Some 100,000 Turks are expected to perform the holy ritual this year

By Sa'ad Abdul Majid, IOL Correspondent

ISTANBUL, January 19 (IslamOnline.net) – Some 19,000 Turks desperately hope to get Saudi visas to perform hajj this year as Turkey ran out of its annual quota and extra visas.

Some 100,000 Turks – including 30,000 on extra visas -- are expected to perform the holy ritual this year in coordination with Saudi Arabia, which allows one percent of the population of each Muslim country to perform hajj every year.

Eleven Turkish tour operators lodged complaints with the Foreign Ministry, demanding it provide visas for additional 19,000 Turks eager to visit the holy places.

Turkish press said that the issue comes high on the agenda of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan who arrived in Riyadh Saturday, January 17.

Erdogan headed a 265-member delegation, including 160 businessmen attending the Jeddah Economic Forum. It is the biggest Turkish delegation ever to visit the Kingdom.

Amid heavy snowfalls and below-zero temperatures, Turkey bade its first group of Muslim pilgrims farewell on January 6.

The airport's departure lounge was chock-full as the pilgrims' next of kin and loved ones came in droves, with snow melting away by warm-hearted feelings.

Istanbul Airport is operating at full swing to meet the demands of the pilgrims. It provides health care for the pilgrims and dedicated for them a place to wear ihram clothes [the state of consecration] before embarking for Saudi Arabia.

It also set apart a prayer room so that the pilgrims would not miss their prayers. Around 40,000 pilgrims are expected to use the airport to go to pilgrimage.

The government's religious body further provides audio and video tapes and advice for the new pilgrims on the hajj rituals and pillars. 

One of the sticking problems facing most, if not all, of the Turkish pilgrims is that  all signs in the holy places are written either in Arabic, English or Persian. 

Hajj costs in Turkey also weigh heavily on the purse of lay people. Tour operators classify hajj into three categories: ordinary, tourist and first-class, which range between $3,000 to 6,000. However, pilgrims chosen by the annual government lot – around 35,000 -- pay $1900.  

Mustafa Gul, a 56-year-old truck driver, told IslamOnline.net that he cannot afford the hajj fees, saying he saves nothing of his $300 monthly salary. 

The hajj, the fifth pillar of Islam, is an obligation for able-bodied Muslims who can afford it at least once in a lifetime.