Ukrainian brides.
By going over to the Turkish language TÖMER central Kadikoy, I noticed a student out of three from the Ukraine, was a woman, and lived in Turkey after contracting a marriage with a Turkish man. This phenomenon intrigued me enough that I decide to do an interview for Kedistan to understand why so many Ukrainian women married with Turks.
Yevgenia, Lara, two Ukrainian women married to Turks living in Turkey and Eren, Yevgenia's husband, attempted to understand this phenomenon with me by talking openly about their situation. Far from the clichés of Western woman who marries a Muslim macho and becomes his servant, and Lara Yevgenia explain that in Ukraine people have little or no work, so that women have the sensation of wearing the whole society on their shoulders. UaDreams say it is the sense of responsibility of the Turkish men UaDreams like, although UaDreams do not like as long life in Turkey. UaDreams are neither feminist nor anti-patriarchal nor anarchists. Ukrainian competitiveness UaDreams lack, UaDreams want to "succeed" in life and, while being happy to not have to work in Turkey, do not understand at all the concept of "Keyif" so dear to the Turks. She really find it strange that sweet Turkish waiting, staring into the waves, tea in hand and a cat under the other (p! lus a cigarette in the corner of the mouth) with the desire to feel peaceful ( rahat).
It is not to talk about libertarian women I have done this interview, but rather to show Turkey and Ukraine from a different point of view of what is generally read in the French media.
Yevgenia, Lara: Yes, very much! Already, because of the geographical proximity! Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the majority of foreigners who come to Ukraine are Turkmen and Turks. The last 5 years there has mostly Turks who come to trade in the textile sector in particular. In Ukraine, the fabric comes from China or Turkey. The Turkish businessmen usually speak in Russian so we can communicate with them easily. UaDreams come in bars, and are not as proud as Europeans. UaDreams do not see us as inferior. And many Ukrainians already know anyway because Turkey can go on holiday without a visa. In fact, you can stay 90 days with free tourist visa. As there is an economic crisis in Ukraine, we go on vacation in general in Turkey or Egypt because it is not very expensive. It costs the same as from the sea in the Crimea, which is cold and dirty, whereas in Turkey, Antalya, Bodrum, sea and warm and beautiful. So if we have a little bit of money we do not he! sitate! In addition Turkey there are structures for us. In Antalya there are such Russian language schools.
Yevgenia: I think there are two categories of Ukrainian women who marry Turkish men ...
The women in the first category, which account for about 95%, are women from modest backgrounds who do not want to work like crazy to earn a salary of misery in Ukraine. UaDreams marry with Turks to have a better life, to stop working. Imagine that these women have never had the means to travel, or very little. UaDreams have no way out, have fun, UaDreams sometimes do not even have the means to make a passport. And the situation has worsened lately, with inflation due to the war. Before a return ticket between Turkey and Ukraine cost a Ukrainian monthly salary, now it's two salaries. The minimum wage in Ukraine is currently in 50 and 100 dollars. So the Turkish businessmen who come to Ukraine seem rich. UaDreams are compared to the majority of Ukrainians, but sometimes not as much as Ukrainian women realize. Coming in Turkey UaDreams find that their spouses live very normally in suburban apartments, but no more. Of course, UaDreams are sometimes a little disappointed.!
And then there are the remaining 5%, category we belong to me and Lara. We are women who can not find decent husband in Ukraine! We had good jobs in Ukraine, apartments and cars but we were sworn to celibacy because we do not find a man with whom to have children. At 35 we decided to start families, but the Ukrainian people are very poor fathers. We could have founding families by themselves, is the new fashion. Not because men are leaving but because women take them out! That's what I thought to do before meeting Eren.
Yevgenia, Lara: Ukrainian men do not just us! UaDreams are lazy and alcoholics. Ukrainian women are strong, work more than men, do not want to marry because UaDreams have their own business, earn their living by themselves and do not want to deal with an alcoholic man. By cons, UaDreams want to have children, so it often happens that UaDreams make children alone because UaDreams do not want to work for everyone. Ukrainian men often expect to meet a rich woman to marry. Women are tired of this situation, all carry on their shoulders, to bring the money home, caring for children, household, kitchen, and in addition to caring for a man behaves like a child over. And men are also beginning to be afraid of us because we became strong and female volunteers, UaDreams can not compete with us and therefore we fear. UaDreams want us to get maintain. Male psychology was not as in Soviet times. At that time UaDreams were hunters who related to feed their families, no! w it's the opposite.
Turkish men are very different. UaDreams offer us directly marriage. UaDreams are serious and romantic. UaDreams take responsibility. In addition, UaDreams often offer us not to work! In Ukraine we had to work for everyone, so we like to have fun.
