Employee

Her father had left for Germany where he got a legal status as a refugee. Later Abeer’s mother and siblings went to Germany as well for a family reunification. “As I was over 18 years old I was not allowed to join them”.

“Now I work here in this company. Thanks to United Work I found a legal job. Without them I would not have this job as executive assistant for the operations manager. He is Syrian too. This is one of the many Syrian companies in Turkey.”

Ana Clinic, the company she is employed in is part of the fast expanding health tourism sector. It is a call center that has a contract with a plastic surgery clinic, where hair transplants are the most popular procedure. Most of Abeer’s colleagues are Turkish and Syrian, but there are also workers from Italy, Spain and Morocco. “I feel good and happy here. People are very kind and friendly”, Abeer says.

Abeer, who is single, lives in an appartment with a Syrian friend in the Beylikdüzü district, a suburb on the western edge of Istanbul. “My roommate is a student. Her family is in Qatar”. Abeer only has to commute for 25 minutes by metrobus to get to her work. She works 9 hours per day, five and a half day per week.

This young Syrian woman is one of the many examples of Syrians who succeeded to change their status from refugee to employee. “United Work changed my life”, she says with a smile.

“I found a comfort zone here in this job. Because of this job I got via United Work I decided to get a Turkish citizenship. I plan to stay here in Turkey”.

Her years in Turkey as a refugee thaught her that ‘it is really difficult for a Syrian to find a job here’. “In may places they didn’t pay me. And if they get to know that you are Syrian they don’t want to work with you anymore”.

In September 2012 she escaped the war in her country with her mom and dad. Her oldest brother lives in Saudi Arabia. Her younger brother was in Lebanon and joined his family in Turkey three years ago.

Shahed was not able to graduate from high school as she had to leave her war-torn country before her final exams. Before she tried to restart her education in Turkey she lived for one-and-a-half years in Egypt.

In Istanbul she tried for three consecutive years to enter a Turkish high school. “In the third year, during the entrance exam for Syrians, I missed only 0.5 points, that’s two questions! And I was like ‘that’s it! I want to start working’.

She heard about the program ‘From Refugee to Employee’ by Dutch NGO United Work in Istanbul and contacted them. “They found me a job here in Galata at the Turkish online wedding marketplace Düğün (Wedding). I work here now for two months at the telesales department. Here I feel happy. I call to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates. As I lived in Egypt and was with my brother for two months in Saudi Arabia I am familiar with their different Arabic accents too. So that helps”.

Düğün is Turkey’s dominant online wedding marketplace where young couples can connect with numerous dress shops, restaurants, photographers, bands, hotels, juwelers, hair dressers, lingerieshops. In 2015 Düğün opened an Arabic-language site called Zafaf.net (Wedding). They have expanded into a dozen countries.

“Our star market is Saudi Arabia”, CEO Emek Kirbiyik says. “Every year there are 160,000 weddings in Saudi Arabia. 25 Percent of them used our platform. We have at the moment a sales team of 4 in Saudi Arabia”.

United Work didn’t only give Shahed an opportunity to get a legal job and a work permit. Mr. Kirbiyik doesn’t hide his enthusiasm either. “United Work helps us in a super way to find proper Syrian workers”.

Yasmin had studied environmental engineering for one year at university in Aleppo. But in Istanbul she wasn’t able to continue her education ‘because I didn’t speak Turkish and because of the financial situation of my family’.

So she started to work. “That was hard for me as I worked for the first time ever. In Syria I didn’t work. In Istanbul I had many jobs. In one company I quit my job after one month as they didn’t pay me. At a factory for glasses and sunglasses in Silivri I worked as well. They were a connection of my father, who is a businessman. In Syria my father imported glasses and accessoires from that factory. Within two months I left my job. I didn’t like it there”.

Yasmin started learning Turkish at TÖMER. “That was not easy, but I practised a lot. In the metrobus for instance I spoke to anybody, specially old passengers.”

Yasmin loves art and fashion. At Aydın Istanbul University she continued her education with a 50 percent scholarship. Not environmental engineering anymore. She decided to study fashion design. And graduated after two years.

She wanted to make some money too, so in the second semester she started teaching Arabic and English at a private school. “I worked in art exhibitions as a hostess as well”.

When she heard about the Dutch ngo United Work offering training and jobs for Syrian refugees she applied and did a training course. “At the end of the course they asked if I would like to work for them. Of course I said yes. It is important what they do at United Work and I like to help Syrian refugees, specially Syrian women. I became a consultant for the women department. I find the women via social media. They also find us through word of mouth”.

Her plans and ambitions fort he future?

“I want to establish my own fashion business, first online. I chose a name already: ‘La Maison de Yasmin’.

She didn’t have a work permit. They payed her only 1,000 Turkish Lira per month, one third less than the legal monthly minimum wage. “I had to work for twelve hours a day, six days a week”.

Only her and one of her brothers have a job. “My father and other brothers worked in construction. Now they are unemployed at home, because work in construction stopped. They don’t want to work in a factory as they don’t understand Turkish. A friend of my brother found a job in this textile factory through United Work. So I also registered a United Work for a training course”.

She became a quality controller and put shirts, T-shirts, sweat shirts, in plastic bags. “I love my job. It is ten hours per day, five days a week. On Saturdays I work too. That’s overtime and pays extra. I get paid the minimum wage of TL 2020. With the extras I can make TL 2500,- per month. My brother, who has back problems and works as a security guard, earns TL 1300,-. So for our whole family we have TL 3800. The rent for our apartment is TL 500. So we have to live from TL 3300,- (540 euro) per month with 7 persons. The youngest is 3 years. My sister of 12 goes to a Turkish school”.

