Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements
Dear Christian, a PhD-project takes at least two people. Thank you for this joint action
and its outcomes. I am also thankful to you for allowing me to pursue my widely scattered range
of interests even though they were not always within the boundaries of your project.
Dear Valeria, Remco, Luca, Annerose, Sebastian, Natalie and Guenther, all of you have
substantial contributions to the papers constitute this thesis. Thank you for your time and effort.
It was a great pleasure for me to work with you.
Dear members of the reading committee, Peter Hagoort, Harold Bekkering, Wolfgang
Prinz, thank you for your interest and time for my thesis.
Dear Ivan, Peter and Aslı, thank you for your support and patience while I was finishing
up my thesis in Nijmegen.
I am also grateful to the wonderful academic environment, staff and
classmates/colleagues of all the schools I attended in the past: Koç University (Istanbul),
Graduate School of Neuroscience (Tübingen) and University of Groningen.
Beste paranimf Jojanneke, somehow it was very easy for us to get along well. All of a
sudden I noticed that we are no longer colleagues who share a room but true friends. Thank you
for being so kind and open to me all these years. And your zen  support during my RSI-horrordays was precious, of course!
Dear paranymph Marc, do you remember your first day in Groningen? One does not meet
someone like you everyday! I always admire you both personally and professionally. We
exchanged a lot of ideas, music, movies and shared a lot of food and wine. I also thank you and
your great family for welcoming me all the time.
Dear Annerose, it was a great pleasure to work with you. All those hard and long working
days somehow ended up with spontaneous dinners and some biers and some more, some music
and some everything!
Beste Marleen, it was always pleasure to be with you! Yeah our trips to Napoli and
Amsterdam were great! Beste Harma, I wish we had more time to spend together outside the lab.
Beste Meisjes (incl. Jojannake), bedankt voor de gezelligheid en tot de volgende meisjesavond
op de Grotebeer Straat of in Nijmegen!
Dear LuKa, I haven’t met anybody either who is so dedicated to his work (Schippers,
2011). I am grateful to you for always being available to solve ridiculous problems together
before the sunrise! Ah MarsBar! Ah Granger!
Dear Jo, I learned a lot from you in terms of work. Thank you very much. It was also
great pleasure to spend leisure time with you and John. Keep in touch!
Dear Sanni girl, from Napoli to Groningen I enjoyed every second we spent together; but
it is never enough! I am glad we met!
Dear Valeria, thanks for the lunches in the town and the time we spent together.
And all past (Mbemba and Dan) and present members of the SBL thank you for great lab
times!
It was a pleasure to be part of the NIC. Thank you Anita and Judith for scanning and MR
related support. Special thanks to K.Vartjes, Hans and the UMCG workshop for developing the
game box. Dear Tinie, Rob, Diana, Janine, Evelyn, thanks for all the paper work. Another special
thanks goes to ICT support. Dear Gerry, you were a great manager and support in every matter. I
am very grateful that you were always there and ready to help. Dear Johan, it was always special
to be with you! It is a pity that you left everything early.
Dear Kiley, Jo and Sanni, thank you for proof reading and help in English grammar and
spelling. Dear Marleen, thank you for translating the summary in Dutch.
Sevgili Cenk, Hollandaca kursundan Budapeşte’ye olan yolculuk! Evet dostum, biz
seninle her yerde çok eğlendik! O küçücük odandaki muhabbetler ve o kutulardan yaptığımız
masanın üzerindeki yemekler çok güzeldi. Daha nice gezmelere ve yemeklere diyorum …
Sevgili Burcu ve Umut, aslında yıllar önce Istanbul’da bir Nisan sabahı film festivalinin
telaşında tanışmış olabilirdik. O çok tanıdık şehirden, mekanlardan, insanlardan, filmlerden
konuşmak sizlerle hep çok güzeldi.
Sevgili Onur, bir insan diğer bir insanı konuşmadan bu kadar iyi anlayabilir! Seninle
susmak ve müzik dinlemek hep cok güzeldi. Keşke hep öyle sen, Eda ve ben size gidip müzik
dinleyerek uyuyakalsak güzel bir Groningen gecesinin sonunda. Keşke o kadar uzaklara
gitmeseydiniz.
Dear Groningen and its unique social life: dear heroes of the bar Paard van Troja on
Thursday nights, thanks for the Friday-morning-headaches, dear Astro-people and their greatest
friendship and parties, dear Bulgarian gang, dear Turkish gang, dear Liga, Terence, Katrien,
Mateo, Hans, Ramona, Ana, Brani, thank you all for many things we did together, those were
wonderful moments!
Dear extended family in Turkey, sevgili geniş ailem, eğitim yıllarım boyunca tüm
destekleriniz için teşekkürler. Artık ben de bıktım, bu son okulumdur! Sevgili Ilkin kardeş,
buradaki desteklerin için çok dank je wel!
Dear Grotebeer straat family (Nikola, Boris, kitty), thank you all of you for our cozy
home and precious daily moments. Special thanks for unforgettable relaxing moments before and
after work (meow, meow, the radio is on, plays silly music, the smell of the coffee from the
kitchen, sleepy soft conversations, breakfast-mreakfast on the white table; great dinners, lekker
banitza, nazdrave, discussions, famous Bulgarian jokes which I don’t get at all, LPs-yes, at
nights we do care about music-, watching movies, documentaries or Top Gear, meow, meow).
Dear Nikola, thank you for all the support, joy and care during both good and bad times since we
met. Thank you for everything we shared!