Top posts 2011

In front of the castle in Ankara

To this post I have collected five posts which I liked the most this year 2011.

1. Does going to exchange make students fat? I could repeat this research with the exchange students of Ankara and there are also some other ideas for different research.
2. This post explains how Spanish are touchy.
3. It was curious to know how much man selling alcohol in the streets can make money.
4. Good times with the friends of academic year 2010-2011 in Basque country.
5. Explains the traffic of Turkey which can be considered dangerous.

Here you can see the Top posts of the years 2009 - 2010.

Street animals

Tomas with street cats

In the streets of Istanbul and Ankara I saw many street animals. There are many more cats than dogs. I suppose that the cats and dogs I saw have been abandoned to the streets.  In the evening you can see cats digging up food from trash piles thrown to the streets.  My flatmate Jordi got attacked by a street dog when he was walking on the streets. He does not know why the dog attacked and he had to go to take vaccination even thought the dog did not bite a deep wound.

Christmas

Christmas section

We do not have any Christmas holidays in Turkey. Today all the supermarkets and restaurants are open like normally. Tomorrow on Monday lessons are held like on every Monday. There are no Christmas lights in the windows of the houses and only few restaurants have put some Christmas decoration. In supermarket you could find some Christmas decoration products but everything is not decorated to Christmas atmosphere like in Finland.

Greeting

Genclik park

Turkish greet differently than Spanish and Finnish. When you meet for the first time in Turkey you shake hands with men and women. After you are closer friends you greet different way. Men greet each other with handshake and by lightly hitting both sides of forehead together or giving two kisses. Some men also chuck their lips when giving two kisses but everybody does not do that. Men also give two kisses to women when they are closer friends but men giving kisses to women in Turkey is less common than in Spain. Women greet each other normally by giving two kisses

Ilgaz

Top of the mountain

This weekend we went to ski in Ilgaz. Skiing center of Ilgaz is not very big place. There are only few slopes and only one of them was open because there was not yet much snow. The trip was organized by skiing club of Hacettepe university. In our group were many beginners and we taught them to ski. Skiing was fun and later I will hopefully join to another skiing trip in better place.

Cap collection

Caps

In the streets of Ankara you can find big plastic bottles hanging in trees. These bottles are used for collecting plastic caps from the bottles. I heard that the reason why caps are collected is that some company in Turkey have promised to donate wheelchairs for collecting these caps. In Finland there is a similar story that if you collect enough clips from cans and somebody will donate a wheelchair.

Speaking Turkish

I have been going to Turkish lessons for two months almost 30 hours every week. Today I was speaking in Turkish with one person at least three hours. I am very happy that I was able to have conversation that long time without using any English. I had pocket dictionary helping me sometimes. I feel like that my speaking level of  Turkish is in the same level as my Spanish when I arrived to Spain. This gives me confidence that I can learn to speak Turkish fluently.

Entering

Shopping mall entrance

In Turkey securities are supervising people who enters to the university campus and in my first day I could not enter because security insisted a official document from me. Even there are securities looking who enters they do not always ask you to show a document. To enter a shopping mall you have to walk through detectors like in airport and also when entering to metro security sometimes checks out your bag with some detecting stick. In Turkey security workers are even more present than in Spain

Smoking

No smoking

In Turkey you can see smoking is forbidden signs in the most of the places. Generally people do not smoke inside but this rule is not followed as carefully as in Finland. You can see some single persons smoking inside even generally nobody smokes inside. There are few ways how smoking rule is twisted. As in Finland you cannot smoke there were you provide service in Turkey you can still smoke in the terrace where you can get service from waitresses. In the winter time these terraces would be cold but in Turkey they set up a tent on the terrace and heaters so the terrace is warm. Even the smoking would be forbidden inside after nine or ten o'clock in the evening waitresses bring ashtrays to the table because after these hours officials are not controlling smoking inside. Smoking is very popular and it seems to me that most of the people are smokers. At least in Turkey smoking is much more popular than in Finland.

Trash

Recycling cart

In the center of Ankara there are no trash containers. That means that in the evening there are trash piles on the streets. Naturally these trash piles do not look nice and makes also walking in the pedestrian street difficult. Recyclable stuff like carton, plastic bottles and paper are also thrown in the same pile but there are people who collect the recyclable stuff with the carts which you can see in the picture.

