İSTANBUL - Cem Cemal, 23, who came to Istanbul from Uzbekistan due to economic problems, has been living on the street for 2 months after losing his job due to coronavirus outbreak.

 

Cem Cemal (23), an Uzbekistan citizen, came to İstanbul 5 years ago as a result of the economic difficulties his family had been through after the loss of his father.  Cemal, who started to work as an illicet worker, employed uninsured in restaurants and factories in the city because he did not have a residence permit, lost his job due to coronavirus pandemic. Having spent his last penny during the unemployment and become a homeless, Cemal has been living on streets with for two months.

For the weeks Cemal has been the friends of other homeless as they survive on the foods distributed by some NGO’s. When we realized him on the street, his rucksack took our attraction which he neves puts aside grom him. As he first shows us his rucksack and later on he goes on telling his story, we see that all the wealth he has got in this rucksack is a pair of picamas, a t-shirt, a radio, a pair of headphones and a napkin.

 

THE HARDEST PART IS TO BE EXCLUSIONED

 

Describing the difficulties of life on streets, Cemal, who goes through the many difficulties such as hunger, cold, not finding a place to meet his  toilet needs and self-hygene, says he is deeply offended by the exclusionary approaches of the people. Noting that most of the time thet do not have a dinner problem because some NGO’s supply dinner and that they often have problems in breakfast Cemal said that they usually have to ask people in the neighborhood for some money and some food in order to survive.

 

THE DREAM OF GOING BACK TO THE MOTHERLAND

 

Emphasizing his wish that he wants to go back to his motherlan Uzbekistan in case he finds a job and saves some money, Cemal told “I still can’t find a job. I had some money before the quarantine. The plane ticket to Uzbekistan costs around 600 TL. I have saved up to 2,200 TL, but as the quarantine began, the international flights was stopped. Therefore I could not leave. I applied to Uzbekistan Consulate, but they did not help me.” As Cemal explained his reason to come to İstanbul was the financial problems he faced in his county,  he was only able to clear his debt during the 5 years.

 

THE POOR HELPS MORE THAN THE RICH

 

Stating that he has witnessed so many things living on streets more than he has ever experienced up to now, Cemal told, “When we tell our situation some people help us, but some of them don’t. But what I see is that the poor helps us more than the rich. Other homeless people sometimes come and ask you ‘are you hungry?’ They also need food, but they share their food with you. When I ask the pass-byers if they can buy me some food some of them stay away, some of them scold.”

 

Cemal, who says he is nor able to find a job neither to ask money from his family that are already doing badly, still dreams of going back to his country after the finds a job and saves some money.

 

MA / İdris Sayılgan - Naci Kaya