Friendship truck that set off on August 4 to meet 2016 Turkish Summer School students visited Bursa. Travelling from city to city as A part of Turkish Summer School Culture Nights festival, the Friendship Truck brought together 40 students from 20 countries with the people of Bursa at the city’s Main Square after its programs in Samsun, Ankara, Denizli, İzmir and Çanakkale.

The event organised with the contributions of the Governor and Mayor of Bursa as well as the Bursa Directorate of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, started with Yunus Emre Institute’s students welcoming the Friendship Truck at the City Square. These students have been taking training courses and attending cultural activities at Bursa Uludağ University, TÖMER and Ankara University’s TÖMER Bursa Branch.

After the welcoming ceremony, Bursa Metropolitan Municipality hosted an introductory dinner for the Turkish Summer School students at the Bursa Gönül Dostları Sofrası restaurant. Subsequently, the Culture Nights activities were started at the City Square with all their excitement and fun. Bursa locals that filled up the City Square gave a very warm welcome to the Turkish Summer School students.

Bursa MP Osman Mestan, Deputy Governor of Bursa Yunus fatih Kadiroğlu, Deputy Mayor of Bursa Abdülkadir Karlık and Yunus Emre Institute’s Vice President Assoc. Prof. Ebuberkir Ceylan joined the Culture Nights activities.

In his opening speech, Ebubekir Ceylan said: “So far we have opened 45 Turkish Culture Centres in 37 countries in abroad. We teach Turkish to foreigners at these centres and organise significant activities to promote Turkish culture, history, and arts. We try to introduce all aspects of Turkish language, culture, arts and history through symposiums, conferences and forums, exhibitions, concerts, and film shows. Now students who learn Turkish at our culture centres in abroad and participate in our cultural events get the chance to learn about Turkey and the Turkish people in situ.” Following the opening speech by Vice President Ceylan, promotional videos of Yunus Emre Enstitüsü and Turkish Summer School as well as short films on Ankara, Samsun and Denizli programs were shown.

Before the “I Compete in Turkish” contest started, each student greeted the people of Bursa and gave messages of support to Turkey. The most exciting moments of Culture Nights program was the “I Compete in Turkish” activity. When also the local citizens were included in the event to compete, the program has become even more fun.

Fatemeh Rafiei from Iran, Mohammad Barakat from Palestine, Fadila Methadzovic from Montenegro, Gent Jetuullahu from Kosovo and Piotr Pawlaczyk from Poland were the main contestants in the “I Compete in Turkish” event which was broadcast live on Sound of Turkish Radio Channel. The contest gave the students a change to both have fun and learn new things. All students gave correct answers to 9 questions out of 10 about the Turkish culture, history, art, the city of Bursa and Turkish grammar therefore they shared the first place. After the prizes had been presented to the winners, the Culture Nights program which received a lot of attention from the local people of Bursa, continued with various activities. The event continued till late at night with visiting students singing and folk dancing with Bursa locals and ended with a family photo.

Next stop of Culture Nights organised as a part of the Turkish Summer School program will be the city of Sakarya. Friendship Truck and Yunus Emre Institute’s Cultural Envoys will meet with Sakarya locals on Tuesday, August 16.