Just Turkish

[tanyakaraman 0]

Hi to you too Wendy! Every time I sign on here, the first thing I look for is to see if there is an update for you and Yilmaz. I am hoping & praying your good news will arrive very soon! You two certainly deserve it.

Hugs!

Tanya

Hi Everyone,

Just wanted to say "hi" and wish Juliaferno best of luck with the AP process. I am sure everything will be okay!!

Hi To awaterlily, tanyakaraman, and Mina. Hope all is going well with you. I haven't see both Debs on here for awhile, I hope all is well with them too!!

How are the "newbies" doing? I hope their visa process is going well. We all know this is a long and arduous journey!! Thank God we have this site and support of others that know exactly what we are going through!!

Take Care everyone and have a wonderful weekend whatever your plans maybe!!

Love and hugs,

Wendy

[wendya 0]

Tanya you are so very sweet and supportive. I am so lucky to have such a wonderful "Turkish family" here on visa journey!! It means a lot to me and I appreciate the thoughts and prayers very, (cok, cok) much!!

Love and thanks,

Wendy

Hi to you too Wendy! Every time I sign on here, the first thing I look for is to see if there is an update for you and Yilmaz. I am hoping & praying your good news will arrive very soon! You two certainly deserve it.

Hugs!

Tanya

Hi Everyone,

Just wanted to say "hi" and wish Juliaferno best of luck with the AP process. I am sure everything will be okay!!

Hi To awaterlily, tanyakaraman, and Mina. Hope all is going well with you. I haven't see both Debs on here for awhile, I hope all is well with them too!!

How are the "newbies" doing? I hope their visa process is going well. We all know this is a long and arduous journey!! Thank God we have this site and support of others that know exactly what we are going through!!

Take Care everyone and have a wonderful weekend whatever your plans maybe!!

Love and hugs,

Wendy

[awaterlily 0]

hey all - just want to pop in and say "Merhaba!"...hope everyone is doing well.

[JULIAFERNO 0]

Hi everyone! Glad to see everyone seems to be doing well.

Tanya - I love your new signature photo...you and Ozgur make such a beautiful couple!

Onur and I are still in AP but I've calmed down a bit and am back in the waiting mode. We're not really expecting an approval sooner than 2 months, although it would be a pleasant surprise. Miamiwife's husband has been in AP for 6 weeks now and I hope they will hear some good news very soon - insallah!

So I was reading a thread in the MENA forum that asked, if you had to move to your SO's country, would you? And I'm curious - would any of you move to Turkey indefinitely? After living in Turkey for 5 months last year, I would do it again only under certain conditions (where we lived, worked, being in a place where I could make friends with other English speakers, etc.) What about you all?

Edited August 11, 2008 by JULIAFERNO

[Mina76 0]

Hi Julia,

I thought and discussed this with my husband many times and agreed to move back to Turkey at the time of our retirement, but of course that won't be for another 15 to 20 years!

We hope to be able to buy a home there that we can use for a vacation home until we are ready to move there for good, this is just one of our plans so far. Like you I also would indefinitely move there under certain conditions too with where we would live and if there are other english speakers too.

This is still too far into the future, so for now we will stay put in the USA!

[Mina76 0]

Hi Tanya, Wendy and awaterlily,

How is everyone doing? I am so glad to see you all here and postings being that our little Turkish forum has been kind of slow.

I come here everyday to keep myself busy and from missing my husband so much, believe me it has really helped alot!

I enjoy coming here and visiting the other forums and posting on the OT, since then I have met some of the other VJ'ers

VJ has alot of wonderful people and many have become dear friends. Of course I miss all of you too and wish I could get to see you all more here, but I do understand that everyone is busy or can't always come online.

Tanya, love the pic...you and hubby make a cute couple!

Wendy, how are you holding up? I am still praying you hear something soon!

awaterlily, how is everything with you and your little girl?

Well I hope you all have a Wonderful Week and Take Care

[wendya 0]

Tanya what a wonderful picture!!! Cok Guzel!!

Awaterlily, I love the picture of your little girl. What a beautiful little princess!!!

Mina, so glad to hear from you. Yilmaz and I have been waiting a year just on the waiver alone!! (it has been almost 2 years for this visa process!!) I talked to Yilmaz the other day and it is really getting hard to remain apart for so long!! I e-mailed Athens today to see if there is any word on how much longer. We shall see. Thank you so much for your continued prayers. My whole family and Yilmaz's too have been praying also.

