Book review by Christine

Two girls
A book about two girls trying to find their luck in a destructive friendship

The book is about two very different girls in the age of 16, living in the big metropolis Istanbul. There are two main topics in this book. The first one is that the two girls are looking for their way to live and their search for luck in a city which has been through a time with a lot of developement but is still dominated by men.
The second topic is the deep and very intensive friendship between two girls in the puberty, which becomes by and by very distructive. Both topics are up to date and very interesting for youngsters, for turkish youngsters but also for teenagers from other countries. There are also cultural aspects which are up to date and where you cab find out something about the life in Istanbul.
The author, Perihan Magden, is very famous in Turkey but her books are also disputed in Turkey because she criticizes the turkish system in her books. She has also been indicted for her books because of her opinion against the Turkish system.

The book is about Behiye, a sixteen years old girl who lives with her parents and her brother in Istanbul. Behiye is in the puberty and she is very unhappy with her life. She does not want to be part of her family anymore. She is ashamed of her mother and also of her father becasue of their way of life and their unsureness and their unhappyness and she says that she really hates her brother who is very dominant and who wants to be the head of the family ang who would like to see Behiye in a subordinated position.
Handan lives togehther with her mother. Her father has left when Handan was a young girl and she hardly knows him. Her mother works as a fancy woman for rich men and she can not handle her money. She is also unable to provide for her daughter because she can not cook. What you can see is that there is a lot of love between Handan and her daughter but you allways ask yourself who the adult is.
The situation for Handan and Behiye changes when they meet each other. Behiye is fascinated from Handan because she seems to be very innocent and brakable. Handan loves Behiye because Behiye can do all the things, like cooking, which her mother can not do.
A very deep frienship begins. Behiye leaves her family and moves in with Handan and her mother. Handan’s mother does not agree with it in the begin but she sees how happy her daughter is, so she does not say anything against it.
In the begin both girls are very happy. The author describes the feelings and the relationship in detail and coulourful, espacially the feelings and thoughts from Behiye.
The situation changes when the feelings from Behiye for Handan become deeper and stronger. She becomes very jelous and wants Handan for herself.

When I began to read this book I thought I would read something about the traditional Turkish family system. When I read the text on the back of the book I got this idea but I found out that I still have prejudices about the way of  living in Turkey. There was a lot of development, especially in Istanbul in the last years. Istanbul is a very big city and because of its position, which is in the very West of Turkey, many things have changed there. The people in Istanbul have tried to accommodate to the values of the countries of the EU because they want to be a part of it. The role of the women has changed a lot but also other things. For example the role of the family.
You can also see that in the book. The two girls do not belong to the traditional big families which you think at when you think at Turkey. These families still exist in Turkey but in Istanbul it is less. Handan lives togehther with her mother. Her father has left the family when she was a child. Behiye lives together with her parents and her brother. Behiye’s father is a very cautious and insecure person. It doesn’t seem that he gives many limits to Behiye. Behiye’s brother is different. He is very dominant and he wants to see Behiye in a subordinated position.
Both girls went to school and both girls want to go to university too.
This shows that women in Istanbul have more possibilities and that they are more equal to men than in other parts of Turkey.
On the other hand the author describes that Istanbul is still dominated by men. The author describes that women are not regarded because of their knowlegde but because of their good look. The author describes this in situations when the girls talk with the director or when they are in the Taxi.

When I read the book I was sometimes a bit confused by the way of writing. The way the ersons talk to each other in the book is very strange for me. It seems to be very emotional and sometimes they talk about themself in the third person. I do not know if this is the way they really talk to each other and that it is a cultural difference to the way they talk here in Germany or Netherland or if it seems to be strange because it is translated into another language.
What I also was very confused about were some of the chapters. There were chapters in this book which were not about the two girls but about people who found dead male bodies. The cause of death was that the gorge was cut through.
There were three dead male bodies found. In the book was told that Behiye had buied a scalpel to protect Handan against alle the people who want to hurt her, espacially for men who look at Handan’s globes. It is not said that Behiye killed these men and it is not told who the dead men are.
I think that this is a weak point of the book. The reader does not get any information. You have to think about it who these men are and why they are killed.
A strong point of this book is the way the author describes the feelings and thougts of the characters, esacially Behiyes thougts and feelings. You can really feel with her without identifying with her. Sometimes you understand her and her feelings and at the other moment you think that she is really crazy. What I also think which a very strong point is that she does not play with prejudices but she describes it the way it is. For me it seems that she gives a good picture of the reality.

