A Voice from Turkey

Çigdem Nakilcioglu studies the Middle East Technical University (Faculty of Education) in Ankara,Turkey.

Editorial: This homework was submitted by Çigdem NAKILCIOGLU to Claire Özel for the course 'Working with Disabled Learners' at the Middle East Technical University (Faculty of Education) in Ankara, Turkey.
Claire is Disability Support Coordinator at METU, the first at a Turkish university (www.engelsiz.metu.edu.tr).

This first page was submitted at the start of the semester; the student had to analyse who they were in relation to disability issues: understanding, experience, and thoughts and fears.
This text is in the student's own words, so any awkward or politically incorrect uses should be taken as a foreign learner's limited ability with words. The text has not been modified in order to preserve the impact of the experience in the freshness of her words. The only modifications made were for reasons of confidentiality.

Who I am, Why I chose this course???

Hi, I am Çigdem Nakilcioglu. I am from Afyon. I am studying English Language Teaching. I choose this area as my future job because it is the most suitable one for me.

I find it very near to my personal characteristic. Human relations are very important for me. I like English, I like people, I like teaching. So then why not to teach??

I chose this course because in my opinion this course will add a lot to my future career. Because in our future experience, I am sure we will encounter so many people with different personalities, different backgrounds, different learning styles and intelligences. So I feel I have to be ready and prepared to meet any of this people. I want to be effective and beneficial for them as much as I can...

I have experienced teaching practice in summer schools however I have never experienced teaching with such people so it is completely a new world for me to explore.

This part of teaching seems to be a detail but it is deadly important. I feel that this course will complete my deficiencies and make me a "full" teacher.

(NOTE: I haven't made any changes while typing this paper. It is the same and pure original one which I have written in a hurry in the first day of class because I am sure I want to see the very first bean which have grown up until the end of the semester. I am willing to see the changes:)

This main text was an assignment submitted 12 weeks after the first, reflecting on the growth in awareness over the three months.

THIS IS ME RIGHT NOW!

Before I begin to write the paper, I really feel the complexity at the same time the relief resulted from being aware of the complexity of the issue "disability". You said in my first writing that I didn't mention about my experience of disability which is my parents are deaf. You are right but it is not because that I don't want to but I am not aware of the content of this course before I took it. At first I thought it would be about some exceptional children like autistic or students with mental retard, etc. I couldn't ever imagine that we would talk about blind or deaf people. And also I thought we would only talk about the classroom environment in which these kind of students would take place. I was wrong. I was completely wrong! In my opinion, this is resulted from the fact that I put my parents' situation and also the image of disability to somewhere deep in my brain which is too far away from my daily superficial life. Maybe I cannot ever imagine that one teacher, additionally a native one, would one day come into class and talk about disability very naturally with a deep sense of sympathy and knowledge and with her strong communication skills. This was the first shock for me. Then the rest came. My understanding, knowledge of disability, my attitudes towards disabled people completely changed during this period of time. Even I feel that my skills of dealing with the problems of disability increased a great deal. I got the POWER now:

In terms of knowledge and understanding of disability, I changed a lot. First of all, I learned the terms of models of disability which enlarges my perspective a great deal. The individual, medical, tragedy/charity and social model show me huge gaps in perception of people of disability in the community. Everybody perceives the concept individually depending on his/her social place or economic condition. For example, a rich businessman in a town, in Afyon (my hometown) perceives the disability as a charity model. As he is rich, he thinks he can help them by his money only. But if his perception is low in terms of social model of disability, there may arouse some problems because the disabled people may feel lost as this model evokes pity in people's eyes and it leaves disabled people dependent on the goodwill of others rather than being able to live on an equal basis with them. However; on the other hand I really appreciate the works of some respected institutions. For example; TESYEV (Türkiye Engelliler Spor Yardim ve Egitim Vakfi) is one of the institutions and they support education, sport and socialization of disabled people. For instance, they provide "TESYEV Uzak Arama Karti" for all people in Turkey and transfer some of the fund to the charity of disabled. They in a way provide the cooperation between disabled people and Temporarily Able Bodied people.

K.M.², on the other hand is one of the good examples of success and struggle among our guests. Until she stood up from her chair after we had a long conversation, I didn't realize anything wrong with her. She is beautiful, well cared, smart, conscious of her situation and very successful in her area. She is doing her master's degree abroad. But it is explicit from her explanations that she had had really hard time in accepting her situation and she adores herself to studying XXX, her own area. Maybe that is the right way for her to be in peace with life, with herself and with people but not everybody is as lucky as K.M. is. What the other helpless people will do to rescue themselves if they do not have sympathetic people and teachers around them, if they do not have enough budget to continue their education life. I want to share a poem which depicts the situation of such a person. It is obvious that he is in deep sorrow, helpless in life and there is nothing for him to depend on, there is no light for him to follow…

NEREYE GITSEM

(Script from a newspaper written by Ethem Saygi which I found interesting as it depicts the mood of most disabled very well!)

