Sailing
to
Byzantium
A Love Affair
Dan Elliott
for
MICHAEL ROOSE
without whose enduring friendship I would never have gone or returned to Turkey
and for
MICHAEL ROOSE
who found the same and a very different country
Table of Contents
Sailing to Byzantium by William Butler Yeats
A Few Notes about Turkish (Türkçe)
Beginnings
Turkey 1977-8
Journey East 1985
Sea Coasts 1989
West to East and Back 2002
The Tour Guide 2004
No Country for Old Men 2011
Why Has Your Hair Turned White, My Friend
Sailing to Byzantium by William Butler Yeats
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
- Those dying generations - at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
A Few Notes about Turkish (Türkçe)
Turks insist that their language is the hardest on earth to learn. As one who has formally
studied it and some Russian, Spanish, and German, I can state that it is undoubtedly the easiest of
those. As one who has taught English, I am thankful each day I am a native speaker. Turkish is
100% regular (the verb “to be” is a slight exception), and there are no bothersome plurals or
genders to memorize. It is totally phonetic. Basic roots are used for all parts of speech, and word
formation is very easy and easily understandable once you get the knack.
There are a few consonants that are not in standard English or are pronounced differently.
c is pronounced as a “j” (j is actually a non-Turkish consonant used in borrowed words and
pronounced as a “j” or a “zh”)
ç is pronounced as “ch”
ş is pronounced as “sh”
ğ lengthens the vowel in front of it as a kind of bridge (k becomes a ğ between two vowels)
There is also a capped “a”, â, that is going out of style and a holdover from Ottoman. It is
pronounced like a growling “ya”—though I am not sure if I ever got it down completely.
Turkish is a very melodious language due a fairly strict principle of vowel harmony (foreign
borrowings are exceptions). Of the eight vowels, four are formed in the front of the mouth and
four in the back, hence front and back. Four are made with lips either pursed or not, hence
rounded and unrounded. Go ahead and try them; you will see.
UNROUNDED
ROUNDED
FRONT
e
i
ö
ü
BACK
a
ı
o
u
Take special note of the undotted i (ı)—pronounced like “uh.”
1. Back vowels are followed by back vowels; front vowels are followed by front vowels.
Do not cross the back/front boundary with your suffixes.
2. Unrounded vowels are followed by unrounded vowels.
3. For rounded vowels it is open season and usually depends on the suffix. (There are
actually rules which—like tying a bowtie—are easier to put into practice than to explain.)
The more seemingly more complex agglutination refers to suffixes added to a root to
indicate person, number, possession, tense, passive, negative, mood, and so on.
el = hand
eller = hands (hand + plural)
elim = my hand (hand + first person singular possessive)
elin = your hand (hand + second person possessive)
ellerimiz = our hands (hand + plural + first person plural possessive)
ellerimizden = from our hands (as above + from suffix)
şapka = hat
şapkam = my hat,
şapkanız = your hats
şapkamızda = in (or on) our hats.
(Notice how we keep the principles of vowel harmony.)
Verbs, though, are really fun.
gel is the root for come (and also the command)
gelmek (gel + mek) = to come (come + infinitive)
geliyorum (gel + iyor + um) = I am coming (come + present continuous tense + I)
gelmiyorum (gel + mi + [i]yor +um) = I am not coming (come + negative + present
continuous tense + I)
gelebileceğim (gel + ebil + ecek + im)= I will be able to come (come + ability modifier +
future tense [the k turns into a ğ between two vowels] + I)
gelemiyeceğim (gel + emi +y+ ecek + t + im)= I won’t be able to come (come + negative
ability modifier + bridging y between two vowels + future tense + I)
gelmiyecekmiştim (gel + mi + y +ecek + miş +t +im)= It was said that I would not be
coming ( come + negative + future tense + reported speech + past tense + I)
So the longest word in Turkish is
Çekoslovakyalılaştıramadıklarımızdanmışsınız
or “You are said to be one of those that we couldn’t change into a Czechoslovak.” That’s ten or
more suffixes on a noun that becomes a verb and then a compete sentence.
