I arrived in Gaziantep early on the morning around 06:30 am.
Decided to take tea and something to eat. This time I had to make it to hotel
myself so there were two options, I take the taxi or use the local transport
system. Local transport system in most of the cities in the country is
comparable to any European standard but knowing which route to take and which
stop to use was a problem. Therefore I decided to ask the young guy serving
tea. When I asked him he explained to me the public transport system. I then
asked if I use taxi, his reply was ‘brother isn’t it pity that you pay 15 dollars
to taxi when you can go by bus in just 1 dollar’. This was the first lesson I
learnt in Gaziantep. However this guy in his good intention forgot that I don’t
know the city well and there is a worth of time (some times) exceeding the
costs.
I was not convinced so simply left for the doors on opposite
side of his café so that he doesn’t see me taking the taxi all against his
advice. From the other side I took the taxi for the hotel. The taxi driver
after formal introduction started telling me about economy. His deep analysis
was really astonishing like…’yes we are exporting a lot but most of raw
material we import’. He also talked about political situation. The lesson I
learnt was, it did not matter if you are taxi driver or a professor, it is all
about personal development based upon your very own preferences.
On second day of my visit to city I met Mr. Ozhan, an old
friend of mine. He is a regional business man but knowing the world better than
many analysts. We talked about the huge amounts of credit loans the city’s
municipality was planning to take or already taken. His reply was, this is a
good indicator for economy. I was surprised a lot so asked him for
clarification. He said, ‘look 10 years ago leave the municipality even the
central government was afraid of taking any internal or external loan. Now they
are taking bold steps and taking loans for heavy investments’. The reason he
put forward was the right type of management and leadership country or local
governments have got which made people confident to take risks and see an ability in them to pay back. Then when I asked why some of the European countries are
in trouble, his straight answer was, ‘the people over there do not work, I work
from 6:00 am till 20:00. I said but this much work is also not good. His reply
was another lesson never to forget. He said, ‘it is the system, not the people
who work. System makes people work. Why the USA is so strong? Because the
system over there makes every one work!’.