But there exits people, we exist and you exist to tell him that THERE IS ALWAYS LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL! There is a way. The thing is to be able to meet them and to show them only the way. They already have the instinct to follow the road, I am sure!

In terms of attitudes, I can say I experience a strong paradigm shift as I have strong positive model in front of me like you. I used to have an approach of a tragedy model for the disabled people. I used to pity for them for the sake of relieving my conscience. I used to say "ah canim kiyamam sana, allah korusun bizim de basimiza gelebilir,vah vah " kind of things. It takes really long time for me to quit pitying and do something concrete and real for them.

I have really never seen anyone like you who has precise and strong attitudes for the disabled. For example, I could never forget the conversation between you and V.B. in Yenimahalle Rehabilitation Center. When we come across with him in the corridor you asked "How are you?" and he answered "I am not OK but trying to be. I am the VICTIM (kurban). I not only have problems with my legs but also with my eyes, too" you said (I want to give it in Turkish same as you said to give the exact meaning "ne diyeyim geçmis olsun ama geçmicek ki! " I was really shocked. At first I looked at him and he was a bit surprised but not like as his friends did. They were a bit angry as I could understand their faces. In my opinion, they thought you are mocking at him. However, V.B. was so sweet. After a few seconds of surprise, he smiled and said "Yes. You are right. It is not a big problem that much. I am happy". He used the word "happy" in contrast to what he had said a few minutes ago "victim". This is really one of the most precious things I have learned in this lesson. First I was shocked when you said this and thought that you are a native English and maybe you could not calculate what a person can feel when such thing is said to a disabled person. (Sorry for my prejudice9) then of course I realized I was completely wrong. You were really an expert spending many years for the sake of this job. You were very much conscious by uttering this word. This means that you do not isolate this person from the society, accept him as one of your close friend and include him in the community by the help of your sense of humor. After than I evaluated my own attitude completely, give up pitying then and give up discriminating them from the society by pitying. I am brown, you are blonde, she is funny, he is depressive and V.B. is disabled. That is the bottom line…

Apart from them I gained the consciousness of disability since the beginning of the term. I used to ignore the news about disability and condition of disabled people as I thought I got nothing to do for them. However, I am more sensitive about the news about disabled people, legislations made for them related institutions now. I am able to assess the institutions in terms of their struggle and work for disabled ones. I follow the works of government for disabled people. I am pleased to see the reforms they make on the legislations. For example, government will pay the employees 5 times more who have disabled children. Also working parents could have permission with payment of 1.5 hour for their disabled child. These are good news. But in terms of education nothing is enough. Disabled people are not given enough attention and sensitivity at schools. They are ignored. As I am a prospective teacher, I focus on education of disabled more for my future career. I learned from our guests that there are a lot of things to learn to implement at school. For instance, as C.E. has a hearing loss, she has to do lip-reading. A little sensitivity would be enough for her through her education process. However, her teachers were not sensitive and sympathetic with her situation and ignore the nuances and destroy her hopes for education. Luckily, she is hardworking and lively so now she is a successful student at METU.

In terms of skills, I believe I proceed a lot too. At first, I surely gained the communicative skills with disabled people. At first, I slightly begin by asking questions to our guests after considering a lot because I had the fear that while the question which was very normal for me could be very offensive or disappointing for him/her. Then Yenimahalle experience added me a lot. I was more relaxed and after I saw your answer to V.B. (geçmicek ki ama olsun önemli degil…⁴), I broke the ices around me and communicate with the people in the center easily. By this way I moved too far in dealing with disability. Also, at this procedure I think parents and family background is very important. When I be a teacher, I see it as a must to cooperate with parents because I believe family and the teacher are the two halves of an apple. Only if they cooperate, will they have a fruitful person.

To conclude, after all these experiences that this course enables me, I feel more understanding, confident, knowledgeable and powerful to deal with any kind of problems of disability. Maybe one can think that I would be the first student in this class whose attitudes would change less as I am living in my world of disability already. However, this is not the case. On the contrary, I can say I have a great deal of profit out of this course. I overcome being belonged to the group of people prejudiced about disability. Now I do not pity for the disabled people anymore. I always think what I can give them and I can take from them in terms of philosophy of life because they really have a lot to teach us. I am also looking for ways to show them the light at the end of the tunnel. All in all, by the help of your great effort, I will forever let my own discretion be my tutor and I know that's the very best way to understand them.

