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Tag: Turkey

  • Drugs, Prostitution and Same-Sex Marriage

    That’s the title of a 10-15 minute presentation I’m giving soon for my Intercultural Communication classes at Yeditepe University, here in Istanbul. I designed it in such a way that it can also be enjoyed without my vocal explanations and here it is!

    Drugs, Prostitution and Same-Sex Marriage

    View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: travel international)

    The Intercultural Communication course is likely to be the most innovative course I’ve taken during my higher education (sadly — universities should make more use of modern technologies). Every Tuesday, we get into a classroom at 4 o’ clock in the afternoon and have a video conference with a class in Lincoln, Nebraska, US. We present ourselves, our culture, customs, daily lives and our countries to each other. It’s fascinating, because both the Turkish class as well as the American class have students from many different backgrounds.

    This part of the Intercultural Communication course, called Global Classroom, has been quite fun so far. We’ve managed to make 2 students from the Nebraskan class dance in front of the camera and they’ve managed to make 2 of our students wrestle in front of the camera (or was it Jiu-Jitsu?).

    There’s only a few sessions left, so I hope I actually get to do my presentation, as our lecturer wanted everyone to prepare one, but there will be no time to actually execute all of them.

    I hope the presentation has given you an insight into Holland’s liberal policies and if you have any questions please feel free to reply. I love answering questions about these issues.

    How about in your countries, how is your government dealing with these issues? What is your personal opinion on these matters? Has the war on drugs failed? Is same-sex marriage morally wrong or is keeping it illegal a form of discrimination? What about prostitution?

  • The Tourist View

    A view of the most touristic part of Istanbul. The mosque on the right is the Blue Mosque or Sultanahmet mosque, left of that is the Hagia Sofia which was a cathedral, but was turned into a mosque during the Ottoman empire and left of that is the Sultans’ palace. Quite a nice view, huh? On the left side of the picture, you see some land at the other side of the water… That’s where I live. Literally less than 2 minutes away from a nice sit at the sea with the view of the Hagia Sofia and the beautiful buildings around it.

    The picture was taken from Galata tower. If you come to Istanbul and want to come home with some cool pictures, go to Galata tower. If you have many friends who go to Istanbul, all of you will have the same pictures though, as everybody seems to go up the Galata tower. It’s also a nice spot for panorama shots.

  • Hypnotized by Futbol

    By far the most popular sport in Turkey is soccer, or as they call it futbol (football). This snapshot was taken on Istiklal Caddesi during the match of Turkey’s two biggest teams, both coming from Istanbul: Fenerbahçe versus Galatassaray. It’s one of the top 10 derby’s in Europe and one of the most exciting games for futbol fans across Turkey and especially in Istanbul. People in shops were following the match on the radio, waiters watching on televisions (as you can see in the above pic) or if they don’t have a TV in their restaurant you can see the waiters running around the corner whenever they can to look at a TV through the window of a nearby shop or restaurant.

    How popular is soccer/futbol/football in your country? What do you call it? What other sports are very popular in your country?

    I’m off to Bulgaria for a few days but posting will continue. You can stay up to date by following my Twitter feed, or subscribe to this blog by RSS or email.

  • Mosque Street Shot


    click to enlarge

    A typical shot of a street on the Asian side of Istanbul in Kadıköy, where I live. I didn’t want to feature this picture until I realized that this very every day scene for me might not be so ‘every day’ for the my many visitors from around the world. Click on the picture or here to get a larger and higher quality version of the photograph. In Holland we have a huge debate about the towers of the mosques, called minarets, spoiling the way the street/neighbourhood looks.

    What do you think, would one (or a few) of these towers spoil the sight of your neighbourhood? Why (not)?

    If you’re not yet subscribed to updates from this blog and you’d like to be, do so now either by RSS or through email updates. If you have any questions about Istanbul, about me, anything else, or you’d just like to tell me how your day was, do not hesitate to email me at .

  • Turkish Lamps

    click to enlarge

    Taken in a touristy shop along Istanbul’s famous Istiklal Caddesi (Independence Avenue), this photo features the famous Turkish glass mosaic lamps. I’m not sure about the origins of them, whether they’re Middle Eastern, Central Asian or from other regions or just from Turkey, but they’re undeniably associated with Turkey. Every one of them is very unique and very beautiful and they make a great object for photography, don’t you think?

    I see there are quite a bit of mosaic lamps on Amazon, what lamps do you prefer? The mosaic lamps there or the ones above? Though the ones on Amazon are true works of art, I prefer the more exotic ones.

    Can anyone tell me more about the origins of these lamps? Can anyone tell me how to take these lamps on a long busride or airflight without breaking them?

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  • Flickr Banned in Turkey? Nope.

    It appears to be a false alarm. Flickr’s working fine now. Disregard this post 😉

    Just received a message that popular photo management and sharing application Flickr is unavailable in Georgia. The sender asked me about the situation in Turkey, since a few weeks ago when Blogger/Blogspot was banned in Turkey, it was also unavailable in Georgia.

    Guess what? Flickr is unavailable in Turkey also. Could it be a new ban? Who knows.

