Help with Turkish girls name

[littleElif]

hiya,

we are having a little girl due and want a Turkish first name (I am Turkish). Our list is down to two names and just wanted see how these names sound to UK-mums:

• Nilay (Nee-lie)
• Filiz (Feeleez)

quite like both of them but started to wonder if the latter sounds a bit like a STD

Which one do you think sounds nicer? I just don't want a name needs too much explaining or might sound too odd in a English-speaking country IYSWIM...

Thanks!

Hi,
I'm half turkish cypriot (my mum) and I love the name Filiz (have a friend called that so it might be why) and it sounds good in english, Nilay also sounds really good, think I like that one better, the more I say it the more I like it
I think Ayse, Senel, Canan, Seda and Mayrem also sound good in english.
There are a lot of really lovely names in Turkish.

Hope you find the right one.

I prefer Nilay.

I like Filiz; I lived in Turkey for a while and loved this name - very feminine sounding. My favourite girl's name was Selen...

I can't see Nilay as anything other than "Neye lay" but Filiz seems to stick correctly in my head :) Neither sounds any odder than any other name of foreign origin to my English ears though.

Both are nice. (To this native english speaker anyway.)

Nilay might be turned into Nee-lay though, rather than Nee-Lie.

But Filiz might be turned into Phil-izz.

They are both nice names, obvioulsy some people will mispronounce names whatever you are called, my name is Joanne and when I lived in Turkey I was always called Joanneh, obvioulsy they thought the anne bit should be pronounced like anne - mother!

My girls are half Turkish, my eldest is Jasmine, although she gets called Yasemin sometimes in Turkey and the little one is Rojin, she sometimes gets called Rosie by people who have never heard her name before.

Out of the two names you have chosen I think I prefer Nilay.