Turkey’s ever first transgender shelter house opens
Ezgi Başaran ISTANBUL
Öykü Ay, a 39-year-old transgender woman, said they had opened their first transgender shelter house with the help of donations.
“God helped us and we opened our first trans shelter house. A million thanks to all the girls. This incident has cheered us up,” Ay said, adding that opening the shelter house showed that it is easier to surmount hardships through unity.
Known as the “veiled trans” as she wears a veil in her daily life, Ay said the donations for the shelter house were raised at a transgender fashion show organized on Nov. 20, 2014, again by a group of transgender individuals under Ay’s leadership.
Ay said the idea of a fashion show had come to her mind as trans women were interested in showing their clothes and it was a tool to raise more donations in order to change the trans guesthouse into a two-floor shelter house, where they would be able to assist more transgender women.
Commenting on the fashion show, Ay said she cried when she saw the whole room filled, adding that with the ticket sales and the money collected from the sales of the dresses presented at the show, a total of 40,000 Turkish Liras had been collected.
“That night I cried … Everything was great and we collected 40,000 liras,” said Ay.