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Ramadan, Islam’s month of fasting, is set to start tomorrow. Since Turkey’s population is said to be 98 to 99% Islamic, I expect the Ramadan to be rather noticeable. Hence my decision to start an article about it and introducing the topic, since I’m sure it will be a returning topic over the next month or so.

Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic lunar calendar and starts on September 1 this year. Ramadan’s believed to be the month in which Angel Gabriel revealed the Qur’an to Muhammad. For 30 days, all Muslims are expected to refrain from consuming food and drinks during the day (this includes water and also chewing gum), besides this sexual activity during fasting hours is also forbidden. One is expecting to keep their thoughts and actions pure for the sake of learning patience and humility. It’s a time when even very moderate Muslims who do not go to mosques join in on the fasting and prayer.

At the end of Ramadan, the breaking of the feast is celebrated by the Islamic holiday of Eid ul-Fitr, but from what I gather from the papers, the whole month of Ramadan is celebrated. In the old area of Sultanahmet in Istanbul, people get together in the evening to celebrate their ’iftar’, which is the evening dinner consumed to break the fast. According to Turkish Daily News, you’ll be able to find classic puppet shadow plays throughout the neighbourhood which are filled with humour. This puppet play called Hacivat and Karagözwas popularized during Ottoman period in which the two characters portray the illiterate and the educated class, leading to humorous situations. (more…)

Yesterday night we met up with a ‘bunch’ of Erasmus students (30) in the Taksim district of Istanbul for a night out on the town. My roommate and I headed from our dorms to the park, where we went into a cable lift over the park towards Taksim. Once there, I was amazed with how modern everything was. What a lively district! I’d been wondering where all the cool, young people hang out in Istanbul and this is one of the places.

Taksim’s main square is a popular place for big public events such as New Year’s Eve celebration and parades. It used to be an important center for demonstrations also, but after a few incidents in the sixties and seventies the Turkish government decided to introduce a ban on these demonstrations on the square.

After meeting up with a few fellow students from Poland and Spain, we decided to head out and grab a bite. We headed down İstiklal Caddesi (Avenue) which is Istanbul’s main shopping streets and is visited by over 3 million people per day during the weekends. In the sidestreets there are many bars and restaurants, but the area also has a lot of other sights to see which you can read about on Wikipedia.

After having some food, we walked down one of the streets and came past a Nargila place. This traditional waterpipe has been a very important element in the social life of Turkish people over the course of history and they are smoked to socialize. One Nargila, five teas and a water only cost us 11 lira total, which is around 6 or 7 euros. Great stuff!

Then we headed to a bar about which I won’t speak, because the best thing you can do is just head over to the area yourself one day and explore all that it has to offer. It’s incredibly vibrant, even more so than what I’ve seen in cities like Paris or London!

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Last year when I was working at the Bulgarian National Radio, they sent me on a worktrip to a town called Troyan. This town lies in central Bulgaria and is not frequently visited by tourists. I was told by the town’s tourist board to go spread the word, I also met the mayor, that’s how few foreign guests they get . Besides work, there was also some time for sightseeing and we visited the church displayed in the picture.

In general, I find most Bulgarian churches more interesting from the outside than from the inside, although my first encounters with the Eastern Orthodox interior of churches were far from boring. Check out the full album of my pics in Troyan.

Have you been to Eastern Orthodox churches before? How did you like it? Ever attended a service and care to share how it differs from Protestant or Catholic services? Share now and leave a comment.

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Merhaba! Benim adım Bas. Nasılsınız?

After just two days in Istanbul, I realized why so few Turkish people speak English. If it’s anywhere near as hard for them to learn English, as it is for me to learn Turkish, I can imagine most don’t even want to bother with it if they don’t need it.

When I came here and didn’t speak one word of Turkish 3 days ago, I longed for Bulgaria where I actually am able to make myself understandable, but told myself to stop being a p***y and stop whining. After all, I didn’t speak any Bulgarian when I arrived there either.

I arrived at my language course 2.5 days late but I figured I could catch up because I’m a fast learner and I as willing to do the work. When I opened my books at home that day, I was looking at a 100% Turkish book. Not only were the exercises in Turkish, so was the explanation. Looked like catching up will be a bit harder to do, so yesterday when they announced a test for today I decided to aim for something I hardly ever aim for. The middle. Not the top 5%, but just be somewhere in the middle. After all, I had missed 3 days, so I had an excuse for myself.

