols just to go a physical shop and try the symbol Because if you choose if you choose the symbols online You can't really find your own sound because you have to try it You have to really play it with a stick and then decide if you want to buy it or not So we always recommend to go to the stores now. We are in uh Approximately 50 55 countries Uh by distributions and a lot of shops all around the world Yeah, I think I said it before but you're the international sales director So you're the guy, uh, you're the guy spreading it around which is uh, you're doing a good job. Um So not only me we're a team here. Oh, yeah family and we are doing our best You know to spread the word out. That's awesome Um now as we kind of get close to wrapping up here, um, and if if if not, that's fine But are there any cool like stories of like I remember doing the the zilgim one and it was like Oh, they tried to blow up the prime or the uh, the uh, sultan and they People were exploding in the uh factory. Is there any kind of neat, you know stories from back and like, um, you know The 80s when the company started or anything like that. There is one thing one story that I can I can share with you Um before agop has had passed away He was working on a new symbol series and he took some notes, uh on his notebook in Armenian language And uh after he passed away his two sons wanted to finish his own project Uh, because his wife had this notebook They asked from her and he she gave them and they worked on, uh, this new symbol series By studying these ideas of agop and uh after they finished it They did it And they gave their father's name to this symbol. It's called the agop signature series with the green logo. Yeah This was kind of uh To carry on his name, you know, yeah In the symbol world. So we this is one of the best selling symbols also And it's a it's a great remembrance to our founder agop actually. That's great. Awesome Well, um says are I think I think that's a great coverage of of the whole history things that I'm taking away from this are Um, that it's cool to know sort of that they were working at the k factory that that agop was at the k factory Because that has its own whole history of a lot of people don't know that the The zillions were in america and there was a k factory running there So it's just all these little branches off of uh, kind of the original, you know core group of symbol makers. Um, So I really like that. I didn't know they started in, um, 1980 I thought it might have been Earlier, but it's like well if they were working at the k factory then He had he had he had to start he wanted to keep it going. Um Yeah, they were actually working for that factory. So they were in the business But officially founding the company was 1979. Okay changing the name to istanbul is 1980. Wow Man, that's an exciting time. Um, and then the the music then is completely changing.  It's in in the 80s things were changing big time Yeah, exactly and there we maybe it was a great time for agop to open the factory back then because The music was changing and it helped for the company to Get well known worldwide. Yeah Awesome. Well, um, if people want to check out the symbols, which they should and look at the artist roster and there's a little Kind of history on there. You can go to istanbul symbols.com.  I think that's that's the key thing to this too. Is is they're all different That's very important. Yeah, we are also on social media facebook and instagram So we are posting a lot of stuff you can learn and see our artist roster products information Great. Yeah, awesome. Well, um, i'm excited to go out to uh, to my shop here, which is called badges drum shop here in Cincinnati and and i'll be playing them and uh and and Try and find something so says are i really appreciate you coming on the show and this is a nice Kind of concise episode where we can just I like how you're prepared with the dates and everything. This was this was perfect So thank you for coming on and uh, enjoy your your evening in in uh, in turkey and i will enjoy my My morning here in Cincinnati. Yeah, great. Thank you. It's been a pleasure for me to do it with you barth Thank you for this opportunity again Awesome, uh, let's talk soon. Okay. All right. I'm sure I'll see you at one of the drum shows. All right. Bye. Bye. Yeah, great Hey guys, I hope you like this episode Um, I wanted to take a quick second here at the end to give a big thank you to some new friends I've made at our tom they, uh, sent me kind of a care package that included Uh, moon gels both the classic blue and then the clear ones which are really cool Um, which I use all the time on snares and toms and i'm actually gonna try them on the bottoms of symbols Which is a cool little trick. Um They also sent the uh moon gel workout pad, which um, I'm not sure if you've tried it It's just basically like that moon gel kind of a squishy material and it's awesome It really really helps you practice um with with a kind of more Dead surface that isn't so bouncy so you can really hone in on what you're doing And if you can if you can sound good and get rolls going on there, then you know, you're doing something, right? Um But something that's really cool is I got the black holes, which are mesh pads that you can just extremely easily Snap on to your uh existing drum set And they just they have some tone to them and I think they said that they bring the volume down by 80 percent So you actually still hear a little bit of the tone of the drum um, and I got them because I have a baby and Practice time has uh become very hard to come by so I got them I set them up and I was actually talking to someone on instagram kind of uh through the messenger because I was posting pictures and I was like Uh, he was asking how I liked him and I was like well, man, they're they're really cool from what I can tell I'm about to actually start practicing and I'm not going to tell my wife and uh see if It wakes her up with the baby um because I was down in the basement and the first floor and then they were on the second floor Um, so I was setting them up. I'm like, okay.   Um, so it worked perfectly I put the workout pad on a symbol stand kind of to my right because I don't have low volume symbols yet and um It worked out perfectly. So I highly recommend them. Um all the r-tom products. I use the workout pad Probably every day, um I'd like to use it more, you know for for an hour or two every day But I probably use it about 10 minutes every day and it's really helping me out I'm using I'm going through stick control And just hitting all of the different stick control exercises on the workout pad and I love it So huge shout out to r-tom You can go check them out at r-tom.com and uh and pick up some stuff for yourself If you like this podcast find me on social media at drum history And please share rate and leave a review and let me know topics that you would like to learn about in the future Until next time keep on learning This is a Gwyn sound podcast


