My nephew, now close to 5, is growing fast, and Sinem and I want to see him as many times as possible before he loses his baby charm. My sister and her husband are currently stationed in Nizip, Gaziantep, serving as a judge and a prosecutor, respectively. So, for the weekend, we flew to Gaziantep … Read more
I must have blogged about this. In every few years, I see this: This is the world’s most dangerous road On one of my visits, I took my uncle and his family to Uzungöl through this route. My uncle was frustrated that I was driving slowly, so he took control of the car. I am glad … Read more
I just came back from Ankara. Sinem and I love Ankara, so whenever we have time, we stop by Ankara. This time, we mostly settled in Çankaya, in our favorite hotel, Hotel Jinnah- but unfortunately, this will be the last time we will stay there as the hotel has been poorly maintained. Anyway, my excuse … Read more
I wasn’t a person to travel a lot. In my first two years in Houston, I saw only a few places except the Rice campus. In order to motivate myself to see more places, I began to collect local newspapers at that time. But I changed a lot. I wouldn’t call myself a traveler, but … Read more
While we were flying back to İstanbul from Adana after an intense day of media training, Sinem took these photos. Turkish Airlines should pay us:) Taken by Iphone latest model. Now we are in Amsterdam to celebrate our first marriage anniversary. Maybe more photos will come!
Last week I was in Eskişehir attending the 5th New Media Studies Conference. The conference is organized by an association, Alternatif Bilişim Derneği. I have been a member from the outset. The association, which is not too active nowadays, was a pioneer in internet freedom causes and now organizes biannual conferences and publishes ebooks with … Read more
I was invited to attend the first meeting of the Turkey-Greece Journalists Platform in Athens. This is a partnership with MLSA, FNF, and the Foreign Press Association (FPA) to enhance cooperation among journalists in Turkey and Greece. I discussed news framing issues between Turkey and Greece relations and possibly more peaceful alternatives. I was glad … Read more
A few weeks ago I stopped by Istanbul Cinema Museum right in the middle of Istiklal Street, Taksim. There is an ongoing exhibition until 1 Februrar 2024: Fans of the Galaxy: Star Wars Fan. I was never a real Star Wars fan but this is a great collection. If you are interested in…
I had the best of memories of Helsinki. 11 years ago, after an intensive work period- for years- I arrived in Helsinki for a conference and spent five days of relaxation. Kai Ekholm had invited me to a librarians’ conference where I would speak on internet freedom. Thanks to Mr. Ekholm, I had the opportunity … Read more
The usual suspects were at work again. Here is the summary of what happened: The controversy emerged after the announcement of the planned liturgy, and a representative from the Islamist New Welfare Party in Turkey criticized it[1]. The Good Party spokesperson, Kursad Zorlu, called for the annual religious ceremony at Sumela to be canceled, which … Read more
I will write more about my recent travels if I have the energy. However, I wanted to point out a moment. I was driving from Bayburt to Trabzon and in the early morning, I saw an old man sitting on this stone bridge. Probably he was out of the morning prayers. I was driving, I … Read more
I am a hidden Google Maps influencer (!). I save places to see, visit them, upload pictures, and sometimes write reviews. Here are my ten most viewed pictures there. On the top left-hand side, you can see the place names. From Peplexity.ai: Google Local Guides is a program by Google that allows users to … Read more
This time, our destination was Nizip, Gaziantep, where my sister and her husband are appointed as a judge and as a prosecutor until the next year. We are now back in Ankara and will drive back to İstanbul soon. We might stop by Sapanca or Bolu on our way. We visited Gordion Ancient city close … Read more
I am currently in Geneva, attending UN meetings on journalism safety. It was not planned, but I had to travel frequently in recent days. I attend a COST project in Warsaw, briefly visited Vienna with my wife, and socialized with a former grad student and lifelong friend and now in Geneva at work. In the … Read more
Although “companion” may sound like a long textual content Patricia Seed had collected 100 relatively less known maps from the history of map making and added short informative and enjoyable texts to invited the readers to a journey in world history and map making. The Oxford Map Companion: One Hundred Sources in World History I … Read more