In a small börek shop in Frankfurt, Yusuf Dağlayan’s life story traces the long shadow of Turkey’s “Kurdish börek” debate spanning courtrooms, migration, and a struggle over identity.
Yusuf the Kurd’s story doesn’t end here of course it doesn’t. Germany, too, has thrown its share of trials his way. These days, he passes the time in his small börek shop in Frankfurt, telling stories from a life that seems to have unfolded across borders, courtrooms, and street corners.
In Frankfurt, there’s a modest place called Dağlayan Börekçilik, sitting right at the intersection of Battonstrasse and Langestrasse. It’s run by a man from Bingöl: Yusuf Dağlayan. His life offers a striking window into the long-running debates in Turkey over Kurds and even over something as seemingly simple as the name of a pastry.
One morning in Frankfurt, looking for somewhere open to have breakfast, I spotted a place with “Börekçilik” written on the sign, right at the junction of two streets. I stepped inside. It was still early; the shop was empty.
Behind the counter stood a middle-aged man balding, with a slight belly who greeted me in German. When I replied in Turkish, he looked momentarily surprised, as if caught off guard by the shift.
A brief exchange revealed he was from Bingöl. From there, the conversation naturally drifted into Kurdish. I ordered a börek and took a seat. After finishing what he was doing behind the counter, the man who introduced himself as Yusuf came over and sat across from me.
After the usual introductions, I brought up a debate that had once again resurfaced in Turkey at the time: the attempt to rename “Kurdish börek” as “küt börek.” I asked what he thought about it.
Yusuf paused, then began telling a story. Not just an opinion but a story that reached back decades.
“I’m Yusuf Dağlayan,” he said. “I’m from the hamlet of Bağkıyan, in the village of Bilece, between Kiğı and Pülümür. You can’t just call it Bingöl. Kiğı used to belong to Dersim it was only attached to Bingöl after 1948. Pülümür and Dersim are closer to us anyway.”
His voice carried both precision and insistence like someone used to correcting the record.
“I was detained in 1982. Tortured. During the September 12 period. Both me and my father. Back then, it was the left-right conflict before the PKK. My older brother was studying, but he fled abroad. The state put pressure on us, took us in. So by the end of 1984, I had to leave and go to İzmit.”
In İzmit, he couldn’t find steady work. So he improvised.
“I started selling börek from a cart in front of the SEKA paper factory.”
They had almost nothing.
“No money. Just börek. So we made Kurdish börek. The first day, they beat me. ‘You can’t stay here, you can’t sell here,’ they said. The next day, there was a big fight we even had to use knives. But eventually, that place became ours.”
The factory brought a constant flow ten thousand people in, ten thousand out.
“Then we expanded. Opened a shop. Had five carts and our own production.”
As he spoke, someone else entered the shop an acquaintance. After exchanging greetings, he joined us, occasionally adding a comment, as if this story belonged not just to Yusuf, but to a shared memory.
Yusuf continued.
“In İzmit, they called me ‘Kurdish Yusuf.’ This was around 1987. After I opened the shop, one day I received a court summons.”
He smiled faintly.
“I went to court. The judge asked, ‘Why did you write “Kurdish börek” on your sign and menu?’”
Yusuf leaned forward, as if reliving the moment.
“I said: We have a man from our village Mehmet who went to Istanbul. Among Kurdish Alevis, we make perğe every New Year, for Hızır. It’s oily, we share it with people. Muslims sacrifice animals; we do this. That’s where it comes from.”
The judge wasn’t convinced.
“He told me, ‘You’re being divisive.’”
Yusuf shrugged.
“I said: There’s Laz börek, Circassian, Bosnian… why shouldn’t there be Kurdish börek?”
From there, Yusuf moved into another story one he had also told in court. A story about “Kurdish Mehmet,” a porter who, over time, became part of the folklore surrounding börek itself.
“Mehmet was Kurdish. Poor. He went to Istanbul, to Kasımpaşa, by ship. Worked as a porter. He made perğe at home, took it with him to eat—near the Galata Bridge.”
Something unexpected happened.
“People saw what he was eating. They liked it. They gave him money, bought it by weight. He ended up going hungry but realized he had made good money.”
So he made more.
“He started selling. A hundred, two hundred at a time. Then he saw he was earning more than from portering. He rented a shop in Karaköy still there today. Built a bakery. That oven is still running. He died long ago. His name was Kurdish Mehmet. People called him Rengo. This was 250 years ago.”
After Yusuf told this story in court, the judge called for a ten-minute recess. When the session resumed, he simply said: “You can go.” The case was dropped.
But months later, another summons arrived.
“A different judge this time,” Yusuf said. “He said: ‘You’re spreading separatism. Your cart has yellow, red, and green colors those are separatist colors. It’s PKK propaganda.’”
Yusuf laughed.
“I said: If those colors are separatist, then from Thrace to Kars, from Trabzon to Antalya, İzmir what about the state? Isn’t the state separatist too?”
The judge frowned. “How so?” he asked.
“I said: I see traffic lights everywhere. Those colors are beautiful. That’s why I used them on my shop. If I’m a separatist, then so is the state.”
The judge paused and then: “You can go.”
The file was closed.
Yusuf kept working in İzmit until 1993. Then, political cases caught up with him. A detention order was issued. He went on the run, five months underground.
After that, Europe.
He paid 15,000 marks to reach Bulgaria, then moved through Romania, Hungary, Austria. In each country, he stayed for a while, took part in political activities. When he finally tried to enter Germany, he was caught on the highway.
It was 1994.
This time, he opened a börek shop at a train station.
“There was a man from Malatya Şükrü. He had a restaurant behind the Bahnhof. In the back, there was a small space with an oven, but he wasn’t using it.”
Yusuf had nothing.
“I told him: I have no money. I’m hungry. Rent me this place. I’d been in Germany for three months, seeking asylum.”
Şükrü agreed 2,500 marks.
“I bought oil, flour, trays. Started again. Took börek to a shop owned by a man from Erzurum. Then I got into lahmacun. Rented a bigger place.”
The scale grew fast.
“In five months, I made 150,000 marks. Bought a bakery. Had 40 employees. I was still undocumented wanted in Turkey. But I was making 60–70 thousand marks a month. In just over a year, I saved 1.2 million marks.”
Yusuf the Kurd’s story, as he tells it, never really settles. It moves from village to factory gate, from courtroom to border crossing, from one country to another.
And now, it circles back here to a small börek shop in Frankfurt, where the past is not behind him, but something he serves alongside the food: piece by piece, story by story.