The Turkish language is very tough for a Western European. We start sentences with the subject and then the verb, but the Turkish do it differently. The verb has to wait until the end of the sentence, which is very unnatural for us. Imagine going to a bar and ordering a drink. “I want a coke.” In Turkish the structure would be more like “I coke want”, but this of course is still a very simple sentence. It gets incredibly complex, the verbs get many suffixes, quite a few grammar rules are unlike anything I’ve had to deal with, even in Bulgarian.

However, I really can’t stand being perceived as a tourist (I’d rather be seen as a foreigner who’s living here) and if you speak English and no Turkish at all, you will get ripped off. Constantly. My frustration with this, my impatience, and high demand of myself to understand the language cause me to pick up the language faster than I anticipated and I even don’t mind doing some studying,

I’m sure within one month my Turkish will be quite okay and I won’t have to fall back on my English, or, since many people don’t understand English, gestures and body language.

Gülü gülü!

Excuse the Turkish symbols in this post. I have a lot to tell but lıttle tıme and I wıll revısıt thıs post later.

It has been 30 hours sınce I woke up thıs mornıng. Last nıght I hopped on a bus to Turkey. Some observatıons:

• As you’re nearing the border, Bulgaria gets more and more Turkish. You actually see Turkish characters like “ç” and “ı” pop up. Also the ınterıor of shops changes drastıcally. I’ve notıced thıs before when I went to Sandanskı, whıch ıs close to Greece.
• The Turkish customs was not as strict as I’ve heard it was.
• Turkish bureaucracy IS as chaotic as I’ve heard it was.
• So are Turkish streets.
• English… the unknown language.
• Istanbul’s like a fairytale.
• Living in a dorm sucks. Especially if you have to share your room with 4 people, your showers and toilets with 80 people and the only door that you can lock in your room is a closet door. Looks like I’ll be carrying my laptop around until I find an apartment.
• Istanbul drıvers are very cheeky, but very polite at the same time.

Anyway, I have to catch up on some Turkish lessons (missed 3 days). Will post something proper once I find a nice wi-fi connection. Lots of great stuff coming up though. When I went to Sofia I expected a place that was 10x more different than Holland. It wasn’t that different. But this place, oh boy

I’m off to Istanbul today. It’s only been 6 months since I came back to Holland from Bulgaria where I lived for half a year. Now it’s time to get myself over to Istanbul for half a year of studying abroad. Since my girlfriend’s been in Holland with me for the last weeks and she’s from Sofia, we’re both flying to Sofia, Bulgaria tonight. I’ll be staying there a night and then I’m taking a 10-12 hour busride to Istanbul. Wednesdaymorning, I should be there.

It looks like Wednesday’s going to be a bit crazy… Out of the bus, into the taxi. Out of the taxi, into the hostel. Out of the hostel, into the classroom for some intensive Turkish language courses. FIrst things first though, I’m leaving in a few hours and still haven’t completely packed yet, plus I need to get myself a new insurance for my stay abroad (but I know which to take, it’s just a matter of signing up). So I’m going to leave you like this. EntreCard users; I’ll try to drop back to the best of my ability, but the next days might be a bit chaotic, so I can’t promise anything. Keep dropping though!

To all the people I know in Holland; I’ve had a great time… To the people I know in Istanbul; see you soon!

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This month’s EC top droppers. These are the people who stopped by my blog the most to “drop” a card at the widget at the top right. Since a drop’s always well-appreciated, I make sure to drop back, but another sign of thanks is presenting the top droppers of this month publicly.

1) Wonderful Pic Collection – About 2 funny pictures per day are posted on this site. That’s it. Nothing more, nothing less.

2) iWalk, U2? - A travel blog & travel guide. Well-written and well-designed.

2) Travel Asia - An Asian travel blog.

2) From A Yellow House In England – The blog of an American ex-pat who lives in the English countryside.

5) Chuvaness… Chakanesss… Eclavu… - One of the most popular ex-pat sites on Entrecard. This blog’s written by a ‘Pinay dreamer’.

6) What a bald guy told me about technology! - A personal ‘technology’ blog about gadgets and software.

