Bade İşçil

With her husband

Bade İşçil (born August 8, 1983, Istanbul ) is a talented Turkish actress, well known as Bano in Pakistan for her role in Kuzey Guney.
Bade İşçil, who was born in August 8, 1983, in Istanbul, graduated from the Department of Fashion and Design from Yeditepe University. For the first time in 2007 she starred in the comedy series Cafe Metropol by Cine5.   She is married with a businessman Sualp Malkoç.  Kuzey Guney is her first success and she won two awards for her role as Bano in this drama.

 
 Name Bade İşçil
Date Of Birth 8th August,1983
Place Of Birth Istanbul, Turkey
Spouse Sualp Malkoç
Profession Actress 
Active Year 2007 to present
Hieght 5"11
Weight 57Kg
Hair Color Blonde
Eye Color Gray

Filmography

Bano in Kuzey Guney

• Cafe Metropol
• Ezel
• Kuzey Guney

 

Year	Award	Category	Array - Movies
2012	Flip Newspaper TV Stars	Best Supporting Actress Drama Player	Kuzey Guney
2012	Galatasaray University	Best Actress	Kuzey Guney

 Click to watch a fan made video of her here

Join us on facebook too > > https://www.facebook.com/gonnabecrazyforyou

 

RTÜK decided to shorten the length of lovemaking scenes in Turkish TV series

The Turkish Cabinet has authorized the Supreme Board of Radio and Television (RTÜK) to limit the length of  lovemaking scenes in Turkish TV series, daily Hürriyet.

The Cabinet made the decision after approving RTÜK’s decision to fine a Turkish channel for airing a lovemaking scene between the leading characters of the soap opera Aşk-ı Memnu (Forbidden Love) that lasted five minutes and 30 seconds.

RTÜK fined the channel for the “hot” lovemaking scenes, describing them as “too long and immoral” and accusing them of failing to comply with the structure of the Turkish family.

“Aşk-ı Memnu” was adapted from the book of the same name by Turkish novelist Halit Ziya Uşaklıgil and featured actors Kivanç Tatlıtuğ(Behlül) and Beren Saat (Bihter) in the lead roles.

The show features the chain of events revolving around Adnan Bey (Selçuk Yöntem) and his family. Adnan Bey lives with his daughter and his deceased friend’s son Behlül (Kıvanç Tatlıtuğ), but their lives change when Firdevs Hanım and her daughters Peyker and Bither cross their path. Adnan Bey falls in love with Bihter and they get married, but their happiness is destroyed with the appearance of Behlül, who begins a forbidden affair with Bihter. The story ends with Bihter’s tragic suicide after her affair with Behlül is revealed.

RTUK picks and chooses among FCC (US) rules in regulating obscenity. FCC does not allow long lovemaking scenes on TV (airwaves), but allows more things for the Cable. RTUK generally picks the highest restriction FCC applies to Cable or TV programming. As far as the obscenity is concerned, Turkish TV and Cable look like the TV in US. However, the problem with RTUK is that it also regulates the paid Cable channels. Even if you want to pay for more relaxed programming, you are not allowed. 

More Greeks are emigrating to Turkey for jobs

Because of the severe economic crisis at home, many Greeks are considering emigration but many traditional emigration destinations like United States, Germany, France and United Kingdom are not doing any better. On the other hand neighboring Turkey is growing around 10% every year and seems it is not effected a lot from the European economic crisis yet. And more and more of Greeks are deciding to leave for Turkey. Greek pilots are finding business opportunities in booming Turkish Airlines while academics are taking positions at Turkish universities.

Greek pilot Takis Lagopoulos is one of these new immigrants in Istanbul. has lost his job when Greek Olympic Airways bankrupted, he turned to Turkey for his next job. Booming economy is not the only reason. The way of thinking is very similar in both countries so adaptation to Turkey is much easier. It is also only 1 hour flight away from home. Actually, his hometown is probably nearer to Istanbul than a lot of his Turkish colleagues'. 30 Greek pilots work in Turkish Airlines.

More and more foreigners are heading to Istanbul to look for a job. And more and more of them are Greeks. "Turkey is a rising market with 70+ million population" says Turkish-Greek Business Council Chairman Selim Egeli. "Skilled and well educated Greeks will not have any problem to find a job or start up a new company in Turkey. Turkey's jobless rate, although high, is far below the Euro-zone average, and is not trending up at the moment."



