In Elbashï, the range of jobs was similar. Apart from several building trade craftsmen, there was a man who had been a clerk in Istanbul, a member of the locally recruited Kayseri Watch (a body which assisted the state urban police), a Kayseri carter, and one or two porters. Others went off casually as unskilled labourers, though in Elbashï casual jobs inside the village were more readily available.
Recruiting is partly a matter of messages reaching the village through established channels, and partly a matter of casual decision. The better known and more skilled regulars sometimes receive explicit invitations from friends. The rest rely on rumour and general gossip about the possibilities in various parts of the country, or simply go off to search. The general election of 1950, for example, slowed down construction work, and people returned to the village saying there were no jobs. On the other hand the building of an airfield by foreign contractors at Adana in 1952 stimulated a minor exodus of hopefuls.
Permanent migration to town was rare in both villages. In Sakaltutan the only cases were those of men who married town women. Even those who were most at ease in the town economic system kept their wives and families in the village. The advantages were partly economic. A roomy village house costs little to build (p. 90), and almost nothing to keep up, whereas a town dwelling of any kind would involve rent, and probably squalor as well. A village family with land would be usefully occupied and providemany of its own needs, and even one without land could earn staple foods by working for neighbours, especially at the harvest, and buy more cheaply than in town.
Social factors were clearly important in keeping people rooted in the village. Most of them, even the young ones, preferred to return where they belonged, among a set of people they had known from birth, permanent neighbours, brothers and sisters, cousins and affines, with all the restraints and conflicts involved. Young men accepted the village system of marriage; and