My First Impression of Secular Turkey

Betty Caplan

As I was packing to come to Istanbul, Turkey, my friends urged me to leave jeans, shorts, and skimpy tops at home. One brought me a little modest outfit that covered my arms and shoulders. Imagine then when I arrived here in 30 degree heat, finding that the dress code is like that of the beach resorts in Mombasa! I have seen more burkhas and head scarves in London and Nairobi than I have here.

The founder of the modern Turkish state, the greatly revered Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, decreed that it should be a secular state and the smart young girls in this up-market suburb have taken him literally. It has always been a lynchpin. After the disasters of the First World War in 1923, the Treaty of Lausanne saw foreign powers off and the new modern borders of the Turkish state were established. Not for nothing was he called Father of the Turks.

He changed the Arabic script into Roman, modernised the language, instituted the Gregorian calendar, banned the fez, promoted universal suffrage and set up institutions of democracy, never allowing opposition to get in his way. The long rule of the Ottoman Empire was well and truly over, though Ataturk’s insistence that the country be thoroughly Turkish still has repercussions in some regions today.

Istanbul is the only city to be divided by two continents: Europe and Asia. It retains a gracious culture from old times where a politeness reigns except on the roads. Ramadhan is observed here and there but when it comes to Bayram, everyone participates whether they have fasted or not. Families plan their gatherings for days before, and women are busy buying up the best and the freshest. The finest cuisine is to be found – as in most countries with their own tradition- in the home. In my first week in a city where virtually no English is spoken, by luck I came across a professor of comparative literature who had lived in the USA and the UK and who was more than glad to have a literary conversation in a newly-opened bookshop.

The following week, I sat at sunset in her home listening to the lapping of the waves of the Bosphorus, and watching those unique shapes of the grande mosques across the water disappear into twinkling lights. The apartment was large and spacious, and the eating area set on the balcony for who could ever resist such a view? My companion is now retired but still attends conferences all over the world. Her American husband, much older, was not to be seen. “That’s a story for another day,” she said. But she is scathing about Turkish men who trade in their partners regularly for more recent models.

Never did I imagine I would praise colonialism, or realise how much we take English for granted in Kenya! (Not that it is altogether a good thing of course.) I have some inkling now of what it must feel like to be deaf-mute. I feel for all those refugees and immigrants who cannot communicate, and unlike Australia, for example, there aren’t translators on hand to assist. We arrogant English speakers expect the world to know our language but in Turkey I sense a slight muttering under the breath when I ask a shopkeeper if they speak English.

“Hmph!” I imagine them saying to another customer. “What do we need their language for?” It is taught in school for only a few hours a week, but things are changing which is why I am here. With the possibility of joining the EU, and with increased trade prospects there is suddenly a need for more English speakers.

Relevant Links

* East Africa

* Kenya

* Middle East and Africa

* Governance

My landlady and I communicate by mime or Google Translate. She is a retired schoolteacher, and having done her 25 or so years’ service, she is now forced to be idle. So she smokes and watches TV all day. Arm-in-arm we go off to the bazaar together where all the selling is done by men. Why? That is not womens’ work in a Muslim country. I think of the thousands of African women sitting on the ground with their piles of oranges and tomatoes who keep their families going seven days a week, 365 days a year. One I knew in Thika sent her four children to university on her meagre earnings. God only knows how.

So far my students at the school are top level company managers. They work for a Swiss pharma firm and are accustomed to teleconferences each week – in English. They are down-to-earth and need the basics. “No reading- no time!” they insist. Ahmet (not his real name) knows that he would earn far more doing the same job in Switzerland but first he must know English. I teach them in-house but back at the school there is the same rush to learn quickly.

We must have covered so much by the end of October. But however fast you teach, it doesn’t mean your students will learn quickly especially when there is little in English in their immediate environment to encourage them.

via allAfrica.com: Kenya: My First Impression of Secular Turkey.