Cyprus What does the community in Turkey know about Cyprus?

Alpeis · advanced member

Hello friends, this is my first post to the forum and I do hope to see rational and constructive comments. Wink

I am a Turkish citizen and have moved to North Cyprus nearly two years ago. My move was supposed to be temporary for a 6-months period, but things developed in a very different way (I fell in love with a Greek girl, but it's another story) than I expected, therefore I had to stay until now. I noticed that I hadn't know anything about Cyprus, Cyprus issue and the history of Cyprus before I came to Cyprus. I would like to mention that I grew up in a highly educated environment, went to the top schools and the top university; METU, in Turkey and eventually consider myself an intellectual.
At the beginning, many issues I read in the newspapers or heard from others were all Greek to me. Afterwards, I searched the web in detail to learn what happened in Cyprus: I first delved into the web pages of Greek origin, then of Turkish origin and finally checked the third party reviews and information about Cyprus history.
Now, I know a lot about the history of the island. Perhaps I now know much more than Turkish Cypriots, but what about Turkish people, what do they think/know about the Cyprus problem. I can easily say that the majority (perhaps %95) of people in Turkey has no single idea about what has happened here and what is going on now.
Let me tell you what they know about here. Whenever I go to Turkey, I always have a chat with cab drivers especially after landing the airport. What they and other people ask me about Cyprus is always the same!
Here are their questions and comments on Cyprus:

-Is it true that Turkish Cypriots don't like us?
-I don't understand why Turkey transfers money to Turkish Cypriots, we are wasting a lot of money for them.

This two sentences above are the only things Turks consider about Cyprus. Consequently, Turkish community in Turkey knows a big NOTHING over Cyprus.

I believe this fact is very important for both communities.

umit07 · lecturer

Hi there Alpeis, I'm a Turkish Cypriot now studying in Australia. I coincidentally also studied at METU ( Electrical-Electronics Engineering). I did not graduate (dropped engineering altogether), I've recently moved back to Melbourne. I had many memories of how TC's were frowned upon by the average "Joe" Turk. The first thing a Taxi driver always asked you once he established you were a TC would be, "I hear that you Cypriots don't like Turks", I would hear this at least 80% of the time I took a Taxi anywhere. At a bus stop opposite the 6 th Dormitory, I was asked whether I was a Greek Cypriot upon telling a fellow student I was from Cyprus. Why? because I spoke slightly different.

I would classify most Turkish "intellects" views into two groups; The Nationalistic type, who would get nutty at you if you even thought slightly different them and the "We love the EU and would do anything to get in" ( usually business people) type who would sell their mothers for a buck.

Alpeis, most people in Turkey are poor and have much more important things to worry about. Just look at the internal political climate, corruption is so wide spread and you can get away with anything. The sad thing is that people see this as the norm. The only people who guard Cyprus in Turkey at the moment are the TAF, Erdogan would sell TC's off at a blink of an eye, if he had the chance .

umit07 · lecturer

iceman · lecturer

free_cyprus · lecturer

denizaksulu · vip

halil · professor

denizaksulu · vip

halil · professor

Turkish citizans from Turkey they can just come upto front of the Turkish Cypriots check point to look towards the Greek Cypriots Check point and take some pictures thats all they can do . In most cases i witnessed Greek Cypriots are scares to talks mainland Turks(Especialy young generations) . Properly he met the GC girl in UK .

All they knows they safe us and we owe our lifes for them . They never knows ... we , the Turkish Cypriots had great struggle to have our own identities since they rented the island to British .
They can not accept our independance . As a Turkish Cypriot myself i would like to live independance from Turkey ,Greece and Greek Cypriots domination . I would like to live Federal Republic of Cyprus umberalla as equal partner with GC's.

Kikapu · vip

Alpeis,

I'm interested to know how a Turk from Turkey managed to find love with a Greek Cypriot girl in the north. I would love to read your story.

Forget about how the TCs feel about the mainland Turks, since it was never that great to begin with, even before 1963. The question you need to ask is, just how much do the mainland Turks like the TCs, and my guess is, not very much also, or else they would help support the economy of the north with their 70+ million population by buying what ever the north produces. Not every non recognised entity like the north has the luxury of having such a huge market available to them from what some call as their "motherland". The truth is, Turks are in the north, because of the military decision and not because of public policy in Turkey, which means that Turks in general do not support the TCs and the idea of Turkey losing EU membership over Cyprus, will only make the Turks hate the TCs.

At age 9, after we were release as captives by the GCs in 1963, in 1964 I was able to go and live with an aunt in Turkey who had gotten married to a Turk. I was enrolled into a school there, where within few days, I had a fist fight with a Turkish kid who had told me that Turkey should not help the TCs. Here was a little kid of my age, who had such a view back then, which is no different than it is today held by many. I'm sure it is worse now, because of the money that Turkey spends in the north to maintain the corrupted puppet regime and also because it is hurting Turkey's EU chances.

After I knocked this kid's block off, I was sent to the headmasters office where my uncle who was a police officer, was sent to come and pick me up. Imagine, I had just arrived from a war zone, and this little shit wanted to give me more shit. He got what was coming to him at the time, but in some respects looking at today's situation, he may have been correct and that he was ahead of his time, so let me apologize to him right now for kicking his ass back in 1964.!