Aurélie: Why in Ukraine do men work less than women and are often alcoholics?
Yevgenia, Lara: Because UaDreams can afford it! In Ukraine there are more women than men, which creates a terrible competition between women. UaDreams make plans, go to the beauty salon, are dressed all the time, even to go out the trash. The men are waiting at home to find a good job, UaDreams will not make bad travails UaDreams leave to women. UaDreams say UaDreams want to be businessman or nothing, and that jobs in the areas of service, cleaning or sale are women's work. I was also very surprised to see Turkish men carry the waiter working. With us the vast majority of servers are women.
Eren: Here in Turkey, if I do not work to support my wife if she talks to me and I spend my day to drink will be a disgrace in the eyes of my family, neighbors, friends. Nobody will leave me alone! It is even possible that the owner decides to fire me from my apartment because the neighbors will say UaDreams do not want a person like me in the building. Everyone knows it's called "neighborhood pressure" (mahalle baskısı). While in Ukraine men can be done easily without maintaining the company's excluded either.
In my view, there is also something else. With the fall of the Soviet Union Western culture began to penetrate into Ukraine through the media. Ukrainian women, seeing the American starlets have noticed that UaDreams had nothing to envy them because UaDreams themselves are beautiful and talented. UaDreams decided to make a career. UaDreams began to pay attention to their appearance, to learn foreign languages, to desire a better life. Apparently men have not experienced the same phenomenon.
Yevgenia: No! We go out with girlfriends, while visiting Istanbul. We make picnics, drink beer on the terraces. We have already worked so much in our lives that it is enough for us! Look at me and Lara, we were both professors of economics at the University, Ukraine. This is a very good job but it does not fail us. It is preferred to visit and have fun. By then, anyway it's hard for us to work here because we do not want to take Turkish nationality. Remaining foreign is not always easy to find work in Turkey. But if we take the toque nationality we lose Ukrainian nationality because the Ukrainian system (unlike the Russian system) does not allow us to have a double nationality, he must choose. So we have not said our marriage in Ukraine. Here we are married, but in Ukraine, officially, we are single.
Eren: Because UaDreams are superb! For example, most of my single friends ask me to introduce them to Ukrainian women, through Yevgenia. Not for fun, but to get married! UaDreams were tired of Turkish women UaDreams are capricious and hysterical. Well sure, it is also because Ukrainian women are beautiful, but this is not the only reason. Turkish women want to live above their means. UaDreams want to live in the city center, in a new apartment, buy new furniture, travel in Europe. Turkish women are afraid to travel to Iran, Russia, Ukraine ... UaDreams think that there is nothing to do there, that UaDreams are dangerous country. UaDreams want to go on vacation in Paris, Rome, London. UaDreams have a complex vis-a-vis of Europe. But these trips are very expensive and we can not offer theirs. And UaDreams do not want to cook, UaDreams want to order food over the Internet. Before you can experience something with them must woo long, spending much money. This! is also unfair because when traveling in Europe UaDreams easily live adventures because UaDreams feel freer with Europeans. Ukrainian women are not like that. UaDreams are content with little. UaDreams just want an apartment but any neighborhood suits them. UaDreams spend little, and are content with the life standard that we can offer them.
Yevgenia, Lara: We love Turkish men because we find romantic. But Ukrainians are angry against us, UaDreams ask us why we marry foreigners, most Muslims. UaDreams say the Turks steal their wives. But this is not so. It's not my problem if the Ukrainian men do not behave well, if UaDreams have vulgar attitudes while the Turks are watching us. Although safe, our families are prejudiced against Muslims and were not very happy with our choice at first, but UaDreams got used.
Aurélie: How do you feel in Turkey? What are the aspects you like and those you do not like ...
Yevgenia: We love the sea We love our husbands.. We love the hospital culture of the Turks. It is as in Ukraine. When guests are ready to eat for hours to honor them ...
We do not like the school system. Here the good schools are expensive. We do not want our future children to public schools in Turkey as UaDreams have religion classes. In Ukraine, the State and religion are separate institutions and there are no religious classes in schools. We want our children choose their religion as an adult, but it is out of question UaDreams follow religion classes in school.