Good afternoon, folks. This is Jacob, filling in for Tom. So they tell me that we're out of the bear market, huh? Everything popped up today. The Dow's up. The future is up 0.13. The NQ is up 0.55. The Russell down a little bit from its kind of pretty quick rise the past few days. So, yeah, Tesla has made major gains today. We'll talk a little bit about why that is the case, but they are pretty poised to get a nice piece of the pie regarding other companies coming into the EVs because they're going to be supplying the charging stations. Well, at least GM will be using it. So that's pretty stellar for them and that really kind of sent them a little bit higher today. We have the GDX down, the Dollar still at the 103.50 mark. You know, we had a few touches on the 104 level above it, but you know, it's coming back down again. So we'll see it's still on a trajectory, possibly to reach the 106 area, but we will see about that. NVIDIA up minor today, just kind of consolidating at this point after that massive run up it had due to the AI news. Microsoft up 0.8. We'll talk a little bit about them. I want to talk today about Meta as well. They're running into some issues. We'll go into that. Apparently there was some kind of criminal activity being conducted on Instagram and I think the European courts want Zuckerberg to answer for it. Steel Dynamics, we have that down about 1.4% today. Again, it just crested over that 100 mark that we were looking at, but it's back down. Minimal volume, we'll see if it tests the last day with volume again. Let's see what else we have. Today, I think I want to talk a little bit about what we have planned here. Some interesting news from Palantir, and like I said, we'll hop into that in the show. They have a Lisa CEO does. Alex Karp has a nice criticism of the rest of the industry, calling for a halt. Palantir is providing some AI for the military. We'll see how that goes in. Talk a little bit about Finland. The prices for electricity are negative there now. This could essentially be a roadmap for the rest of the world in the future as we're approaching this, quote unquote, renewable or greener energy kind of dynamic. Folks, stay tuned. We will be back for the three o'clock hour.


We'll be right back to you.  Welcome to your 1 p.m. Update I'm Steve Rhodes coming to you live from sunny Delray Beach, Florida. Right now we've got the Dow off about 58 points, 27018 S and P's down to Nasdaq 100 up one point. So basically flat markets out here, Russell is the Well, the transports are the leader on the way here. We're going to get out here. We're going to get out here. We're going to get this is up 1% 14 cents. No big deal. There you've got gold up $2 over two pennies. No seven cents out there. Lights we crude is off 278. Oh we need a chart that would be helpful in the update out here. So let me get that going for you. Sorry about that. Dinners. Let's get that out here. And so there we go. Basically today, I don't know if you caught the show. Not that you had to, but Larry showed the update at nine and at 10. And it feels like we're just watching paint dry because I don't think the markets have really done much since that last 10 o'clock update. Here's what you'll watch during the day, and we were doing the same thing at nine o'clock price bounced off of it. And that is on a $2.5 million is trading down into its support level of 27 008. It's a closing basis that is critical there. And what we saw the we saw the Dow Equity Futures contract is test that level for a couple of hours. It was doing that from nine o'clock. Did it again at 9 30. Did it again at 10 o'clock and did it once more at 10 30 and then bounced out of there. No big bounce. Nothing big a big bounce. It's a big bounce. It's a big bounce. It's a big bounce. It's a big bounce. It's a big bounce. It's 25 points from where we're at right now. That's not likely to happen. If you did see a close on a 30 minute base below 27 008 what we ought to see is run down to 26 8 93 and really it's the Dow Equity Futures contract that is the one that is providing you with the most amount of information right now. For you to see the Dow Equity Futures contract. It's a big bounce. It's a big bounce for a silver silver has an interesting pattern. If we take a look at it right now, it had broken through resistance. And if the high from between 12 30 and one gets taken out, it'll move up into the 18 15 18 26 level. Hey folks have a great day. Stay tuned for Steve Rhodes. That's me. The


Hey everybody, welcome to The Waldoch Way. I'm Jessica. Today's video is a homeschool show and tell. The homeschool show and tell series is an open collaboration hosted by Abby from Rooted and Rest and myself. The goal with this series was for us to be able to show that there is not one size fits all for homeschooling. And the way we do that is by bringing homeschoolers from around the world together each month to talk about a different homeschool related topic. We have discussed everything from homeschool planning to our favorite educational gifts and sneaky learning toys to joining us for morning basket, our favorite subjects and more. This month, we are going to be talking about nature study with you guys. And I am so excited because we love nature study, but I feel like nature study sometimes gets a bad rep because people feel like it has to be elaborate to be effective. And if you take nothing else away from my channel, I want you to take this away. Nothing, and I mean nothing in homeschool has to be elaborate to be effective. Like it can be so simple and still be super effective. This month though, we are all coming together to talk nature study and I'm just seriously so excited about it. I cannot wait to watch all the other channels and all the other videos about this. And I hope that you will too when you can do that by clicking the link in the description box down below for the playlist and then watching all of the videos from people that are collaborating with us. So let's talk nature study in our homeschool. You guys, it is seriously the most simple subject that I teach and I say teach in a very light manner because I don't actually teach it per se. Now I did used to teach