Charge your mobile

Chargers

In Turkey there are many places where you can charge you mobile for 40 cents. There are many cables so you can find one that fits to your mobile phone. I have never seen this service available in Finland. I never imagined that somebody would stand in the street and wait for mobile to get charged. Of course sometimes you might need just some power to make an important call.

Time to pray

Inside mosque

Washing before praying

Muslims are supposed to pray five times per day. Before praying they should wash their feet, hands and face. In the picture you can see one washing place next to the entrance of one mosque. I did not see men having any towels to dry themselves. Women were not washing themselves in the same spot so I do not know what are their washing rituals. In mosque women had their own little praying section and men were praying in the main area of the mosque. While tourists could visit the mosque there were few people praying  but during the official praying time tourists were not allowed to enter. When entering the mosque women were advised to cover themselves and wear a scarf. Everybody also had to take off their shoes.

Döner kebab

Döner

Chicken döner kebab

Eating out in Turkey is cheaper than in Finland or in Spain so I have not been cooking much in Turkey. The cheapest option is chicken döner kebab what you can see in the picture and it costs 1,5 euros as in Finland I have to pay at least 5 euros. Beef döner kebab costs two times more than chicken döner kebab. They measure always 100 grams of meat to one kebab serving. Kebab serving includes salad, different vegetables depending on the place and serving can include also some french fries. Döner kebab means that is cut from the rolling piece of meat and I have not seen anybody using machine for cutting like in Finland. Kebab is also prepared in other way what is not döner kebab. The taste of beef kebab in Turkey is different than in Finland and Spain. In Finland we are also used to that kebab places sell also pizza but in Turkey all kebab places do not sell pizza.

Women's outfit

Couple

Before speaking to any Turkish person I assumed that in Turkey there are a lot of women who dresses up like the woman in the picture above. Turkish friends explained that it is not common that women in Turkey dress up to a black cape. Still before coming to Turkey I expected to see women dressed up in a black cape. In Ankara I have not seen any women dressed like the woman in the picture so dressing like that is not common at all. The picture is taken by Olga in Istanbul and there I could see few women dressed up in black cape but very few. Turkish friends explained that normally women dressed up in a black cape are not from Turkey.

Parking

Evidence

In Turkey people care even less about the parking than in Spain.In the picture you can see cars parked in the street against rules.You can see the sign and the yellow line what indicates that parking is not allowed. The street leads to the center of Ankara and it is about two kilometers away. On the road should be two lanes on both ways but the other lane is always occupied by illegally parked cars. This lane of illegally parked cars is at least everyday one kilometer long. These parked cars must make the traffic go much slower during the rush hours.

Mid-term exams

In Turkey during the semester you have mid-term and final exam in each subject in some cases you might have even two mid-term exams before the final exam. Now is time of the first mid-term exams and I had my first one today. During two weeks when mid-terms are held we do not have classes but in some faculties of Gazi university you have also classes even you have exams so there is not guideline what Gazi university is following. In the end of the semester we will have final exams.

Istanbul vs. Ankara

Istanbul

Ankara

During the Bayram we did a five day trip to Istanbul. All the Turkish seem to love Istanbul and hate Ankara. One Turkish friend who lives in Ankara said that every time he visits Istanbul he loves it more. I have been asked several times that why did I choose Ankara and not Istanbul for my exchange destination because Istanbul would be much better place in their opinion.

Bayram

Hangia Sophia mosque

Last three days were national holidays called Bayram in Turkey. That mean that Turkish families get together and eat well. Therefore all the buses have been full. A lot of traffic in the highways and too many buses in the bus stations. Bayram has also a religious meaning. During the Bayram you sacrifice animals to the god and give some part of this meat to poor people. At least in university students take today and on Friday unofficial holidays even Bayram ended. Teachers advised us that no one is coming to the lessons so we do not have to come either

Simit

Breakfast

In the picture you can see round breads and in the background other kind of breads.  Round brown breads are typical in the Turkish breakfast and they are called simit. In the morning one simit costs about 50 cents as they are fresh. In the midday you can get three or four simits for the price of one and in the evening you can get even eight or nine simits for the price of one. There are many carts in the streets and there is nothing covering on the simit. Therefore it is not that hygienic.

