When I think about my childhood, reading and writing were the only things that made me understand and love the world. In my poverty-stricken life, computers or TVs did not exist. I did not have parents who would read me bedtime stories. They were more worried about putting food on the table, and they truly worked very hard for it. I can understand the struggle that they went through now, but back then, it was all blurry. My mum and dad couldn’t read or write, but Dad loved books. Every night when he came home from work, he would ask me to read to him. Sometimes I read him a book that I had got from a neighbour, and sometimes a newspaper that they had wrapped the shopping in. I even read him the adverts in the newspaper. It didn’t matter what I read—he just loved listening to my aloud reading.
He was a street seller; he would push a very heavy cart every morning and evening to the centre of the city. In the summertime, he would sell lemonade, and in the wintertime, a milky drink called salep; autumn was dessert time, and spring, meatballs in bread. I always wondered where he got the energy to listen to me every evening after such a hard day. He never complained, though. I know that if he could have afforded to, he would have bought me many books, but money was something that we never had.
We had one bedroom, which was a living room during the daytime and a bedroom for six people at night. The bathroom was a large plastic bowl in one corner of the room that appeared only at weekends, and the kitchen was a small camping cooker in another corner. There were no places that I could hide and dream, except for the books. They did not take up much space—I could just keep one under my pillow and enter the world of adventure whenever I wanted.
When I was in middle school, my two best friends gifted me a book each: Heidi by Johanna Spyri and A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I don’t know how many times I’ve read these two books over the years. Each time, it felt as if I was on a different journey. Through them, I travelled to lands that I didn’t even know existed. I thought London was just a made-up place, so I dreamed of the loft room where little Sara Crewe stayed. I felt her pain when the school owners were so cruel to her and her joy when her father’s friend finally found her. It was the same with Heidi—I felt the breeze of the Alps on my face and found comfort in Heidi’s kindness to everyone.
These books didn’t just allow me to learn about different places and people’s lives—they helped me develop the most important skill for a better world: empathy. It doesn’t matter which job you do—a teacher, a doctor, a shopkeeper, or an academic—you need to have the ability to understand what people are going through and visualise how your actions would impact them. It is only through empathy that we can reflect on our actions and become more considerate towards others. Otherwise, we end up being tormented by cruel bullies. And believe me, they don’t just disappear after school—you find them at work, too. For me, books were my teachers, teaching me the most important skills that I still use to shape my life.
It is natural that after reading so many books, I was able to write my own stories from a very young age. I won many story and poetry competitions in primary and secondary school. My ability to play with words to express my mind was so advanced, my teacher questioned whether it was my parents who were writing my stories. When I told him that they couldn’t read or write, he said nothing and looked at me with a beautiful, warm smile. After this, he spent more time with me, helping me with my writing skills.
I believe that my experiments in dealing with different situations in stories helped me become a better problem-solver. I learned to visualise solutions to many problems—it could be a simple game design issue or finding the best route when I travel. I taught myself many things and learned very quickly too. I learned to play the piano in a couple of weeks and managed to reach Grade 5 within months. I taught myself how to design websites using HTML when I was pregnant and then earned my living from designing websites for many years. So, from reading for pleasure to learning for pleasure, I developed a love for learning—learning anything…
Now, almost twenty years after I came to England, I’ve set a challenge for myself. I know I can write academic papers, but the question is: can I write stories in English? After all, it is not my native language, and experimenting with words in English is a lot harder. This is how I decided to have a go and share my stories. I hope to publish the first one in the spring of 2019.
Let’s see if I can help a child learn skills such as empathy to make our world a better place for everyone. Let’s see if I can help someone else develop a love for reading and learning, so that they will be empowered to shape their future.
As always, thank you for reading!
Yasemin