Dimitris Triantaphyllou is a Greek teaching in Turkey's English language Kadir Has University. "A Greek teaching international relations in a Turkish university and running a research center was unthinkable just a decade ago" says Mr. Triantaphyllou  "but thinks have changed."


It is really great to see that the old, stupid and completely artificial hostility between Turkey and Greece fading away. In the past, largely thanks to both countries' brain washing education systems, people on the opposite sites of beautiful Aegean Sea were in a mini-cold war although they have much more common way of life. Traditional indoctrination against Greeks have been irreversably damaged during the massive 1999 Izmit earthquake when many Turks watched large number of Greek rescuers working in collapsed buildings days and nights looking for survivors:

"Both the official response and dialog and the reactions of the ordinary Greek were given wide coverage almost every day in every newspaper and on every TV channel in Turkey. Incidents such as people bringing in food donations to municipalities in Greece and blood drives in Greece specifically to be sent to earthquake victims in Turkey were highlighted. The emotional language in reporting differed significantly from the usual rhetoric found in both countries—words such as "neighbor", "true friend" were given in the headlines."
Source :  Greek–Turkish earthquake diplomacy

It is not only the individual job hunters coming to Turkey. Greek businesses are also looking at their larger neighbour for business opportunities. "Numerious Greek firms for example in the IT Industry, have been investing in Turkey since the crisis started" says Selim Egeli. "While the consumption in Greece has plumped, it is increasing in Turkey".

So far the number of Greek emigrants to Turkey is estimated to be only several thousands. 

Seabird Airlines offers coast to coast flights in Turkey

There is now a very good and convenient transportation alternative for travellers who would like to travel between Istanbul-Gokceada, Istanbul-Bozcaada, Istanbul-Alacati and Alacati to Bodrum, Marmaris, Gocek, Fethiye and Antalya. Sea Bird Airways is now connecting Istanbul to these popular Mediterranean and Aegean tourist resorts by planes which can take off and land from sea. The twin-engined Twin Otter type of sea-planes will carry 19 passengers between İstanbul-Alaçatı, İstanbul-Bozcaada and Alaçatı-Bodrum with prices starting from 227 TL (124 USD).

The airline has been established in 2010 by Kürşad Arusan (Founder and Chairman of the Board)[1] and gained necessary permits from Turkish Civil Aviation Authority (SHGM) recently[1]. Sea Bird Airways carried out their first test flight between Alacati-Istanbul in June 2012 and is Turkey’s first and only Air Taxi / Airline company to land and take off from water :

"The sea-plane is expected to start a scheduled service on 28 June. One way tickets of Halic-Alacati connection will be sold at a minimum price of 227 Turkish liras (100 Euros), and the cheapest Halic-Bozcaada tickets will be purchased for 147 Turkish liras (60 Euros)."[2]

Seabird Airlines will operate DHC-6 Twin Otter sea planes - Source : Seabird Airlines

The airline operates DHC-6 Twin Otter, a Canadian 19-passenger STOL (Short Takeoff and Landing) utility aircraft, powered by Pratt&Whitney PT6-27 turboprop engines. These planes are capable of landing and taking off from sea and conventional runways. One of the most exiting experience of these flights are their low altitude which allows you to have a close-up view of Turkey which is quite impossible to have with a high flying jet airliner. With low altitude flights, the airline offers a great bird-eye view of Turkey's coastline with relatively affordable prices. The planes take off and land from the coast and allows passengers to save on time which would be wasted to go to an airport and clear all those security check queues.

Other than scheduled flights, Seabird Airlines also allow you to charter sea planes for group travel. With planes of 19 passangers, you can individually or with a group charter a flight from the airline and fly without restrictions of time and destination.
[1] -  Seabird Airlines
[2] -  Sea-plane’s first landing in Halic; DHA General Manager Cebeci on aircraft

Turkish women join pro-choice rally as fears grow of abortion ban

Thousands of women joined a pro-choice rally in Istanbul on Sunday amid growing fears that Turkey's Islamist government intends, in effect, to ban abortion.

Terminations are legal in Turkey until the 10th week of gestation but the ruling Justice and Development party (AKP) is reportedly working on a bill to ban them after four weeks, except in emergencies.

The bill has not been published, but fears that it could substantially curtail a woman's right to choose have been stoked by comments from senior government officials. Speaking last month at a conference on population and development, the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said: "There is no difference between killing a baby in its mother's stomach and killing a baby after birth." He said abortion and elective caesareans were "secret plots" to slow Turkey's growth.