Water

Water

In Turkey tap water is not drinkable. One friend accidentally drank the tap water and he got sick. Therefore all the water you drink has to be bought in a bottle. The bottle in the picture is 19 liters so it is not very light. Luckily there are shops which are specialized for selling only water. The bottle costs 2 euros and they bring it to your home.

Taxi

Button

In Ankara you do not need to call a taxi because you can see plenty of them in the streets. But if you do not see a taxi you can call a taxi just by pushing a taxi button. There are many buttons for calling a taxi. Taking a taxi ride is cheap. When you get in the price is one euro and after taking a 10 minute you have to pay about 4 - 5 euros. As taxi is cheap I have been taking taxi rides few times. I have noticed that in Turkey taxi drivers do not use a seat belt. Sometimes you can fasten your seat belt but there is not always seat belt available in the taxi. I have also taken ride with some Turkish friends and they did not use seat belt either.

Ankara Castle

Castle number 1

Castle number 2

Yesterday we visited the castles of Ankara. First we arrived to the castle number 2 and we were surprised that how is it possible that there are no other tourists. Finally we figured out there is another castle nearby and all the tourists were there. As you can see in the first picture there were not any kind of fences protecting from dropping down. From the castle we could see the old part of the city where everything is really modest and the new part where everything is in much better condition. In the modest part there are still houses which were build in one day because back in the days law permitted you to build a house to that area if you could do it in one day.

Residence permission

Cover of residence permission in Turkey

To stay in Turkey for the whole exchange period I had to apply for residence permission in the first month of my stay. I handed out my application on the fourth of October and got my permission today. I had student visa to apply for the residence permission but you can equally apply for the residence permission with tourist visa like some exchange students did that way you can save money because student visa cost me 60 euros and touristic visa is only 15 euros. Price of the residence permission was 60 euros. Even my student visa is valid only until end of may my residence permission in Turkey is valid until end of June.

Demonstrations in Turkey

Protest

There are demonstrations all over Turkey today, after the Kurdish terrorists killed Turkish soldiers. Demonstrations have been on the streets already few days. You can see a lot more Turkish flags in the street picture as people have put flags of Turkey to their balconies and on their cars. Especially today there was a lot of people marching from the center Ankara through the city.

Turkish studies

Tömer

At the moment my studies are mainly focused on studying Turkish. My exchange program Campus Europae offered me an opportunity to attend 30 hours of Turkish lessons every week. These lessons are mainly meant for students who are going to study an entire career next year in Turkey. There are several same kind of language classes and students are mainly from Kosovo, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Arabic countries. These Turkish lessons take a whole year and before the summer everyone should have reached C1 level in Turkish. So here I do not have separate language course for Campus Europae students like I had in Spain. In Gazi university we are only four Campus Europae students as in Spain we were about 20. I am able attend about 25 hours each week and hopefully this will help me to reach fluency in Turkish.

Crossing road

Crossing road

The way how pedestrians crosses the road in Turkey is different than in other countries I have been so far. Here people cross the road in any place they feel like crossing the road. That means that people do not use that much zebra crossing and cars do not stop if you are waiting on the zebra crossing for crossing the road. You just have to cross the road fast when you see a bit wider gap between the cars. So far I have seen cars always slowing down when they see somebody crossing the road but in Turkey instead of slowing down cars accelerate. Then you of course feel like taking several quicker steps to avoid car hitting you.

Turkish toilet

Toilet

So far the biggest shock for me here was seeing a Turkish toilet. I did not know anything about the Turkish toilet so seeing one when looking for a flat was a big surprise. Luckily there are flats where are normal toilets and also in my flat we have two normal toilets. In a Turkish toilet you do not sit down. After finishing you use the water in the blue plastic cup to clean yourself. For example in the toilets' university of Gazi I have not seen toilet paper and there are not hand dryers either. So drying yourself is not made easy. If there is toilet paper the toilet paper should not be thrown to the toilet. Turkish are afraid that the toilet paper will block the toilet so they prefer throwing used toilet paper to a trash can. Also in normal toilets Turkish prefer not to throw the toilet paper to the toilet.