at a co-op before this year because well, the pandemic and it was fantastic. It was a lot and free. And we use the exploring nature with children curriculum, which I love. We've actually been through it two full times with Emily and I would have loved nothing more than to have taught it a third this year at our co-op because it is a fantastic curriculum. If you are looking for a nature study curriculum, something that walks you through, hold your hand gives you topics each week exploring nature with children is what you want. It is written in a way that you can take as little or as much as you want. You can do it as light or as heavy as you want. It's just, it's fantastic. I absolutely love it. I happen to know and love the person who wrote it. Lynn is amazing and I love the curriculum too. I actually also have a look inside if you wanna know more about it. I will link that right here for you guys so that you can see more kind of like what the curriculum consists of. But other than that, we've never done a formal nature study of any kind. Nine times out of 10, our nature study is because something has wandered into our yard or flown into our yard or found its way into our yard. We live in an extremely rural area and there are lots of critters. There's just lots of critters, you guys. We have had lessons on sandhill cranes, possums, alligators, tons of different birds and that's all just because they have found their way into our yard. So that is probably the biggest way that we do nature study is something shows up, we are interested in it and we find out more about it. And it is really that simple. That is probably 80% of nature study in our homeschool is something shows up in our yard and we learn more about it. Another way that we incorporate nature study into our homeschool is by visiting our state parks or national parks. We love going on adventures together. So when we can and we're trying really, really hard to make more time for it. When we can, we like to adventure to our state parks and our national parks. We recently went to Blue Spring State Park which is a state park about two hours from us that is known for manatees in the winter and it did not disappoint. So the springs are a constant 72 degrees which means that in the winter that is much warmer than what the river is and the manatees go there to stay warm. So we were able to see hundreds of manatees in Blue Springs when we were there and it was amazing which that of course led to us coming home and learning more about manatees. So that is always a great thing too. I mean, we never plan anything elaborate. We just get out in nature and enjoy it and kind of see where it leads. That is probably how we do nature study is we just enjoy nature and see where that leads. Now, we do live in Florida which does mean that we have some wild weather and when it's not being wild, it is blistering hot. So there are many times when we cannot get outside or we can't get outside as much as we would like to get outside. So while we love the simple fact of getting outside nature and learning more about it sometimes it's not always a possibility and when that's not a possibility we use a program called No Sweat Nature Study and it is with Cindy West and I absolutely love Cindy West and it is live classes two times a month. Two times a month she picks different topics. She releases the schedule a year in advance so you know what it's gonna be on and then you also have access to all of the previously recorded sessions as well. Now, because the weather in Florida is normally blistering hot in the summer and that tends to be when we don't go outside as much, we don't always do the live classes. The way we choose to use that membership is to use it when we need it. So we use the times that it's comfortable to go outside and the times we're enjoying outside, the times when the weather's cooperating to get outside. And then when we can't get outside we will use either a live lesson if it's scheduled when we can't get outside or that library of lessons because there are so many in there and we will use that as our nature study instead of being able to go outside. So that's what we use that for and I love it. It's fantastic. She helps you through actual nature journaling.  So it's a really great introduction to nature journaling and through that, it has also kind of taken the pressure off of what I even thought nature journaling was supposed to be. And so now we all keep nature journals and so thank you, Cindy, for that. And she has your label and she teaches you about it as she's drawing it and talking to you and showing you it's just a really, really fun class. So if you live in an area that has like blistering cold winters or, you know, atrociously hot summers or you just have wild weather or maybe you live in an area where you don't have alligators and sandhill cranes and possums in your backyard because I know that that's not exactly the most common thing in the world. I really highly suggest if you don't have that to get the no sweat nature study because it's easy and you don't have to worry about teaching it. So it's not putting one more thing on your plate because Cindy's gonna teach it for you. So those are my tips for nature studying. My top tip would be just to get out in nature, period. Get out in nature and enjoy it. Take some of the pressure off of yourself. You don't have to, you know, journal while you're out there. A lot of people will just see it, you know, enjoy the nature while you're there, go for hikes, enjoy what you see and then come back and draw something in their nature journal that you saw while you were out and about. Or, you know, just talk about it. I mean, it doesn't have to be elaborate to be effective. Don't forget that. Just get out in nature and enjoy it. And if you can't get out in nature and enjoy it, then sign up for Cindy's no sweat nature study membership so that you can still be getting nature in without having to worry about getting out in bad weather. Hope you enjoyed hearing and seeing a little bit about how we incorporate nature into our homeschool. And I would love to hear how you incorporate nature into your homeschool. So please tell me in the comments down below, what do you use for nature? How do you use it? You know, how do you incorporate it? What's your favorite thing that you've learned about nature? Maybe this school year. I would love to know more. And then don't forget to go to the description box and click on that playlist so you can see what all of the other homeschoolers had to say about how they incorporate nature into their homeschool.