6) Search Engine Panel - A blog by a Toronto Search Engine Optimization expert.

6) Sonnie’s Porch - An Assistant Vice President’s take on life, from the Phillipines.

6) PragueConnection - Travel stories from a guy based in Prague.

6) The Traveling Pants - A blog covering a family’s travels, but often relating it to some historical background.

As you notice, many people tied. Would like to be in this list? Start dropping.

To all droppers: thanks a lot.

I took this shot during the Global Day of Action for Tibet on the Dam square in Amsterdam. Besides this being one of the few pictures that corresponded with the theme, I also feel quite strong about the Tibetan issue. If you haven’t already, check out the BBC documentary “Undercover in Tibet” (for free via the link).

To see the whole album of pictures I took during the Global Day of Action, click here.

If you have a wrinkled picture of your own to share and you’re a PhotoHunter, be sure to leave your name and a direct link to the post below! All PhotoHunt posts get Stumbled!

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It’s my last weekend in Holland. This Monday I’m flying to Sofia, Bulgaria, from where I’ll take a bus to go to Istanbul where I will be studying for half a year. Moved out of my apartment last weekend, staying at my parents now, getting ready to stay in a hostel for a while, so I’m officially homeless again. Woohoo! Freedom!

Figured I’d deliver an update on some things.

My visa
After posting the concerns I had about my visa, I decided to email a friend of mine, Ivaylo, who has a lot of experience with travelling and living abroad. His take on it was that once I get my residence permit, I’ll be a temporary citizen of Turkey, which will thus grant me entry into Turkey. So even though I have a single entry visa, once I get my residence permit I should be set.

I’ve tried calling the Turkish consulate over the last 2 days to get a confirmation about this, but haven’t been able to get through yet. Once I’m finished with my studies I’m seriously going to consider helping out ministries of foreign affairs around the world to shape up the external communication side of their consulates and embassies, since I have very few very good experiences with consulates or embassies. The only embassies that I dealt with and I’m impressed with is the English embassy in The Netherlands and the Dutch embassy in Bulgaria, though I guess the latter doesn’t have very much to do (just joking of course).

Monday morning I’ll get up early to call the consulate, just in case I do need to go to Rotterdam to change my visa, which I don’t expect. If I don’t get through, I could of course take care of it when I’m in Turkey.

Language course
I decided that I actually should take part in the language course I blogged about. After posting it here and going through the comments, I figured “why not?” So let’s just do it and see what happens. I emailed them again to double-check if they had seen the email in which I said I would not be attending and to ask whether I could still be part of the course.

And I can. Cool.

A place to live
We set up a group on Facebook which has a big number of the Erasmus students who are going to be doing one or two semesters for an exchange this year. Some of them are already finding apartments and looking for people to come and live there.

I decided to add everyone to my friends with a small note about the exchange in Istanbul and then get messaging to see if I meet like-minded people to live with, or people who are already looking for an apartment. While doing this, a Turkish girl who studied at the university I’ll be attending (Yeditepe), sent me a link to a consulting company that helps with temporary housing in Turkey. BY Consulting Company‘s site looks promising, but they don’t have anything near my university currently. Maybe if I contact them once I’m in Istanbul I can find out more.

Turkish hospitality
Every Turkish person I know or have spoken to through Facebook has been incredibly friendly and from a Dutch perspective are going out of their way to help me out. Offering to hook me up with people in Istanbul who can introduce me to the city, helping me out with ideas for housing, regularly checking on me; I’ve never met a more hospitable people than the Turkish and I haven’t even set foot on Turkish soil yet.

All worries are gone. Everything will be perfectly okay and will run smoothly. The only thing I worry about now is getting my stuff washed and packing my bag with as much stuff as the airline allows (which is just 20 kilograms). Just 3 more nights in Holland!

I took this picture during my trip to Veliko Turnovo, Bulgaria. I was having dinner on a terrace and this stray dog kept begging people for food, shoving its head through the fence and putting it on people’s tables. First time I really saw a stray dog like that, but during my five month stay in Bulgaria I saw many. It was also featured as photo of the day on the website of Radio Bulgaria (the international service of the Bulgarian National Radio).

To see the whole album of the pictures I took in Veliko Turnovo, click here.

Got a story to share about stray dogs? Your experiences in Bulgaria or Eastern Europe?

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