Mechanic? That’s a Woman’s Job
“We are entering these fields and becoming role models. That’s where real change begins.”
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In Turkey’s industrial zones, where oil-streaked floors, shop talk and a deeply masculine work culture long kept women at the margins, a quiet shift is underway. From the capital Ankara to İzmir on the Aegean, women are stepping into garages, running their own workshops, and changing how the country sees skilled labour.
Among them is 22-year-old Mia Uyanık, a motorbike mechanic in Ankara who fell in love with machines as a child, and 48-year-old Rukiye Karaman, who rebuilt her life after divorce by learning to change tyres. While they remain outliers in a field where women make up less than 3 per cent of the workforce, Uyanık and Karaman are reshaping the industrial landscape, one repair at a time.
Uyanık’s first memory of work is standing beside her father in the repair shops of Ankara, listening to the clanking of tools and smelling grease and gasoline. Most children might have wandered off. Mia asked for a mechanic’s overalls.
“It wasn’t just a piece of clothing,” she said. “It was me choosing the life I wanted.”
At 22, Uyanık now works as a motorcycle mechanic in one of the capital’s industrial districts, a space where few women stay long and even fewer are taken seriously. The passion got her through the door, and what kept Uyanık there was grit.
“In the beginning, people assumed I was just here on a whim,” she said. “They thought I’d get bored and leave. But I stayed. And that surprised them.”
Some of the resistance came with subtle warnings, Uyanık remembers. If she wanted to be accepted, Uyanık was told, she couldn’t be “too feminine”; she had to blend in or at least toughen up.
“They don't think women belong here. And if you act like a woman – if you don’t hide it – they say you won’t survive,” she said. “In contrast, I leaned into my strength. I didn’t hide being a woman, but I also didn’t let anyone think I’d break easily.”
Breaking In
Support came, but not always from where she expected. Customers, especially women, became some of Uyanık’s strongest backers. She remembers women customers telling her how safe they felt with her presence.
“That meant a lot. It told me I wasn’t alone,” Uyanık said.
But inside the garage, solidarity was harder to find. Over the years, Uyanık searched for a master, a mentor who would teach her the job properly. It was the way male apprentices were taught, yet no one stepped forward for her.
“They kept their knowledge to themselves,” she said. “Like it was a secret they had to guard. I had to figure it out on my own.”
Even now, Uyanık hesitates to call herself a master, “usta” in Turkish. Not because she doubts her ability, but because the system never allowed her the mentorship she deserved.
Still, she’s determined to pass on what she knows.
“If someone came to learn, especially a woman, I’d share everything,” Uyanık said. “That’s how a profession survives. And when women share it with each other, it creates something powerful.”
Looking ahead, Uyanık dreams of running her own garage and teaching other women the skills she had to fight to learn.
“They always say a profession is a golden bracelet,” Uyanık continued, remembering the old Turkish saying about how important it is for women to have the necessary skills – a golden bracelet – to rebuild a life if they ever need to. “For me, that's what this is,” she continues. “I can start over anywhere. It’s freedom."
Survival and Stability
Rukiye Karaman’s tyre shop is around 600 kilometres away from Uyanık’s garage, on Turkey’s western coast. Unlike Uyanık, Karaman didn’t set out to become a mechanic. She became one because life gave her no other choice.
Born and raised in İzmir, Karaman married young, raised two sons, and spent years balancing family life with bookkeeping jobs. But when her marriage ended, so did her sense of stability. She needed to earn a living fast. A friend offered her a position in a tyre shop. It wasn’t part of any plan. It was survival.
“At first, I was just doing the accounting,” Karaman recalled. “Then I started watching the work. I picked things up. And one day, I realised that I didn’t just need this job – I actually liked it.”
Karaman stayed. She learned. She opened her own shop.
Today, Karaman runs a small tyre and repair garage in İzmir, working side by side with one of her sons. She changes tyres, manages the business and greets customers, many of whom still do a double-take when they realise she’s in charge.
“I didn't sit around wondering whether I could do it,” Karaman said of her first days in the business. “I just did it. And I’m still learning. But now I walk into the shop with my head high.”
The social expectations, however, haven't disappeared. Even now, many female customers arrive accompanied by husbands or fathers – not because they have to, but because it still feels strange to walk into a garage alone.
“They hear my voice on the phone and feel at ease,” Karaman said. “But showing up solo? That’s still a big step for a lot of women.”
Karaman hopes to change that – not just by example but by hiring other women. Her long-term goal is to establish a workshop where women are not only welcome but also visible and empowered.
Uyanık and Karaman’s stories don’t exist in isolation. Across Turkey, efforts are underway to open traditionally male-dominated technical sectors to women, with national institutions beginning to offer structural support.
In 2021, the Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey (TOBB) launched an initiative through its Women Entrepreneurs Board that aims to increase female participation in industrial trades like welding, machining and auto repair.
“This isn’t just about employment,” said Nurten Öztürk, chair of TOBB’s Women Entrepreneurs Board, in a recent statement. “Women are entering these fields and becoming role models. That’s where real change begins.”
According to TOBB, more than 10,000 women across 32 provinces have participated in such programs. The shift is slow but tangible.
For Karaman, the policy developments are welcome – but the real transformation, she believes, still happens one woman, one customer, one working day at a time.
Her dream is simple: a shop staffed by women, serving everyone, and standing as proof that gender should have no place in defining skill.
“I want to teach,” she said. “So the next time someone says ‘a woman can’t do this,’ we won’t need to argue. We’ll just show them we can.”