My flat in Turkey

My room

In the first the day when I arrived to Ankara I had a look on two different flats. The flat I chose is quite close to metro station Maltepe and five minute walk from Tömer where I am having language studies everyday so the location is good. Walking to the center of Ankara takes about 20 minutes. I am living with two Spanish guys and one Turkish. Unfortunately there is not a living room in the flat because Turkish guy is using it as his own room. The rent is 200 euros including all the costs. I have two beds in my room so if somebody wants to visit me I have no problem with providing accommodation.

University lunch

Lunch in the university

In the area of Gazi university there are student restaurants. Lunch offered in the university is very cheap. The lunch in the picture costs only 80 cents. Quality is ok and so far university lunch has been always eatable. Meals do not include much meat but it is understandable as the meal is so cheap.

Visit to the faculty

Center of Ankara

I have been now 5 days in Ankara. My tutor have been helping me a lot with settling to the city. I went to the faculty to talk about what courses I can study in Ankara. The coordinator was not there so we ran in to one professor. The professor got extremely excited for seeing a Finnish person in the faculty. He started to talk about his travels to Scandinavian countries in Turkish and in French. He even invited me and my tutor Rabia to his office to have tea with him even we did not have common language. A bit later he wanted to present me to his whole class and I was there standing in front of 100 Turkish students without much idea what he was telling to the class. I do not know if anybody have looked that excited for seeing me as this professor.

Istanbul

With Beril in Istanbul

Bus of  Metro

On Sunday afternoon I arrived to Istanbul and my Turkish friend came to pick me up from the airport. Before going to Ankara we had some hours time to have look on Istanbul. We had a walk in the old town and tried some Turkish flavors. I had a only quick view on Istanbul so I have to return to see the city more.

In the midnight I had bus to Ankara. The journey took six hours from Istanbul to Ankara and it cost 16 euros. I had never been in such a luxury bus before. All the seats had private screen for watching TV, to use your USB-device or to use your cameras memory card. There were only 3 seats in row and plenty enough place for the legs. There was also a lady who offered drinks and snacks which were included to the bus ticket price.

Good bye Madrid

Plaza Cibeles

I Finished my internship in Madrid. Company was happy with me and I got good feedback from the bosses. As a result I have now in my CV a person who can recommend me. I found the internship useful and I am happy that I got relevant working experience.

Ending the internship means that tomorrow I am flying to my next destination which is Turkey. I will meet a friend in the airport and then spend rest of the day in Istanbul. At night I will take bus to Ankara where I have to find a place to live in. I have already few phone numbers of persons who can show free room in their flat.

After work

In Spain bosses have taken us to after work drinks once in a month. The company is small and we are less than ten in the office. I have been wondering that do bosses tend to take their employees to drinks also in Finland. As I have now only corporate working experience in Spain I do not know if bosses take their employees for after work drinks also in Finland.

Kapital

Finally I entered the famous nightclub Kapital near train station Atocha. ESN Madrid Organized there a welcome party for all the Erasmus students in Spain. The entrance was free until 1:30 and included also a free drink. As many most of the international people is used to go out earlier than Spanish the club was already after 00:30. Kapital is like a theater. There are seven floors and from all the floors you can see to the stage in the first floor. The place is big and you can easily lost your friends but I managed to find my friends after losing them. Though finding them took time.

Ice

In summer time Spanish have a habit to drink coffee with ice. Waitress brought a glass of coffee and also a glass with ice cubes if you wanted to drink your coffee with ice. When Spanish go out they always buy a bag of ice to put ice in their drinks. Usually I do not take ice because Spanish pass ice cube from hand to hand to your glass and I do not want anyone else to touch my food.

Hepatitis B vaccination

Yesterday second portion of hepatitis B was injected to me. First portion of the vaccine cost 50 euros in Finland. Here in Spain taking the second injection did not cost me anything because I managed to get a recipe. Without the recipe the vaccination would have cost something. In Spain hepatitis B is a basic vaccination and it is given to everybody.

Paella

Paella

I tasted some traditional flavors from Valencia. The most known food from Valencia is paella and they are also very proud of it. Almost everybody in Valencia says that they love it and want to make you taste paella. Paella is prepared in a big frying pan. When paella is eaten you do not take it to your own plate, Everybody just eats with their own fork or spoon straight from the frying pan. Other thing what I tasted was horchata. Horchata is a very sweet drink and it is consumed especially in the summer time. I liked paella very much but horchata is a bit too sweet in my opinion.

