Last weekend was full of events, since many of us have celebrated International Children’s Day and Easter.
It was nice to see that many Turkish people have gladly joined Easter celebration of their Catholic and Orthodox neighbors and friends. That shows once again tolerance and respect of Turkish people to other nations’ traditions and culture.
International Children’s day is also a day, which brings people of many nations and cultures together and joins them at Children’s Festival. The festival gives many foreign children a chance to see Turkey and its culture, and an opportunity to present the culture of their countries. I admire the idea of whole the event, and think that it’s a great fun for children to travel to Turkey and enjoy sincere hospitality of Turkish people.
But there is a reverse of the coin. Don’t regard me cynical, but no matter how colorful and joyful Children’s day’s event looks from aside, it seams like for children in Turkey, who don’t go abroad for the festival and just participate in the endless rehearsals and then parade, this day is a nightmare. Wouldn’t it be better, if adults have organized free entertainments and cartoon séance for the children, hand out ice creams and chocolate, and let children do whatever they want that day? That would be a real Children’s Day!
Or, another scenario: children and adults exchange their roles in families for one day. That day children would be allowed to behave at home as their parents, and parents would render all their duties to their daughters and sons. Many children want to grow up faster, because they think that adults can do whatever they want and nobody tells them when and what to eat, when to go to bed and that they have watched enough TV for today. But one thing they don’t realize is that freedom requires more responsibility. So, probably, if they had a chance to play adults just for one day a year, they would understand a real value of being just a careless child and wouldn’t want to grow up faster any more.
As for me, since I was busy all day long with the newspaper that day, I decided to give extra pocket money to my son, buy him a large box of ice cream and let him alone. I think he was pretty happy.
Talking about Turkish children, I have to admit that they do have responsibility within their families. Elder children are responsible for the smaller ones, and sometimes all through their lives elder brother’s or sister’s authority is strong than the authority of mother, especially for grown up children. And it is not because women in Turkish families are not respected, that’s because elder brother is a person of the same generation, who has protected his smaller brothers and sisters, and sometime knows more about them than caring mother, who indulges her children. So, since their childhood elder children in Turkish families get more freedom, as well as responsibility.
Hopefully, I didn’t bore you. One more thing I was going to tell about, but couldn’t connect to this week’s subjects (also, there is not enough space for it in my column), is a significant reduction in residence permit fee since April 1, 2011.
See you next week. Take care.
Polina Akar
