Now I became a different person
We do not have to be old in age to have many life experiences or life events. Every person has their own struggle and own story. — Büşra Dündar
His Story
I am a Mechatronics engineer. I graduated in 2015. I have some work experience in Humanitarian field with international and local experience.
I came from Aleppo. When the war started there, we did not think of it as a war because we thought it would not last for that long. My family and I left Aleppo right after the bombings in our neighborhood. We felt unsafe and and it was extremely terrifying to live under these conditions. We came to Turkey because we had some relatives who were living here. We thought it would not be long before we went back to our homes. It was Ramadan when we had to leave our home. We had to cross the borders illegally that time and it was a crazy journey. There were children and women and we had to keep them safe.
When we arrived Turkey, we stayed at our relatives house. As the war prolonged we needed to find work in order to live. We couldn’t stay at our relatives house for a long time. As a family we didn’t speak Turkish. So we needed to find work in a field that didn’t require Turkish language skills, and that was nothing to do with my educational background. We worked in constructions sites and it was an exhausting experience since we have not worked in it before and we did not have the physical ability to do this job either. We worked for 12 hours a day and my life was just working and sleeping. One day at work,I fell from the 2nd floor and I broke my foot. That wasn’t expected at all. I think it life is like this. No pain, no gain.
For 2 years I kept going back and forth to Aleppo to take me university exams, so I can graduate. I failed my 3rd year because I wasn’t able to go to take the exams. Eventually I completed my exams and graduated. My last border crossing towards Turkey, after I graduated, was extremely painful. We were caught by Jandarma and they beated us harshly and tortured us. My feeling were crashed. I was depressed and disappointed because I felt that I won’t be able to make it to Turkey again after they put me in the prison for 1 day. I do not know who to blame here. Many people have to cross the borders to come to Turkey and this is not their choice, since they cannot bear shelling and bombing in Syria. It took me 2 months to recover mentally from that situation.
My struggle did not end when I came to Turkey. Another struggle started looking for a job here in Turkey. Finding a job in Mechatronic as a fresh graduate is difficult because it is limited. I kept searching for jobs meanwhile attending many courses to improve my skills and my english language. I spent most of the days improving my english until I took the IELTS exam and scored 6.5 out of 9. After taking the exam I found a volunteer opportunity in DRC as a Trainer who trains people on CAD design. I worked for 2 months until I quit because I needed to find job that brings me money since my family still needs support. My mother was the breadwinner for my family during my absence in Syria. She is a teacher for Syrian children here in Turkey.
I have an ambition to achieve a Master’s degree in Mechatronics, and this is not possible for me because of our financial situation. I tried to apply for many scholarships but I couldn’t get any.
Now I became a different person. I don’t feel pessimistic or depressed anymore because I am aware of my abilities and qualifications, so I believe that I will have better opportunities in the future. And having the parents prayers and support, I believe I would find greater opportunities in the future.
I have a message to all people who had the same conditions of mine and who say they never find time to improve themselves. We all find it difficult to improve our skills or to learn a new language because there is no time. But I believe that we are able to manage our time and diminish wasted time and dedicate more time to improve ourselves. Opportunities do not come to us by there own, we need to fight and work hard to find them.
Academic education is not everything and we need to focus on getting what is important for us in practical field. Maybe my Bachelor degree did not help me as much as my english language did.
One other thing I learned after many years of experiencing life, we shouldn’t focus on people’s mistakes. We spend so much time talking about them, than rather focusing on our mistakes and habits.
One last message for Syrians and Turkish people. It might seem like we are taking the job opportunities from Turkish people, but really all we are doing is to survive. For those who experienced bad things from Syrians, I want to say that not all Syrians are the same. I need the Turkish people to understand that we are good people generally. Some Turks treated us badly but that doesn’t mean that all Turks are bad. I have a lot Turkish people who treated me like one of their own family members.