She is working in her current job now for seven months. “I would like to learn more”, she says. “I feel much more comfortable here than in my former jobs. It is legal. Because of United Work I got a work permit for one year. This company produces jeans, T-shirts, sweat shirts, jackets, shirts. They sell to international and local  fast fashion retailers like Zara, Street One, Koton, Mavi, LC Waikiki. On Sundays I relax, go to the park or a shopping mall with my parents and brothers and sisters.”

Since the influx of Syrian refugees started in 2012 nearly 20,000 Syrians have settled down in Sultanbeyli, a conservative working class suburb with a population of more than 300,000.

Hairdresser Ghadir is 37 years old and came four years ago from Aleppo to Turkey with her mother, husband and two kids. Her youngest boy, Fajir (Morning), was born in Istanbul and is now one and a half years old.

“My Turkish is basic and I didn’t know the Turkish culture. Now it is better. I had no jobs here in Istanbul. For five months I stayed at home. Then I decided to start my hair and beauty salon. As you see, we have a nice collection of bridal gowns as well. Not for sale. All of them are for rent. In the past we had bought gold from the money we saved. With that gold, plus money from friends who wanted to help me, I started this business. That is now three years ago”.

United Work, a reintegration and placement services NGO, funded by the Dutch Government aiming to support Syrian refugees being employed in Turkey, has an office in Sultanbeyli as well. On the top floor of a multifunctional community center organized by the Refugees Assistance and Solidarity Association.

“I heard from friends that United Work had an office there”, Ghadir says. Abdullah Bakira (23) from Damascus, a Syrian refugee himself, is the coordinator at the United Work office here in Sultanbeyli. “Everybody knows him”, Ghadir says smiling. “He helped me with the Turkish documents to make my business legal. He also was in charge of the procedure to get me a work permit”.

Her husband works in a textile factory in Istanbul, six days a week. “My beauty salon is open seven days a week. I manage because two of my kids are in school and my youngest is with my mother. She takes care of the children when I’m at work”.

She doesn’t want to go back to Syria. “Turkey is much more developed. Also the education is better. We want to apply for Turkish citizenship”.

Fashion store Masaya (The Evenings) is one of them. When I visited the shop was full of ladies who discussed wedding gowns and sexy lingerie. The ladies love a lot of glitter and glamor, the owner Amal Daniell (37) agrees.

She was born in Aleppo, had little education, was forced to flee her country and became a sucessful businesswoman in Istanbul.

“We fled five years ago. Together with my husband and three children ”. Here in Sultanbeyli, a conservative suburb of Istanbul with 300,000 inhabitants and 20,000 Syrians, they found a safe haven and tried to build a new life.

It wasn’t easy. In a foreign country with a foreign language. “I was in school in Syria until I was nine. I never had a job ”. She was already a mother when she was 19. “Twins first, boys. The following year a daughter. One of my sons has a medical condition, so he has to stay at home. The other one works in a textile factory and speaks Turkish well”.

Amal earned money after she started selling clothes from her home. She was able to save 3,000 euros. Together with her cousin, who also contributed 3,000 euros, they started their own fashion store, specializing in wedding dresses and wedding articles. They also have a spacious beauty salon on the first floor.

“To arrange all Turkish permits, we got help from Abdullah, a young Syrian who works at the office of United Work in our neighborhood,” says Amal.

United Work is a Dutch NGO that, since 2017, helps jobseekers with recruitment, training, work permits and other facilities to find a legal and sustainable job in Turkey.

Amal is happy now. Going back to Syria after the war? “I don’t thinks so”, she says. “I have built up a good business here. I want to stay”.

The company buys all the meat from abroad. They cut and process it for supermarkets, restaurants, döner kebab joints.

Miryam lives with three children in Esenyurt, a district on the European side of Istanbul, 30 km west of the city center.

She has an appartment with three bedrooms. She pays TL 700 rent. “Thanks to United Work I now earn the legal minimum wage of TL 2020.”.

With overtime she earns TL 2250. I her previous job in a big restaurant, where she worked as a cook, she had a salary of TL 1600. That was netto as she worked illegal and paid no taxes. “My son worked there too. At the end of 2017 I quit my job at the restaurant and stayed at home for four months. Then I saw on Facebook an advertisement from United Work that the Turkish company Bonfilet was looking for workers. I got the job and worked for seven months the night shift from 21.00 tot 06.00 hour. After the government made night shifts illegal I started the day shift, also 9 hours.”

She would prefer to go to the Netherlands. “My husband went to Greece with smugglers. Now he lives in Apeldoorn. Due to all kinds of bureaucratic problems we cannot go to him”, Miryam says.

Her husband has a legal status as a refugee in the Netherlands. “We have one child together and he has two children from a later marriage. But on paper we registered them as our children, because the mother of the two youngest kids died”.

All this happened in Aleppo, Syria. Five years ago they all came to Turkey as refugees. “It was too dangerous because of the war”, she says.

Miryam cannot go tot he Netherlands for a family reunification. When the Dutch authorities checked her dna they discovered that the two youngest children were not hers.

Her job situation improved dramatically thanks to the services of United Work, but her private situation is still very complicated. “The two youngest children, a girl of 14 and a boy of 16, are not in school. They stay home. I have no time tob ring them or take them from school. I leave home at 7 and I return sometimes late at night at 11. In the evening I cook fort hem so that they have food fort he next couple of days. On Sundays I do shopping. The kids are a big responsibility and my greatest concern”.