Turks are doing their best to stop the flight of tourists: “Earthquakes will be long”

On the night of March 6, the element marked the monthly “anniversary” of earthquakes with new tremors, as a result of which the coastline of the southern Turkish province of Hatay was flooded. And to other troubles, an acute shortage of drinking water is approaching the country. The tourism industry throws up its hands: not only the guests are running, but even the Turks themselves.

We learned first-hand about the moods and aspirations on the Turkish shores.

According to Turkish press reports, on the night of March 6, an earthquake of magnitude 4.8 was recorded 19 km northwest of the city of Iskenderun (aka Alexandria Minor, the largest city in the southern province of Hatay). As a result of underground vibrations, the coastline of the entire province is flooded, which inevitably promises problems for the entire coastal infrastructure. Meanwhile, on the west coast, it has become impossible to hide the impending shortage of drinking water from the population and visitors. As it turned out, due to the “hottest winter in the last half century,” as local newspapers call the past three winter months, drinking water (which is a source of drinking water for northwestern Turkey. – Auth.) Nilüfer reservoir in Bursa has almost completely dried up: it has the lowest water level in the last 40 years. The authorities were forced to face the truth and sent out a warning to citizens and hoteliers asking them to save fresh water.

– Notifications from their water supply departments about the need to save water have already been received in Istanbul, Izmir and Izmit (aka Kocaeli, the capital of the province of the same name. – Auth.), – they say in the Istanbul travel agency. – From Istanbul and Izmir, this will additionally turn away tourists who are already refusing tours with might and main. Izmit will also be affected, as it is a center of food production and a business hub for entrepreneurs in this industry from all over the world.

It would be possible to console oneself beloved not only by Russians, but also by Turks “maybe it will resolve itself” (in the Turkish version of “inshallah”), but even the annual world gas summit scheduled for March 22, traditionally hosted by Istanbul, has been canceled. And for the first time, contrary to the protocol, even the date to which the event was rescheduled was not named. Turkish climate experts say that without a series of new laws, both in terms of seismic safety, as well as energy and water supply, the situation in Turkey will not stabilize in the coming months.

“But the laws still need to be developed and approved,” say relocants from the Russian Federation, hastily leaving the coastal Mersin, which has been feeling the aftershocks (echoes) of the very first and most powerful shock on February 6 for a whole month, which destroyed several cities and claimed a huge number of lives. . – We love Turkey very much, but, alas, we have to run away from here. Earthquakes will be here for a long time – and these are no longer horror stories, but warnings from the local authorities themselves. There is already a drought in many areas, it is coming to others. And now they are openly admitting that there is no water. In some localities, it turns out, for a long time. They just didn’t advertise, hoping that it would get better.

Residents of Turkey – both indigenous and those who chose it for permanent residence – unlike tourists, are really in no hurry to flaunt their “communal” problems. But they still answer the question in the forehead.

“We were sent official warnings about the lack of water, which said that Istanbul’s fresh water supplies would last only 60 days,” says a Russian who recently changed his relocation site from Istanbul to Dubai. – People from Istanbul are pouring in packs, not only foreigners, but also locals. Businesses are being curtailed, their shops are being mothballed. Even if the ex-Soviet Central Asia tumbled home, what can I say! In Dubai, life is much more expensive, but at least it’s not scary.

What does “official warning” mean?

– This means that soon water will be supplied by the hour, as is already happening in a number of provinces. Car washes are already closed there and watering of vegetable gardens is prohibited.

The Turkish tourism industry, not without bitterness, admits that the number of tourists that Istanbul expected in the spring is melting before our eyes. Restaurant occupancy alone in the city has already fallen by 70%.

– The tourism sector has already been undermined, and not only in Istanbul, but in the whole country, – they state in the Istanbul travel agency. – And not even an earthquake, but “the fear of this earthquake.” Problems only with water would not stop tourists.

Alas, this is also recognized by domestic tour operators, inclined to optimism to the last: refusals from tours to Turkey are acquiring an unprecedented scale. Against this background, the Turkish authorities are urging their tourism industry to take some kind of “compensating maneuver”. Some sensitive entrepreneurs have already heard them: a number of expensive resort hotels have reduced prices – from 100 euros per day to 80 euros. And the Turkish migration service pleased with the promise to lift the ban on tourist residence permits for Russians.

“In a situation where everyone is fleeing, the Turks decided to at least keep our relocators, which is reasonable,” the Russians who settled in Antalya express their opinion. – It is known for sure that the ban on issuing an ikamet (tourist residence permit) was ordered to be lifted by the Russians. And even closed areas plan to open.

From the beginning of October to the beginning of February, marked by a tragedy for all of Turkey, due to the unprecedented influx of relocators from the Russian Federation, the authorities decided to stop issuing residence permits to Russians not only on the basis of a long-term lease of Turkish property, but even to owners of Turkish real estate, if it is located in one of the 1000 areas of the country where foreigners were forbidden to live.

“Of course, it was a shame,” the new “Turkish Russians” admit. “We buy expensive housing from them, spend in their country the money earned elsewhere, and instead of gratitude, we get a refusal in ikamet even without explanation. But, as they say, there is no evil without good. The Turks quickly realized that if we also left, they would be left without guests at all. Those who applied for ikamet in the last week of February still received unreasonable refusals until March 6. But those who submitted on March 1 today received approval even without personal communication with the inspector, as before: they simply took a folder with documents, removed their fingers – and that’s it, welcome to Turkey.