The FINANCIAL — The 14,517 bookworms that converged on İstanbul's Ali Sami Yen football stadium on June 13 in an effort to break the Guinness World Record for the book reading event with the highest participation saw their efforts fall short of the mark, as organizers failed to garner attendance high enough to beat the standing record of 15,440 people.
The FINANCIAL — The 14,517 bookworms that converged on İstanbul's Ali Sami Yen football stadium on June 13 in an effort to break the Guinness World Record for the book reading event with the highest participation saw their efforts fall short of the mark, as organizers failed to garner attendance high enough to beat the standing record of 15,440 people.
According to Today's Zaman, the stadium was full of people, including students from schools across the city and bookworms from every walk of life, for the event organized by the Düşün Taşın Association, a group whose professed goal is to increase literacy and reading rates amongst Turkish society and which regularly holds Sunday book readings.
The attempt at breaking the record was conducted in coordination with the İstanbul Provincial Education Directorate, which helped reach out to schools in districts across the city to encourage reading and recruit participants for the event. Thousands traveled to Ali Sami Yen Stadium in the early morning hours, waiting for the doors to open and the event to begin.
The readers withstood the heat of the summer sun at the event, which was hosted by President Abdullah Gül’s wife, first lady Hayrünnisa Gül. The crowd included the youngest of students alongside the most veteran of educators along with parents, and the youth participants explained to the press the reasons they felt the event was beneficial for them personally. Recalling how their teachers were constantly trying to get them to read, students noted the importance of reading as a lifetime habit. The youngest participant at the event was a toddler named Elif, who read from a book while sitting in her mother’s lap.
The event, which was emceed by poet İbrahim Sadri, saw the participation of a number of high-ranking officials, including Education Minister Nimet Çubukçu and İstanbul Governor Hüseyin Avni Mutlu. Still, the crowd’s efforts fell short of the desired goal — the 14,517 tickets counted by Guinness Book officials present were not enough to shatter the existing record, which was established when 15,440 people participated in a mass book reading in the Mardin province.
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