Morning, Kerem! Oh, have you had your hair cut?
1kestirdim: getting it done
Waiting is beklemek. But when somebody made you wait, Turkish says so in one word. Today Zehra Hanım, who forgives everything except lateness, will be late herself, and she’ll come into the office saying Sizi beklettim, “I’ve kept you waiting”. One letter, t, has gone in between the stem bekle and the past -ti, and now there are two people in the verb: you did the waiting, and she was the reason.
This is the causative, in Turkish ettirgen çatı. çatı is the “voice”: you know it from Lesson 2’s işteş çatı, where people did things to each other. And TDK’s dictionary explains ettirgen as having a job done by someone else, or causing it to be done. The word itself has the same ending in it, by the way: et is “do”, ettir is “get done”.
English reaches for a second verb: make, have, get, let, help. Turkish puts an ending on the verb itself. Without it, you did the thing; with it, someone did it for you:
Saçımı kestim.— I cut my hair myself.
Saçımı kestirdim.— I had my hair cut.
Raporu kendim yazdım.— I wrote the report myself.
Raporu Kerem’e yazdırdım.— I got Kerem to write the report.
What you get is a new verb, and everything you already know works on it: any tense, the negative, the question, Lesson 1’s -malı, Lesson 8’s “if” with -sa. The causative ending always comes straight after the stem, before everything else:
Saçını mı kestirdin?— Have you had your hair cut?
Yarın saçımı kestireceğim.— I’m getting my hair cut tomorrow.
Bu ay saçımı hiç kestirmedim.— I haven’t had my hair cut once this month.
Bu hafta mutlaka saçımı kestirmeliyim.— I really must get my hair cut this week.
Raporu Kerem’e yazdırırsak, cuma biter.— If we get Kerem to write the report, it’ll be done by Friday.
2-dIr, -t and the verbs to learn by heart
The rule first, then the exceptions, and there are more of them here than usual. Don’t let that put you off: the rule works nearly every time, and the main exceptions fit in one short list.
After a consonant it’s -dIr. The stem’s last vowel picks the vowel: -dır, -dir, -dur or -dür, as with Course 1 Lesson 13’s -dı. And after a voiceless consonant — f, s, t, k, ç, ş, h, p — the d turns into t, as in Course 1 Lesson 2’s -da and -ta. That makes the same eight shapes as the -dır of signs in Course 1’s Lesson 23 (kapalıdır), only in a different place: that -dır closes a word, and this one goes straight after the verb’s stem.
| Last vowel | After a voiced consonant | After a voiceless consonant |
|---|---|---|
| a ı | yaz → yazdır | yap → yaptır |
| e i | ver → verdir | kes → kestir |
| o u | dur → durdur | koş → koştur |
| ö ü | gül → güldür | dök → döktür |
After a vowel a bare -t will do: bekle, beklet; oku, okut; yıka, yıkat; temizle, temizlet. Stems of two syllables or more ending in l or r take -t as well: otur, oturt, “seat someone”; yüksel, yükselt, “raise”. One-syllable stems in l and r usually follow the main rule: güldür, verdir.
Arabamı yıkattım.— I had my car washed.
Hafta sonu evi temizlettik.— We had the flat cleaned at the weekend.
Two short verbs break the rule: ye and de end in a vowel but take -dir. yedirmek is “to feed”, dedirmek “to make someone say”:
Misafirlere bütün böreği yedirdik.— We got the guests to eat the whole börek.
Sonunda bana “evet” dedirdi.— In the end he got me to say yes.
And three groups you simply learn. Here it isn’t -dIr or -t but -It, -Ir or -Ar, and there’s no guessing which verb goes where. Peeking at the list is fine: that’s how they stick.
With -It, five:
korkmak → korkutmak— be afraid → frighten
ürkmek → ürkütmek— take fright → startle, scare off
akmak → akıtmak— flow → pour; shed (tears)
sarkmak → sarkıtmak— hang down → let hang, dangle
kokmak → kokutmak— smell → make smell
With -Ir, nine, though there are more:
içmek → içirmek— drink → give a drink to
uçmak → uçurmak— fly → make fly, fly (a kite)
kaçmak → kaçırmak— run away → miss (a bus)
doğmak → doğurmak— be born → give birth
pişmek → pişirmek— be cooking → cook
düşmek → düşürmek— fall → drop
taşmak → taşırmak— overflow → make overflow
geçmek → geçirmek— pass → pass (through)
bitmek → bitirmek— end → finish
With -Ar, two:
çıkmak → çıkarmak— go out → take off; take out
kopmak → koparmak— snap off → tear off, pick
And in sentences:
Kerem kalemini yine düşürdü.— Kerem’s dropped his pen again.
