Long time since I posted anything on here. A wordpress upgrade broke the old “Options” theme I was using, and I’ve been fiddling with making the blog presentable again since then, on and off. Mosty off as I was spending a lot of time job seeking, then getting ready to move, and finally moving from Minneapolis to Samsun.
Samsun is a small city on the Black Sea Coast of Turkey – friendly, middle class, full of observant Muslims, and a bit dull. I’m teaching English at a private girl’s school outside town, and my husband is doing the same at a boy’s school under the same management. People are friendly, the food is *great*, there’s nothing to spend money on, and a year here should let us recover economically from the debacles we’ve had to deal with since leaving Moscow.
I’m going to be posting a lot more travel writing and catching up on older photographic work, so do want to find a good way to present all this material… which I guess means fussing with WordPress more. I’ll try to post more often, anyway.
UPDATE 2014: I only spent one year in Samsun, it was a nice, safe, dull place and we worked through the school year and left in the spring. I’m not there, I can’t meet you, and I’ve been gone so long I can’t really recommend any work options either. Sorry!
Beyza Özeren
25 Nov 2009Hi Miss Kira. Did you remember me? I saw your photos and i love them. Thats so profetionel… Congratulations!
Beyza Özeren
25 Nov 2009Hi Miss Kira. Did you remember me? I saw your photos and i love them. Thats so profetionel… Congratulations!
amberdlanning
30 Mar 2010Kira, my husband was just offered a job in Samsun…well, his current company wants to relocate him…and we need to decide what to tell them. My biggest concern is that online I am not finding a single english/american international school for my children. Is there one? Can you give me some information? I'm going to spy on your website to see what else you have written about Samsun…thanks for blogging 🙂
Kira
30 Mar 2010Hi Amber, there are currently only 7 expats from English speaking countries in Samsun (that I know of), and five of us are leaving when the school year’s done – there is no international school. Maybe 5% of people in Samsun speak some English; it’s very much an immersion environment for Turkish, which is not an easy language. The city is sort of like a cross between small town America in 1950 and a Turkish village; people are friendly, the food is good (though at this point I’m sick of it, since only Turkish food is available and there’s only so much yogurt and eggplant you can eat), there are chickens everywhere, it’s very socially conservative, and there is almost nothing to do…
Anyway, there are international schools in Ankara and Istanbul, and Samsun does have some good private schools where lessons are in Turkish… but it would be difficult to be here with kids. Internet access is pretty good, which helps a lot. Mail is okay, takes 2 or 3 weeks from the US. Taxes are ridiculous on mail order things from overseas, though – over 50%. There’s a bookstore that stocks Time and Newsweek, but almost no English books are available. Also, though there is slightly more going on in the city center, the air there in winter is atrocious – everyone burns coal to heat their homes and sometimes from the hill over town you can’t see the Black Sea 2 km away the smoke is so thick.
That said, it’s a very safe and stable city. Kids here are mostly happy and healthy, if bored. Their general attitude is VERY small town though. Anyway, feel free to contact me if you’ve got any other questions. -Kira
kirahagen
30 Mar 2010Hi Amber, there are currently only 7 expats from English speaking countries in Samsun (that I know of), and five of us are leaving when the school year's done – there is no international school. Maybe 5% of people in Samsun speak some English; it's very much an immersion environment for Turkish, which is not an easy language. The city is sort of like a cross between small town America in 1950 and a Turkish village; people are friendly, the food is good (though at this point I'm sick of it, since only Turkish food is available and there's only so much yogurt and eggplant you can eat), there are chickens everywhere, it's very socially conservative, and there is almost nothing to do…
Anyway, there are international schools in Ankara and Istanbul, and Samsun does have some good private schools where lessons are in Turkish… but it would be difficult to be here with kids. Internet access is pretty good, which helps a lot. Mail is okay, takes 2 or 3 weeks from the US. Taxes are ridiculous on mail order things from overseas, though – over 50%. There's a bookstore that stocks Time and Newsweek, but almost no English books are available. Also, though there is slightly more going on in the city center, the air there in winter is atrocious – everyone burns coal to heat their homes and sometimes from the hill over town you can't see the Black Sea 2 km away the smoke is so thick.
That said, it's a very safe and stable city. Kids here are mostly happy and healthy, if bored. Their general attitude is VERY small town though. Anyway, feel free to contact me if you've got any other questions. -Kira
naz
7 Jan 2013Hi Kira,
My name is Naz, I currently live in UK and I have my fiance who lives in Turkey, Samsun. I was hoping to move to Samsun and he has said that jobs in teaching English are queit available, espically in private organisations who provide the service. I have always been interested in teaching English but I do not have any qualifications such as a teching degree, although I am planning on doing a TEFL online course which is a teaching english for other languages. Any inforamtion on how the teaching works would be much appreciated.
many thanks
Naz
Kira Hagen
9 Feb 2013Hi Naz, sorry about he slow reply. I’d recommend getting TEFL certified, but you should know the online courses are not highly regarded. You really want one that has about 100 hours of classroom time with practice teaching.
Teaching in Samsun, if you want to work in a school (I worked at Feza Berk, which was sometimes odd as it’s a private Muslim girl’s school, but overall pleasant) you’ll probably be providing a speaking and reading component to balance local teachers working on grammar and vocabulary. The teachers in my school were not very fluent in English, and hardly anyone in Samsun is. There are almost no native English foreigners; btw – I knew of 8 when I was there, in a city of 500,000. It’s a nice, safe town but very dull. Good luck!
omar hatem
6 Jul 2014Hi miss kira,
Iam just asking is there anyway to get a job in samsun – turkia , iam speaking English very good have (management master degree) ( drawing on AutoCad) Hope u can help me. Iam ready to work anything coz now I have very bad financial conditions and I need to learn turkey by time … Restaurant, mall, office, or in my certificate any job will be great.