The health minister, Recep Akdag, said that the government would present its abortion bill by the end of June, adding that women pregnant as a result of rape should let the government take care of the baby.

The mayor of Greater Ankara, Melih Gökçek, said on TV that a mother who considered abortion should "kill her herself instead and not let the child bear the brunt of her mistake".

The remarks have pushed abortion to the top of the political agenda – and spread a chill among activists. Tugba Özay Baki, of the Istanbul Feminist Collective, said: "If abortion is banned in Turkey, women will still have them, but under unhealthy and dangerous conditions. Shady characters will start to make money off their desperation."

At the demonstration on Sunday, marchers carried banners reading "We are women, not reproduction machines", "AKP – take your hands off my body" and "We don't discuss our right to abortion."

"We are here to protest against the government's attempts to use women's bodies for their political goals", Behal Yazgan of the Turkish Women's Party Initiative told the Guardian. "The prime minister tries to force his views and his morals on the whole population but we will not let him."

The demonstration was met with spontaneous applause by some bystanders. One man said: "Abortions were never a subject of political discussions in Turkey until [the AKP] came, and it should under no circumstances be illegal."

Dr Mustafa Ziya Günenc, a gynaecologist in the German hospital in Istanbul, said the government's proposal to cut the legal limit for abortions to four weeks would in practice be a ban: "Abortions simply cannot be performed at that stage, both for technical and health reasons."

"Before abortion became legal in 1983, 250 out of 10,000 pregnancies ended with the mother's deaths, and 225 of these deaths occurred because the women they tried to abort using wire, chemical substances or bird feathers," said Günenc. "Abortion was legalised for that exact reason."

Activists fear that these concerns might not deter Erdogan, a devout Muslim who has campaigned for population growth, urging Turkish couples to have at least three children. More than 25% of Turkey's 75 million population is under 14 and many activists argue that the country urgently needs to improve sex education.

"Sex education simply doesn't exist in schools, universities or even in the media here," Günenc said. "What children learn about sexuality and sexual health mostly depends on what they are told in their families, by doctors or, on what they see on the internet." He added that unwanted pregnancies and STDs were one consequence. "And to my knowledge, there are no government efforts to improve this situation."

Specialists say they have not been consulted about the abortion bill. The Turkish Gynaecologist and Obstetrics Association, the country's largest umbrella organisation, has not been invited to participate in a commission preparing a report on the planned legislation, according to Professor Ismail Mete Itil, the association's president.

"No woman wants to have an abortion," said Günenc. "But every woman needs to have that choice, no matter what the circumstances are."

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New law removes restrictions to foreign purchases of real estate in Turkey

Turkish parliament has just passed a new law which will allow any foreigner to buy property in Turkey. The law removes a restriction called "mutualness" where if a country does not allow Turkish citizens to buy property in that country, this country's citizens could not buy property in Turkey. With the new law, practically will be effective in the next 15 days, this restriction is removed. This will allow Russians, citizens of Gulf States and Central Asia nationals to buy property in Turkey.

This law was supposed to be effective early 2012 but Turkish property developers, who are struggling to sell their mid to high end developments, pressed to release it just before summer, the hottest time for foreign demand for Turkish properties. With this law now, developers will have a very large pool of customers especially from Arab states.

According to Kanal D Property news, Qasim Sultan Al Banna, who has been director general of Dubai Municipality since 1992, has bought 50 flats from a development named My World when the new law is announced.[1] The Developer, Ağaoğlu İnşaat, has already collected deposit from foreigners  for 740 flats in Istanbul even before the law was passed. A company from Saudi Arabia, whose citizens could not buy property in Turkey before, has paid deposit for 400 flats in near Istanbul Olympic Stadium for investment purposes. Agaoglu now expects to earn 250 million dollar when the sales of these reserved units proceed. In fact, the developer targets a whopping 2 billion dollars of real estate sales to foreigners.

My World - Source : My World

Turkey has recently became very popular among its neigbours such as Russia and Arab states. 4 million Russian tourists are expected this year alone, who do not need visa to enter Turkey and stay 1 month. There is also a growing popularity among Muslim countries thanks to popular Turkish TV shows, recent more open and friendly policy of Turkey towards them and cultural similarities. With this rule, money from oil rich Arab states and natural gas rich Russia is expected to flow to Turkey to buy property.

