EU between Italy and Poland

In one of my posts, I`ve mentioned about the Crosses in the classrooms at my college, Lazarski School of Commerce and Law at which I was studying as an Exchange student in Warsaw, Poland last year. When I first saw these crosses which are symbolic items of Christianity in the classrooms, I remembered the issue of education prohibition at colleges for ladies with headscarves since headscarves are the symbols of Islam and contrary with secularism at colleges. Then I asked if I`m only the one who should be irritated by this incompatibility since I`m a Muslim but then I found some others who are going to be irritated by this issue.

They are Christians, Christian Italians. As far as I`ve recently read in one of newspapers, EU wanted Italian colleges to be removed from crosses in the classrooms since they symbolize Christianity. Appearently, Italian Christians will be arguing with EU till either kind of same decision will be valid for Polish colleges, as well or EU lets them have crosses at Italan colleges again.

Till when and with whom Muslim Turkish will be arguing, then? The answer is WITH the government which can remove that silly prohibition easily and TILL the government gets rid of the fear of around 30 percent of the public`s possible tough reaction and uses its will...

BaROCK`s Impressiveness

During the elections for the US new President, by the Turkish Press, we were informed of a black guy`s being about to carry the election. For me, his being a black was the only impressive side of his victory just because i`ve had no chance to watch any of his speeches. All I could witness on TV's had been his pictures as far as he had his first oversea visit to Turkey as the New President. This time, at his speech in Turkish Parliament, the only one impressive thing was "The" Barack Obama.

Personally, if i had been uninterested in Politics at all, I would have looked forward to hearing his each following sentence even just to listen his fascinating elocution in ENGLISH. In the Turkish Parliament, he made a perfect start on affecting the Worldwide Countries by his self-confidence, geniality, charisma etc.

After the series of his hopeful and consolidative talks all over the world, I was wondering when he`ll be awarded rather with a concrete reward than the positive public reactions. If I had a chance, I`d reward him by A Perfect English Prize but he`d already got the Supreme Nobel Peace Prize.

Finally, in my opinion, the difference between Obama and G.W. Bush is that none of Bush`s speeches are bearable to be listened till the end on the contrary to Obama`s admirable ones...

A Worrying Lack in Turkish Lecturers at Colleges

I`ve never thought that I could be worried that much one day, while listening to my lecturers at my university. It was the first week of the school and I was having my girlfriend who is Belarussian, in my city, Adana. We`ve decided to go to my university together since she could see where i m currently studying at.

I knew that it was going to be a little weird to introduce my girlfriend to my lecturers and it was also going to be the first time that I would see my Turkish lecturers speaking English with someone else than their students. I`ve been always thinking whether they could speak English only at lectures by memorizing what to speak about or they already had that self-confidence to communicate with foreigners in English.

Let`s come to the first victim who was my English Language teacher... The dialog between my girlfriend and my lecturer has consisted of 3 simple sentences and it's been more like an interpersonal body language communication with smiling faces. My teacher`s red face was enough explanatory to understand what she`d felt while speaking with my girlfriend. I`ve described this situation by A lack of self-confidence !

Another victim was my ex history lecturer who is going to do her Postgraduate in the U.S.A. next year. The conversation between them has not lasted more than 3 words so, I had to interrupt this embarrasing speech... again A lack of self-confidence !

Finally, we came together with one of English Preparoty School teachers who I always enjoy talking to and I introduced my girl to him. They started to talk about my girlfriend`s first impressions on my city, Adana, also Turkey and so on. That was a pretty long talk between all of us in English. No! It should not be surprising for you because that lecturer`s name was Curtis Miller who is an American teacher at our university.

So, should I say my Turkish Lecturers have a lack of self-confidence or a lack of English? ))

What do you think?

A Fear of A Muslim

Participation of the World Blog Surf Day bloggin' event requires you to be an expat blogger. At this point, my flight date to Turkey gives me that chance to be one of the participator of this common day of the bloggers from all around the world since I`ll be a regular blogger when the calendars show 14. Jun. 2009.

Today, the common theme of the expat bloggers' posts is Food, which might allow you to read about diiferent cuisines. To adopt a new cuisine of your new residence is not that easy especially when you`re comin' from a country which is famous with its great food. Moreover if you are coming from a Muslim counrty and at the same time from a "food heaven", it's much harder to resist loosin weight.

