I was born on the 14th day of August in 1959, on the outskirts of the cloudy mountain of Karadag, located in the mid-Taurus Mountains, rising on the border between Konya and Karaman. I am the mother of two sons. As the eldest daughter of the house, I would herd goats and kids while also taking care of my younger siblings. Being the daughter of a deep-rooted family also meant that I had heavy responsibilities. My grandfather, Kerim Savran (Savranlar) was the head of a large family that loved having guests.
We managed to trace our family tree back as far as 300 years ago and we are still adding to it. You may find my speaking language a little odd. I had limited access to formal education. However, I adopt and use only Turkish when I speak, no matter how strange I may sound. Our rule is: “Every Turk is a nomad (Yörük); every nomad is a Turk” and Turkish is the language spoken in this country.
Anyway, let us go back in time a little: Pervin was someone who did not speak much; she used to spend her day working. She was a nomad woman doing all the work - making bread, washing the clothes, cooking - without complaining as she thought these were duties to be fulfilled. My grandfather and father worked hard to keep this culture alive. My uncle, Ahmet Savran, who passed away in September 2011, made efforts to ensure the continuation of this culture. Uncle Ahmet supported me all his life, he was a role model, he never surrendered to exploitation and he never let us surrender. “This head has never been and never will be bent down”; those were his words which have shed light on my path and which I have adopted as a bequest in my life. These words have become a principle for me and for those who will come after me.
With the establishing of the “Social Assistance and Solidarity Association of Sarikecililer” in the Aydincik district of Mersin my responsibilities increased. You may call it a rumor, defamation or a claim; but they tried to make everyone believe that goats harm the forests and kill the green areas. The ban on grazing goats in the forests and the penalties related to that became so harsh that the Sarikecilis began to find themselves facing a different type of assimilation. Something had to be done by us. The slogan “Nomads set up their caravans on the road” was adopted as a principle to initiate our “caravan march” campaign. We started to read and write about it. By the way, I managed to complete compulsory education thanks to the efforts of my family, but my nomad relatives did not have that chance. They were absorbing whatever information they could; men during their military service and women from people around them in the tents. I started to explain that the goats, which are a large part of our culture, do not cause any harm to the forest. Investigations targeting me followed one after another because what I took action, to survive, to save our culture.
You may wonder who the Sarikecilis are: Sarikecilis are a glorious clan of the Oghuzes, who live in tents woven with goat hair, who herd and live with goats, who do not have a regular place to live either in the summer nor in the winter, who spend winter months around Mersin and the summers around the mid-Taurus Mountains, who love their mountains, forests, rivers, who protect their habitats, who love their country, and who have been maintaining a culture they brought from Central Asia to Anatolia one thousand years ago. Throughout years of nomadic life, many of our relatives have settled or have been forced to adopt sedentary life in different parts of our country. All in all, a few thousand of us are left. Some of us, though less and less in number now, move from one place to another on camels, the rest moves with tractors and trucks.
We do not stay in one place for too long so as not to damage the nature. In fact, what we do is similar to what honey bees do, it is biologically efficient. However, those who consider themselves intellectuals have been trying hard to destroy our migratory routes in recent years and, in a mood of unawareness, they have destroyed the common living areas. For instance, the historical Görmeli Bridge in the district of Karaman used to be on our migratory road. It is now under water due to the dam. How are we supposed to cross the tunnels that were built to replace the bridge with our camels? Our goats and camels became the silent witnesses to this massacre of nature. I have many things to revolt against: forests destroyed to make golf resorts, intact coasts given away to tourism investments, hydro-power plants that kill nature just to get 3 kilowatts of energy, the culture we lose. The people of Cavus village were evacuated because of a dam. Their culture, hopes and memories are written in water. Which dam could bring back an eight hundred year old historical bridge and our memories scraped on its bricks? There is no end to what I can tell you, neither to my revolt, but go and see the Taurus mountains; our revolt is written there.