Çocuklar parkta uçurtma uçuruyor.— The children are flying a kite in the park.
Lütfen çiçekleri koparmayın!— Please don’t pick the flowers!
Balık bütün evi kokuttu.— The fish has made the whole house smell.
uçurtma is a kite: the thing you fly, uçur, with -t and -ma. And TDK’s dictionary explains kokutmak as leaving an unpleasant smell, so you wouldn’t use it for perfume.
3bizi or Kerem’e: who does the job
A causative sentence has two people in it: the one who got it done and the one who did it. The first is the subject, as usual. The second, in the examples below, takes one of two cases; look at what decides which.
No other object: the one doing it takes the accusative, like bizi and herkesi:
Belediye bizi bir ay bekletti.— The council kept us waiting a whole month.
Kerem herkesi güldürdü.— Kerem made everyone laugh.
There is an object: the one doing it moves to the dative, like Kerem’e and ustaya. The object itself behaves as in Course 1’s Lesson 14, -ı when it’s definite and no ending when it isn’t:
Raporu Kerem’e yazdırdım.— I got Kerem to write the report.
Kapıyı ustaya boyattık.— We had the workman paint the door.
Ustaya bir masa yaptırdık.— We had the workman make a table.
And very often the one who did it isn’t named at all: nobody cares who exactly held the scissors. Saçımı kestirdim, Arabamı yıkattım, and that’s that.
4pişirmek, anlatmak: old acquaintances
Good news: you already know a dozen or so causatives. They came in as words of their own, and each has a partner, a verb where the thing just happens. On the left it happens; on the right somebody makes it happen:
pişmek → pişirmek— be cooking → cook
bitmek → bitirmek— end → finish
uyanmak → uyandırmak— wake up → wake (someone) up
kalkmak → kaldırmak— get up → lift, pick up
değişmek → değiştirmek— change (by itself) → change (something)
dolmak → doldurmak— fill up → fill in, fill
uzamak → uzatmak— get longer → lengthen; stretch out
anlamak → anlatmak— understand → tell, explain
Everything on the right is Course 1’s: pişirmek from its Lesson 15, bitirmek from Lesson 18, uzatmak from Lesson 19, değiştirmek and anlatmak from Lesson 20, uyandırmak and kaldırmak from Lesson 24, doldurmak from Lesson 25. Three more are among section 2’s verbs to learn by heart: çıkarmak from Course 1’s Lesson 6, geçirmek from its Lesson 15, kaçırmak from Lesson 22. kaldırmak lost a k along the way: kalk and dır. And in anlatmak you can see anla and -t: by its shape, “to make someone understand”.
Toplantı on birde bitti.— The meeting ended at eleven.
Zehra Hanım toplantıyı erken bitirdi.— Zehra Hanım finished the meeting early.
5Make, have, let: one ending
What exactly the one in charge did — made them, asked them, let them, helped them, or simply caused it — the ending doesn’t say. TDK’s dictionary explains yaptırmak just so: to see that someone does a thing, or to make it possible for them. English picks a verb for each case; Turkish has one ending, and the sentence tells you which:
Zehra Hanım bizi cumartesi de çalıştırdı.— Zehra Hanım had us working on Saturday too.
Defne arabasını kimseye kullandırmaz. Ama bugün bana kullandırdı!— Defne never lets anyone drive her car. But today she let me!
Kerem yaşlı bir teyzeyi karşıya geçirdi.— Kerem helped an old lady across the road.
Bu haber hepimizi çok sevindirdi.— The news made us all very happy.
Here çalıştırdı is “made”, kullandırdı is “let”, and geçirdi is “helped across”. In sevindirdi nobody asked anybody: the news was just that kind of news. kimseye is “to anyone”, with a negative, like kimse in Lesson 2’s Kimse gülmedi, “Nobody laughed”. And in bana kullandırdı the car isn’t named a second time, though it’s still the same car, and bana is in the dative, like Kerem’e in section 3.