Notes

¹A reference to my describing the students' initial mind, at the start of the course, as 'a dry bean' that would be put in to soak, then start pushing out roots and shoots as they broadened their perspectives and deepened their understanding of disability issues.
²'Ah you poor thing! May Allah protect us from such a fate'
³ 'What can I say? "May it pass" -a standard expression when someone mentions difficult times- "but it won't pass"

2. Never Tired of London
PART 1

Petra Cerar, Tina Iskra, Anita Ivic, Petra Kežman, Polona Prodnik, Martin Robic, Andrej Salobir, Katja Vlašic and Maja Zor

In October 2003, a group of third and fourth-year students from the Department of English at the Faculty of Ljubljana went for a one-week study trip to England as part of their British Studies course. Here are some observations they have made.

When visiting a foreign country there is no chance of avoiding contacts with local inhabitants. The first impressions and contacts are often the ones that stay forever…and sure they vary in length, grade of intimacy and…quality.

I got another confirmation of my statement that the British are the nicest nation. I was standing in the street with a map in my hands, trying to figure out which way to take, when somebody came to me and asked me if I needed any help. He then showed me the way I was looking for. Wasn't that nice? I did not even ask him to tell me the way; seeing how lost I was, he just stopped and helped me. I am impressed. (Anita)

Today, over and over again impressed by the size of the city and the endless amount of its inhabitants, I came into close contact with the widely known English politeness. It is the number of EXCUSE ME's and Sore's that I'm referring to and am taken aback by... it is when (accidentally, of course) you step on somebody's foot and you, surprisingly, don't get a dark look (as you normally would in Slovenia), but the 'hurt' person instantly articulates their 'SORRY' before you even manage to notice that you've touched them. The British really seem to be kind of allergic to sudden bodily contacts with strangers... (Petra C)

But I was most taken aback by the following incident: stepping into the pub, we figured out there were no free tables in it, but there was this one woman sitting at a table for six, reading the daily newspaper and drinking her ale. Maja pulled the shortest straw and was pushed forward to ask her if she'd mind our joining her at the table. She looked at us with a purely amazed look for a moment, but quickly regained her British coolness and composure and went into an apologetic fit, "Oh, I'm sorry, here ya go, do sit down, I'll just sit at the bar, anyway I was just leaving." With a whole pint of beer? Sure. We nearly begged her to stay at the table, explaining it wasn't our intention to scare her away and that we could wait for a free table. But she wouldn't be bothered. In 4.56 seconds, she was at the bar and resumed her interrupted occupation as if nothing had happened. Oh well. In retrospective, I guess we appeared really rude to the punters but at that time we were just way too merry to actually worry about that. A pint of beer did not really deepen our worries. (Martin)

Mojca, Anita and I took a bus to Camden and we chatted all the way. We were, as usual, completely absorbed in our conversation (needless to say that it was about other people) and so we did not notice that the bus arrived at our stop. Again, London provided us with a bunch of surprises as a stranger on the bus said, "Punce kle morte dol, k je to Camden." And as if that was not enough another man approached us just as we got off the bus and said, "Jer niste bili vi jucer na BBC." In the end it turned out that he is working for the Serbian section and saw us in the canteen there (isn't it a small world?). (Maja)

In the evening we went to a pub. The atmosphere there was great and quite different from Slovenian pubs. It was only weird that we had to leave by 11 p.m. In the pub we met an Englishman who was very funny, spontaneous and interesting. I cannot believe how easy it is to meet new people in England. There, people seem to be much more open to talking to a perfect stranger than in Slovenia. (Anita)

What surprised me the most was the politeness of the people who inspected us on the way in. They were all smiling and gave a few kind and humorous comments to every person who entered. I think people in Slovenia with similar jobs could use a few months of training on how to work with people. (Tina)

What I also found interesting was the fact that practically nobody smoked in the pub, although there were no "smoking prohibited" signs. I also noticed that in the streets there were very little fags on the pavement and I actually saw a person smoke her cigarette, put it out with her shoe, then pick up the fag and carry it to the nearest bin (which can, at least in some areas of London, mean a five minute walk). The other sign of any advanced western country, the chewing-gum littered pavements, were also quite rare, compared to e.g. Berlin or Prague, or even Ljubljana, where there are ten times fewer people but manage to make a bigger mess than Londoners. (Martin)

A couple of girls from our group had a different kind of a contact with the British. They had the privilege to make a presentation on Slovenia in one of primary schools near London…