Valencia

New modern buildings in Valencia

The beach of Valencia

I had a nice weekend in Valencia. I played football after a long break in a hot and humid weather. I survived also without burning myself even I spent time in a swimming pool and in a beach. As you can see in the first picture there are many very modern attractions in Valencia but also in the city center you can find historic buildings. There used to go a river through Valencia but after it flooded and killed many people the river was decided to direct different way. Now the whole old river area is a nice recreation area with football fields, parks, playing grounds and the buildings in the first picture are also there.

Madrid has waken up

Madrid is now full of life as the most of the people have returned from the holidays and started working. A significant change could be seen on Monday this week. There is much more traffic, many businessmen in suits in the streets and more people everywhere.

This weekend I am going to Valencia so there will not be an update in the weekend.

Aggressive prostitutes

River of Madrid in the night time

Yesterday night I got attacked by two aggressive prostitutes in the center of Madrid. They came to me, grabbed my crotch and offered their services for 20 euros. They did not seem very feminine so I would not be very surprised if they were actually men. Anyways I could walk away from the situation fast.

Scooter

a man with his scooter

I have noticed that in Madrid a very different kind of group is driving a scooter than in Finland. It seems that most of the scooter drivers are wearing here a suit and they are men. Moreover one of my bosses also comes to work by scooter. So I would say that an average scooter driver in Madrid is a working man between 25-40 years old. As in in Finland I see a scooter as vehicle of under 18 years old boys and girls.

Mac

I have completed almost two months out of three months of my internship in Madrid. Before the internship I had never used Apples computers but now I have worked with iMac almost two months. Mainly I have been using the Microsoft office programs and web browser Safari. I do not see much differences using a Mac compared to a PC. I just have had to learn new shortcuts and get used to that some things work differently. I have not fallen in love with Macs praised functionality because for me Windows seems to work equally well. So when I will buy my next laptop it will be likely a PC.

Holiday month August

As August is a very hot month in Madrid people from Madrid go to beach to spend their holidays there. You can see less traffic, free parking spaces, closed shops and closed bars. Last two weeks were especially hot and I was sweating a lot also during the night. Despite the heat I could still sleep. The whole my stay in Spain I have been sleeping without any blanket or sheet top of me.

Visitors from Finland

Palacio Real in the background

I got this weekend two visitors from Finland. My friends Janne and Jarno are making an interrail trip and they are now in the half way of their one month railing. The visit of the Pope during weekend have caused a lot of rush in the metro. We had to let two metros pass us in the metro station because we could not enter the full metro. After that we just decided to take another line which was not that crowdy. We went to the famous market Rastro in Madrid. I did not spot there any second hand products. There was just normal products what are always sold in any stand. Especially one guy had interesting selling methods. We stopped to his stand where was a big sign showing that he is selling scarfs for two euros. As we stopped and started to look and touch few scarves for a few minutes. The guy started to repeat two euros, two euros. He repeated that more than ten times and did not say anything else. Finally we walked away without buying anything from him.

JMJ 2011

Group of young people of JMJ 

The letters JMJ comes from words Jornada Mundial de Juventud. JMJ 2011 is an event where many catholic young people have gathered to Madrid this year. It has been estimated that about 1,5 million people have come to Madrid to participate this event so you can see the effect of the event very well in the street picture. The people who have came to Madrid can be easily recognized from the similar back bags and from big groups wearing different color of T-shirts with JMJ logo. All the groups have flag of their own country and they sing songs of their country which reminds me of a sports event between different nationalities. These religious young people are not that innocent because they have been spotted buying alcohol and condoms.

Illegal business

Crowdy streets

Yesterday there was a party in la latina neighborhood in Madrid. Lot of people gathered to the streets. Bars had set up a serving points and speakers to play music to the streets. Always when a lot of people gather together immigrants appear to the streets to sell beer, sunglasses and hats which is illegal. Even there are some policemen it does not stop immigrants to make business. When we were sitting in one market square almost every five minutes somebody comes to offer their products. I asked one that how much does he earn in a night by selling beer from his bags and he responded that 100 euros by working five hours. Even there are a lot of immigrants doing this illegal business they make reasonable income. In Finland there are no people doing this illegal business but there the collectors of the bottles which are worth money.