I could give many more examples but would just be showing off. And I bet already made
mistakes.
Let’s see, word order is noun, object, verb, unless you want to emphasize, say, the object then
it would be first. Stress is usually on the last syllable except for borrowed words when it falls on
the next-to-last, though place names are variable (as in İs TAN bul and AN kara). [Note the
dotted İ of vowel harmony in the first. I am dispensing with that in this word and the ü that really
should be in Türk.]
Atatürk (a combination of “father + Turk.”) way back in the 1920s was instrumental in
eliminating the many Arabic and Persian words of Ottoman Turkish, bringing back or inventing
standard Turkish words, and changing to the Latin script which befits the language more than the
Arabic/Ottoman. Turkish has changed so much since that Atatürk’s speeches have had to be
“translated” three times over so the populace could understand them. Foreign language
borrowings are now the major exceptions to Turkish “purity.”
Now that I have thoroughly confused you, let’s get on with the story.
~1~
Beginnings
“The best way to enter Istanbul is by sea,” I had read not long before I first made my way
to that charmed city. I tended, and still do, to take such pronouncements—if they come from an
even vaguely authoritative source—at face value and plan accordingly. So that was why I, still
blissfully unaware of Yeats’ masterpiece, was standing on the deck of a Turkish Maritime liner
in the Marmara Sea as it headed into the Bosphorus, that little sliver of water that connects the
Marmara with the Black Sea in the late morning one day in early March1977.
How did it come to pass that I was sailing then to Byzantium? And why am I, an older
and hopefully wiser man, still trying to unravel the tangled threads that led to that trip, my
extended stay, and my life-long fascination with that land? Like Yeats in his later years (but for
vastly different reasons), I perceive that literal journey as a metaphorical one. Mostly for the
good, my post-sojourn life was invariably colored by experiences in that foreign country.
While on the deck, I did not think I was particularly young a month before I was to turn
27. I also did not think I was totally unprepared for starting a new life in this celebrated city. I
had several hundred dollars in travelers checks—a fortune in my mind—in my pocket and
foolishly expected that to last me about six months. If I did not find work, I would turn tail and
return to the states. I had two years of Turkish language studies under my belt, had read
extensively in Ottoman and Turkish history and culture, and was something of a maven of
Byzantine architectural history. Better equipped than most who ended up here by accident, I was
ready, wasn’t I?
It was wonder, trepidation, excitement, and any number of other emotions that coursed
through my brain that morning. There was also nostalgia—in the sense of longing for an
idealized past, very Yeatsian—that doesn’t trouble me as much now when I am in or think about
~2~
this city that straddles two continents. Now it is embarrassment and amusement about how green
I was and unprepared for the glories I would encounter.
From the boat deck, I was ogling remnants of the ancient defensive land and sea walls,
domes and minarets aplenty, the Beyazit and Galata towers, the storied hills of this New Rome,
the mouth of the Golden Horn, the bobbing Galata Bridge, the frenzied ferry traffic in the
waterways, the scruffy nape of the Bosphorus, the incongruously modern Atatürk Bridge, the
delicate lonely Kız Külesi on her own little island, the Hydarpaşa train station holding court on
this westernmost spit of Asia, and the misty silhouettes of the Princes’ Islands off to my right.
Did my virgin eyes and consciousness take in all this? Probably not—it is simply too
much. This is a view “for old men.” One doesn’t need the sea voyage to enter Istanbul; one just
needs to get there the first time. On subsequent visits, these sights will stir you to the core in
more fundamental ways. Istanbul—like all great cities—has to be experienced at street level first
before one can really appreciate its many charms and complexities from afar.
In some ways that I will attempt to elucidate, I was then “a paltry thing, a tattered coat
upon a stick.” I was believing of absolutes and certainties that four further decades of life experiences have worn thin to the point of transparency. Yeats the poet, saw Byzantium as an
“artifice of eternity” and a paradise. The younger me would have agreed; the present me now in
my seventh decade of life knows it is just as much eternal artifice, and I love it all the more.