Juliaferno, I hope you hear something soon on your AP!! I do remember all of us that our going through this process in my daily prayers!!

In answer to your question about living in Turkey. I do love Turkey, but I am afraid that I would not be able to get a job that could help support our family. I have a very good job here and great health benefits and belong to a wonderful retirement system! I just think Yilmaz and I would be able to have a better standard of living here in the US. Also, I don't think we would live in an area where there would be many English speaking people and I don't think I would be able to handle that. But of course if this is our only option, I would do it and give up a lot to be with my love!! I was really hoping that he could come here and we could start our life here and save money and eventually have a home in Turkey and split our time between the two countries. Time will tell!!

Best wishes to you all. My love and prayers to everyone!!

Wendy

[tanyakaraman 0]

Hi everyone and thanks so much for your kind comments on our pic! It's my favorite picture of us...taken at the beach in Istanbul where we stayed for a week in August '06 (the first time I traveled back to visit him after we met 2 months earlier). I remember how scared I was then....wondering if he'd really be waiting for me at the other end...amazing how far we've come since then

As far as moving to Turkey, I personally would love to! Ozzy initially invited me to move there to live with him and I would have loved to take him up on the offer. It presented a legal problem, however, because of my 3 children. There is no way their father would ever agree to me moving out of the country with them, and I would never attempt it any other way than legally. So, unfortunately, for now it is not an option for us. We do hope to move there someday though, after the kids become of legal age....or doing as Wendy said and splitting our time between here and there...

As far as me finding a job in Turkey...that is a subject we have given a lot of though to. I am still not anywhere close to fluent in Turkish (although I am making slow progress ). Ozzy says that I could easily get a job teaching English, and there are many English language schools in Istanbul. From what I have learned (Ozzy rented a room to 2 different roomates who were working in Istanbul as English teachers), they actually prefer to hire non-Turkish speakers, since that eliminates the temptation to teach the class partially in Turkish. I just don't feel I have the "teacher gene" though and don't think I would be happy doing that. Its a definite possibilty for anyone else who might enjoy it though...

On the other hand, I am currently 3 semsters away from getting my RN degree in nursing, but apparently nursing is not a very lucrative or prestigous profession in Turkey like it is here in the US (besides the fact that I would not only need to be fluent in conversational Turkish, but also medical Turkish) and it seems like sort of a shame to throw away all the time and effort I've put into getting that degree, ya know?

I have also given thought to possibly working in one of the US Embassies...or doing as I found another American Ex-pat married to a Turkish man in Antalya doing- she and her husband own a 150-ft sailboat and take vacationers out on day/week-long cruises during the tourist season! That seemed like ever so much fun

Otherwise, I'm not sure if I could be content with being a housewife in Turkey...I think I'd be willing to give it a try though

My best wishes to everyone...especially Julia & Wendy, my thoughts are with you guys!

Tanya

[Ctrl+alt+delete 0]

Merhaba Everyone,

It's been awhile......can’t explain how busy I am. Sorry for not coming around more often.

Julia I hope you hear something very quickly....(((Hugs))) Pardon my quick pm response. Right when I think I have a moment to write...seems I can’t finish anything I am doing at the moment. Did he find out anything regarding that issue?

Wendy....(((hugs))) to you also... I feel so bad for those of you who are in this position of having to wait to be with the one you love....

Mina...Happy belated Birthday. When is hubby coming home?

awaterlily......glad all is going well. Your daughter is sSsooo pretty!

Tanya I too Love your photo, how sweet!!!

For all those who are in the process.........best wishes....times can be very hard but the end result will take your breath away.

About moving to Turkey...........IN A HEART BEAT..! Yes, I could live in Turkey perfectly fine. Inshallah, maybe one day.

I would be perfectly fine being a house wife because I am dead tired of working and dealing with problem employee's............... got 1 issue that is horrible! Can’t seem to fire/terminate anyone anymore. I'm tired.!

My husband and I are doing well. I think the next process is citizenship which we should be able to do here in a few months. I need to start reading up on it more but finding time is hard right now. He wants to keep his citizenship with Turkey also...

We are in the process of buying a home...making allot of offers on short sales, so paperwork is non stop and they take forever...we lost a few because of being outbid...so ;-) Inshallah maybe one pans out. It's a buyers market for sure.

