 Bilkent University alumni on America's west coast met during the weekend of March 12 for a Turkish night of memories. In Seattle Orçun Akça (THM/98’), president of software startup company ILG Studios, organized an evening cocktail for old peers. Many of the Seattle region alumni work in the software industry, especially at Microsoft's headquarters in the nearby town of Redmond.
In the San Francisco Bay Area, about 25 alumni met for dinner at Sultana's restaurant in Menlo Park, nearby Stanford University. The alumni enjoyed a three-course Turkish meal and took a quiz about Bilkent-related facts and memories. Bilkent alum Ali Dasdan (CS/M.S. 93’), Director of Engineering at eBay, delivered a speech about his experiences transitioning from a PhD student to a leader in the corporate world. He advised alumni to have self-confidence, do networking, and learn from their seniors. Dasdan also advised them to distinguish between important and urgent task items: focus on the important ones, not only the urgent ones.
The San Francisco dinner was organized by three alumni: İbrahim Okuyucu (CS/98’), a Facebook platform leader at RockYou!; Oytun Eskiyenentürk (IE/96’), Lead Data Analyst at Dapper; and Çağdaş Dirik (EE/01’), Senior Systems Modeling Engineer at SanDisk. Additionally, Okan Kolak (CS/98’), a Senior Resarch Scientist at Google, helped significantly during the event. 
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