Pickles And Politics In Turkey

Many foreigners don't know that one of the things that a Turkish kitchen can't do without is pickles. There are many different flavors of pickles served in a Turkish kitchen.
Making pickles is one of the traditions in Turkish culture that not only has an impact in kitchens here but also shows how politics is done in the country.
There are many similarities between making pickles and conducting politics in Turkey. For instance, both pickles and politics have implications on the conservative nature of Turkish society. Making pickles is not due to the desire to have a different flavor in the kitchen, but is a must in order to preserve a variety of vegetables to prevent them from spoiling. Politics are conducted in the same manner. It is not done to serve the people but to preserve benefits for the sake of politicians and their supporters in Turkey. In other word, politics is a way of making sure that the interests and positions of the leaders, bureaucrats and businessmen who are associated with the party in power are protected.
Making pickles gives Turks the confidence to put their problems -- perishable vegetables -- into jars to get rid of them in the short term. Many women in Turkish homes make pickles not because they plan to make them but because they realize that unwanted and unused vegetables are about to perish. When a Turkish woman has too many pickles in her house, she gives them away to her neighbors and gets the benefit of receiving gratitude from her neighbors.
Politics in Turkey works in the same manner. Politicians are experts of putting problems into jars to get rid of them in the short term. Instead of tackling the problems and solving them, politicians prefer to push them from one corner to another. Most importantly, just like Turkish women, Turkish politicians also have a tendency of thinking that putting problems into jars and nicely placing them in a corner of the house is a solution to the problem.
From the Cyprus problem and Armenian issue to corruption and authoritarianism, there are many examples that can fit into this category. The most recent example of such an attitude is the approach to the Kurdish question and peace initiative.
The Justice and Development Party (AKP) government has been arguing that it will solve the Kurdish problem and end the conflict and establish peace with Kurds. In reality, what the government is trying to do is put the perishing problems, the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)-state conflict, into a jar to remove them from the center of the room and place it in a corner.
For instance, no serious analyst believes in the tale of the PKK laying down its arms in the near future, which the pro-government media propagates. What the government is doing is just putting the problems into a new jar. The government doesn't even guarantee basic rights for Kurds while it is trumpeting that it will solve the Kurdish problem.
Making pickles at home also means gaining some extra time for Turkish women. When women don't know how to deal with extra vegetables and food they immediately think of making pickles.
Thus, jars of pickles are like time capsules in the corners of many Turkish homes. You can find several-year-old pickles in homes. It is not because waiting longer gives you better pickles but because they were initially put there to gain more time.
Such an analogy is especially suitable for how Turks deal with foreign policy. When policymakers face a problem, they initially think of methods to gain more time and put the problems into a jar to be solved in the future. There are Turkish diplomats who have only one expertise, such as in the Cyprus problem or the Armenian problem, and have to deal with that problem throughout their entire career but when they retire the problems are still not solved.
Most recently, Turkey has been dealing with the Syrian problem, in particular the problem of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan promised the US that it would be a leading member of a coalition. However, when policymakers at home saw some problems, they tried to gain more time and put their problems in a jar to place into a corner to deal with in the future.
Perhaps because both pickles and politics are the byproduct of expired objects in Turkey, both are sour and salty.
While welcoming him, I would strongly urge Mr. John Bass, the new US ambassador to Turkey, to study Turkey's pickle culture, which has a lot to do with the political culture here.

EMRE USLU (Cihan/Today's Zaman)