[TurkC-L] Alanya -- home of the biggest German colony in Turkey
TurkC-L
Alanya -- home of the biggest German colony in Turkey
* Germans living in Alanya are organizing their own club to help
elderly Germans. They will not only provide help with Turkish
authorities but also organize entertainment and give them the
feeling of togetherness
ANGELIKA SCHUBERT
Antalya - Turkish Daily News
When the first Germans began settling in Alanya more than 10 years
ago, nobody thought that this would be the foundation stone of the
biggest German community in Turkey. Pioneers like Vera Wilke, Monika
Cetinkaya and her husband Ali were followed by more and more Germans.
Late-comers like Anneliese Depnering and her husband and Felix Beding
and his wife have been attracted by a city that dates back to historic
times with magnificent nature reserves and a mild climate in winter.
All of them helped form a German colony that has grown to 5,000 to
8,000 people. Most of Alanya's Germans are elderly and retired,
sometimes sick, who are trying to realize a long-held dream of
livelihood and an apartment under a Mediterranean sun, something that
would have never been possible in Germany with the meager pensions
some people receive.
New Turkish law paves way for new club
In midyear, the Turkish law relating to the foundation of clubs
changed and smoothed the way for a German club. Preliminary work
started in January this year, when interested people began meeting
once a week to exchange thoughts and experiences. The heart of the
founding process is Professor Ortan, who studied law in Germany many
years ago and who still speaks excellent German. He has been a
well-known lawyer in Alanya for a long time. He has been kind enough
to put his Alanya office partly at the club's disposal and works as an
honorary consultant to solve the clubs legal problems. Until the
foundation procedure is finalized the club will simply be called the
"German Club."
The club's activities are widespread and do not only involve
entertainment. Interested people have joined the club's social
activities, such as a boat tour in summer and a trip in October to
Antalya to visit the famous "Gorch Fock," an educational sailing ship
of the German navy. There will also be a meeting on Nov. 29 to
celebrate the first Sunday of Advent. But more important is concrete
advice and help for the members of the German colony in Alanya. Even
the German vice-consul from Antalya's newly set-up German consulate,
Wolfgang Einsiedler, joined the October meeting and showed great
interest in the activities of his German fellows.
Usually 40 to 60 people joined the club's meetings, which are arranged
once a month in Iskele Restaurant underneath the Red Tower.
Participants receive information about important topics, like the
recent change in the Turkish law related to the residence permit for
foreigners, the possibility of dual citizenship for German women who
are married to Turkish men, or the projected changes in the Turkish
taxation law. The importance of such subjects should not be
underestimated, since Alanya's Germans mostly do not speak Turkish.
During the meeting, which goes on the whole afternoon, there is enough
time to bring up complaints or ideas, to meet people and chat.
Different country, different problems
But even under midsummer sun problems don't melt and disappear.
Instead of struggling for survival in Germany, the same people are
struggling now with Turkish authorities. They run the gauntlet,
beginning with the residence permit, a long, long journey to Antalya,
filling in forms nobody understands, and dealing with civil servants
who don't know a foreign language. And sometimes all this turns into a
complete nightmare, when the authorities are not only incompetent but
also incorrect. And the gauntlet continues when every tradesman in
Alanya believes that any foreigner is a cow ready to milk. People
might get used to greetings like "Hello" and "Guten Tag" out of the
blue, but are offended when they find out that they had to pay an
unusually high price for a small and loud apartment in Alanya's worst
district.
Another problem that not only Germans but all inhabitants of Alanya
have to deal with is a severe infrastructure problem in the
fast-growing city. Electricity blackouts, sudden changes in voltage
and overflowing sewage plants are on the agenda. All these problems
mix in a cocktail some Germans in Alanya are no longer willing to
consume. A small minority of them began thinking about a second
emigration. But don't think that they now long for good old Germany.
Once away from home, nobody wants to go back, and the wishful thinking
of these people is directed to Spain, where infrastructural problems
have now been solved.
German and Turkish people living in good neighborhood
In spite of all these problems, German and Turkish people live close
by and have cultivated a good relationship. Meeting at a dinner party,
visiting a sick person or just chatting with a friend gives back a
kind of warm relationship, which has been lost and forgotten in
Germany long ago. The community of Alanya responded to the needs of
the German colony by allowing the Germans to announce urgent messages
by loudspeaker in German. The reaction by Turkish people was positive
besides one peeved question which wondered whether the Germans were
getting out of the hand. But that's not all. For some time a part of
the community-owned cemetery was reserved for Christians, since some
of the colony don't want to be buried in Germany. Alanya now has a
private hospital that has agreed with some German health insurance
companies to ease the medical treatment costs of the elderly and sick
Germans.
Nothing works without a driving force
Like any other organization, the German club needs a life and soul
that keep things moving. In Alanya, Ute Brix, a capable and
enterprising German lady who
Iskele Restaurant underneath the Red Tower, Alanya's symbol. You are
welcome to celebrate the first Sunday in Advent at the same place on
Nov. 29.
A portrait of Germans in Turkey
Monika Cetinkaya and her husband Ali settled in Alanya more than 10
years ago. Soon after sending their 6-year-old son Topuz to school,
their daughter Ceren was born in Alanya. Today, the 8-year-old girl is
very proud of being a "native of Alanya". But in the meantime, Monika
also feels herself as part of Alanya, not least because of her husband
Ali being an excellent teacher of Turkish language and culture.
Monika agrees that living with her Turkish partner was very helpful
during the first year. It was her husband Ali who made the first
neighborly relations and established a circle of friends, therefore
giving Monika a chance to knit a net of friendship by herself. But
Monika still had to learn a lot about the new culture she was now
living in, where a lot of things are different. It begins, as she
says, with the religion, the waste everybody throws away and nobody
cares about, dates nobody keeps, and the sun, that even shines
differently.
She stresses, like most Alanya Germans, that neighborly relations, the
warmth of a human community, and a circle of good friends, in short,
all the things that have been lost in Germany with the industrial
upswing after the Second World War, easily compensate for the
incompleteness or lack of other things in Turkey.
Mixed feelings about Germany
Is it easy for Monika to identify advantages and disadvantages of life
in Turkey. She has mixed feelings about Germany since an event that
happened years ago. When her children were young she accepted Turkish
citizenship, ignorant about Germany not allowing a second passport.
But the day came when she had to extend her German passport and ended
up leaving the German consulate without being a German national
anymore. She successfully changed her anger with German authorities to
craftiness, and with a fair amount of persistence she succeeded in
getting back her German nationality, but this time loosing the Turkish
one.
With the same persistence she insisted in working in her profession as
a physiotherapist. She opened a surgery in Alanya, only to find out
soon after that Turkish people don't understand the significance of
training certain groups of muscles. But giving up the surgery did not
mean giving up gymnastics. For some time Monika has led a group of
Turkish-German ladies who meet in a friend's hotel a few times per
week for "wellness."
__________________________________________________________________
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