I hadn’t always yearned for and loved this city that graces two continents, two seas, and
two navigable slivers of water, and—some might say—two religious currents. I trace my fascination back to the sixth grade when a chance remark from a classmate set the wheels of my fate
in motion. He and I were lounging near the basketball court of the new junior high we would be
~3~
entering that fall when he turned to me and asked, “What city has three names?” Though a star in
geography and history, I was stymied. Then he smirked, “Byzantium, Constantinople, Istanbul.”
For many of you, like Yeats, those three words conjure up a magnificent world of
“hammered gold and gold enameling,” “moonlit dome[s],” and “monuments of unageing
intellect” (an apology for really misusing all of his metaphors). It is possible those place names
may have triggered similar images for the wet-behind-the-ears youth I was then.
Or maybe that all came later.
This sixth grade thing is significant, I now realize, for at that prepubescent time I was
blissfully unaware of the “complexities, [t]he fury and the mire of human veins.” Though my
female classmates were sprouting little nubbins of breasts and overtaking the boys in height, it
wasn’t until the next year that my fellow males so progressed. Then they too quickly overtook
me whose voice hadn’t cracked, whose body was still as hairless as a newborn babe, and whose
musculature remained insignificant. Oh, sixth grade was the glorious end of those golden years,
the days before hormones and sexual yearning held us in sway. It took me years, nay decades, to
catch up, if I ever have. I might never have gotten as far as I have if I had not set sail to
Byzantium.
Be that as it may, I cleared junior and regular high school as a not unpopular student who
was more than a little eccentric. I liked to read—even back then I was devouring massive novels
in lieu of football and basketball practice and weekend nights out. Second shortest of the boys in
the school, I had furtively seen in gym class that the only other I had a bare inch on in height was
more significantly accelerated in his manly development than I. I had chaste dates to the junior
and senior proms but otherwise was without a consort.
~4~
My biggest break before the Orient1 was going off to Indiana University and spending the
first of many nights away from my childhood home. Bloomington may have only been 60 miles
from my hometown, but it might as well have been in another dimension. I was still physically
and sexually at the back of the pack and a too quixotic student, but a whole new world of
academics and experiences opened up. I started learning Russian and studying art and
architectural history. Somewhere along the line—shades of that sixth grade casual query?—I
fancied myself a lover of the Byzantine.
As a senior I had course hours to fill with electives and decided to study another
language. Though Greek would have made more sense, I enrolled in an introductory Turkish
class. Actually since by this time my Byzantine fixation was almost exclusively centered on
Hagia Sophia, the sixth century Justinian marvel of Constantinople/Istanbul—a building I knew I
would visit one day—this was maybe an understandable choice.
The Russian language, in those cold war years, was considered an appropriate area of
study—but Turkish had a totally different cachet, one that I was proud to trumpet. After earning
my B.A., I spent another year doing advanced Turkish and Inner Asian studies. I may have still
been physically in Southern Indiana, but in many ways I was already meandering amongst the
minarets of the ruined Ottoman Empire if not trotting on the steppes of Central Asia.
A move to Washington, D.C. soon after should have been a professional and social high
water mark. But I ended up in a satellite office of a University of Miami conservative think
tank.2 Though hired as a Russian and Turkish translator/scholar who was to flesh out their
1
Yes, this is a loaded term that will be discussed further. I still like to think that the magical allure of the “Orient”
represents, for me at least, just a simple escape from the confines of growing up in a small, homogeneous
Midwestern town. You might ask, “Just like the confederate flag represents a wonderful way of life in the
antebellum South?”
2
In those years well before the Regan “Revolution,” such a place was considered an oxymoron among my peers
and most of the civilized world.
