Bonsai

Fourteen bonsai trees of late Turkish environmentalist Hayrettin Karaca, nicknamed "Grandpa Earth," in the Yalova Bonsai Museum — Türkiye's first and Europe's largest — are being passed down to future generations.

A 7,300-square-meter "Lotus Flower and Bonsai Art Park," which will be home to Turkey's biggest lotus breeding pond with 200 different types of endemic lotus flowers, plants and trees indigenous to the city and a bonsai greenhouse, will be opened by the end of this summer to nature enthusiasts on the northwestern province of Bolu's Alpağutbey neighborhood. 

The cheap synthetic drug known as "bonsai" has spread to dangerous levels in Turkey, with around 500,000 people known to be using the drug in the country, daily BirGün reported on May 30.

There are around 1.5 million drug addicts in Turkey, with approximately a third of them using bonsai, the daily reported.

The tree was planted by the Yamaki family in 1625. When the USAF dropped the Bomb on Hiroshima, the Yamaki family lived just two miles from ground zero. Miraculously both the family and the tree survived the explosion that killed around 140.000 people.

Anti-narcotic teams formed as part of the government's anti-drug action plan have captured a total of 610 dealers in 72 days since they were established last December.

A total of 202 operations were launched between Dec. 11, 2014, and Feb. 20 by the anti-drug units, meaning 8.4 people statistically were captured per day. Some 182 of the 610 people were arrested.

Prime Minister Ahmet Davuto?lu?s suggestion that objecting to the government?s controversial security bill amounted to supporting the use of cheap synthetic drug ?bonzai,? as well as Molotov cocktails in demonstrations, has been slammed by Turkey?s opposition parties.