6Türkiye up close: at the barber’s
In Lesson 6, on your way out of the hamam, you heard Sıhhatler olsun!, literally “may it be health”. TDK has it as what you say to someone who’s just washed or been shaved, so you’ll hear it at the barber’s too. So that’s where we’re going.
You know berber and kuaför from Course 1’s Lesson 23: a barber and a hairdresser. TDK’s dictionary gives the berber a second name, erkek berberi, literally “a men’s berber”, and explains the kuaför the same way: kadın berberi, “a women’s berber”. The first word came from Italian, the second from French.
Now the part that belongs to this lesson. TDK explains tıraş olmak, “to have a shave, a haircut”, as cutting your hair or beard yourself, or berberde kestirmek, having it cut at the barber’s. There’s the causative, right in the dictionary entry. You get up from the chair saying Saçımı kestirdim; strictly, Saçımı kestim means the scissors were in your own hands.
TDK gives kestirmek six senses, by the way, and the fifth has nothing to do with scissors: “to sleep for a short while, to take a nap”. So Biraz kestireyim after lunch isn’t a trip to the barber’s.
One more thing. tıraş etmek is “to shave”, but TDK gives it a second sense too: “to talk so long that the listener gets fed up”. And tıraş on its own also means empty chatter there, with the example Bırak tıraşı, doğru konuş!, “Enough of the waffle, talk straight!” No razor involved. It’s slang, though, and TDK marks it so: not one to try on your boss.
7Dialogue: five buildings in Üsküdar
November, a Monday, nine in the morning. Kerem is at the office on time today, with a new haircut. Defne is already at her desk. Zehra Hanım isn’t in yet.
Defne:
Günaydın, Kerem! Aa, saçını mı kestirdin?
Kerem:
Evet, cumartesi berbere gittim. Bugün belediyede bir toplantı var. Belki fotoğraf çekerler.
Yes, I went to the barber’s on Saturday. There’s a meeting at the council today. They might take photos.
Defne:
Çok güzel olmuş.
It looks great.
Kerem:
Sağ ol. Berber saçımı yarım saatte kesti, ama beni bir saat tıraş etti!
Thanks. He cut my hair in half an hour, but he talked my ear off for a whole hour!
Defne:
Saat dokuz oldu. Zehra Hanım nerede?
It’s nine o’clock. Where’s Zehra Hanım?
Kerem:
Geç mi kalıyor? Ama Zehra Hanım her şeyi affeder, geç kalmayı affetmez!
Is she late? But Zehra Hanım forgives everything except lateness!
Zehra:
Günaydın! Sizi beklettim, kusura bakmayın. Belediyeden geliyorum.
Good morning! Sorry to keep you waiting. I’ve come from the council.
Kerem:
Bir sorun mu var, Zehra Hanım?
Is something wrong, Zehra Hanım?
Zehra:
Oturun, Kerem Bey. Belediye kararını verdi.
Sit down, Kerem Bey. The council has made its decision.
Kerem:
Ve?
And?
Zehra:
Üsküdar’da bir sokakta beş eski bina var. Beşinin de restorasyonunu biz yapacağız!
There are five old buildings on one street in Üsküdar. And we’re the ones restoring all five!
Kerem:
Beş bina mı? Korkuttunuz beni, Zehra Hanım! Yüzünüz çok ciddiydi.
Five buildings? You scared me, Zehra Hanım! Your face was so serious.
Zehra:
Ciddi bir iş, Kerem Bey. Bu ofisin en büyük işi. Sözleşmeyi öğleden sonra imzalıyoruz.
It’s a serious job, Kerem Bey. The biggest this office has had. We’re signing the contract this afternoon.
Defne:
Şartnameyi hafta sonu bana okuttunuz, Zehra Hanım. Üç yüz sayfa! Ben hesapladım: üç kişiyle bu iş bitmez.
You had me read the specification at the weekend, Zehra Hanım. Three hundred pages! I’ve done the sums: three people won’t finish this job.
Zehra:
Haklısınız, Defne Hanım. Yeni arkadaşlar alacağız: bir restorasyon mimarı, bir mimar ve bir inşaat mühendisi.
You’re right, Defne Hanım. We’re taking on new people: a restoration architect, an architect and a civil engineer.
Kerem:
İlanları kim yazacak? Siz mi?
Who’s going to write the ads? You?
