Yaşar Sarıca Assistant Tour Guide
Emre Çevikel met recently with Yaşar Sarıca and asked him about his experiences with Bougainville Travel. Yaşar is 32 years old and said he has been with Bougainville Travel every year since 1996 except for his 2 year stretch in the military. He was 18 when he started working at BT and he has become, in Turkish, what is commonly called a “joker” or jack of all trades, but for sure, he is also a master of them all. He drives the transfer bus to and from the airport, he is an assistant tour guide for trekking, canyoning, and mountain biking and he sometimes pitches in and helps the staff at the Oreo Hotel in Kaş.
Yaşar Sarıca Assistant Tour Guide
Yaşar is from the village of Belenli just a few kilometers outside of Kaş. His first time ever in Kaş was when he was 12 years old. He was shocked at the size of the big city of Kaş, after all, his village was less than 100 houses at the time! Yaşar said it was a strange and exciting experience for him. As a 12 year old his first job was selling locally prepared gözleme to locals and tourists. Gözleme is a common and popular Turkish village food which has various ingredients such as cheese, spinach or potatoes inside a thin flatbread called yufka and slowly cooked over a wood or gas fueled dome until the outside is browned and crispy and the inside is soft and hot. Yaşar later worked at the small restaurant in the otogar or Kaş bus station and then the Likya Hotel.
Yaşar with his family
Yaşar is married to Gülhan and they have twin daughters, Selin and Aylin. Yaşar and Gülhan met while he was on a BT trek. Gülhan was out in the mountain meadows close to Burdurpicking maydanoz (parsley) for dinner.
Emre tells us that Yaşar really likes his work and that he is “like a goat” when walking or biking in the mountains. Sometimes while on a mountain bike trio and a customer is tired, Yaşar will pull the customer’s bike while pedaling his own up steep hills. Customers and staff alike can scarcely believe their eyes when they see this happen.
Yaşar has had some interesting experiences over the past 14 years, which incidentally, makes him one of the longest working members of the BT staff. One story he tells is of a man from Israel who was with a mountain trekking group. This man was around 50 years old and, to Yaşar, he appeared to be very unfit and overweight. However, when the group came to their first rough stretch of hills, this man, was way out in front of the group and calling them to come hurry on. Yaşar had all he could do to keep the man from simply leaving the group far behind. As the trek progressed, the rest of the group got tired and called for a rest stop while this man was still going strong. He said he was really fooled by this man’s appearance.
Another incident was with a canyoning group. A woman stopped the group and claimed that she twisted her ankle and that the pain was too great for her to continue walking. As they were deep into the canyon, the guides put together their stretcher and started to carry her, four people at a time, one on each handle of the stretcher. As the going in the canyon was very difficult, the guides tired easily carrying their gear with hers and her on the stretcher. This happened around 4:00 in the afternoon and it was almost midnight when they finally carried her out of the canyon. The exhausted guides put her down near the van which was to carry the group back to Kaş; the woman promptly got up from the stretcher and walked easily to the van without so much as a limp! The next day she continued with her group on a day long mountain bike excursion. That upset Yaşar and the other guides, but, they are professionals in their work and this, although extraordinary, was still all in a day’s work!
Yaşar’s experiences prove him capable, strong, resourceful and energetic. He said he loves his work and can’t think of anything else he would rather be doing.
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