This past Friday and Saturday a conference entitled "The Volga-Ural Region as a Crossroads of Eurasia: Empire, Islam, and Nationality" was held at Kazan State University. The conference organizers were the Islamic Area Studies Center at the University of Tokyo, Kazan State University, and the Slavic Research Center of Hokkaido University.

İsmail Türkoğlu keeps the crowd entertained while Diliara Usmanova and others look on

I only attended the Friday sessions of the conference and the post-conference party on Saturday night. It was super seeing a lot of old friends and acquaintances from the US, Japan, Kazan, Ufa, and Turkey, including Hisao Komatsu, Rafik Mukhametshin, Charles Steinwedel, Il'dus Zagidullin, Diliara Usmanova, Norihiro Naganawa, İsmail Türkoğlu, Azat Akhundov, Masumi Isogai, Marsil Farkhshatov, Ramil Sabirov, Mami Hamamoto, Xavier Le Torrivellec, and others. At the post-conference party, talk flowed interchangeably between Russian, Tatar, and Turkish—a perfect Kazan evening!