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Expats aspirations, expectations and minor frustrations (2)
Frustrations abroad need not ruin your experience though, and if managed can easily be overcome and replaced with a more realistic yet much more enjoyable attitude towards your new home, too.
Personal reflections
Let me give you a few personal examples linked to me coming to Turkey. Many things surprised me, some puzzled me, and a few I still do not understand or approve of -- yet with the latter category I most likely have no right to criticize.
On no particular scale of relevance, I was surprised that most meals come without sauce, Turkish citizens living by the sea prefer to eat meat, pop music and starring in video clips is a profession for the older generation instead of being the domain of 18-year-olds only, many young people refrain from reading books or even newspapers and some bus companies do not allow members of the opposite sex to sit next to each other unless they travel as a family.
I do not like to see violence on television before children are sent to bed (a common occurrence on of almost all Turkish soap operas) and absolutely do not approve of male offspring telling their female siblings what to wear, where to work or whom to marry.
What I definitely do not enjoy are people disobeying the local municipality’s bans on construction work during the peak tourist season doing exactly that -- every day and over the weekends.
If I would now add a list of things that I truly like about Turkey I would need to write another article. Hence, and to end this contribution on a positive note let me give a few light-hearted examples. I admire the people of İzmir, who each day transform the city center into a catwalk, the citizens of Ankara, who set new records with regards to how much time per week a person can possibly spend in a shopping mall, and the villagers near Kuşadası, who have a state-of-the-art organic food-processing plant.
So yes, there are a few issues I would have with life in this otherwise fascinating country but did any of it make me pack my bags straight away? No way! To a varying degree, similar cultural surprises could arise for a Turkish citizen moving to Manchester or Belfast. Multiculturalism means that we are able to overcome these obstacles and learn how to make the most of our stay abroad. Happy in Turkey? You bet! Happy about my first home, which is 1,599 miles away (measuring the distance from İzmir to London)? That’s a clear “yes,” too.
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| BÜLENT KENEŞ |  |
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| What befell Niyazi-i Misri in the past is happening to Fethullah Gülen now | |||
| EKREM DUMANLI |  |
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| When a call for fairness and reason finds acceptance | |||
| ŞAHİN ALPAY |  |
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| Uludere, test case for democracy in Turkey | |||
| EMRE USLU |  |
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| Are the Kurds mentally divorced from Turkey? | |||
| GÖKHAN BACIK |  |
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| Erdoğan, Gül and Davutoğlu: the inner bargain on Turkish foreign policy | |||
| MARKAR ESAYAN |  |
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| Taking lessons from previous experiences with the military | |||
| YAVUZ BAYDAR |  |
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| Qualm | |||
| ÖMER TAŞPINAR |  |
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| A new phase in Syria? | |||
| İHSAN DAĞI |  |
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| Turkish foreign policy: Time for a re-evaluation | |||
| SEYFETTİN GÜRSEL |  |
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| Poor-friendly economic growth and the AK Party | |||
| CHARLOTTE MCPHERSON |  |
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| Missing women, missing opportunities | |||
| BERK ÇEKTİR |  |
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| Changes to incentives for investment in Turkey | |||
| MERVE BÜŞRA ÖZTÜRK |  |
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| The 1960 coup: a final test for democracy | |||
| AMANDA PAUL |  |
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| Ukraine: a lost country | |||
| MÜMTAZER TÜRKÖNE |  |
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| The 52nd anniversary of May 27 | |||
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