I am working part time for a friend of mine, she needed someone to do her business books...so...that's what I am doing in my spare time.

Other than the above...kids & husband... my time is limited ;-)

I better get back to work.....lots to do.

Best of wishes to everyone.

Debbie

[camistanbul 0]

Merhaba from Marmaris, Turkey!

I didn't know this part of the forums existed until Mina sent me a note yesterday! I am an American who has been living and working in Turkey for the past 3 1/2 years, got married, and applied for my husband's visa via the US Embassy in Ankara (we did DCF for CR-1). We just got back this morning from our interview in Ankara and we were approved! We applied in May and were approved yesterday, so it didn't take long.... now we just have to start planning when we'll move back to the US.

It seems many of you want to come live in Turkey so if you have any questions about it, feel free to PM me. I lived and worked in Istanbul for 3 years and had a variety of jobs: started as an English teacher, then became the manager/DOS, started writing for a newspaper, and now I'm in Marmaris and I have a part-time job doing market research in Turkey for a company in the US. It's a wonderful country to live in, but it's quite difficult to make ends meet, especially in Istanbul. The cost of living has risen exponentially in the little time I've been here, but wages tend to stay the same. If you find a cushy expat job and are recruited from abroad, you will have a much better salary and life is much more comfortable.

For me, I love Turkey and my husband does too, but I think we both agree that we will have far better opportunities in the US. Our goal is to move to the US, work hard, and hopefully come back in 10-15 years to a nice seaside town.

Anyway, I'm so happy and relieved that my husband will be receiving his visa in the mail!!! I can't wait to come back to the US and celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas this year with my family.

Kendine iyi bak!

[tanyakaraman 0]

Camistanbul, welcome to to the Turkish forum and congratulations on your fast approval!!!!

I want to ask you...(and really everyone on the board!)...well, how fluent are you in Turkish and what affect did that have on your ability to get a job in Turkey? If you are pretty fluent, how long did it take you to become so?

I have been trying to at least get to the point where I can have a basic conversation for about 2 years now, and progress has been soooo slow. My husband's English is excellent so we usually just converse in that language. He teaches me little bits, and I pick up a lot more during our visits to Turkey....as well as watching Turkish movies on Youtube and fooling around with a Turkish Rosetta Stone CD I bought, but I'm still not able to carry (or understand) a real conversation with my in-laws, mostly because I have a really hard time with the verb conjugation.

It's very frustrating to me....

Edited August 13, 2008 by tanyakaraman

[JULIAFERNO 0]

Tebrikler camistanbul! That's great news. I'm happy for you (and jealous!) I'm starting to think I should have stayed in Turkey as well and taken the CR-1/IR-1 route!

Where will you be moving back to in the states?

Keep us posted!

[awaterlily 0]

I speak very little Turkish and while I stayed there, was offered a permanent teaching position and one in sales. Had I taken the teaching position I would have made more $ than my Turkish sister in law, who is a teacher by profession and with a teaching degree.

If one is interested in teaching, what I recall is the schools do most recruiting in the school year for the next school year. And, I suppose some of the job availability depends on demand and your locality.

It seems there is more of a demand for American English than British - at least that was my experience. Perhaps due to saturation?

I want to ask you...(and really everyone on the board!)...well, how fluent are you in Turkish and what affect did that have on your ability to get a job in Turkey? If you are pretty fluent, how long did it take you to become so?

[camistanbul 0]

I speak very little Turkish and while I stayed there, was offered a permanent teaching position and one in sales. Had I taken the teaching position I would have made more $ than my Turkish sister in law, who is a teacher by profession and with a teaching degree.

If one is interested in teaching, what I recall is the schools do most recruiting in the school year for the next school year. And, I suppose some of the job availability depends on demand and your locality.

It seems there is more of a demand for American English than British - at least that was my experience. Perhaps due to saturation?

I want to ask you...(and really everyone on the board!)...well, how fluent are you in Turkish and what affect did that have on your ability to get a job in Turkey? If you are pretty fluent, how long did it take you to become so?

