Notes: Episode 14

This post includes some notes about Episode 14 and other information about the show in general, as well as Turkish culture and language.

NOTE: Episode 15 will come with delay due to new years holiday. Honestly, I couldn't even watch that episode yet, let alone starting translation. You will probably see it ready on Sunday/Monday. 


Letting you know so that you won't have to check the website for an update every single hour :)


And I wish you all a healthy, wealthy and happy new year!

ELİNE SAĞLIK - AFİYET OLSUN

"Eline sağlık" or "ellerine sağlık" is the basic phrase of expressing ones gratitude to food made by someone else and its literal meaning is "I wish your hand (that made this food) good health".  

"El" means "hand". And "eller" means "hands".  "-ler" is the affix that makes the word "el" plural.

And "afiyet olsun" has basically the same meaning as "bon appetite".

HOŞGELDİN - HOŞBULDUK

"Hoşgeldin" is the Turkish of bidding someone "welcome", which literally means "Nice that you've come".  

"Hoş" means "nice" or "well". "Geldin" means "you've come". 

"Hoşgeldiniz" is used in relatively formal contexts, or when there are more than one person is being welcomed.

"Hoşbulduk" is a persons standard response to "Hoşgeldin".

And this concludes our weekly Turkish lessons :) Since these phrases are used very often in every Turkish series, I thought it might be useful to explain what they meant.

MAŞALLAH and the EVIL EYE

This arabic word/phrase "Maşallah" is  used very often by us in our daily life in different circumstances, generally to praise something good or beautiful.

Since I don't know Arabic, I don't really know what it literally means in Arabic. But in Turkey we generally use this phrase when we want to mean "may God preserve (someone or something) from evil".

As in many other cultures, the "Evil Eye"  ("Nazar" in Turkish) is something commonly (and for some, superstitiously) believed in Turkey as well. To protect something we love from the "Evil Eye"; we even use the evil eye stones ("Nazar boncuğu").

The Evil Eye Stone (Nazar Boncuğu)

If it's our new house that we want to keep protected, we put one of these evil eyes at the door or place one on the door. Or if it's somebody beloved, we pin a very tiny evil eye stone on that persons clothing and we believe that way they'll be immune to the evil eye.

I won't tell you whether I believe this or not. But I can tell you that I had to carry one little evil eye stone inside  my school uniform, since primary school until the end of high school :)

You can look at many different types of evil eye stones in this address. 

Saying "Maşallah" is, like having an evil eye stone, a way of asking God for protection from Evil.

But sometimes (especially by Mukaddes in this TV show) maşallah is used more sarcastically. Like when she sees Kerim and Fatmagül chatting, she goes over to them saying "Maşallah, May God make you always chatty like this".

MUKHTAR'S OFFICE

I'm not sure if this "Mukhtar-ship(?)" organization has an equivalent in other countries. But in Turkey every village or neighbourhood has a Mukhtar selected by the people of that village or neighbourhood. They are not connected to any political party and they work for the people in the village or neighbourhood. For example when you move to another town or city in Turkey, first thing you generally do is to visit the Mukhtar's Office in the village or neighbourhood you'll be living, and register yourself and declare your residency in that place.

The residency papers that you'll get from Mukhtar's Office will be needed for  most of your bureaucratic processes, like applying a new job, or a school. 

In this episode Fatmagül and Ebe Nine had to get their residency papers from the Mukhtar's for Fatmagül to apply high school.

MUKADDES'S PUN

When Mukaddes is back in home Rahmi tells her that Ebe Nine and Fatmagül is out together, for Fatmagül to apply to finish high school from home.

Hearing this Mukaddes says something like "She'll see high schools when I hit her head really well."

In Turkish "baş vurmak" means both "to apply" and "to hit (someones) head", so in that sentences Mukaddes uses her wit to make a pun out of it.

Hope you enjoyed reading it. These were the things we picked to explain. Let us know if there were other things that we've missed. See you next time!





EDIT: I decided to add some of your questions and my answers as well, in this post. As more people may want to read those.


