hi everyone

I live in boring drab ankara and though i do visit istanbul from time to time i would also like to form an expat group here in ankara who do fun things like the istanbul groups and then maybe both cities can get together for a big bash. So all you ankara expats lets get this forum rolling.

great to have you on board caro and hope a little life can be breathed in to the Ankara section. We do have a few Ankara members and you can see who they are by checking the members list. Our own flying Dutchman has a history with Ankara and he may well be able to organise a get together in Ankara.
Good luck and look forward to any posts even better if you have some tit bits about the capital.

hi caroline -- and welcome to the forum. when i saw your post in our 'new members introductions' forum i thought your screen-name and introduction looked familiar. and then i remembered; i had seen your posts in a thread titled 'Let's get together!' on MM. wanting to find out about the expatriate community in Ankara and whether they have a similar thing going as we do here in Istanbul, i noticed a couple more familiar screen-names: rsjbaker [he wrote me an email when i was planning to move to Turkey] and annieapples who recently registered with our forum as well. what struck me as odd about this particular thread is that there was great enthusiasm to have a get-together but that it took from end May until beginning of September to organise to see e.other at Starbucks [of all places]!?

i know you wrote, you've been here for 3 years and only found out about the forum thanks to an introduction by justforfun. i don't find this surprising as this forum [in its current format] is only a mere three months old that probably also explains why our Ankara forums haven't developed as much as we would have hoped they had. that plus the fact our member base in Ankara is a bit scarce in numbers [for now] therefore i am glad to see you are calling on your fellow expats in ankara to join you in getting this forum rolling.

i sometimes travel to Ankara for weekends and I will be back there soon as i need to extend my residence permit perhaps we could meet up some time when i am over and we could talk some more. meanwhile I will PM you on some of the ideas I have to get things moving for a get together in Ankara after all the expatriate base in Ankara should not differ all that much from the one here in Istanbul me thinks. the only thing, i can do with some guidance on places to go out in Ankara as from my own experience i haven't found that "great" hang-out place yet.

FD

thank you for your interest and i hope to see you and med blue the next time you are in ankara.

im all up and ready to get this party going and forming a bussling ankara expate group i just hope we can find them

as for the "perfect" hang out place there isnt one of such
but there are a few nice places during the spring and summer , first of which is mayday right near sports international at bilkent. it has a wonderful pool and tennis courts which you can make use of during the day and at night it turns into a club on the decked floors. but as i said its usually better during the hot months

hope we can have a gathering there one day and all you istanbul expates are invited too
cheers

If there is a get together in Ankara, I would come down for it. But expect me on the first bus back if the rumours about it being dull are true.