I`ve been living in Warsaw, Poland for 8 months and I`ve still no idea what to choose to eat while shopping in supermarkets. When you have no fear to try "Pork" as a Muslim, shoppin' in a supermarket might be enjoyable for you but what if you prefer to read the ingredients of what you buy to make sure even "Pork Oil" is not included in your food? During your shopping in a supermarket in Warsaw, you may seem buying regular Sausage made of turkey or a Spaghetti Sauce but in fact, you are about to taste Pork Oil.

If you have a friend in Warsaw who claims that he's seen a Turkish saying that I lost 3 kilos here, probably, that Turk is me :) because the Turkish people who are tired of readin' ingredients of each food, accept going to "Turecki Market" which is almost only one in Warsaw and very far from the city centre to buy some food . My point of view on the reasons of loosin' weight is that the kilos you have, are dissepearing on your way of that Turkish Supermarket in which you can find all safe Turkish food :)

Never believe the sellers who claim that they are selling Turkish Kebap in Warsaw. When you look from the following view, you will understand what I mean. If those guys sells Turkish Kebap in Warsaw, why would I still look forward to eating my Real Kebap in Turkey? If you still couldn`t differ the Real and Fake Turkish Kebap, here you go then

Real Turkish ( ADANA ) Kebap

Fake Turkish Kebap ( Kebab )

And again If you are still not convinced, last option is to be my guest in ADANA which is my hometown.

I sadly need to confess that the Polish cuisine is poor . You might notice that fact when you see Polish people who mighty prefer to eat those kind of fake kebap which doesn`t belong to their own dishes. Indeed, I still have big doubts on cleanliness of those food and the place in where they are prepared, either.

As a result, I can not say that I m not happy not to write from Warsaw, anymore because I`d rather prefer writing on my table while eating my own food. I`m ending my post with a wish for myself. I`m planing to go to the United States in June in the next summer, I'd love to join this event again next year as an expat from the States.

A big THANK goes to Anastasia Ashman who is the Twitter reporter for this edition of World Blog Surf Day. And I wish you an enjoyable trip within' our mutlinational bloggers' posts during your World Blog Surfing.

Now, the next stop is Hospitalera`s blog for a new advanture. I`m sure you`ll have new surprises in each following blog as in Hospitalera`s.

ENJOY!!!

VedatC.

Triplex City, Paris in France

Before your trip to Paris, you do not expect the life under the ground to attract your attention when you get there. However, from the first moments of your stroll within the city, you start to pay much more attention to the other city under the ground not to get lost. Yes, there is another city under the ground in Paris. If you are out of a good map which shows you the over and underground routes, you are no more than a stray cat :) There are more than 10 metro lines which have been seperated by different colors and at the moment you think that your access is restricted by underground only, you find yourself somewhere high above. Here is another surprise, one more floor of the city. If you are not a walker in Paris streets, ignore all what`s written above :) These hints worked a lot for me while my Paris walk since I walked during more than 14 hours within 2 days. "The best way of exploring a city is to walk through it" sounds familiar, doesn't it?

After that huge walk, I`ve noticed some details which I could name as unique to Paris such as

Hundreds of parked bicycles and motorcycles for public use near the sidewalks,
French people don't even try to speak English as much as they try to understand while you are speaking or asking something,
Huge amount of people from different nationalities ( I`ll be back in this topic ),
A lot of city maps at the corners of the streets and street names written on easy seable signs on the walls of the each corner buildings,
Dirty streets,
Numerous huge squares,
Many worth seeing structures next to each other,
Several bridges with the same interspaces to each other on the river,
Policeman and policewoman on bicycles,
and the rest I`ve forgetten :)

In order of the other nationalities' majorities in Paris, I determined that Indian people must take the first place, Arabs should follow them, right after Spanish, slant-eyed Asian and Turkish people often appear during a journey in Paris. So that, while I was walking through one of the great streets in Paris, there were only various Indian shops along the street. Any Indian need is supplied in those shops. They didn't miss any detail of showing Indian culture in those shops. Only the detail they`ve missed is that to name that area as Indian Town as I was expecting because I`ve seen no difference from China Town in some cities such as New York City or Boston in that A French Man named street. That street was also a bit scary and was making me feel like an alien between those Indian people around just as China Town made me feel in the same way in NYC.

And of course, there is a spacious place for Love in Paris, too. I`m not gona try to explain in what way Eiffel Tower or Champs- Elyssees impressed me since that would be a useless effort :) but I may present some photos from there.

