26. A Christmas message for you all

Dear Sıla, Begüm, Emin, Metin, Ali, Tuğçe, Simge, Hazal, Ece, Denise, Selen, Serra, Mali, Mehmet, Fatih, Onur A., Duygu, Nil, Arda, Can K., Emir K., Ezgi O., Cem, Janbek, Beri, Hasan, Alican, İzzet, Atalay, Bahar, Burak B., Erman E., Erman K., Emir G., Burç, Elif K., Can M., Onur O., Meltem, Baran, Ayşe, Yavuzalp, Ezgi Y., Albert, Erdem, Yalçın, Elif D., Egemen, Koray, Cemre, Burak Y. and Gamze:

(Watch me dance for you here)

Thank you for this semester: for all the hard work, for the laughs, and yes, for the (minor) frustrations. Obstacles are what push us forward and help us grow.

Lots of love, Sonja x

19. The gift that keeps on giving

'For the love of books' by Chocolate Geek, licenced under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 Generic


As you probably know, Christmas is coming up, and as part of that tradition we usually exchange gifts with friends and family. It is also a time of charity to those who are less fortunate than ourselves.

A colleague of mine has a friend working as a teacher in Afghanistan. Can you imagine, despite 30 years of war and destruction, students at Kabul University are still making a great effort to claim their education. The problem is this: they have no books, paper, pencils or even chalk. The library has 147 books.

We are requesting that you donate your stationery - pens, paper, folders and so on - as well as any books in English you will no longer use after this semester. If you have photocopies or printouts of reading texts, don't put them in the bin - these would be greatly appreciated by people who are struggling to improve their lives.

I will keep a box in my office for anything you can spare. We will collect materials until the end of the semester.

Thank you so much in advance for your generosity. All contributions make a real difference to real lives.