Portrait of a Mardin woman, SE Turkey.

Backtracking through my photography collection from this trip, one thing is striking- my portraiture subjects are mainly men.

In fact I only have one portrait of a woman so far, taken in a market in Sinop. And perhaps one of the reasons for this is that particularly in the more conservative regions of the country women feature in a much smaller public role.

Take a stroll through the back-streets, where the tea-rooms and kebab cafes are packed with only men, and you can almost see the testosterone in the air. And this overtly boisterous atmosphere is conducive to travel photography because, as I've mentioned before, many of the local men want to have their picture taken. In fact, I've been called over by a group of guys at least ten times to take a photograph of them and their pals.

I have never been called over by a group of women. And even approaching them to ask for a photograph I feel slightly out of place, or as if I'm perhaps trying to do something that I shouldn't. And, oftentimes, I'm turned down politely.

Even when photographing this woman above, who was getting ready for a traditional dance as part of a festival, it was the men sat around who were more vocal in giving me permission.

And this morning I approached a group of around eight women selling jewellery, all but one rejected my request - filtered in Turkish through a friend from Istanbul. But the same one who accepted the request also gave me a free bracelet, so, you know...

...it must be my dashing, ginger, half-beard I'm rocking...