Turkey: 11-year-old donates hair to cancer patients

YALOVA, Turkey

An 11-year-old Turkish girl donated her hair to children with leukemia as part of a campaign.

The Life Without Cancer Organization started the campaign "Let my hair be yours".

Ece Su Dagistanli lives with her family in the northwestern province of Yalova.

She had been growing her hair for some time and wanted to get a haircut.

Her parents, Zafer and Mergul reached out to volunteer hairdresser Melike Deneva to have their daughter's hair cut for donation.

"I got really excited. I was thrilled to do something for children with leukemia," the girl said.

"We must do everything in our powers to make them feel that they are not alone," she said urging others to join the drive.

Hairdresser Deneva said she was moved by the hardship that cancer patients go through and decided to support the project.

"One of my relatives who has cancer came to me and asked me to dye her wig. Because the wig was part-synthetic material, we were unable to do that.

"I gave her a wig from my stock. Her friend heard about it and came and asked me for one. So I gave her one too," Deneva said.

Deneva said she realized that there were no volunteer hairdressers in her province and so she joined the organization and began collecting donations at her hair salon.

As a volunteer for the last six months, she said she has collected 12 hair donations and will send them to the organization's headquarters in Istanbul.

*Writing by Merve Aydogan in Ankara.