Throwback : When a lady in Starbucks asks you to take off your hijab
My school had a winter session anthropology class in Salonica, I was having good time with great company and enjoying the strange familiarity in a city I immediately stand out.
As I was on my computer trying to finish up my homework and sipping my coffee at Starbucks, a lady staring at me started to talk to me in Anatolian dialect and we had a conversation in Turkish:
Lady: Are you Turkish?
Me: Yes, I am Turkish, are you Turkish too?
Lady: No, kale, I am Rum (ethnically Greek people in Turkey).
Me: Where did you learn Turkish?
Lady: I learned it from my father and grandfather.
Me: Oh, are they from Turkey?
Lady: Yes, they came here when Izmir was burnt down.
Me: Oh, were they from Izmir?
Lady: No, they were from Konya. What do you do here? Do you study here?
Lady: You are very young. How old are you?
Me: I am twenty years old.
Lady: (Pointing at my scarf) You look old because of this. When young people wear that they look old. Their fathers and brothers force them… Your father forced you right?
Me: No, not at all.
Lady: Don’t tell me, I know how it works. When I was young, my brother forced me to cover up. He beat me up a lot. “Don’t wear this, don’t do that, don’t die your hair”. Since they were from Turkey, they took their culture and imposed it on us. Because of them, I am single. But now, his daughters, oooh. They wear mini skirts, they do whatever they want. I am telling you, you should take it off. People who come to here from the city, they don’t wear this. They are very modern. People who came from countryside, they wear this.
The important thing is good heartedness. My grandmother was a religious woman, she told us, you should cover her skin, and the hair is not a problem. There was a priest a while ago who raped a 13 year old for ten years. When she said she is going to get engaged, he said he would kill her and he killed her. The important thing is good heartedness. Why are there women who don’t wear “this”, aren’t they muslims?
Me : (Finally given the chance of answering) Yes, of course they are Muslims.
Lady: See. I know Erdogan ( the prime minister of Turkey) forces women to wear this.
I was laughing.
Lady: Don’t laugh, I know well. I can read Turkish, I read newspapers. Take the scarf off. You look very modern except your scarf. You wear pants. We don’t wear pants when we go to Church, but I wear them in winter. What is your name?
Me: Nur.
Lady: My grandmother used to say “ like nur” (nur gibi) . It means light right?
Me: Yes. What is your name?
Lady: My name is Zoi.
Me: It means life right?
Lady: Yeah, bravo you know it. I never came to Turkey.
Me: You should come , it is really beautiful in Istanbul.
Lady: I know they tell me so. My brother lives in Rodos, he went to Istanbul many times. I was going to go with my sister, but she died in a traffic accident. Then she started crying. They, my brother and my father, beat her up too. Take it off (pointing to my hijab) .
I smiled.
Lady: Do you have brothers?
Me: Yes, two. But they are younger than me.
Lady: Why do you wear it ?
Me: Because, I want it.
Lady: Come on…
She then pat me on the shoulder and repeatedly told me to take it off. Finally, I got away with her when I told her that I was going to restroom and then she said goodbye and left.
Despite her intrusiveness and Islamaphobic comments, we had an unexpectedly smooth conversation. I was 20 year old at the time, but my life experience had taught me that it is very hard to change people’s minds with one conversation, especially old people’s. I could have told her to leave me alone when she questioned my motives to wear hijab or I could just leave. But I didnt, because I chose not to self-victimize myself . I was someone who knows why am I doing what am I doing and I was talking to this old woman who was my grandma's age and from what she told me she had a very traumatizing life. I wasn’t oppressed by my family but it sounded like she was heavily oppressed. I had the opportunity to study and visit so many different cultures. Last but not least, I am a Muslim who is supposed to hate the evil characteristics not the people, because people can change.
The fact that she blamed her Orthodox Greek father's and brother's abusive treatments on my religion and culture upset me, however given the anti-Turkish nationalist propaganda in Greece, involving strong anti-Muslim elements unavoidably , one cannot approve of but can easily see how she associates her suffering with her Rumness. On top of that, she was probably not exposed to a positive narrative since not a lot of Turkish people live in Salonica. She is not responsible alone for holding this archaic perception of modernity, and it is not her fault to live in a mono-cultural nation state. I am a strong believer of one hates that which one does not know.
People might think, I empathize too much with the woman. Her attitude to me was not in any way justifiable and people's offensive actions cant be all attributed to their environment however trying to see beyond victim and hater dichotomy is empowering. I managed to keep calm against someone who was listing the most ridiculous arguments about my religion and I turned a micro-aggression into a learning experience. This is a unique situation, and I am not encouraging people to have a dialogue with an offensive person . However, I believe the key is to exercise hikmah (judgement) accordingly. I think this might save us , people who experience these sort of micro-agressions, time and energy to fight against the unjust systems and institutions rather than individuals who are victims of their own society.
