Cyclists: Another Source of Happiness

People always asked me in Holland if there was any cyclists in Turkey during the everyday life. "No, never ever" I said. "Only children in summer time, for fun, in front of their houses".

Well, this was valid for Istanbul, and I thought it was the same all over Turkey.

Luckily, It wasn't. But, this, I have realized only when I came to this small city few weeks ago.

I always appreciated the role of bikes in dutch people. I always envied them. That was why I was very happy- as in the case of seeing a magpie- when I saw cyclists in this small western city of Turkey.

It is not like you see only few. You can see a cyclist passing through in every 10 minutes or so (which may sound very rare compared to Holland :) ). They are not children; they are all adults who even sometimes carry some bags with their bikes: exactly dutch (and danish) style! Moreover, It is not unusual to see bikes parked here and there.

Spotting bikes and cyclists in the city centre makes me smiling since:

• it reminds me of Netherlands; my (Johan's) bike there, my cyclings etc....
• it makes me proud to see that people here are aware of the advantages of using bikes. I guess it only need some municipality-based official encouragement to make it more common here.