Turkish people ~ from a Malay's sight

#I wrote this post about a year ago, but just now having opportunity to publish it #

Based on my experiences living in Turkey for almost a year, I could see that  Turkish people are  kind towards foreigners, yeah as people called “misafirperver” ,welcoming people etc . Maybe in Malaysia also people are saying the same, but im saying it generally. I could see clearly their sincerety when helping me especially when I first reached  Turkey with zero Turkish language. 

How difficult the condition was because I wasn’t be able to interact with them because some of them with zero English J  so we just communicate with bahasa “ayam n itik “ :D Just today its clearly proved by a cute Turkish girl.My Malaysian friend just arrived Ankara from Malaysia and since she is still new here she didn’t know much about the place. We were planning to meet somewhere but because of the place is quite far from hers it was bit difficult. Then the girl who can communicate in English little  helped her to get in the bus until the 30 minutes journey ended. I was surprised because she was not going to the same direction as my friend did but just sent my friend to meet me in that place and return back to her place which took 30 minutes.May Allah bless her for her kindness. 

There was also one time when I went to a kind of rural area in Ankara to look around the place and I stopped by a roadside because there was a man selling a flock of shoes which attracted me much. I expressed my desires to my friend, how pretty the shoes was but without having any intentions to buy it since I already had one.then there was a woman with her girls passed by and approached us.She asked me which one did I want because she will buy it for me.i was shocked because I didn’t even know her.maybe because she saw that im a foreign student and she struggled to help me as much as she can.at the end, I refused and she was just ok.

                                  Baba n me,  ISTANBUL - 2013

There was also one time when I was in Istanbul. I took a box of cargo sent by my family from a Turkish friend who just came back from Malaysia.it was almost 10 kilogram and I must carry it for about 40 kilometres journey to my friend’s house by changing several transportations. My hands was getting purple-reddish due to carry that box. Until I reached the residential area, I stopped for a short rest because it was tiring. 20 minutes left for walking. When I continued my journey, suddenly 16 year old a high school boy appeared and offered to carry the box until my friend’s house. I was like wow! Released Alhamdulillah! :D he didn’t talked much just asking where Im from and continued the journey. This time I could feel he helped me not because im a foreigner, but because had taught by his family to help people whoever he/she is.

My friends and I also even have Turkish family here in Ankara. We got to know each other when we attended Arabic class in a diyanet centre in Kizilay. They always invite us to have dinner or lunch in their house about once a month. I was dreaming to have a Turkish family here since im going to stay in this foreign land for almost 7 years insallah. We do feel need of a family when we  being far from our own beloved family.its not an easy decision to leave our beloved family in homeland because it needs a very big sacrifice.even when I was in boarding school, SM Sains Muar which is located about  2 hours from my house in Bangi, I kept  feeling homesick :# Thanks allah for giving me such strengths to struggle for jihad in this foreign land,which took about 10 hours by plane! 

 

Back to our Turkish family, the family consisted of a parents, 2 daughters and a son. The daughters are Merve Nur,17 and Elif 13 year old while the son, Yusuf is 8 year old.im happy to be accompanied by them. Surely I will never ever forget my beloved family in Malaysia since I miss them a lot allah knows but sometimes the sadness of being lonely disappeared when replaced by the happiness from this bless family.the Turkish mother always reminding us not to feel isolate here because we are muslim brothers,sisters are like muslim family without borders.alhamdulillah cok sukur :D

yeah, am an "alien" :#

Selam alaykum. It had been long time I didn’t write  any  posts here. I just came across with an issue which  currently affecting me. Regarding befriending with foreigners. The word “foreigner” for me changes depends on several aspects.it might be people who don’t have blood relatives wih  us, or those who maybe do but seems not because we are not used to them. In Turkey sometimes they prefer to call foreign students as “misafir” which brings meaning guest rather than calling them “yabanci” which means “foreigner”. “Foreigner” that rounding in my mind now those who are not sharing the same homeland,languages,cultures and traditions with us, that’s the general thinking among us when we mentioned about’ foreigner’.

 

   
                                                GAZI TOMER 2012

For most of us, befriending with  foreigners are really wonderful. we’ll get opportunities to learn about many things that we might not even know because keeping ourselves in a bubble not gonna help us to widen our mind..a lot of things we could learn by interacting with those who are “alien” to us .Sharing about different cultures, lifestyles,religions,interests ,education and even improve our language skills .but nowadays what we could see clearly (in Malaysia) there are small group of university students who choose to be away from those who are being called foreigner, maybe because they don’t feel eager to learn new things and  open their eyes towards the outer world. 

Even sometimes there are a lot of foreign students in their school, and even in the same kuliyyah, but this group just don’t have the eagerness to befriend with them, because they are “different” , so they choose  just staying in a community who are from the same race, religion and so on. Of course im not saying that it’s a must for every SINGLE students to get know with the foreigners.but because I do  heard  complaints by some foreign students who are studying in local university, claiming “ why some local students here didn’t even want to talk to me is it just because im a foreigner, come from where another part of the wprld’. And when there are some malay students who are kind towards the foreigner, no matter where does he/she come from, this small community will keep jeering towards them saying that they are discriminating the local without realizing actually they are the one who are discriminating! As I heard also this kind of group also even thinking that those good people are trying to show off their skills in communicating in English. What a shallow thinking, maalesef!

One more thing, from what I heard , some of those group just trying to communicate with foreigners based on the countries that seems they like. Help them just because those foreigners looks attractive and have good-looking comparing to other foreigners  from ‘low standard’ countries who are also needing help. 

Come on my friends,lets change our thinking. Its not what had been taught by our beloved prophet saw. Prophet Muhammad  never taught us to be racist. Even when he confronted with the not yet Muslims, he never told them they are kafirs. He didn’t need to tell everyone he was a practicing and good muslim because people could see by his own behaviours.all the behaviours taught by allah in this bless religion being applied by him in his daily life until his last breath. Being kind towards everyone is really a blessing. Maybe today we could help them for the sake of allah,and in the future when we need help allah will help us in many ways. Being a foreign student in a foreign land also sometimes give the same expression as what foreign students in Malaysia feel.

Actually really, those feeling not really felt by those who are in Malaysia, but im sure everywhere, even in Turkey I had the same feeling which took much time to recover. By seeing this conditions I understand that some local people need us to approach them first then they could start conversations normally, so those who are feeling so “alien” in a foreign land, you will surely confront kinda situation, yeah a bit hard to accept some of them, but instead of blaming the whole race to have the same “antisocial” attitude, try to adapt with the locals and as time passing we will miss those precious moments with colourful people.