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Online Turkish Language Learning Tips, Tipoffs, Tricks, Traps, Techniques, Curiosities, and Oddities... Related Pages: Other 'Tips' pages Profiles of the Turkish People The Turkish Kinsey Report Gossipy Turkish Who's Who The Lying Eyes Club of Turkey Turkish Culture -- Two Turkish traditions we especially like Turkish Culture -- 4 things you shouldn't do in Turkey Turkish Culture -- 5 things you should do in Turkey Turkish Superstitions Turkish Circumcision Ceremonies Circumcision and what many Turks believe about Westerners Also: Whole Earth Catalog of Turkish Movies Newsreaders Encyclopedic Dictionary, Index Mature Foreign British Bride in Turkey Mature Foreign Swedish Bride in Turkey The wrong and, the right ands We don't know about you, but early in our Turkish-language learning-experience, we got hooked on using the Turkish 've' to mean the English 'and' -- at almost every opportunity. Oh, yes...we do remember, vaguely, something in our text-books about the '-ıp' suffix and the stand-alone 'da' -- but why should we worry about them when 've' was available, and so easy for us to understand and use? Well, here's what one of our favorite Turkish-language advisors, Deniz Sarıöz, has to say on the subject: "Something I am really anal about is the pathological overuse of the word 've' in Turkish, which is considered a substitute for the English word 'and' -- due to the frequency of non-Turkish movies on TV with very very bad translations. More often than not, 'and' would translate better to Turkish as 'da' or 'de' or as '-ıp, -ip, -up, -üp' -- according to the rule of vowel harmony. For instance, in the example, 'Mektubu aç ve okuyalım.' (Open the letter and let's read it)... it would be so much more natural to replace the 've' in the sentence with 'da'." What Deniz (a native Türk) must mean is that it's so much more natural for native Türks to do that! (He hasn't thought about us poor non-natives -- who don't find much that's natural about the Turkish language at all.) But nevvvermind, his point is well taken. Because, we sure hear 'da' and 'ıp' (and 'ile', by the way) here in the Turkish streets (and in Turkish radio and television programming) a lot more than we hear 've'. So if you too would like a simple and effective way to sound better in Turkish, then cast out the unnatural-sounding 've' (wherever you can) -- in favor of the native-sounding 'da', 'ıp', and 'ile'... Note: All of the 've' variations adhere strictly to the rule of vowel harmony as shown: 1) da, de 2) -ıp, -ip, -up, -üp 3) ile, -la, -le Remember, though, that 'ile', '-la', and '-le' are also commonly used as prepositions (postpositions) meaning 'with' or 'by'. So we need to be careful not to confuse 'ile', the conjunction, with 'ile', the preposition, as we translate... -- see examples three thru seven, below -- Examples: 1) Bütün o problemleri unut da zevkine bak. To translation 2) Her seferinde aynı şey, suçu kendi işler, kolayca kardeşinin üstüne yıkıp zeytinyağı gibi üste çıkardı. To translation 3) Doğu ile (or Doğuyla) Batı arasında uzlaşma var. (There is rapprochement between East and West.) 4) İzmir'e uçak ile gidiyorum. (I'm going to Izmir by plane.) 5) İzmir'e uçakla gidiyorum. (I'm going to Izmir by plane.) 6) İzmir'e otobüs ile gidiyorum. (I'm going to Izmir by bus.) 7) İzmir'e otobüsle gidiyorum. (I'm going to Izmir by bus.) Out-loud Word Spelling in Turkish When you want to get rid of that pesky IRS agent who keeps calling at your door, how do you do it? Well, if you're like us, you crank up the voice a notch and shout, S as in Scaramouche, C as in Concertina, R as in Rhubarb, A as in Albatross, and M as in Mayonnaise... S-C-R-A-M! But if you're Turkish, you have to know your Turkish city names or else you'll be in, Trabzon'un Te'si, Rize'nin Re'si, Ordu'nun O'su, Urfa'nın U'su, Bursa'nın Be'si, Lüleburgaz'ın Le'si, Edirne'nin E'si... T-R-O-U-B-L-E! So if you need to, say, spell your foreign-sounding surname to a Turkish-speaking someone, over the phone... you'll be better understood if you can imitate this method (as best you can) -- if not with Turkish city names, then with any Turkish words that come to mind! Well-known Language School(s) in Turkey Want to combine your next vacation with some 'Total Immersion' Turkish Language practice? If so, we've got the in-country school for you... Well-known in İstanbul -- click here for an Adobe PDF document or a JPG image. More 'Istanbul Educational News'... It was in March 2000, in the English-language Turkish Daily News -- that we first read of the International House language training school. (You may read more about its current status in the abovementioned PDF/JPG document files.) Back in 2000, the IH advert specifically said, "looking for EFL teachers, part or full time." It went on to say... "Degree and CELTA essential. Please contact Doris Leach or