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...

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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!

IUS's First Graduation Ceremony

Yesterday night we had our first graduation ceremony of our university since the establishment of the university in 2004. Actually, I have not been attending any of my graduation ceremonies until now. This time, I just wanted to be together with my students during their special time. Unfortunately it became longer than I expected since the long speeches of people and also our minister V. E. I think I will not change my tradition about not to go to ceremonies will continue, even for my own Phd one, because of the crowd, unnecessary speeches and loud music etc. Anyway, I was just feeling happy to see my students being excited of getting graduated. They will learn soon that this is not an ending but just a start of so many difficulties, challenges and beauties also :) Here are some photos...

I know, not the best photos but it was a bit dark inside and my battery depleted at the end :( Murph Rule was at work!

Bosna Fasli 3

Evet, Bosna ile ilgili actigimiz fasla devam edelim. Bu defa size burayla ilgili bilgi edinebileceginiz kitap ve filmlerden bahsedecegim. Once kitaplar...

1. Short History of Bosnia (Noel Malcolm): It gives information from the medieval times to today. But the book also includes explanations and opinions of the author. Not only a pure history book... Despite it says short do not think it is very short though.

2. BIH (Mustafa Imamovic): This is a book written by a Bosnian historian. It covers the periods from ancient times to today but in more historian way.

3. Modernization of BIH (Fikret Karcic): He is a Bosnian academician whom I got my Bosnian History course also. The book covers more about the modernization process in Austria-Hungary times.

4. Gecmisten Gunumuze Bosnaklar (Aydin Babuna): Evet, Turkce bir kitap sonunda. Kitap agirlikli olarak Avusturya donemine yer verse de diger donemlere de yer ayiriyor. Su ana kadarki zikri gecen kitaplardan en cok inceleme ve yorum icereni bu bence.

5. Sevdalinka (Ayse Kulin): Henuz bu kitabi okuyamasam da Bosna ile ilgili savas donemine dair bir roman oldugunu soyleyebilirim. Ayrica, yazar Ayse Kulinin soyadindan hareketle orta cagdaki en buyuk Bosnak imparatorlarindan biri olan Ban Kulinin soyundan geldigini dile getirebilirim.

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Simdi de filmler...

1. Perfect Circle (Abdullah Sidran): Bu topraklarin yetistirdigi onemli isimlerden biri Abdullah Sidran. Bu film, savas doneminden hemen sonra cekilmis olup savasa dair izlenimleri ozellikle 2 cocugun gozunden sunuyor.

2. No Mens Land (Danis Tnaovic): Bu filmi de nedense bulamadim bir turlu ama merakla bekliyorum izlemeyi. Ve bu da savasa dair bir film.

3. Wellcome to Sarajevo (Michael Winterbottom): Film gibi degil de bir haber kamerasindan belgesel gibi cekilmis fakat istedigimi pek de bulamadigim bir film.

4. Grbavica (Jasmila Zbanic): Yonetmenin odullu filmi, savastan sonraki yalniz bir annenin kiziyla olan iliskileri uzerine kurgulanmis. Bu arada, filmin adinin gectigi yer Saraybosnadaki onemli yerlesim yerlerinden biri, benim yasadigim yere de yakin. Savasin en cetin gectigi yerlerden biri imis. Filmdeki muzikler harika bu arada!

Fark edildigi gibi filmlerin agirligi savas uzerine. Ama yapilacak bir sey yok, savas bu insanlarin hayatini belki daha onlarca yil etkileyecek!