Zehra:
Hayır. Bir insan kaynakları danışmanıyla çalışacağız. İş tanımlarını ona yazdıracağım. Adı Nilay Hanım, gelecek pazartesi başlıyor.
No. We’ll be working with an HR consultant. I’ll have her write the job descriptions. Her name’s Nilay Hanım, and she starts next Monday.
Kerem:
Bu iş bizi çok çalıştıracak.
This job is going to work us hard.
Zehra:
Çalıştıracak. Ama bir gün o sokaktan geçersiniz ve “Bunları biz yaptık” dersiniz.
It will. But one day you’ll walk down that street and say, “We did these.”
Defne:
O gün Kerem’in saçı da güzel olur.
And on that day Kerem’s hair will look nice too.
Kerem:
Öyleyse kahve! Kahve makinesi boş mu?
Coffee, then! Is the coffee machine empty?
Defne:
Boş. Kural üç, Kerem.
Empty. Rule three, Kerem.
Kerem:
Biliyorum: makineyi ben dolduracağım.
I know: I’ll be the one filling the machine.
kestirdin, beklettim, korkuttunuz, okuttunuz, yazdıracağım, çalıştıracak: all causatives, and so is dolduracağım, from Course 1’s Lesson 25. Beni bir saat tıraş etti is “he talked my ear off for a whole hour”: the second sense of tıraş etmek from “Türkiye up close”. Kerem’s line about lateness is Defne’s, from this course’s Lesson 1, and so is “rule three”: “Three: look at the coffee machine. Empty? Then you’re the one who makes the next pot.” A şartname is the specification, the terms of the job. Bunları biz yaptık is “we did these”.
8Reading
Friday, the end of the following week. Nilay Hanım, the HR consultant, writes Zehra Hanım a report on her first week. Everything below is hers. Read it through; open a translation only where you’re stuck.
İlk haftanın raporu
Nilay Hanım’s report to Zehra Hanım.
Sayın Zehra Hanım,
Dear Zehra Hanım,
İlk haftam bitti. Size kısa bir rapor yazıyorum.
My first week is over. Here’s a short report.
Pazartesi bana da şartnameyi okuttunuz. Üç yüz sayfa!
On Monday you had me read the specification too. Three hundred pages!
Defne Hanım haklı: üç kişiyle bu iş bitmez.
Defne Hanım is right: three people won’t finish this job.
Salı günü herkese bir liste yazdırdım: yeni arkadaşlarımız ne bilmeli, ne yapabilmeli?
On Tuesday I had everyone write a list: what should our new colleagues know, and what should they be able to do?
En uzun liste Kerem Bey’inki: on dokuz madde.
The longest list is Kerem Bey’s: nineteen points.
On dokuzuncu madde: “Futbol oynayabilmeli.”
Point nineteen: “Must be able to play football.”
Akşam iş tanımlarını yazdım: bir restorasyon mimarı, bir mimar ve bir inşaat mühendisi.
That evening I wrote the job descriptions: a restoration architect, an architect and a civil engineer.
Çarşamba ilanları verdim.
On Wednesday I put the ads out.
Üç günde yüz yirmi öz geçmiş geldi. Hepsini okudum.
A hundred and twenty CVs came in in three days. I read them all.
En iyi on ikisini Defne Hanım’a da okuttum.
I had Defne Hanım read the best twelve too.
Gelecek hafta iş görüşmeleri var.
The interviews are next week.
Görüşmede her adaya küçük bir cephe çizdireceğiz.
At the interview we’ll have every candidate draw a small façade.
Kerem Bey de adaylara ofisi gezdirecek.
And Kerem Bey will show the candidates round the office.
Bir başvuru sizi çok şaşırtacak.
One application is going to surprise you.
İnşaat mühendisi için bir aday var. Öz geçmişinde “Futbol: kaleci” yazıyor.
There’s a candidate for the civil engineer’s job. His CV says “Football: goalkeeper”.
Defne Hanım öz geçmişi okudu ve çok güldü. Sonra bana maçı ve iki bareti anlattı.
Defne Hanım read the CV and laughed and laughed. Then she told me about the match and the two hard hats.
Evet: mühendislerin kalecisi!
Yes: the engineers’ goalkeeper!
Onu alırsak, gelecek yıl maçta bizim kalemizde durur.
If we take him on, next year he’ll be in our goal at the match.
Kerem Bey de sonunda forvet olur.
And Kerem Bey can finally play up front.