An interesting day at the primary school in Tadworth. At first I felt tense talking to the whole class of native speakers, but seeing how relaxed the atmosphere was, the fear soon melted away. The children, all wearing uniforms, were a pleasant audience. The atmosphere in the class was very different from the one in Slovenian schools, where only one person talks and others listen. What I found surprising was their readiness to cooperate. I will never forget their comments, such as, "I saw ski jumping in James Bond!" and questions such as, "What if the bear eats you?" It still makes me laugh. I expected the teacher to have more authority - nobody took much notice of her. (Anita)

When a traveler is lost in a foreign country, everything can help, even when just crossing the road…

I noticed that those signs on streets saying LOOK LEFT or LOOK RIGHT are very helpful. Not to mention that I nearly got run over by a taxi despite them. (Polona)

I was standing at the pedestrian crossing. I stopped there to have a look at the map when a car on my left stopped. Then a car on my right stopped as well. I looked around, a little surprised, as something like that hadn't happened to me so far, I usually had to throw myself under cars to get to the other side. But then I remembered what the French roommate had told me. By certain crossings there is a flashing light which is a sign that cars have to stop by that crossing and let pedestrians cross the road. Mystery solved. ((Katja)

…and he or she has to get used and adapt to everything, too. Even to the different habits of eating out.

While I was walking around the city I noticed that restaurant tables are placed at the windows and there are no curtains. So when I passed a restaurant I could see directly on people's plates. But they just did not seem to be bothered about that. Maybe passers-by are not supposed to look through the windows into restaurants. ((Polona)

London really is a cosmopolitan city. It has a wide range of events, among them also film festivals. With famous film stars attending them…

In the evening, when Maja, Mojca and I were walking around Leicester Square, we saw a crowd of people shouting with excitement. Still in the spirit of Thursday's celebrity hunting, we ran to the crowd to see what was going on. And there he was... not Hugh Grant, but Anthony Hopkins! While I was looking for my camera he had already left inside the building. Mojca only got a shot of his grey hair:) ((Anita)

Every nation has institutions to educate their "hope for the future". We, as students of the University of Ljubljana, visited University College London.

First of all we looked around the rooms, examined the timetable and obligations of our fellow students and turned green with envy when we realized that the range of lectures and seminars they CAN choose from is twice as big as ours, and the number of those they MUST attend are half the size of those in Ljubljana. Since the lecture on Plato's Symposium was a far cry from being stimulating, most of us spent the time gaping at the "catwalk show" of the British female students. While we were wrapped in warm pullovers and jackets, as suitable for this time of the year, it seemed perfectly normal for them to walk around in sleeveless tops and mini skirts without tights. Besides, during the lecture they seemed to be so busy checking whether their ponytails and nails looked all right that they hardly had time to jot anything down. Actually, there was no need to, since the lecturer regularly produced handouts with all the important and unimportant details the students should know (by the way, a very good idea for our department, too!). ((Petra K)

After being herded into a common room, I set off on exploring the differences between our university and the UCL. The first striking difference was the Examiner's report on the papers students wrote, describing in detail how the students fared in general, focusing on single questions and drawing conclusions what there is to be done in the future. Very admirable. I also found it interesting that the students attend literature-only courses, as there is only one linguistic course available.
We arrived at the classroom more or less unnoticed and I believe nobody would have noticed the lot of us if the professor hadn't mentioned us. The class was quite mixed, ranging from typical British people, to people of Asian, Hispano and Afro-American origin. No wonder nobody noticed us.
As most of the faculty building is made of wood, there are a lot of fire exits and fire extinguishers throughout the building. I guess the Great fire of London memory still burns bright in Londoners' memories.
During the lecture, none of the students dared to talk, although they were quite lively before the lecture began, even with the professor already in class. Because they get handouts beforehand, nobody really writes down everything the teacher says - at the pace she speaks that would also be impossible, but they just take notes on subjects they think are important. The teacher managed to work through six pages of the handout in one hour, which I found very impressive. ((Martin)

Having mentioned fire extinguishers - all buildings in London seem to have at least one feature in common…

Already on the second day of our journey, I noticed something that was with me all the time: the people in England must be very afraid of fire. Everywhere, in every single building, even in our hostel, which was otherwise not really a state-of-the-art building, there was extensive fire protection. You couldn't miss it. Almost every 10 ft., (well…maybe I'm A BIT exaggerating) there was a fire door with the sign on it, "Fire door. Keep shut." Besides, every single room had at least one fire extinguisher and every single fire alarm had to be investigated by the fire department. ((Andrej)

(to be continued…)