Last night in Turkey.. had a really good day.. got some good work done, a little sightseeing and gave a talk at beautiful Koç Üniversitesi . I apologize, but the way I
m uploading pictures here won’t let me inter space comments, so I’ll have to describe the day and put my pics afterwards.
The sightseeing was really fun. My friend Esra offered to be my tour guide as we talked about IBM Smarter Planet stuff and life in general.. She was the local lead on a very cool Smarter Transportation project called City in Motion that used cellular data to map out the travel patterns of groups of people around the city without violating anyone’s privacy.. it was really cool We took the funicular and tram down to the old city. We took a quick but exciting walk around the town..
and got to see the Hagia_Sophia.. which was a church, then a mosque and is now a museum.. The ceilings and window were gorgeous. There was this really cool place where you made a wish and put your thumb in a hole. If you could turn your hand all the way around without taking your thumb out.. you got your wish.. I did it.. but forgot to make a wish.. I guess I’ve got my wishes already.. 🙂

From there we walked right across the courtyard to the amazing Blue Mosque.. Its still an active mosque.. we took our shoes off and quietly walked around as folks prayed. it too was a wonderful building..

From there we took the tram back to the spice markets.. what a scene.. blocks and blocks of folks selling everything from pet food to leeches.. the smells and colors were amazing..

We then grabbed a quick lunch and went back to IBM.. There met Engin and Jale and we headed of to Koç University.

Koç is another university funded by a private foundation. the campus was one of the most appealing university campuses I’ve ever seen. the buildings are only about 5 years old and stand on a hill overlooking the Black Sea and the Bosforus . I got a very warm welcome from Prof Türkay and the Dean of the college.. They had done great publicity on the talk so the auditorium was pretty packed. It was a great audience.. I got a great treat afterwards by getting to hang out with the Society of Women Engineers chapter. We talked about how to encourage kids.. women and men kids.. to go into engineering. We even did some experiments and blew up the schools microwave in the process. They are great and powerful women ..
The night ended with a very nice dinner with Engin and Jale at a river side fish place hosted by Prof Türkay. Fantastic food. Lots of small plates..cool tasty things I couldn’t pronounce..

now back at the hotel and a couple of hours of meetings to keep up with day job.. I’m beat. Heading home tomorrow after a really good and welcoming trip here.. I just love this place

teşekkürler (thanks) istanbul !

nite all, nite sam