:(((

Bazen uzakta olmaktan nefret ediyorum. Doğduğum, büyüdüğüm yerlerden, alıştığım hal hatırdan, tanıdığım yüzlerden uzak olmaktan... Ama bazı şeyler var ki uzakta olmak daha da kahrediyor böyle zamanlarda. Rahatsızlandığı kendisinden öğrendiğim Faruk Yücel'in vefat(ı) ettiğini ancak bugün öğrenebilmem gibi, yani 10 haziran'ın ardından nerdeyse 1 ay geçtikten sonra öğrenmem gibi... Bu Yaka ile tanımıştım onu ilk. Dili sert ama yüreği yumuşak olunca kendisine tılsımla yakın tutuyordu insanları, öyle karar vermiştim. Sonra evlenmişti, sevdiği kızla. Sonra en büyük tutkusu, yazmak ve Gerçek Hayat... Nasıl da sığdırmış hepsini kısa zamana. Oysa benden bile küçüktü değil mi yaşı? Oysa demişti ki en son onunla konuştuğumda, "kanserle boğuşuyoruz işte ama iyiyim!" Koymuştu o zaman da iyi olacağını düşünmüştüm, ta ki bugün öğrenene kadar. Keşke katılabilseydim cenazene ve keşke imam "hakkınız helal mi?" dediğinde olanca imkanımca "helal olsun!" diyebilseydim. Allah gani gani Rahmet eylesin!

The Agenda

Nowadays, one of the most dominant current issues in Bosnia is the decision of EU that the "Citizens of Serbia, Macedonia and Montenegro should be allowed to travel to most EU nations without visas, the European Commission has proposed." (Visit this link for the whole news on BBC). The thing is, while these 3 countries will be allowed to visit EU countries, even some war criminals perhaps like Mladic, Bosnia, Albania and Kosovo are not listed among them since they could not manage to finish the necessary process. It can sound fair however these things should be taken into account; Bosnia has a very complex decision making system including 3 different entities where Serbia generally would like harder the things. On the other hand, even though Serbia somehow finished the necessary process, is it enough to accept it without checking how decisive they are about paying the results of the war. Finally, the issue contains a structural unfairness in which Serbian and Croatian people of Bosnia have 2 citizenship (1 from Bsnia and 1 from their motherlands). It means that this situation basically affects only Bosniaks at the end who have only 1 citizenship. I have not so much idea about Kosovo and Albania, hence, I have not so much to write about them yet.

Religious Sitcom?

Probably most of you have heard or even became fan of different sitcoms, either in your own original language or from other languages and nations, like Bill Cosby, Avrupa Yakası, Nanny etc. Now, I would like to introduce you an alternative one; a religious sitcom :) You can wonder how it is possible to have sitcom about religious issues or about religious people but basically being religious is not immune from facing with the funny parts of every day activities. Yes, this sitcom which is about a small community in Canada tries to do that. And according to my opinion they do quite well, even better than I could imagine. If you have possibilities to find, I would suggest you watch this sitcom called 'Little Mosque on the Prairie'. Actually, as I know, one of the Turkish TV channels was planning to show some episodes. But I am not sure if they ever have done or continue to do it.

Trip to Dubrovnik (Croatia)

After long time, half a year it became actually, I exit the borders of Bosnia for going to Dubrovnik in Croatia. Actually, the trip was not basically for visiting but for some official procedures. My visa expired and I needed to leave the country and then enter again to start the process of 3 month legal staying period in Bosnia for every country citizens. It is a bit weird process but it works like that, what can I do?! Anyway, we wanted to have a small vacation with my husband also. Dubrovnik is a good choice since it is one of the most closest cities to the border between Croatia and Bosnia, we do not need via (well I do not visa because anyway my husband has no problems like that because of EU citizenship) to go to Croatia and it is one of the most beautiful cities around that area. B. Shaw calls this city as a 'pearl of Adriatic'. I did not see so many other Adriatic cities, but I can agree that it is quite nice city. We took bus from Sarajevo to Dubrovnik which goes directly and such kind of a bus trip generally takes around 6-7 hours. On this way, you see Konjic and Mostar as basic Bosnian cities. Interestingly, we did not only exit Bosnian border and enter to the Croatian one but we did this twice! Yes, because there is a small place after you enter into Croatia, called Neum, which is inside the border of Bosnia. hence, because of this small place belonging to Bosnia, you exit Bosnia and enter Croatia twice. Complicated? Everything is possible around here. A scene from a break from our bus trip somewhere between Croatia and Bosnia. During the whole trip, you see similar views; high mountains, green environment and green lakes...

...

Dubrovnik is not a big city, just around 45.000 population in regular times. I say 'in regular times' because during the summer time I think this number doubles or even triples! I have never seen so many tourists in one area and also I have never heard so many different languages at the same time. You even become tired to try to understand where they are from. By the way, there are especially German and Swedish tourists. We have arranged our hostel before we go there, hence, it was just a matter finding the address of it and get settled. A scene from our window where we stayed. I suggest you to use this web site if you plan to arrange a hostel from all around the world: www.hostelworld.com There are so many stone type old houses where the landlords are renting for tourists. So, you feel as if you stay in a real house, nice.