Schools do most of their recruitment before the school year begins and then again in the wintertime, though people are always coming and going and if you want to find a teaching job it's not too difficult. People who have a university degree, TEFL certification, or even better, CELTA or DELTA certification will be able to find the better, higher paying jobs. As the Director of Studies of a school, it didn't matter to me (or to my company) if someone was British or American. We tried to find a balance in the schools so students would be exposed to all kinds of accents. And yes, foreign teachers always make more money than their Turkish counterparts, even though the Turkish teachers are generally well-trained, speak good English, and have more experience. It's just the way it is, even though it doesn't seem very fair!

How fluent am I in Turkish? Well, considering I worked 6 days a week at a school and spoke no Turkish there, and went home to my English-speaking husband..... I'm not really where I'd like to be. I took a course at TOMER in Istanbul and it was good for the basics. I can understand well but speaking is quite difficult. We're staying with my in-laws now for the next 3 months (before we move back to the US!) so I'm trying to practice and it's coming along, but slowly. As far as jobs are concerned, most teaching jobs would not want you to speak Turkish with the students, in my experience. At my school, it wasn't allowed. I only know a couple of foreigners who are truly fluent, but they had boyfriends/girlfriends who couldn't speak English or hung out with people who never spoke English with them. I've tried to get my husband to do that, but he gets bored after a while.

That said, there are lots of jobs out there and I am fortunate to know many American women working in Istanbul doing everything from law, research, reporting, teaching, music, etc. If you really want to live in Turkey, it's possible -- just kind of far away.

[tanyakaraman 0]

Wow, that is very interesting and encouraging! Especially living in a country where we expect everyone who comes here to learn "our" language in order to get very far...

I have a very basic vocabulary of nouns and adjectives, a few common greetings, etc. (and Ozzy has taught me an assortment of curse words LOL), but the Turkish verb tenses just confuse the heck out of me!

My lack of ability to speak Turkish has led to some interesting situations sometimes, since Ozzy is really the only person in his whole family who speaks English. Sometimes he will run to the store or whatever without his cell and his mom or sister will call for him. I have a little "script" I memorized so I can tell them he's at the store, will come back in a few mins, and I'll tell him to call them back, etc. His mom worries that if "anything" ever happend to him, I wouldn't be able to tell them. But really, I just love his family and would love to be able to really pick their brains...or have a little "girl talk" with his sisters (without an interpreter)

Maybe someday...

I speak very little Turkish and while I stayed there, was offered a permanent teaching position and one in sales. Had I taken the teaching position I would have made more $ than my Turkish sister in law, who is a teacher by profession and with a teaching degree.

If one is interested in teaching, what I recall is the schools do most recruiting in the school year for the next school year. And, I suppose some of the job availability depends on demand and your locality.

It seems there is more of a demand for American English than British - at least that was my experience. Perhaps due to saturation?

I want to ask you...(and really everyone on the board!)...well, how fluent are you in Turkish and what affect did that have on your ability to get a job in Turkey? If you are pretty fluent, how long did it take you to become so?

Schools do most of their recruitment before the school year begins and then again in the wintertime, though people are always coming and going and if you want to find a teaching job it's not too difficult. People who have a university degree, TEFL certification, or even better, CELTA or DELTA certification will be able to find the better, higher paying jobs. As the Director of Studies of a school, it didn't matter to me (or to my company) if someone was British or American. We tried to find a balance in the schools so students would be exposed to all kinds of accents. And yes, foreign teachers always make more money than their Turkish counterparts, even though the Turkish teachers are generally well-trained, speak good English, and have more experience. It's just the way it is, even though it doesn't seem very fair!

How fluent am I in Turkish? Well, considering I worked 6 days a week at a school and spoke no Turkish there, and went home to my English-speaking husband..... I'm not really where I'd like to be. I took a course at TOMER in Istanbul and it was good for the basics. I can understand well but speaking is quite difficult. We're staying with my in-laws now for the next 3 months (before we move back to the US!) so I'm trying to practice and it's coming along, but slowly. As far as jobs are concerned, most teaching jobs would not want you to speak Turkish with the students, in my experience. At my school, it wasn't allowed. I only know a couple of foreigners who are truly fluent, but they had boyfriends/girlfriends who couldn't speak English or hung out with people who never spoke English with them. I've tried to get my husband to do that, but he gets bored after a while.

That said, there are lots of jobs out there and I am fortunate to know many American women working in Istanbul doing everything from law, research, reporting, teaching, music, etc. If you really want to live in Turkey, it's possible -- just kind of far away.