With your love, Paris is a city of Love... ( I was alone :( )






Best Regards,

VedatC.

Sweetened Sweden

I`d like you to know that I`m pretty glad to get back to bloggin' after a little bit long break time especially with a post concerning my observations on a Scandinavian country. Basically, I didn`t think that it was going to be a much more different trip than the other I had to Prague, Czech Republic but I have to tell you that I`m absoulately thrilled by Sweden too much.

The background of our trip was like me and my girlfriend have been invited to Sweden by our Bosnian friend, Amir who lives in Sweden. We`ve been to Sweden for 3 days and also had a chance to meet Amir`s family and another Swedish friend, Sofie there. It was super cool to see those people in their country.

Well, the strangest part of walking around in Gothenburg streets was that the city was giving me some clues about the features of this unique country in a quite short time. You completely feel safe and peaceful while getting through the streets. The reasons that you have such these sensations were that the low population and the calm area with no horns at all.

The details that I found surprising in my trip were that a lot of parked bicycles everywhere, even men in suits riding bicycles, restrooms without a gender seperation and a language sounds like a mixture of French and German.

The impressive things that you can easily notice in this country that all the houses are gorgeous and very well-designed, most of the Swedish people speak English quite well, the police rarely shows up, at the weekends and even in the central streets, there are not too many people around, there are almost no skyscrapers, Swedish girls are just stunning as they can never be passed over and lastly it is quite possible to meet many people who are not Swedish but living or studying there.

Finally, I did have no hesitation after my trip that Sweden and of course the Swedish are rich and this makes the life extremely quality for them.


Some pictures that I`ve taken in Sweden,


Kungalv, Sweden

Gothenburgh, Sweden

An Adorable Capital...

I had a trip to a Central European City for the last 3 days of 2008. The tragic part of my staying there was that the hostel I stay in was horrible with its construction work, unlikable staff and the beds which are about to crumple up :) The only side of the hostel which made me decide to stay there was that it was close enough to the city centre but it sucks anyway... Don`t worry I`ll not pass without giving the hostel name because I don`t want my readers to be Trip Victims. "CHILI HOSTEL" :(

The City is a beautiul by itself but in compharison with Warsaw in where I`m currently living and studying, it is almost Heaven :) I`m sure that Polish people don`t like when I compare this city with Warsaw but I had to say that Warsaw is nothing beside it... Look! How can you compare these two capital cities of two different European countries which have been accepted to European Union at the same time in 2004? lol. One side, the city I travelled has a great river accompanied with a wonderful view and a bridge, several historical stuff which are worth to see and a well-organized transportation system with its 3 different subway lines... The other side, Warsaw has no more than 10 skyscrapers, a river and a bridge which almost can`t be seen at nights because of the lack of the lights on them and a transportation system which is organized enough but still has just 1 subway line for whole city... now we might have two options , either acclaiming the Czech Community or blaming Adolf Hitler :(

I want you to know that I did leave 2008 behind but couldn`t do the same for Prague which still amazes me while I`m looking at the pictures which I took of that adorable Capital.


Here they are... ( suggest you to view their larger sizes ))

A Turkish Phrase for Polish People

Have you ever tried guessing the country of a person by considering his appearance?

Slant-eyed people must be from an Asian country such as Korea, China, Japan etc. The people who have a dark brown skin color should be from India, or the people who have tattoos all around their bodies might be from the States (because tatoos are crazily common in the USA, lol)...

As you know, currently I`m living in Warsaw, Poland and I was observing what could be too common on Polish people`s appearances. What could differ them from other races? Finally, I got something to name them in a different way. " Ball Nose " We use this phrase in Turkey for the people who have a nose like a small greengage :)

I couldn`t believe in my eyes each time I see people with a " Ball Nose ". Young or Old, Blonde or Brown, Male or Female, Ugly or Beautiful but almost everyone has " Ball Nose ".

That was the most surprising common thing of Polish people for me. I`ve noticed some other common things here in Warsaw such as most of the students are also working. Meeting people who you met via Internet is also too common. You see people in smart dresses only on Fridays and Saturdays because those days are clubbing days, lol. There many christians who don`t go to the churches. Weekend studies at universities are also common. Turkish Kebap is already favourite of many Polish people altough it`s not real Turkish Kebap :)

Those were some of my observations only for this post :)

By the way, Christmas is very soon so the streets and the christmas trees were already lightened. Here is the biggest Christmast Tree of Warsaw in Old Town.