Mardin, Turkey 5-7 December '15 |
My trip to Mardin was exceptionally eye opening; the diversity seen in this Mesopotamian city was very significant. Kurdish, Turkish and Arabic could be equally heard in streets. And also the Assyrian impact could be significantly seen, all governmental charts were written in Kurdish, Turkish , Arabic and the archaic Assyrian. And as a person who is pretty interested in minorities’ questions, Mardin was a pool of interesting observations between different races and religions. Mardin , unlike most of the Turkish cities , only one mosque was listed on the sightseeing and the main must-sees were beautiful churches and monasteries.
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Visiting these Christian picturesque places opened my eye and heart to very old and well rooted civilization , faith and ethnicity. I was fortunate to visit Derelzeyfrun Orthodox Monastery (1500 years old) and meet an Assyrian Christian Turk, who dazed me with how his people are barely now surviving in the land they sprang from 5000 years ago, (Assyrians exist since 3000 B.C) they were the first settlers of Mesopotamia and they are also one of the first people accepting Christianity and turned their temples to churches and built hundreds more. Now to survive they had earlier to migrate to other spots of the world, out of 4 million Assyrians around the world now they are only 20.000 in Turkey , 4000 in Mardin (Where their civilization started) , and in the beautiful monastery we visited , after hosting 200 priests and nuns , only 20 are there.
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Morocco TrıpSummer 2015 in Ramadan, I made a 17 days trip to Morocco visiting 7 cities. Each Zanqa in every city had a story, I want to share.
Vlog - Blog |
the states trıpsOn my exchange program to America in UMD, D.C.
I explored some other cities and states, that I vlogged! But also want to share their tricks. NewYork- Chicago- Boston Vlog - Blog |
Syrıan borders
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