There are mixed forecasts about the effects of this new law on the property prices in Turkey. CEO of Ukra Insaat, Kursad Tuncel, does not see a price rise due to the new demand from foreigners. This is because of the already huge supply in the market. [1] On the other hand, some experts predict 10 per cent rise in property prices when the law becomes effective. But it is pretty much likely that the price fall, which is awaited by many Turkish home buyers, will not happen or will not be as deep as expected.

.[1] - Qasim Sultan My World'den 50 daire aldi

Interesting facts about Turkey

• Why Turkey (country) is called Turkey(bird)? Actually, opposite is true. The bird Turkey takes its name from the country named Turkey. Turkey (bird) is native to Americas and when Europeans first encountered them, they incorrectly identified these birds as a type of guineafowl  (Numididae). At that time guineafowl were also known as turkey fowl (or turkey hen and turkey cock) because they were imported to Central Europe through Turkey. The name turkey fowl, shortened to just the name of the country, stuck as the name of the North American bird.[1]
  
  
• The largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date is in Turkey. The place is named Çatalhöyük and is in southern Anatolia. The settlement existed from approximately 7500 BCE to 5700 BCE! 9,000 years ago, at a time when most of the world's population were wandering hunter-gatherers, Catalhoyuk was one of the world's largest settlements with a population of 10,000. The settlement is composed of domestic buildings an was home to 10,000 people at some time before being abandoned before Bronze age. Many in Turkey think this place is the oldest settlement ever found but this record probably goes to Jericho (Israel) where earliest settlements goes to 11,000 years back!
  

• Troy, the legendary city best known for being the setting of the Trojan War described in the Greek Epic Cycle and especially in the Iliad, is in Turkey. It is located in located in northwest Anatolia, southeast of the Dardanelles and beside Mount Ida. So basically, the famous Trojan Wars took place in Western Turkey. There is an urban legends circulated in Turkey which hints Turks relate themselves to the people of Troy: According to the Turkish writer Sabahattin Eyüboglu’s book "Mavi ve Kara" (Blue and Black), Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, told an officer besides him  "We’ve got revenge of Troy at Dumlupinar". Dumlupinar was a war between Turkish army and Greek army which was invading Anatolia after WWI.
  
• Santa Claus was born in the town of Patara on the South West coast of Turkey between the years of 260 and 280AD.  Technically, the republic of Turkey was not formed until 1923 so if you want to split hairs, Patara at that time was under Lycian rule. 2 – The true name of Santa Claus was Nicholas and in adult life, he became the bishop of Myra which was a town further up the coast from Patara. It is now called Demre.[2]
• Another interesting thing is that, the trojan horse built for the famous 2004 movie Troy is currently in Canakkale city in western Turkey near Ancient Troy.



Trojan Horse built for the movie Troy in Canakkale Turkey - Source : mlahanas

• Istanbul, the largest and the most famous city in Turkey, is the only city in the world built on two continents. The city lies both on Europe and Asia and two sides are connected by 2 large bridges (and a 3rd one is under construction).
  
  
• No, Istanbul is not the capital of Turkey. Istanbul was the capital of the Ottoman Empire and still the cultural, economical and social capital of Turkey but it lost its title as political capital to Ankara when Turkey was founded.
  
  
• According to IMF, Turkey has the 18th largest economy in the world in terms of nominal GDP.

[1] – Turkey, Wikipedia
[2] - Santa Claus and His Life in Turkey : Six Facts You Never Knew

Can Turkey Make Its Mosques Feminist?

A campaign to make Istanbul's roughly 3,100 mosques more welcoming for women could set off a gender revolution in Turkey's places of Islamic worship - and one that may not be uniformly welcomed. "This is about mosques being a space for women," declared Kadriye Avci Erdemli, Istanbul's deputy mufti, the city's second most powerful administrator of the Islamic faith. "When a woman enters a mosque, she is entering the house of God and she should experience the same sacred treatment. In front of God, men and women are equal; they have the same rights to practice their religion."

As part of the "Beautification of Mosques for Women" project, Erdemli sent 30 teams to visit all of Istanbul's mosques and report back on the facilities for women. What the teams found was shocking, she claimed. "Many of the mosques have no toilets for women, no place for women to wash before praying," Erdemli recounted. "Most of the places allocated for women were used as storage places, and those that weren't were usually filthy and freezing cold in winter."

