April means festival for Adana. People feel a different kind of energy with the smell of orange blossoms. It builds up passion to celebrate these special days. 7 years ago people started to celebrate it and called it as “Adana Orange Blossom Carnival”. Participation is getting bigger each year. More people open their booths, and the carnival area gets larger and larger.
If you visit the festival, you can get your fill of colours, especially green, orange and white. It reminds me of an Irish day or Ireland. That’s why I am so willing to tour around the festival area. You will see hundreds of booths in which people sell various things from coronets made with flowers to jams. It increases the joy to wear a coronet and walk around the city with that.
You can also find several kebab serving booths. But you should be careful when you walk near those booths, otherwise you may not resist their delicious smells which I think are better than the smell of orange blossom.
There are also concerts and dance shows in every corner. You may listen to three different music at the same time, and it’s like a culture conflict. There are so many people that play drum. And to be honest it annoys me. But if you like drum, there will be no problem for you.
The carnival was really joyful in general. However, there were of course some problems. First one is the garbage problem. I think people don’t know how to have fun. You may ask “Is there a rule for having fun?”. It definitely is. First of all, you are in public, and there is a crowd. You should respect people if you don’t respect nature. You can’t just put your trash on the ground. There are rubbish bins in every corner for you to put your trash. Garbage men are not here for your insolence. Second point is about getting too drunk. You should know your limits. Again you are in a crowd, not alone. Please control yourself, and try to have fun without disturbing anyone.

Last week, I also had the chance to visit Adana Atatürk Museum. It’s a small building right next to the Cinema Museum. When Atatürk came to Adana with his wife during the Independence War, he stayed in this house which belonged to Suphi Pasha from Ramazanoğulları. He spent one night there.

The house was opened as a museum in 1981. And on every 15 March, people celebrate Atatürk’s visit to Adana in this building. 

The museum is a two-storey building. On the ground floor, there is a library and a study room. And on the upper floor, you can see the main rooms such as press room, Hatay room, Kuva-i Milliye room. 

When you first step into the lounge, you’ll take the smell of “old” which made me feel so emotional. I started shaking when I first took the smell. Because Atatürk and his fellow soldiers were there chatting, drinking something and making plans. And now I am there. I saw his bedroom, study room and everything he touched. The feeling is literally inexpressible. And I understand once again that he was such a good leader that his only one night stay made the house a museum and named after it. 

In the museum, there is almost no written information. I expected to see some information about the rooms. But it’s not a big problem. The smell was so strong that I didn’t feel the need to read an information. 

If you happen to visit Adana, I highly recommend you to see this museum. It is a big chance for us to have a place like that. Because sometimes reading is not enough. We should go and see, as well to understand the situation better.  

Last week, I had the chance to visit the Cinema Museum in Adana. It was my first time to visit there as a 21 year-old Adanian. It’s a museum that includes movie posters, materials from some movies, belongings of some artists and model statues. It is located near Taşköprü, an another tourist attraction of Adana. You can enter for free. In the museum, Yılmaz Güney is at forefront with his statues, letters he wrote when in jail, posters of his films. 

There are several rooms for other films of different artists, as well. Most of those artists are citizens of Adana. Besides, there is also a library in the museum. 

To be honest, I don’t feel any kind of remorse for not visiting there till now. Because I don’t have an interest to the old Turkish Cinema, at all. However, when I was there, I imagined there as if it was full of things from modern Turkish or foreign cinema. Because the rooms, walls and the whole building were so cute and well-designed. I can not say the same thing for the model statues of the artists, though. I think people can only recognize them from their costumes. For example, I took a selfie with the statue of Kemal Sunal in order to share. But when I looked at the photo, I said “Who is this?”. Unless you see the names written under, it’s impossible to recognize who they are. So I ended up by giving up sharing. 

Overall, if you are interested in Turkish Cinema, you should visit the museum. I really like the building and its design. And I’d probably never left there, if there were materials, posters and statues from modern Turkish or foreign cinema.  

Have you ever dreamed of living in an ancient age? Well, after visiting the museum, you most probably will. Pay attention if you don’t believe that!