Basque country

The beach in Zarautz

Rastas

During my trip to Basque country which is one region in the north of Spain I spotted the hair style in the picture above many times. The hairstyle is long rastas in the back of the head and short hair in the rest of the head. I have never seen that hairstyle in Finland. In basque it is typical that a group of friends have rented a place to make party. Both young and older people have these party places called lonja. In northern Spain instead of tapas they serve pinchos which were equally the same as tapas in my opinion but pinchos had a little stick. When we ordered hamburger there were a stick also.

One day we went to the beach where the waves are bigger than in the eastern or southern coast of Spain. We took advantage of these waves and decided with one friend to try surfing for the first time. Unfortunately waves were good only two hours so we could not surf more.

Festival in Vitoria-Gasteiz

Plaza

Party people in the costumes

I took three days holidays from work and went to Vitoria-Gasteiz. In Vitoria-Gasteiz we had a meeting with 15 students who did Erasmus in Joensuu last academic year. In this weekend there was also a festival. The festival started in the main square where people sprayed champagne on each other. We got also wet clothes from the champagne shower. Then there was different groups performing  on the stages and groups of people singing, dancing and playing songs on the streets. You could see people from all the age groups partying: mothers with their babies in the stroller and seniors. Streets were full of plastic bottles and other trash because most of the people were drinking. Also you could see in the center of the city many wet spots which were of course urine of the people. Festival guarantees great party atmosphere in the city for five days.

Protected house

I have enjoyed the past days the Spanish friendliness. First I got invited to a party of one friend of a friend in the same day I met her. Then I spent nice day in a house of a friend. I noticed that Spanish private houses are very well protected compared to Finnish ones. In Spain houses have a high fence surrounding the house with a door that you cannot enter without permission. Then all the windows had bars The final thing to secure the security was a alarm system what recognizes movement in the house.

How are you?

In Spain after greeting you ask always how are you. Always it is not even necessary to reply or you can reply by asking also after greeting directly how are you. Other curious aspect is that you might ask how are you more than once. Second how are you might be asked right away after the first one without even getting reply to the first one or after the reply if you want to know more. One example how one person can start a conversation when he/she sees his/her friend is: ¡Hola! ¿Qué tal? ¿Qué tal estás? Translation: Hello!, How are you? How are you doing? Then the friend gives his/her reply.

Topless

Demonstration

Yesterday I went for the first time to a public swimming pool in Madrid. Before I had been a few times in a private swimming pool of row houses. I was surprised to see women sun bathing topless. Women from all age groups were taking tan with bare boobs. My estimation is that 20% of the women were sun bathing topless.

On Sunday I saw for a second time Spanish demonstrating against the economical crisis and for more democratic voting system. The busy streets of the center of Madrid were closed because they were full of people demonstrating. Many had sign with different messages, some were singing and one guy painted to the wall of bank of Spain. Jesús took the picture above but unfortunately he was not with in the public swimming pool so there are no photos of topless women.

Smell of the food

Seems that Spanish do not like the smell of the food. Here I will give three different examples. Spanish guy wanted to cook in a hotel room but he did not want the smell of the food to spread all over his room so he decided to move the stove next to the window to prevent the room from smelling food. I have been cooking in a kitchen and then my flatmates have advised me to close the door to stop the smell of the food spreading to living room but it is not problem to take the plate to the living room and eat there. The last one is that I suggested to make a one big room by removing the wall between the kitchen and living room but Spanish did not like the idea because then the smell of the food would spread to the living room

Tapas bar

El Tigre

One of the most famous tapas bars in the center of Madrid is called El Tigre. The bar is almost always full of people like popular discos on Saturday nights. There are no chairs to sit down and just small tables on the wall. The reason why El Tigre is so popular is that they put various different tapas and glass of a drink for 2,5 euros. El Tigre is the place to go if you want to eat and drink well for a good price.

Toledo

Entrance

Bridge

On Saturday I made a one day trip to Toledo with my working mates. Toledo is a old capital of Spain like many other cities. Toledo is on a mountain and surrounded by a wall and a river. As the city is on a mountain the city did not really have flat areas. Almost all the streets were uphill or downhill. The streets were also narrow and walking lines were not separated from the lines to the cars but there were not many cars. Toledo had a old-fashioned atmosphere even the streets were packed of tourists.