For me the book was interesting but sometimes a bit strange. The friendship between the two gilrs is not what I think a friendship is. I think that it is very destructive and too intensive. Sometimes I got the feeling that the girls were in love with each other. For me it was very difficult to identify with this story because I can not compare it to the friendships that I know from my culture.
On the other hand it was very interesting to find out how it is in aother cultures.
I think the book is worth to be read. It showas the situation of girls who try to find their way in a city or country which is dominated by men and the way they try to handle it.
In the end they did not find their luck but the relationship, esacially the dependency from Behiye destroyed her life nearly.
The book is a change of feelings. At one moment you can laugh with the characters because they are happy and they have fun together and then the situation changes and you feel sad or angry because of the acting of the characters.

 

Perihan Magden
Two girls- Istanbul story
Suhrkamp
324 pages
978-3-518-46005-4

Recension written by
Christine Schweitzer
31 may 2012

Evaluation week 5 by Josta

Well this week we went to Brussel. I though this was pretty awesome, especially the walk trough Brussel with the ex-homeless guy. He knew a lot and had a lot to talk about. Every meter we walked he stood still and talked for 10 minutes than again 1 meter and talking for 10 minutes. It was very impressing, because I never been so close to how homeless people are living. I definitely changed my way of thinking about homeless people. I also found it very cozy, just to learn the other people in the group a little better and eating and drinking together. This is probably the best excursion we had so far, also the best week we had so far.

Evaluation week 4 by Josta

To be honest I can’t remember much about this week, only that it was a very short week. My long weekend was very nice, I had time to do things for school, well I could have done, but i didn’t sadly enough.

I only attended the OT’S and they’re very much. We have to read and some one has to take and news item, the things we have to read we discuss, I think that’s a good thing to do, so it gets clearer.

 

 

Evaluation week 3 by Josta

We had an excursion to Hasselt, I thought it was very interesting to see the difference between Landgraaf and Hasselt.
Landgraaf was like the bigger thing they gave the stuff to smaller places and Hasselt was like a little store I though. People come there, there’s a little store where people can buy clothes, the most expensive thing was €2,-. They ask money for it so the people can say ‘I bought it myself’, that’s good for their self-confidence.

We also had a training by Chantal and Babet, I thought that one was very funny. It felt like high school all over again with the red cart and the silence. It was also very interesting because of the questions we had to answer first how we saw them and than how our child from our case saw them.

 

 

Article week 4 by Christine

The article is called ‘The status of rural women in Turkey: What is the role of regional differences?’. It is written by Ayse Gündüz-Hosgör and Jeroen Smit from the Radboud University Nijmegen.

The article is about the role of the women in Turkey. I wanted to find out if women have still anotzehr position than men in Turkey. The article describes that it depends on the fact where the women live.
There is a big different between the West and the East and between women living in towns and women living in the countryside.

In the east there wasn’t such a progress than in the West of Turkey. Many women in the east, espacially in the countryside are bad educated and many of them do not speak the official language, turkish. Many women have more than five children and they are not mobil. They also think that men are on a higher level than women and that women shouldn’t make important decissions.

In the Wast it is different. There are more women who go to school and who have another idea of the role of the women in their country.

The article says that it depends on the geographic factor, education, poverty and the traditional relationship with the family that many women in Turkey do not think that they are equal to the men in Turkey.

For my case that means that it will be very difficult for the family to live in Istanbul. Istanbul belongs to the ‘modern’ West of Turkey and the women their have another idea of the roles of men and women. They feel more equal to the men than in the eastern countryside where the family comes from.

http://www.ru.nl/nice/workingpapers

 

Article week 4

The article I chose for week 4 is about the link between human rights and poverty in Nepal. According to the author a big part of the solution for poverty is making human rights central to policy making. The solution comes through human-centered development. Each five-year plan has shown an increase in development expenditure, largely financed by foreign aid, yet there have been no obvious improvements in the standard of living. Human rights in the struggle against poverty would be based on participation, accountability and transparency, instead of investing in a small part of development.