Ama karar sizin. Sizi bekletmeyeceğim: görüşmeler salı başlıyor.
But it’s your decision. I won’t keep you waiting: the interviews start on Tuesday.
Saygılarımla,
Kind regards,
Nilay
Nilay
Sayın is “Dear” at the top of a business letter. ilan vermek is “to put out an ad”, as TDK’s dictionary has it; iş ilanı, öz geçmiş and iş görüşmesi are from Course 1’s Lesson 23. A madde is a point on a list. Kerem Bey’inki is “Kerem Bey’s”, with -ki: his list. gezdirmek is “to show someone round”; TDK’s example is Konuklara Ankara’yı gezdirdi, “He showed the guests round Ankara”. The engineers’ goalkeeper is the one who, in Lesson 2, found two hard hats with the office’s name on them on a site: Geçen ay şantiyede bulduk, “We found them on the site last month.” And in the P.S. to his e-mail about the match, Kerem wrote, “Next year I want to play up front.”
1What did Nilay Hanım do on Wednesday?
2What will every candidate do at the interview?
3Who is the candidate who will surprise Zehra Hanım?
9The lesson’s new words
These are the words the lesson brought in for the first time, in the order you met them. Section 2’s three groups of verbs stay there, except those that turned up in sentences; causatives that follow the rule and simply mean “get it done” aren’t here either.
New words
- bekletmekto keep (someone) waiting
- kesmekto cut
- kestirmekto have (hair) cut; to take a nap
- yedirmekto feed
- dedirmekto make (someone) say
- korkutmakto frighten
- kokutmakto make (something) smell bad
- uçurmakto fly (a kite)
- düşürmekto drop
- koparmakto pick, to tear off
- uçurtmakite
- belediyecouncil, municipality
- güldürmekto make (someone) laugh
- çalıştırmakto make (someone) work
- kullandırmakto let (someone) use
- sevindirmekto make (someone) happy
- makasscissors
- tıraş olmakto have a shave, a haircut
- Kusura bakmayınSorry, I do apologise
- şartnamespecification, terms of the job
- inşaat mühendisicivil engineer
- insan kaynaklarıhuman resources
- danışmanconsultant
- iş tanımıjob description
- SayınDear (in a letter)
- maddepoint, item (on a list)
- ilan vermekto put out an ad
- gezdirmekto show (someone) round
- şaşırtmakto surprise
10Say it yourself
Out loud first, then the answer. Each one needs a causative, and one needs last lesson’s “if” as well. Getting it wrong and then checking is exactly what this is for.
I had my hair cut yesterday
Dün saçımı kestirdim.
sorry to keep you waiting
Sizi beklettim, kusura bakmayın.
I’ll get Kerem to write the report
Raporu Kerem’e yazdıracağım.
you scared me!
Beni korkuttun!
if we get the car washed, we’ll go to the seaside on Sunday
Arabayı yıkatırsak, pazar günü denize gideriz.
the news made us very happy
Bu haber bizi çok sevindirdi.
11Check yourself
Six items. A miss shows you the right answer straight away, and why.
1Match each picture to its word.
2Fill in the right word: “I’m getting my hair cut tomorrow.”
Yarın saçımı ?
3How do you say “have someone read” from okumak?
4How do you say “to frighten”?
5Fill in the right word: “I got Kerem to write the report.”
Raporu ? yazdırdım.
6Defne arabasını kimseye kullandırmaz — what does it mean?
12Homework
Two to say aloud, three to write. Write by hand or in your phone’s notes, then read it aloud: the ear finds what the eye let through.
- One verb through every tense, out loud: kestiriyorum, kestirdim, kestireceğim, kestiririm, kestirmeliyim, kestirirsem — and each one in the negative. Then the same with yazdırmak.
- Section 2’s three groups of verbs: read out the left half of each pair — korkmak, içmek… — and say the right half yourself, without looking. Then check. Again tomorrow.
- What do you do yourself, and what do you have done for you? Five or six sentences: Saçımı kestiririm, Yemeği kendim pişiririm…
- A report on your week, like Nilay Hanım’s: what you did yourself, what you had others do, who you kept waiting. With Sayın at the top and Saygılarımla at the end.
- A job ad, as in Course 1’s Lesson 23: who you’re looking for, what the new colleague will do, and what you’ll have them do at the interview: … çizdireceğiz, … yazdıracağız.