Please need ur advice.
Omar hatem,
05370185868
Kira Hagen
9 Jul 2014Hi, as I emailed you, I left Samsun in 2010 and haven’t been back. I believe the people I worked with have mostly moved on and I don’t have any current information on jobs there. Good luck!
Michelle
28 Aug 2014I’m going to Samsun in September… I have a friend who I know, but I want to meet more people..we should get a community together. Let’s do things and meet each other!
arif
30 Sep 2015Hi Michelle,
I just came here a few days ago from İstanbul and was looking some friends, expats to do some activities together. It seems,gonna stay here for some time. Lets meet somewhere.
face: arif ayluctarhan
Hala
3 Sep 2014Hi kira,
Are you still in Samsun, I came here 8 months ago and would be nice to meet if u got some time
Hala
arif
30 Sep 2015Hi Hala,
I just came here a few days ago from İstanbul and was looking some friends, expats to do some activities together. It seems,gonna stay here for some time. Lets meet somewhere.
face: arif ayluctarhan
Kira Hagen
14 Oct 2015Good luck, hope you can connect with someone. Check out couchsurfing.org, too; Samsun had an active group when I lived there.
Kira Hagen
3 Sep 2014Sorry, I left Samsun in 2010 and have mostly been working in Moscow since then. Good luck with your time there!
Lori
9 Jun 2015Hi Kira, you mentioned Moscow. Do you speak Russian? Are there Russian speakers in Samsun? If I can find Russian speakers, I will be ok without English. Thanks!
Kira Hagen
11 Jun 2015Yes, I speak Russian, but I am not in Samsun anymore! I’ve been in Moscow since 2010 now. There are some Russian speakers, though, mostly women who have married Turkish husbands. You can find them at the big bazaar by the harbour. A fair bit of Russian oil business goes through Samsun so you might meet people in that field as well. Good luck!
Me
18 Nov 2020Hi there Lori! Do you still live in Samsun by any chance?
afsha sayed
23 Sep 2018Hey Kira,
My name is Afsha m a play school teacher from last 5 years in India.
My in-laws want me and my fiancee to settle in turkey Samsun as they are interested in investing the so we both are planning to start a small India cafe. We both don’t know any other language other then English or Hindi… What do u think will this plan work their?
And what kind of job we can do for starting months ?
Please reply I’m desperately waiting for ur reply
Kira Hagen
23 Sep 2018Hi Afsha, Samsun is very much a small fishing village that happens to have a city’s population. There are very few English speakers but if you took a nursery school job, which you could very likely get pretty easily, you’d do okay. I don’t know about an Indian cafe… there were no foreign restaurants when we were there 10 years ago, but maybe at the university end of town it would work. They think foreign food is from the town 100km down the coast, and are so proud of Turkish food they don’t really think any other ethnic cuisine is necessary. So, maybe? There’s a gap in the market anyway. People are very nice, it’s a safe town, good for kids, etc etc etc. We were bored out of our minds there, but it was overall a good place. The university area is probably where you’d do best. Hope that helps!
Anne-Marie
10 May 2021Hi Kira—thanks so much for all the information here. My husband and I live in Antalya and are considering moving to Samsun as we’d like to buy a pretty place with a view and Samsun is so much cheaper. We plan to visit Samsun after we get vaccinated and the intercity lockdown is lifted.
Two questions: Would you have any opinions about neighborhoods, specifically Atakum and Canik?
I was also wondering what you found lacking/boring in Samsun. Was it mostly a lack of night life and/or expat community? Or was it something else? Before living in Antalya, we lived in Izmir for a couple years and in both places what we gravitate to, in terms of activities, are restaurants/cafes/tea gardens; parks; going to the mall or seeing a movie occasionally; going for walks or bike rides; seeing an exhibition or going to a fair a couple times a year, and doing occasional day trips. I imagine Samsun has these things as well, but your comments about being really bored have me a bit worried.
Thank you so much for whatever information or opinions you can share.
Kira Hagen
24 May 2021Sorry, missed the notification on your message somehow! First, please understand I worked one school year in Samsun and then left in spring of 2010. I lived in Atakum and it was a nice neighborhood. Don’t remember Canik. Downtown had massive coal smoke air pollution in the winter, Atakum was pretty clean. If you are looking for a nice, safe place to raise kids and don’t mind a rather conservative atmosphere, Samsun could be a good place. But, there is NO expat scene – I think we had 9 native English speakers in town at one point and that was the peak. Some university kids had some dance classes going and we took lessons for a couple months with them, and went out with them to a restaurant that opened their basement for dancing. Never saw a club beyond that. You couldn’t get a glass of wine with meals; only a couple tourist oriented places on Atakum beach served alcohol and not with food. They think foreign food is the specialty from the next town down the coast. It takes a minimum two hour bus ride to get anywhere outside Samsun and at least four to get anywhere interesting. We hosted couchsurfers regularly to have a social life. Samsun is like 2 km wide and 15 km long, hugging the coast, and it has like 500,000 people yet is still a fishing village (or was ten years ago). The food’s good and the people are nice, but… Oh, and the Black Sea is so polluted there were no shorebirds on the beach, just crows and pigeons. It is completely different from Antalya (which I really like) and it’s not bad but seriously, there was nothing going on there.