Greece's Olga Antonea (right) and Turkey's Sukru Ilicak (left) pose for a portrait at a Park in Athens.-AFP

Merve Kocadal, who is 28 and works in a call center, met her Greek boyfriend 32-year-old Yorgos Taliadorous on a dating app in 2017 when the two were in Cyprus, an island that is still a point of tension between the two countries. Located at the outer limits of Europe in the Mediterranean, one third of Cyprus has been occupied by Turkey since 1974 after a coup aimed at uniting the island with Greece. Kocadal says the island is "the main point of friction" between her and her beloved's family.

"Some conversations are tense and voices can rise," she says carefully, "but that takes nothing away from the love we have for each other." She is Muslim and he is Orthodox Christian and the couple wishes to marry without a religious ceremony since neither of them plans to convert-despite wishes from both their families for any future children to be "Muslim" or "baptised within the church". Aeronautics engineers Theodoros Smpiliris and Ayca Kolukisa were married in a civil ceremony in Greece in 2019 before throwing a festive celebration in Turkey.

"For my parents it doesn't matter that Theo is Greek or Orthodox. What is important is that he is a good person," says Kolukisa. Smpiliris, for his part, admits to having come a long way as far as his views on Turkey. "At school, history books created resentment. We grew up with the idea that Turkey was the enemy," he says.

'Listen to each other'

Some political or religious subjects remain sore among family and friends, such as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's 2020 decision to convert the Hagia Sophia museum and former basilica to a mosque. "But all you have to do is talk to each other and listen to each other to bring the tension down," says Smpiliris. The couple recently launched an Instagram profile called "Ouzo and Loukoum" in order to "show Greeks the beauty of Turkey and Turks the treasures of Greece," says Kolukisa. "Our family is like a bridge between the two countries," Smpiliris says.

Researcher and Turkish native Sukru Ilicak discovered Greece in the 90s through rebetiko-a musical genre created by Greek refugees in exile. He moved to Greece permanently when he married his partner Olga Antonea, a graphic designer, in 2016. "We share the same values and the same politics," says the 49-year-old. "Diplomatic relations aren't going to influence our relationship. "If we can have a Greco-Turkish love story, why should it be any different on a larger scale between our countries?" - AFP