NE HABER - NE OLSUN

Megan asked: " hi, thanks for translating this series.
I wonder if someone could explain what "ne olsun" means. I'm thinking it means "what's up?" but I don't really know. I think "olsun" is used in a lot of phrases so I can't really figure out the meaning. I can't even figure out what part of speech it is (noun, adjective, adverb, verb, etc).
it was said between Enise and fatmagul towards the end of this part (14-1)."

Our answer:

"Ne olsun" doesn't mean "what's up" but is a response to it.

If a person says "ne haber", he or she wants to say "what's the news" or "what's up".

You can answer them, saying "ne olsun", which is actually another interrogative sentence but means "nothing is really going on", "not much" or "nothing bad".

I'm not an expert in this. But to me; both "ne haber?" and "ne olsun" are grammatically improper sentences and phrases in Turkish that have already sticked to our tongues, accepted by all of us and used often everyday.

"Ne haber" is kind of like the question "what news" in English without using "is" after "what".

"Ne" means "what". "Haber" means "news". Even so, you can even say "naber" instead of "ne haber" to ask someone "what is up".

In "ne olsun", the tricky and confusing part is probably "olsun". "Ol" here is the root of this word, which is a verb that means "to be". "-sun" is the suffix gives the verb an optative and/or imperative mood.

For example of imperative meaning: when the painter asks you "Which color you want your walls to be?", you can says "Kırmızı olsun" and this means "I want it to be Kırmızı(Red)". Here "olsun" means "(I) want (it) to be".

Or for example of its optative meaning: We say "Geçmiş Olsun" (to wish well when someone is sick) "Afiyet Olsun" (to wish good appetite when someone is eating) which I explained in the previous notes.

However, obviously "olsun" has a different (exceptional) meaning in "ne olsun" phrase. And makes it mean nothing imperative nor optative but just a common answer to "What's up?" in Turkish.

Sentence structure is already so different in Turkish than most of other languages. And phrases like "Ne olsun" and "Ne haber" improperly structured even in Turkish, makes them even more confusing to the learner I can imagine :)

WHO KNOWS THE REAL STORY? HOW COME POLICE AND THE HOSPITAL DON'T REVEAL THE TRUTH?

Christinahodeib and Dazedeshoo asked this questions.

And our answer was:

Right now the truth is known by only the Yaşarans, Fatmagül, Mukaddes, Rahmi and Kerim.

Mukaddes knew that after the rape incident, living in that town would be a nightmare for them all, and their dairy business would collapse as well.

Since she found Selim's engagement ring at the crime scene she saw that as an opportunity to make profit out of disaster and she went to Reşat Yaşaran to threaten him with speaking to police.

They made an aggreement. Yaşarans gladly accepted to give them money for their silence. Kerim had to accept to marry Fatmagül to save what remains of her life and future. He didn't do it for money.

Then Mukaddes and Rahmi took Fatmagül out from the hospital suddenly, claiming she was alright and staying in the hospital was no longer needed. At that point If I recall right, she wasn't fully examined by the doctors. And despite their suspicion regarding the incident might be rape of a group of people, nobody in the hospital knew that for certain. Then Fatmagül, forced and persuaded by Münir and Mukaddes, told the gendarmerie in her statement that it wasn't a rape and she had been with Kerim willingly. This made all the clouds of doubts disappear, and therefore the case was closed.

She had to lie to the gendarmerie, she had to say it wasn't rape. Because Münir and Mukaddes together made Fatmagül believe that if she said she was raped by those guys, she'd be showing Mustafa "targets" to kill and ruin his life and she didn't want that.That's why she had to sacrifice her own life, so that Mustafa wouldn't kill those rapists and spend the rest of his life in prison.


Not believing in that story, Ebe Nine went to Yaşarans' house to speak with Kerim. Although at first she thought that other rich kids raped the girl and put the blame on Kerim, when Kerim himself said that "he" was the one who did it alone... despite how hard it was to believe, now all Ebe Nine knows is that Kerim is the guilty one.

So yes, Ebe Nine doesn't know the true story either and all she knows is Kerim did it.

Fatmagül knows the story but she doesn't speak, because she still cares too much about Mustafa.

Mukaddes and Rahmi can't speak about that either, as they can't go back to their home towns anymore. They need to settle in Istanbul and build their new life, forgetting about past.

Kerim won't speak the truth, as he is guilty as well. And speaking the truth wouldn't help Fatmagül anyway.