Meet our Students

1. What is your full name?
My full name is M.Yasin Cakmak. M stands for Muhammed but in my country we use our middle names so I go by Yasin.

2. What country do you come from?
Turkey.

3. What is your favorite place in Seattle?
Pike Place Market is my favorite place in Seattle. You can find everything you want over there, and everything is fresh and healthy.

4. What do you enjoy most about Seattle Central?
I really enjoy the laboratories at SCCC, especially the Biology labs. Time passes so quickly when I study in my Bio lab. Also I enjoy the diversity at Seattle Central. Seeing lots of people from so many different cultures is wonderful. I learnt a lot from my fellow international student friends.

5. What are your plans for the future?
I am graduating at the end of this summer and hopefully I'll transfer to a 4 year University. I applied to Harvard, Columbia, University of Washington and Washington State University. I already got accepted to WASU and awarded with a $5,000 international student scholarship.

6. What are the biggest differences between life in your country and life in Seattle?
There are not a lot of differences in technology or in nature but the biggest difference is cultural. Turkish culture is so different than American culture. Nearly everything is different in a cultural and religiousl way. For example, Turkish food is really different from the food we have in Seattle. But the Turkish Community in Seattle has helped me a lot to overcome these cultural difficulties that I faced.

7. What do you consider to be your biggest accomplishments? Why?
In this country, my biggest accomplishment is my high GPA and the Academic Excellence Awards that I got from SCCC and WASU. It is hard to adapt to the lifestyle here in the US and study at the same time. But I think I have done a good job so far.

8. What do you consider to be an interesting fact about you?
An interesting fact is that I work as a General News Coordinator in a soccer-news website even though my major has nothing to do with Journalism. Since I started working there I got a lot of job offers from other newspapers and websites. The URL of the site is: www.aslanlar.net.

9. What are your hobbies?
Everything about soccer (playing, watching, writing about it, talking about it), swimming, writing, reading, driving, hiking, camping, fishing, discussing in forums, bicycling. And I love having pets. Especially reptiles or dogs.

10. What were you doing prior to coming to Seattle to study at Seattle Central?
I was in one of the most respected high schools of my country. The name is Private Nilufer High School.