Nightfall in a Romany Neighborhood
Nightfall in a Romany Neighborhood
The Romany neighborhood Ornekköy is experiencing the problems common to all poor neighborhoods in a more severe way. However, Ornekköy is slightly different, it is a cheerful neighborhood where people spend most of their time on the street.
The Ornekköy neighborhood of Cigli/Izmir hosts the Romany who are among the poorest section of society in the city. Just like all poor districts in metropolitan cities, Ornekköy is also a neighborhood consisting of migrants, the majority being the Romany migrating from the Balkans. Residents say that the neighborhood is as old as a half century.
Waste collection, package selling and corn selling are the main sources of living in the neighborhood where people leave to the fields in Menemen region as seasonal agricultural laborers. The neighborhood's interest in music is less than reputed and only several families are engaged in music.
Ornekköy is a Romany neighborhood but there are denominational differences among the residents. There are Sunni and Bektashi Romany and a Christian Romany family in the neighborhood where everybody knows each other and live without any sectarian problems during the daily life.
Besides a Bektashi Monastery, the neighborhood also has monasteries of Naqshbandi Tariqa and the Gulen movement.
It would not be wrong to say that there is an invisible discrimination in the neighborhood where people give utterance to these differences during discussions and debates, they tell.
The biggest problem of the neighborhood is drug addiction and dealing. Ortaköy has recently displaced Tepecik as the sales center of various substances, marijuana and drugs in particular. People in the neighborhood complain about the non-interference of the police in the situation.
While the elder people of the neighborhood know and speak their mother language, young people understand the language but cannot speak it. They mostly prefer to speak Turkish.
There are four Roman Associations in the neighborhood but it is difficult to say that these associations carry out works for the protection and development of the Romany identity. The most attention-grabbing is the Romany Fire Association which, to say with the most diplomatic words, "tries to present well-dancing Romany women to the magazine world". The association therefore drew some reactions.
In Ortaköy neighborhood, which we visited towards evening, Romany live together on the street. People come together there after work, they eat, drink and talk on the street which is also the settled playground of the children.
Remaining distant from the camera in the first instance, people smile at the objective after finding a mutual trust. Ortaköy has a different atmosphere where people are cheerful despite poverty and deprivation.
The housing estate rising around the neighborhood points to a doom because Ornekköy is included in the municipality and the government's demolition project called "urban transformation". When demolition comes to their agenda, they slightly say "We don't know what we would do".
Translation: Berna Ozgencil
The Ornekköy neighborhood of Cigli/Izmir hosts the Romany who are among the poorest section of society in the city. Just like all poor districts in metropolitan cities, Ornekköy is also a neighborhood consisting of migrants, the majority being the Romany migrating from the Balkans. Residents say that the neighborhood is as old as a half century.
Waste collection, package selling and corn selling are the main sources of living in the neighborhood where people leave to the fields in Menemen region as seasonal agricultural laborers. The neighborhood's interest in music is less than reputed and only several families are engaged in music.
Ornekköy is a Romany neighborhood but there are denominational differences among the residents. There are Sunni and Bektashi Romany and a Christian Romany family in the neighborhood where everybody knows each other and live without any sectarian problems during the daily life.
Besides a Bektashi Monastery, the neighborhood also has monasteries of Naqshbandi Tariqa and the Gulen movement.
It would not be wrong to say that there is an invisible discrimination in the neighborhood where people give utterance to these differences during discussions and debates, they tell.
The biggest problem of the neighborhood is drug addiction and dealing. Ortaköy has recently displaced Tepecik as the sales center of various substances, marijuana and drugs in particular. People in the neighborhood complain about the non-interference of the police in the situation.
While the elder people of the neighborhood know and speak their mother language, young people understand the language but cannot speak it. They mostly prefer to speak Turkish.
There are four Roman Associations in the neighborhood but it is difficult to say that these associations carry out works for the protection and development of the Romany identity. The most attention-grabbing is the Romany Fire Association which, to say with the most diplomatic words, "tries to present well-dancing Romany women to the magazine world". The association therefore drew some reactions.
In Ortaköy neighborhood, which we visited towards evening, Romany live together on the street. People come together there after work, they eat, drink and talk on the street which is also the settled playground of the children.
Remaining distant from the camera in the first instance, people smile at the objective after finding a mutual trust. Ortaköy has a different atmosphere where people are cheerful despite poverty and deprivation.
The housing estate rising around the neighborhood points to a doom because Ornekköy is included in the municipality and the government's demolition project called "urban transformation". When demolition comes to their agenda, they slightly say "We don't know what we would do".
Translation: Berna Ozgencil