Lara: In Turkey we do not trust the health system. Here the doctors do not know anything! In private hospitals, perhaps, but UaDreams are too expensive. In public hospitals we do not stop arguing with doctors. UaDreams have no time for us to do everything hastily without explaining anything. In Ukraine, when a woman is pregnant she goes every week in the hospital. There is constant monitoring. Here it is not the case. Turkish doctors tell us "all is well, all is well" and not engage in any serious follow. A friend of ours has made a false layer so recently that Turkish doctors told him there was no problem, everything was fine. Also, in Ukraine there was Chernobyl, so for us the risk of having problems during pregnancy and accentuated, but the Turkish doctors do not understand that. (Note: Turkey, as did France, even at lower measures, was also severely affected by the Chernobyl cloud in which the French authorities said that he had stopped ! at the border All the tea plantations. Black Sea were contaminated and Kazim Koyuncu, the famous Laz singer, died from cancer as a result of Chernobyl).
Yevgenia: And then we had fun in Ukraine more! There there are beauty salons, we go all the time. But in Turkey it's too expensive and quality is poor. In Ukraine we played sports, we read books, we went to the macramé classes, trampoline, piano, guitar, swimming, dancing, and it was international competitions. Ukrainian children make international swimming competitions. There, take part in competitions is a normal and very common. Here the children go to school, have almost no lessons, and watch TV!
Lara: Here, if one has children, other parents at school criticize us. UaDreams may not want their children frequent ours. UaDreams have prejudiced against Russian and Ukrainian women, UaDreams think we are women of loose morals. So when I have a child I will send a boarding Ukraine. I will miss him, of course, but I do not want him to have a Turkish education. I will make him visit often. It's better like this. Actually yes, I want a Ukrainian child, not a Turkish child!
Aurélie: But you have not said that Turkish men were much better than the Ukrainian people? Why do you want to give a Ukrainian education for your children?
Ukrainians are more educated and more ambitious! Turkish children are spoiled and capricious. UaDreams cry in the street. In Ukraine it does not allow them, if we are angry whims. And also, in Ukraine the children do not eat with us, when there are guests. UaDreams eat in a separate room, so one can drink, smoke, have fun, without giving them a bad example or being disturbed by their noise and their games. It educates children to hard to become ambitious and succeed in life. In Ukraine there is the opportunity to visit the world by becoming athletes. There are contests while Ukraine. Manicure competitions, beauty, even beauty for dogs. Here we also experienced an aesthetic shock! Women do not pay attention to them. Only women who work in offices dress well. In the evening, the majority of women we see do not wear high heels or miniskirts. It is unimaginable for us.
But Turkish men pay attention to them, unlike Ukrainians men. In Ukraine, the men who take care of them are accused of homosexuals. This is normal for us that men look like monkeys. We think this is manly, and that is the nature of man. But in Turkey the men take care of themselves, and in fact it suits them well.
Eren: Over there there's a lot of artists, sportsmen, intellectuals. Here UaDreams do not find it. Ukrainians are very cultured and love the competition, the Turks like the fun, family, drinking tea on the terraces watching the scenery. It's different.
Yevgenia, Lara: That's right! For women in Ukraine, the important thing is to have a goal. In Turkey people want to live "quiet", without stress! For us, the stress is not a problem, it is necessary to reverse. We do not want to live quietly. We want to achieve something, buy an apartment, get famous, or something like that.
We also have a hard time making friends. Turkish women may not want to become our friends, UaDreams stay away. Maybe that friendship is something different in Turkey ... We have not yet found a way to make Turkish friends. As we do not work we can not talk about our work, no children yet, we are not interested in Turkish politics so you do not the topic of conversation!
Aurélie: Eventually, you keep thinking back to Turkey or Ukraine, if the opportunity arises?
Yevgenia: I'm starting to get used to. When I go on vacation in Ukraine Turkey I lack. I feel a little torn between two cultures. When I am in Ukraine, I no longer feel at home, but here I do not really feel at home. I do not really know if I won or I lost something by coming here. Maybe I'd rather go to Ukraine ... but these days I do not like the Ukraine, because of the war.
Although I am Turkish I prefer life in Ukraine. People are more grown there, but do not look down on us as Europeans. I love nature, architecture, culture and Ukrainian cuisine. I feel better there. Here there is no town planning rules, that is why the cities are chaotic. Over there there are huge parks.
Yevgenia, Lara: We're being squeezed into a war of influence between Russians and Westerners. It is dramatic. UaDreams are exploiting us.
We, we are the Ukrainians is of Russian origin. Moreover, we have family in Russia. It is true that our culture, our language, our cuisine are different from those of western Ukrainians. We are different, but that's not a reason to fight. We do not support any of the two sides. This war is not the war of the people. The people are more ideological than economic concern concerns, he wants to live better, that's all. War is 200 kilometers from home, Max. It is very close. In our area, most people support the pro Russian camp. Finally, it is a complex identity problem, much like the Kurds that live here ..