Basnet, G. (2012). Human Rights, Poverty & Nepal. Source: http://www.nepalnews.com/home/index.php/guest-column/17583-human-rights-poverty-a-nepal.html

Reflection week 4

Week 4 was a very short week for me since I couldn’t attend the first OT because of an appointment and missed the second one because I didn’t know there was an OT on Friday because of some roster confusion between the module book, infonet and people. What I did attend was the lecture about the European Union, afterwards I did wonder why though. The information was very basic and pretty much all known. The lecturer didn’t seem to know a whole lot about what she was talking about or didn’t prepare very well, all the information given could have been found on the website and she wasn’t familiar with some terms in her own PowerPoint presentation. I was mostly looking forward to the link between social work and Europe because I have acquired very little information about this subject in European Studies. Sadly, the information given on this topic was: “There pretty much isn’t any social policy on European level.”. This did confirm my previous thoughts but didn’t really taught me anything. Further, I did some reading in my book for the book report and hope to make it through the book before the deadline.

Women and the State in Modern Indonesia

Article 4, by Kim.

This book describes almost everything about modernday women living in Indonesia.
It describes about motherhood, education, early marriage, citezenship and a lot more things which are connected to my case. I haven’t read all the pages of the book, but I do believe that this link is very useful for me.
It is very hard to find stuff about modernday Indonesia, most of the articles I found are from the ’90’s.

Blackurn, S. (2004). Women and the State in Modern Indonesia. Cambridge: University Press

http://books.google.nl/books?hl=nl&lr=&id=dRrQ2HDxTHgC&oi=fnd&pg=PP1&dq=young+women+in+indonesia&ots=tWD_mEun5P&sig=L2pJxnzPKji3WwsR_Y4-CTQeIaA#v=onepage&q=young%20women%20in%20indonesia&f=false

First reflection by Kim

My 2 learning goals were:
1) At the end of the minor I want to be able to know the differences and similarities between Social Work in the Netherlands and International Social Work.
2) I want to know as much as possible, via the help of this minor, about the Indonesian culture before I start my internship in Indonesia.

I think I forgot a bit about my first learning goal. I know some differences and similarities know, but that’s because we had to read some articles about it. I didn’t try to find some articles about it on my own. I think, when it comes to this learning goal, I’m still to dependend on the teachers who share their information with me. So for the next couple of weeks I’ll try to find some information on my own, hoping that’ll broaden my knowledge about the differences and similarities between Social Work in the Netherlands and International Social Work.

I did work on my second learning goal though, but I don’t think it’s possible to neglect that one, because for our assignments I have to research the Indonesian culture. I know a lot more about it before I started this minor and I’m still learning more and more about Indonesia. I tend to work more on that learning goal, because I’m going to Indonesia for my internship and than I have to know as much as possible about the Indonesian culture. And even when it’s not for school I’m searching for information about Indonesia. So for the next couple of weeks I’ll continue my way of working on this learning goal.

Week 4 by Kim

The only things we had this week were 2 group gatherings and one guest lecture.
The 2 group gatherings were very helpful. We talked about researching 2 different countries; how would you research 2 different countries, what do you need and what do you have to keep in mind. Somethings came up, like being aware that a problemdefenition can mean something entirely different in the Netherlands, than for example, in Indonesia. It made me aware that I have to search deeper and more out of the box when I want to look into the Indonesian culture.

The second group gathering was about all the information you’ve gathered so far about your country and you had to put this in a mindmap. I had toshare my information with the rest of the group and they had to comment on this or had to gave me tips and advise. Some advise was really helpful and I’m glad I shared my information with the group. I realised that I’m on a good way, but, again, that I need to search deeper.

We also had a guest lecture about the Europian Union, as a preparation for our trip to the Committee of Regions in Brussels on tuesday. The lecture was very basic. Some of the things the woman told us about I already knew and some of the things she said I didn’t know. I was kind of interesting, but also kind of boring. She didn’t use a lot of examples, which for me help a lot when I want to remember information. So I didn’t remember a lot of it, but before we’re going to Brussels I’ll look it up on the website of the Europian Unions.

So apart from the lecture, it was again an interesting week for me.