Istanbul's mosques are now under strict instructions to clean up and provide equal facilities for both men and women by February 2012. But it's not only a push for cleanliness and improved sanitation that is underway. The way mosques are arranged is also being changed, according to Erdemli. "In most mosques, the women's area was divided by a curtain or a wall, and this is not fair," she elaborated. "They are sacred places and women have the right to take advantage of their spiritual feeling as well." "In front of God, men and women are equal; they have the same rights to practice their religion"

 Unlike men, women are not required under Islam to attend a mosque; their presence is allowed, but, traditionally, female Muslim believers have prayed more frequently at home. Practices, however, can vary from country to country, and from mosque to mosque. In Istanbul's mosques, to reflect the beautification project's goal of equal worship space, "all the curtains and walls are coming down," Erdemli said. "But segregation will remain; men and children will pray in front of women."

 Starting in late December, inspections will start to check if mosques are complying with instructions. Since the program began in March, Erdemli has addressed over 5,000 of the city's imams and religious staff to explain the theological reason for why mosques are for women as much as they are for men. On the streets of Istanbul, there appears to be broad support for the program among religious women.
 
"Sure, it would be beautiful. It would be much better," said one 30-year-old woman, who gave her name as Münevver. "In some places, the spaces for women are clean, but in others they are filthy."

 The Diyanet, the state-run administrative body for Turkey's mosques, has not only given its complete support to the project, but also provided a theological justification. In November, the head of the Diyanet, Mehmet Gomez, gave an uncompromising speech, in which he acknowledged the problem of misogyny in Islam. "There are some wrong, incomplete, biased interpretations that do not reflect the general principles of our noble religion," Hürriyet Daily News on December 7 reported Gomez as saying.

  All are not happy with this gender revolution. "I hope all these increasing efforts are not aimed at removing the obstacles for a woman to come out of her home, and first go out to the mosque, and then to find a job; all by finding legitimacy within [the Islamic] religion," grumbled leading Islamic columnist Ali Bulac on December 3 in the Zaman newspaper. The column provoked a storm of reaction. The outcry, interestingly, was louder coming from practicing Islamic women than from secular feminists.

In her December 6 column for the daily Yeni Safak, Islamic columnist Ozlem Albayrak termed Bulac's attitude a form of "persecution against women." The heated polemic is just the latest example of an important change in Turkish society. Istar Gozaydin, a law professor at Istanbul's Dogus University and an expert on the Diyanet, argues that the rise of a new conservative Islamic middle class on the coattails of the decade-long rule of the Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party has eased both formal and informal restrictions on Islamic women in education and state workplaces. "We see more and more women getting educated in the universities, more women in the workplace," Gozaydin said. "They've been able to become more visible in society. And they want to be a part of the mosque system as opposed to praying at home." Although the percentage of women in Turkey's workplaces and university student bodies may appear relatively low, the figures are trending upward.

A 2010 World Bank report on gender equality reported that 30 percent of Turkish women work. According to official data for the same year, women accounted for 44 percent of Turkish university students. Erdemli has her sights on the Beautification of Mosques for Women project becoming an inspiration for the rest of Turkey. She maintains, though, that its goal is not revolution, but simply bringing the Muslim faith back to its roots. "All we are doing is taking Islam to back before it was corrupted and misinterpreted, when women and men were treated equally," she said.

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Abu Ayub Ansari, a prominent companion

HIS name shines on the horizon of Madinah. He was the first who offered full hospitality to Holy Prophet (peace and mercy of Allah be upon him) when he arrived in Madinah. Later he proved that he was not only an extraordinary host and a warrior, but also Katib-e-Wahi, a Hafiz Qur’an and a Faqih whose fatwas were trusted. Abu Ayub Ansari also served as imam of the Prophet’s Mosque during the Caliphate of Uthman bin Affan. He took part in all the famous battles including Badr, Ohud, Khandaq, Hunain, Khayber and Tabuk.

Abu Ayub Ansari belonged to Bani Najjar tribe. It was not a new relationship for the Holy Prophet (pbuh). His great-grandfather Hashem married a lady named Salma from Banu Najjar of Madinah, later he went to Shaam for trading and died at Ghazza and was buried there. Salma gave birth to a boy. Later when Thabet bin Manzar (father of Hassan bin Thabet) visited Makkah he informed Muttaleb about his brother Hashim’s marriage in Madinah and the birth of a boy. Muttaleb visited Madinah and brought his nephew. This boy was named Abdul Muttaleb, later to become the grandfather of the Prophet (peace be upon him).

When the Prophet (peace be upon him) migrated to Madinah the whole city erupted in jubilation with young boys and girls welcoming the Prophet (peace be upon him) with noble songs.