    I guess we will find out soon. Either it will come back online, or we will see something like the below:


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  • Kadıköy Bazaar

    The following shot was taken at a big bazaar that’s held every Tuesday and Friday in Istanbul’s Kadıköy area, which is on the Asian side of the Bosphorus.  You can find food like fruit, vegetables, spices, nuts and grape leaves there, but also clothes such as the headdresses below. I was walking around there with a blond girl and boy, do you draw attention if you’re a young, blond, European woman in Istanbul. People were yelling out “Obama, Obama”, “hoş geldiniz” (welcome), “hello!” and “buyrun” (come in please/come here).

    I apologize for the recent lack of updates. I had a friend from Holland visiting me here, but will now resume my posting about life in Istanbul. 🙂

    I plan on posting a lot more pictures and short stories like this one in the coming time, so if you’re not yet subscribed to updates from this blog, do so now either by RSS or through email updates.

  • Obama Elected, The World Rejoices – Turkey, Macedonia Perhaps Not So Much

    Even though sentiments are mixed in the US, around the whole world people have reacted enthusiastically about Obama‘s election. People around the world have had more than enough of Bush’ policies and were hoping for a change. Change being the keyword of Obama’s campaign and McCain being associated with Bush, caused the most people to be more favourable towards Barack Obama. The website If the world could vote? shows that all over the globe, more people were rooting for Obama than for McCain.

    Obama is young, ‘black’, a Democrat and instills hope, whereas McCain was seen as very similar to Bush, partly due to employing similar tactics to the ones of former Republican campaigns.

    One country that seemed significantly pro-McCain on aforementioned If the world could vote? is Macedonia. Why? The Republic of Macedonia borders Bulgaria, Greece, Albania, Serbia and Kosovo. Not the easiest region for a country. Greece refuses to recognize ‘Macedonia’ as their name, one of the reasons being a similarly named province in northern Greece, and Macedonia is thus referred to in the UN as The Former Yugoslavic Republic of Macedonia (FYRM). It’s a very complex issue. McCain has been very outspoken about recognizing Macedonia by its constitutional name, whereas Obama has been more careful about it.

    Randy Scheunemann, a McCain adviser said the following about NATO membership bids:

    On Albania, Croatia and Macedonia, Senator McCain has been strongly outspoken in support for including them. They are ready. In the case of Macedonia, they’ve been a membership action plan for eight or nine cycles.

    With respect to the Greek concerns, the United States recognizes Macedonia under its constitutional name.

    And he certainly hopes that there’s not going to be this throwback to the 19th century style of Balkan politics, and the Greeks throw a red card on the membership of Macedonia.

    Since this is a very big issue in Macedonia, as territorial, cultural and national integrity always are in the Balkans, it’s no wonder people in Macedonia were hoping for McCain to win.

    As for Turkey, people might be happy to see a change in government. Bush’ unpopular policies have led to an increase in anti-Americanism around the world. In June, a Pew poll found that out of 47 countries, Turkish people had the least favourable view of the United States (source: The New York Observer). In that sense, Obama will be a welcome change.

    It is hoped that the new President will aid Turkish efforts against the PKK and the Kurdish insurgency in the Iraqi border area, support the EU’s membership bid and put pressure on European politicians, and support Turkey in its process of becoming a modern, democratic country. It’s not expected that Obama will aid Turkey’s military efforts or put significant pressure on the EU to get them to admit Turkey.

    Moreover, just one day before the elections, Obama renewed his commitment to recognize the Armenian genocide, a very sensitive issue in Turkey. McCain “never pledged to label the Armenian killings as genocide and is seen by the U.S. Armenian community as a politician against or indifferent to Armenian matters” (Turkish Daily News).

    Turkey’s foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said “the formal recognition by the United States of genocide would seriously damage U.S.-Turkish ties and hurt Turkey’s efforts for reconciliation with Armenia” after meeting Phil Gordon last week, a senior foreign policy adviser to Obama.

    Turkey is an important ally (NATO member) and trade partner to both the US and EU, as it has a stabilizing presence in the Middle East, often mediating in Arabic-Israeli talks.

    Looks like Obama will have a lot on his hands when he takes office in January.

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    What are your perspectives on this? Have your say in the comments!

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  • Republic Day Fireworks (Video)

    On the 29th of October, Turkey celebrates the foundation of its Republic in 1923 by founding father Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. This goes together with Turkish flags hanging from every window in Turkey as well as some free parties in Istanbul and some amazing fireworks above the Bosphorus.


    Click here to see the video on Vimeo

    They spent quite some money on the fireworks, as you can tell from the video. Last year the show was even bigger and they also had a lasershow showing important images from Turkey’s history. This year the show was a bit shorter allegedly due to terror alerts. Still an amazing show and I bet it keeps the Turkish people in Istanbul proud of their nation for yet another year. 😉

    It’s every year, so if you have the chance to be here around the end of October, seize the opportunity!

  • Dawn in Istanbul

    click on the photo for alternate version

    Just before dawn, Istanbul’s fishermen get in their boats and move onto the Bosphorus or the Marmara sea. If you walk or sit along the coastline, you can hear them talking or listening to music. A great place to visit in Istanbul, if you want to sit along the coast, is Kadıköy, which is also where this picture was taken. Inspired by the work of Michael Kenna.

    Tell me, which is better, the above or the alternate version?

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