Sandra Wilding. Phone (90) 212-282-9064 [or 9065] Fax (90) 212-282-3218." The school now has an E-mail address (info@ihturkey.com) and new contact person (Natalya Zaporozhets) -- and a website (www.ihturkey.com) that lists most course prices and schedules. Note above that the (90) is Turkey's country code and (212) is an Istanbul area code... Well-known in Izmir/Ankara See below. Tömer Language School www.tomer.ankara.edu.tr webadmin@tomer.ankara.edu.tr Student Schedule and Pricing Information thru December 2003 -- for courses taught in Ankara, Antalya, Alanya, Istanbul, Bursa, Izmir, and Samsun. Choose one of the following links to download a 2-page information brochure in Adobe 'PDF' format. General Tömer contact info: Istanbul: (90) (212) 230-7083 Ankara Voice: (90) (312) 426-2047, 434-3090 Ankara FAX: (90) (312) 435-9786, 435-8397 Izmir Voice: (90) (232) 464-0544 Izmir FAX: (90) (232) 464-0548 Izmir E-mail: tomeri@kablonet.com.tr Antalya: (90) (242) 312-5013 Bursa: (90) (224) 250-7297 Trabzon: (90) (462) 326-0380 If you call Long Distance: Turkish phone numbers work just like American ones: Country code for Turkey is 90. The area code is 212 for Istanbul, for example... and the rest, 230-7083, is the local Istanbul number. In fall/winter/spring classes run 2 months -- that's the 'standard program'. Condensed 4-week classes are held in spring/summer/fall. All student applications must be made through the Tömer Central Branch in Ankara. See 'Adobe Acrobat .PDF' file (above) for course schedules and pricing details. Warning... The Tömer classes aren't for everyone. One LPT site visitor commented: "I have taken an intensive 4-week with Tomer in Istanbul, and will never do it again; I learned a lot, but the teaching style was a bit... well, mean, actually. All of the English speakers opted out of the second 4-week phase because it was so brutal in style -- but for some reason the (un-named country) contingent thrived in that atmosphere!" Another Izmir/Istanbul/Ankara lead -- not as good as Tömer... "The English Fast International Language School" [They also take on students learning Turkish.] Course Schedule and Pricing is up to you... [They also have a branch office in Izmir -- just across from the Izmir Bay. Please contact us if you're interested in their office phone number.] How Turks Learn English Pronunciation Phonetics 101 Note: The following tidbit was published in the Turkish daily Newspaper Sabah. It's author had his tongue firmly planted in his cheekle cavity. We translate and paraphrase... Remembering how to pronounce "Fish" in English When he looks at the spelling of the English word 'fish' a Turk's instinct is to pronounce the word as "feee-sh". To help himself remember the correct pronunciation, he must memorize the character sequence 'ghoti'. After that, he simply needs to remember to pronounce the 'gh' as in the English word 'tough', the 'o' as in the English word 'women', the 'ti' as in the English word 'nation' -- and there you have it. F - I - SH... Thanks to H. Uluç 1997 Phonetics 102 These next two come from a Turkish friend -- who swears he used them as crutches when he first started learning English. Do we believe him? Well, we haven't made up our minds yet. Anyway he says... As an English language pronunciation exercise, I used to repeat two phrases to myself over and over. The first one was, "I run each team". And the second was, "Why high, one why?". But to help me pronounce the phrases correctly, I'd say the Turkish phrases "Ayran içtim" and "Vay hayvan vay?" -- which gave me a close approximation of the sounds I wanted, though the syllable accenting wasn't very good. The first Turkish phrase means, "I drank Ayran" -- Ayran being a national drink of ours made from yogurt. The second one means, "Oh! animal oh!". And I'm not kidding, these phrases got me going -- taking my first baby steps in English! Courtesy YS, May 1997 Bad Sign Language A OK is not ok Don't use this hand signal in Turkey... (or anywhere in Europe, for that matter) If you're American, it's probably safest to leave all your tried and true American hand-signals at home...Most of them don't translate well on this side of the Atlantic. If you can't figure out why, write us. We'll tell ya' a story... And don't prop your feet up and point your soles at the Turkish person you are talking to. No one is likely to say anything to you, but they'll mark you down as a bad mannered boob. One other thing...Don't praise children to their parents -- unless you remember to say maşallah (mah-sha-lah), before and after you do your gushing. It wards off the evil spirits who may be listening -- and that Turks don't like to tempt... Click here for an example of maşallah used in a Turkish idiom. And, here for an example of maşallah in a site-visitor's Personal Experience. There are a few more such behavioral recommendations. Do drop us a line, if you're interested... Sluurrring