Young Turks Making It in the USA

türkçe links to original Turkish article

(Haberler.com website, 5 January 2016)


Coincidentally, his first sergeant is named Bilkooğlu.

When Oğuzhan Durmuşoğlu finished high school he participated
in the U.S. 'green card' lottery and now he's serving as a corporal
in the U.S. Army even though he didn't know English when he joined
up.  Oğuzhan, from Yalova, went to the U.S. via his green card at age
18 without knowing any English but he signed up with the Army and
now he's a citizen.

Oğuzhan, now 24, was born in Çınarcık, Yalova, After winning the
lottery at 18 he went to the American Embassy in Ankara for an
interview and was accepted, despite the language barrier.  So he went
to New York with his mother and tried for two years to scratch out a
living, working in Times Square (!).


He's entered the ink world in a big way, too (mom and dad).

Oğuzhan wanted to go to university but the cost was too high. Instead
he joined the army, which opened up the road to citizenship for him.
First, he got three months of language training in the army, then
weapons training. Now he's a corporal and he documents his life of
"being a Turk in the U.S. Army" on Periscope each day, with hundreds
of followers.

He gets lots of questions from Turkey, including "why aren't you in
the Turkish army?" and "how can you serve in an army of a country
like America that splatters blood all over the world?" - to which he
replies matter-of-factly "I'll get a university education out of it."

Questions from Turkish women generally sound like this: "if I marry
you will I get U.S. citizenship right away?"


From Çınarcık, to Times Square, to the army barracks.

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türkçe links to original Turkish article

(Cumhuriyet Newspaper, 1 January 2016)


          Got a shaving kit for graduation.

İsmail Günaçar has graduated from the University of Cincinnati at the
age of  17, with a degree in biochemistry.  He and his family
had come to the U.S.from Turkey when he was very young.  About
his success, he says he's not special, just a harder worker than his peers.

"When I first started university at 12, I looked like a kid but by age
15 or 16 my classmates accepted me as one of their own.  I owe
everything to my dad. He took us to American when we were young.
He was a dentist in Turkey and works as one here, too."

"Generally, medical schools don't accept applicants under 22 so I'll
work in a masters program now and do research in biochemistry.
The people I've taken as examples are Aziz Sancar (recent Nobel
Prize winner from Turkey), Elon Musk and Oliver Sacks."


      Where the heck is Cincinnati?