language.

‘Kolay gelsin’ is a phrase in Turkish that everyone you ask will give you a different translation. I’ve been told it means ‘good luck’, ‘power to the elbows’ and ‘may it come easy’. People say it entering a shop or to friends or acquaintances engaged in some form of work. As a tall, pale woman with a shaved head, using it in Istanbul often brought a confused smile to the face of the receiver. I was determined to use it on my trip in the Black Sea region, where I stood out as a foreigner even more starkly. A perfect moment presented itself to me at dusk, as I walked through the village of Demirkapı over the bridge of a fast running, almost glacial river. A middle aged man sat with his back to me on some rocks with a fishing line. I shouted ‘Kolay gelsin’ over the noise of the rapids as I walked past, he turned around to see my smirk and burst out laughing. I’ll never know if he was laughing at the irony of my comment or the sight of someone like me using it, but I felt proud that I had cracked my first joke in Turkish.