Father of the Turks

As the content suggests, I wrote most of this a little while ago, but I only just managed to post it. My apologies for the delay.



Today, a country stopped everything for one man. So I figured I would stop the program of my blog for a bit for him too. If you have ever had even a glimpse of Turkish history, you know exactly who I mean: Atatürk.

For those of you don’t, I wish there was some kind of easy analogy I could make to some American leader of similar importance to give you a sense of who he is to Turkey, but there is no one. No American figure has ever been anything comparable to Atatürk. He is like every founding father on Mount Rushmore combined, and then multiplied by John F. Kennedy, plus Martin Luther King. But bigger.

Today was the anniversary of his death. Needless to say, there was a little to-do.

9:05 a.m. November 10th 1938, this country said goodbye to its beloved founder and creator. Now, at that exact minute, every year, something rather incredible happens. An entire nation, stops. Everything. Cars come to a halt in the middle of the road, conversations are dropped mid-sentence, and 73 million people seem to hold their breath. I have not experienced a quiet moment in this city since I arrived, but at 9:05 not a sound could be found. Not a sound, save a long, mournful siren.

At my school, everyone was gathered in the gym, which had been transformed into a rather grand conference hall, complete with an enormous flag and portrait of Atatürk hanging from ceiling to floor. All 2,000 students and a significant number of faculty members sat in stands that had been opened for this. I tried to imagine Telluride’s whole population occupying the seats, a sea of familiar faces – my whole school, the clerks from Clark’s, the lifties, maybe even Big Bird Jesus. It feels as though the entirety of my past life could fit in this room.

However, something very different is in the room. There is an incredible spirit here today, and even I, although I am not Turkish in any way, can really feel it. The presentation began with a video projected onto a giant screen at the front – a run through of Atatürk’s life, told through a stream of dated pictures that tried to give a sense of all he had done. But when the dates reached 1938, the slideshow abruptly stopped. The suddenness felt wrong, exactly as their leaders sudden death must have felt to his people. The screen cut to black, with only the numbers 1881-1938 printed across it. The 8 at the end was turned on its side, to form the infinity symbol. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk: 1881-infinity. The music was suddenly just a long monotone note, a sound I know only from Grey’s Anatomy; the sound that accompanies the stop of a heartbeat, the sound of death. Then, slowly, a siren began to wail. It went on for what felt like a minute or more. No one moved. Finally, two words appeared on the giant screen.

Unutmadık.
Unutmayacağız.

We did not forget.
We will not forget.

I have not I grown up with the unconditional adoration of Atatürk that everyone around me has, and I am not generally easily awed by politicians, but this stirred somthing deep in me. The lights slowly came up, and the ceremony moved forward, but I remained unmoving. The effect that one man has had on this country really is incredible. As overly sweeping a statement as it is, the reason that Turkey is in such a different position than the many impoverished, corrupt, and/or oppressed nations to the east is more than anything else, due to this man. I’m not saying he didn’t have his flaws – he did. He is after all, still only human. But what he accomplished for being only human really is astounding.

This was followed by a choir of students singing national songs (the same ones every year, my friends beside me whispered) and several dances also by students. One dance, however, was performed by a professional dance troupe. It was the traditional Zeybeck dance, done in full costume and perfect synchronization. It is done only by men, to display their self-assurance, honesty, and bravery. There were also readings, a mini play, and a number acts, but these were entirely reliant on language and thus obviously more difficult for me to follow. However, my limited understanding of Turkish did let me catch a few interesting things. For example, Atatürk is addressed not as ‘siz’, the more formal respectful form of ‘you’, but as ‘sen’, which is usually reserved for close friends and children. Each Turk feels connected enough to their founder they can call him sen, despite his obvious higher status (and age). He is also often called ‘Mustafam’, which is his first name (Mustafa) but in the “my” form. There is a definite intimacy to that term. He is seen not just as the Father of the Turks in general, but a father to each individual Turk, even those born long after his death.

The presentation had been conducted with a stiff formality throughout, yet the choir concluded with, not another march song or anthem, but with Sertab Erener’s Koparılan Çiçekler. A wild pop song to close the official ceremony ? Why not. It’s Turkey.