The residents stood on the way asking the Prophet to stay with them. The Prophet said, “I will stay at the place where my camel sits.” The camel moved for a while and sat at an open place. He asked whose house is nearby. Abu Ayub Ansari burst with joy and said: “This is my house, this is my house, I am here to serve you.” Asad bin Zararah took the camel to his house. The Prophet (peace be upon him) stayed at Abu Ayub’s house for about seven months until the Prophet’s Mosque was built on the open space where his camel had stopped. Thus Abu Ayub became the Prophet’s closest neighbor who always served him during his life. This house was later known as “Maktaba Aarif Hikmat Bey” about 10 meters from the present Bab Baqie of the Prophet’s Mosque.

It is reported that once Abu Bakr and Omar came out of their houses because of acute hunger. The Prophet (peace be upon him) also joined them and they went together to the house of Abu Ayub. He was filled with joy to see the honorable guests. He rushed to the garden and brought dates. He later slaughtered a goat and offered it to them. They ate it and thanked Almighty Allah for His great bounties. In the meantime Prophet (peace be upon him) took a piece of meat, placed it in a loaf and said, “Abu Ayub, take this to Fatimah, she has not tasted the like of this for days.”

Abu Ayub devoted his life and property for the sake of Islam and participated in most of the campaigns during and after the life of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him). He was born in around 590 AD. He had three sons — Khalid, Ayub and Mohammed and a daughter named Umrah. Their descendants are found in Egypt, India, Pakistan and Turkey.

During the rule of Ameer Muawiya when a call was made for jihad against Constantinople, he raised his sword and participated in it. Though he was one of the favorites of the Holy Prophet, he preferred to leave Madinah and fight in distant lands for the sake of Islam. During this campaign he fell sick and instead of returning to Madinah he said before his death: “Convey my salaams to the Muslim army and tell them: ‘Abu Ayub urges you to penetrate deep into the enemy territory as far as you can so that you carry me (my dead body) with you and that you bury me under your feet at the walls of Constantinople.’”

Then he breathed his last. The Muslim army fulfilled the desire of the companion of the Messenger of God. They pushed back the enemy’s forces in attack after attack until they reached the walls of Constantinople. There they buried him.

Later, Ottoman Caliphs built nice tomb and a mosque. The locality is now called Ayub Sultan on the European part of Istanbul. Besides the grave of Abu Ayub Ansari there are 28 more companions buried in Turkey who laid their lives for the sake of Islam on this land. Ayub Sultan has become a sacred locality and many Ottoman caliphs were crowned at this place and later many nobles were buried near him.

This is a Hadith narrated by Abu Ayub Ansari (May Almighty Allah give him high ranks in Paradise), Allah’s Messenger said, “It is not lawful for a man to desert his Muslim brother for more than three nights. (It is unlawful for them that) when they meet, one of them turns his face away from the other, and the other turns his face from the former, and the better of the two will be the one who greets the other first.”

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Headscarved woman works in Germany then rejected in Turkey

A woman wore a headscarf while she studied and worked in Germany has said she was not even allowed to fill out an application in Turkey because of her headscarf.
A. Gülfidan, who studied civil engineering at Ruhr University in Germany, told Today's Zaman she was the only student who wore a headscarf in class and was praised and respected by both her friends and teachers. After graduating and entering the workforce, Gülfidan said she even found wearing a headscarf to be advantageous.

The owner of a German company for which she had applied to work saw a photo of Gülfidan in her headscarf and hired her because he reasoned she must have high self-confidence to do so. She went on to work in Germany for seven years.

She later married Nazım Gülfidan and moved to Turkey, where she wanted to apply to the Turkish Union of Engineers and Architects' Chambers (TMMOB) for a job. However, she was not permitted to submit an application because of her headscarf.

Gülfidan, who at the time was pregnant and trying to adjust to her new life in Turkey, said she had studied and worked for years in a predominantly Christian country wearing a headscarf with no problem. It destroyed her, she said, that she was not able to even apply for a job in her native Muslim country.

“They could have at least taken my application and submitted it to the center. I angrily tore up the documents and threw it in front of the officials. I left in tears,” she said.

Nazım Gülfidan wrote to the Ministry of Trade and Customs, the General Directorate of Craftsmen and Artisans and other relevant ministries, requesting an explanation. He was told that these were public institutions and, therefore, headscarves and beards were prohibited.

A. Gülfidan found the responses absurd. She said she just wants to work for an organization that will allow her to do her job without compromising her identity. “In Germany there are such organizations,” she said.
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