in Turkish Whatchagonnadonexsadurdeeforlunch...? That's right...We English speakers don't have a corner on the slurred speech market... For example, in proper Turkish you would hear... Bir çay içeyim, geliyorum; I am coming [to visit]; so that I may drink a glass of tea [with you]. But in slurred Turkish speed-speech, this becomes... Bi çay içem geliyom. This is very colloquial (just like in English), but it is heard/seen frequently in everyday speech -- and also in the dialogs of novels and stories. Based on an idea from TÇ -- May 1997 Click following to see an ilustrated example of Off-color Turkish slurring but be warned -- the language is very explicit! How to Type the Turkish Character Set without a Turkish keyboard, using Windows 95/98/ME/NT and so on... So, you say... that you downloaded and installed the free Turkish fonts from the Freeware and Shareware page -- but you don't know how to type them in your Windows word processor... Here's an easy (albeit somewhat cumbersome) way to do it. But, first -- you have to make sure that your keyboard Num Lock is 'On'. If it's already 'On', that's fine. No worry. Move on... If it's not 'On' yet, go ahead and depress the Num Lock key. After that, bring up your Word Processor program and, from the font menu, select one of your new Turkish fonts --the ones you've already installed, remember. We did include the instructions for installing them, for both Win 3.1 and Win 95/98 -- Zipped together inside the Freeware Turkish -- English TrueType Fonts file. Then -- while holding down the Alt key, type any of the number sequences in the following chart... and finally let go of the Alt key. Now...Try it yourself. Turkish Typing Tip -- the Alt Key Method â = Alt 0226 (some say this character is on the way out) ç = Alt 0231 (this works even without a Turkish font operating) Ç = Alt 0199 (this works even without a Turkish font operating) c = Alt 099 (for completeness) C = Alt 067 (for completeness) ğ = Alt 0240 (yumuşak g) Ğ = Alt 0208 (yumuşak G) ı = Alt 0253 (dotless lower i) İ = Alt 0221 (dotted upper I) i = Alt 0105 (dotted lower i, for completeness) I = Alt 073 (dotless upper I, for completeness) ö = Alt 0246 (this works even without a Turkish font operating) Ö = Alt 0214 (this works even without a Turkish font operating) o = Alt 0111 (umlaut-less lower o, for completeness) O = Alt 079 (umlaut-less upper O, for completeness) ş = Alt 0254 Ş = Alt 0222 s = Alt 0115 (lower s, for completeness) S = Alt 083 (upper S, for completeness) ü = Alt 0252 (this works even without a Turkish font operating) Ü = Alt 0220 (this works even without a Turkish font operating) u = Alt 0117 (lower u, for completeness) U = Alt 085 (upper U, for completeness) û = Alt 0251 (seen in proper names) By the way, in most versions of Windows, there's also a way to make your keyboard switchable -- between Turkish and English keyboard formats -- so you can avoid the Alt key method above, if you want to. And once it's done, you can switch back and forth simply -- by depressing, holding, and then releasing, the Alt and Shift keys. So, for example, once you switch to the Turkish keyboard, it only takes one key depression per Turkish character -- just like on the counterpart English keyboard... But to enable keyboard-switching, you'll need to install the Windows 95/98/ME Multi-language support feature which is found on the original Win 95/98/ME CD -- or on our "Downloads" page. If you don't know the necessary steps to do the installation, drop us a line... BTW, on that same Downloads page, you'll also find a nifty Turkish Keyboard Diagram -- and, even, a Turkish-keyboard typing-tutor program! Related Pages: Other 'Tips' pages Profiles of the Turkish People The Turkish Kinsey Report Gossipy Turkish Who's Who The Lying Eyes Club of Turkey Turkish Culture -- Two Turkish traditions we especially like Turkish Culture -- 4 things you shouldn't do in Turkey Turkish Culture -- 5 things you should do in Turkey Turkish Superstitions Circumcision and what many Turks believe about Westerners Also: Whole Earth Catalog of Turkish Movies Turkish National Election, 2007 Newsreaders Encyclopedic Dictionary, Index Mature Foreign British Bride in Turkey Mature Foreign Swedish Bride in Turkey Language-Learning Related Pages: Translating Turkish, the basics Essential Turkish Vocabulary Turkish Verbs Essential Idioms, Index Essential Suffixes, Index Sentence Structure, Standard Turkish Pronunciation Turkish Accenting Numbers in Turkish Other Turkish Difficulties Unrelated fun: Habibullah and the Great Cannon Caper A simple Turkish 'thing'... Turkish Belly Dancers Sneeeezing in Turkish Turkish Terms Of Endearment Turkish Personal Names Politically Incorrect Turkish Humor Off-Color Turkish Turkish Conventional and 'Erotik' Movies, Index The World's Worst Sport Novelty Turkish Wedding Invitations

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