School (or something to do with that)

When I wrote the last post, I had intended to follow up on it shortly after. Obviously, that didn’t quite happen. Instead, for the last several weeks I have had the pleasure of experiencing Turkish exams. It is not a cultural experience I would recommend.

It is only this past week that school life resumed a normal degree of stressfulness, so now I’ll try to share what exactly that is.

In Turkey, students must choose to specialize in either Science or Turkish/Math in 10th grade. This choice decides the careers that one can pursue. This seemed a bit early to have to choose one’s life path to me, but my friends explained that actually most of them had their careers in mind long before that. At age 6, children can decide that they will be doctors. I think my future plans at age 6 involved something to do with going to Hogwarts. But in Turkey, when a little kid (and probably his family as well) chooses to become a doctor, that is exactly what he does. Which is what about half my class wants to do. I ended up in the Science branch, meaning my classmates are mostly very studious, focused teens with their eyes on the white coat. I’ll admit, the first reaction I had as this was explained to me and the entire row behind me told me of their shared aspiration was, “How many doctors can one city have?”

So, what does one study in the Science Department? Actually, at this school the math and science classes are in English. Well, that’s what they say anyway. My three science classes (Kimya (chemistry), Fizik, and Bioloji (you can figure those out)) and two math classes (Matematik and Geometri) are all taught in what I dub Türkglish,(very original, I know) with varying ratios of Turkish and English in each. In math, for instance, everything is always in Turkish. Shockingly enough, in math I am currently at the bottom of my class. Yet in biology, which is nearly always in English, I am at the top. Generally though, the “English” classes are mostly in Turkish. Really, who can blame a Turkish teacher for speaking Turkish to a class of Turks? I am grateful for all the immersion I can get, but the drawback here is that since the classes are officially in English, I am expected to perform like any other student in them. Unfortunately, Rosetta Stone and my sincerest of efforts can only get me so far in understanding the factoring of multiple variable polynomials.

English classes are a bit easier. However, I have been really impressed by the material that is being taught in English. My tenth grade class is currently reading Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, which I only read in seventh grade. Obviously, this class is getting something very different out of the book – rather then analyzing the deep foreshadows and intriguing allusions, they just try and read through a section, asking the teacher (an Australian woman who doesn’t speak Turkish) the meaning of a word every other sentence or so. Yet their English is impressive to be sure. Just like the English content in my other classes, this is both good and the bad for me. On the one hand, being able to communicate has been priceless in allowing me to forge friendships and make vital initial connections. Yet I find myself wishing more and more that my classmates knew no English.
When talking to a non-English speaker, there is a kind of unspoken mutual understanding, a pre-emptive forgiveness for all the mistakes you may make. It doesn’t matter how bad your grammar is, or if you say something completely stupid. You can use hand gestures and charades and basically make an utter fool of yourself, and it doesn’t matter. You are doing what you need to do. And you know that whatever you are doing, no matter how wrong, is better than they could do in English. You are forced to at least try, and also given permission to fail. I wish I had that.

Actually, I have begun seeking out such people for just these reasons. I strike up conversations with random people in the grocery store and always chat with the salesmen calling out to passersby that others usually just brush off. I thrive off of these interactions, these spontaneous “pocket friendships” (as Chuck Palahniuk would have said). One of those conversations has led to an actual relationship – my friend Sumeyra who works at the Levent metro station. Yet the people I am around every day can all speak to me in English.

My friends do encourage me to speak Turkish when they remember, but at the level I’m at now it may take me a few seconds to figure out what was said, and a few seconds more to formulate a reply. By that time they’ve usually just assumed I didn’t get it and have switched to English. It’s a bit frustrating to be sure, but I know it must only get easier in time.

Well, I guess I’m really awful at staying on topic. I had meant to go through an average school day, but I seem to have only touched on a few of my classes. The hectic disorganization of my life has spilled over into my writing, so I’ll try to continue this train-crash of thought later, hopefully sometime sooner than I followed up on the last post (my apologies, parents).