The city is not big as an area also. The most important part of the city is the 'old town'. There are so many things to see in that area; churches, monasteries, museums, fountains and even a mosque. We got a detailed map of old town before we go there and then see all the things what we wnated to see. Good to be organized. You can a scene from the main street of Old Town. There are beaches and some less crowded places to swim. You can also take boat trips to the closer small islands. We could get a chance for quite long walk around the places of Old Town, but I need to say, there are only houses, not so much special things to see.
Some tips for Dubrovnik; it is quite expensive city. You can search on wikitravel (http://wikitravel.org/en/Dubrovnik) where you can eat with cheaper prices before you go. There are some bakeries called 'pekara' where you can get cheaper stuff to eat outside wherever you want. Try to find a place to stay somewhere close to the Old Town. Otherwise you need to take bus in city every time when you want to go there. Below, you can see a nşght view from the Old Harbor.
Two days were totally enough to see most part of the city and all in all, it was really nice to see this small and beautiful city!

Bascarsija Nights 2009

During the whole July, there will be activities like concerts, movies, art exhibitions as parts of 14th. 'Bascarsija Nights' festival. Together with nice weather, green environment and its famous colorful roses, these are the Best times of Sarajevo...

Do Not Forget!

Today is the 14th. anniversary of Srebrenica happenings. This year we are not attending the ceremony but I am sitting at home and watching some documentaries about Srebrenica and trying to keep my conciousness. They will bury 530 victims, whose only some parts were found, today. It is not known how long it will continue to bury people since it is not known exactly how many people died. Just try to think today for a while what happened there and wish nice things for both victims and for the survivals.

Small note: The name of Srebrenica comes from Srebren which means silver since silver mining was always important in that small area. However, today, the area is out of silver but its soil is now full of with victims maybe whose bodies are more valuable than silvers.

Improbable

Nice expression; improbable, which means not impossible but very unlikely to occur or happen. This is the name of the novel of Adam Fawer. It was different than I expected but in some terms, even better than I expected also. The book became more meaningful to me while I have been teaching statistics and probability course since 3 semesters in the university. Because the book is actually about the life of a lecturer of statistics and probability. Without going into details, here are some parts that I selected from the book:

Pascal was one of the early researches about probability issue. By using the expected value calculation (which is one of the basic calculations in probability theory today), he decided to change his life towards being more religious. Why? Here is the reason:
Which is greater?
a. Expected Value of hedonistic life
b. Expected Value of religious life
where
a= probability of no afterlife*joy from hedonism+probability of after life*eternal damnation
b=probability of no afterlife*joy from religion+probability of afterlife*eternal happiness
Pascal's logic was simple; if a was greater than b, he should be hedonistic but if b is greater than a, he should live religious life. Here, the value of eternal happiness was positive infinity and that the value of eternal damnation was negative infinity, hence, for the above calculations, a becomes minus infinity while b becomes positive infinity. Of course, then, a gets smaller than b which triggers Pascal to turn to religious life.

Laplace's Demon; Just because we can not measure the factors does not mean the coin flip is determined by chance. This theory basically was arguing that if ALL the factors of an event (let's say to flip a coin) are known like the speed of the particles in the air, the angle of our arm, the density of each side of the coin, the effect of any voices around us etc. etc. then prediction about what side will come as a result of flipping this coin could be done. But there is no program, human kind or any source which can take into account so many factors to predict the future events. And even for a small event like flipping a coin, there are so many factors, can you imagine how it would be hard to predict an event which is affected by more and complex factors? There are billions billions of events are happening around the world every day, how would it be so hard to predict so many events at the same time. Can you imagine? But as it was said above, just because we can not measure the factors does not mean they are the results of chance. (Can you imagine the complexity of the God's brain? :) Laplace also showed that the best way to predict reality is not to calculate the right answer but to figure out what answer will be the least wrong. (Nice principle :)

On the other hand, Laplace's Demon knows everything in the past, because the past is alway singular. But Laplace's demon does not know the precise future because there is more than one. Why? Because in each step of acting even the small changes move you towards different futures. To know all the facts never enough since to control them is something different. You wake up in the morning and if you could not drink coffee for example, later on you would need to go to a coffee shop where you will meet one of your friends and by keeping him or her via talking he or she will be late for the work which can cause his or her firing. If you could just manage to get a small cup of coffee in the morning before you leave the home, none would happen. Billions billions of different futures by very very small act of you in each day. Crazy? Yes, if you knew what each of them would cause you could trun into crazy easily. This fits so much into my fate theory. Nice... And finally, Deja vu (the feeling as if you had this moment before) is a memory of a possible future...

Bu arada, youkarıda bahsettiğim kitap Türkçe'ye Olasılıksız adı ile Şirin Yener tarfından çevrildi. İlgililere duyrulur!