Bilkent University welcomed 26 exchange and visiting students for the fall semester with an orientation program. Thanks to the International Exchange Program, students came from universities in many different countries all over the world, in order to learn more about Turkish customs and culture, and for academic purposes. Bilkent students from different departments cooperated, thanks to the Bilkent International Student Club and the International Center, to prepare an orientation program for the new students.
The orientation program included visits to historical places, museums, and Anıtkabir, as well as dinners and lunches displaying traditional Turkish hospitality. The newcomers also had the chance to visit Istanbul and Cappadocia and to learn the basic communication skills of the Turkish language with a course given by Nurdane Mumcu Öz.
Mariah Harrower, a 4th year Literature and Political Science double major student from the University of California, Santa Cruz, said that she found her dormitory and the campus quite similar to her own.
Another student from the University of California Los Angeles, Pamela Sit, who is in her junior year in Anthropology, said: “So far in Bilkent and Ankara I don't see a lot of difference. It is like the USA, but there are some differences for example, the language. I’m getting used to it.”
5th year Physics student, Lukasz Michalak, from Adam Mickiewicz University, finds the weather strange and says “It will take time to get used to it.”
David Cox, from the University of Maine, is studying Microbiology in his 4th year at Bilkent. He shared some of his impressions about Turkish people: “Turkish people are very hospitable; also, compared to people where I am from, the majority of the young people in Turkey are very slim!”
We hope our new exchange students will enjoy their stay in Turkey and at Bilkent. Welcome to Bilkent University!