~5~
research on the Turkic speaking peoples of the then Soviet Union, I was more valuable because I
could remove the jams from our recalcitrant copy machine and remember how our few but wellheeled donors took their coffee when they occasionally visited the office. 3 For this they paid me
a seemingly obscene amount of money which fueled a relatively sedate lifestyle and allowed me
to fairly quickly pay off most of my college loans and save for the next phase of my
education/life.
I was still not dating but considered myself straight as an arrow. I lived in a 13-story
apartment complex on the fringes of Dupont Circle in a building that housed many of the
prostitutes who walked the nearby streets of Logan and Scott Circles. The other prominent
demographic was a platoon of interesting and handsome homosexual—I don’t think the term gay
had been appropriated quite yet by general society; more pejorative terms were used—men. The
highlight of the building was the rooftop pool where the boys cavorted on the northside deck
most sunny summer weekend afternoons. A few hookers and I quietly took second stage on the
opposite side—the ladies of the night to recharge their batteries, and I to dig into yet another
hefty tome.
I had many acquaintances and one good friend, a hopelessly straight man named Matt
who I had befriended on bus rides into the city when I had briefly been a commuter from my
sister’s home. Matt was desultorily pursuing an engineering degree as he worked full time as a
manual laborer. Roughly handsome, genuinely genial and just a year or two younger, he too
hailed from a large Catholic family. While my high school years were taken up with student
council and pep rallies, Matt had taken the alternative route of bad boy high jinks. I was
endlessly fascinated with his tales of roaring around Corning, NY on his motorcycle and leaving
3
It took another 20 or 30 years—after the fall of the USSR, the discovery of oil reserves in the various stans, and
the rise of Muslim fundamentalism—before the world at large focused much attention on this area. By then, I had
moved on too.
~6~
a shower of sparks when he planted his nail-studded boot heels to the ground. He had drunk and
caroused a lot, had years ago given up his virginity, and had already had a long and ultimately
semi-tragic love affair. Living life by proxy was I.
We spent most weekends together and even more time when he moved into my studio
apartment after he lost his lease. Matt’s presence (as well as the example of the swimming pool
crew) was ever so gradually prying open the closet door I desperately wanted firmly shut and
also blasted to blithereens. But our relationship more closely resembled Oscar and Felix of “The
Odd Couple” than the torrid dynamic I may have preferred of Stanley Kowalski and Blanche
DuBois. Had I made a tentative move of gentle groping, Matt may have not resisted whether out
of curiosity or, more likely, pity. Another dear friend just three years earlier had allowed just
that, my only remotely shared sexual experience up to then.
But Matt provided more than a foil to my suppressed yearnings. You see, Matt, in addition to all those non-Dan activities, had also travelled on a shoestring in Europe and Asia and
had some grand tales of hippie Istanbul cafes and characters that easily outstripped those from
my academic studies. Under his guidance and assurance, I soon had the essentials for international travel: a backpack, substantial hiking shoes—my Swiss mountain boots were seemingly
large enough to ferry me across the waves had they not weighed two pounds each—a passport,
and a ticket out of town.
So on a snowy mid-February morning after a champagne and homemade cream puff bon
voyage party at the institute, I took the second airplane journey of my life away from the only
country and the only continent I had known up to then.
In Paris, I was met by two recently-married friends from university who were doing their
dissertation research on French Gothic churches. They babysat me for a few days as a way
~7~
easing me into the new linguistic and cultural world I was now immersed in. My first forays on
my own were not very auspicious. I was sure my rudimentary French would greatly offend, but
the lure of patisserie wares, delicious coffee, and proximity to many of the monuments and
paintings I had studied, had a way of blunting my well-honed midwestern reserve.
Five days each in Paris, Rheims, and Clermont-Ferrand; then I was really off on my own.
I took a train to Marseille to rendezvous with that Turkish liner coming from Barcelona. I had
dearly wanted to travel steerage (as first class was out of the question), but the agent in Paris was
only authorized to issue a one-step-up third-class berth. Only a dozen fellow passengers were
aboard. I still remember the Turkish brothers who studied in France and were heading back for a
family visit. I got to practice my more scholastic Turkish with them and the more numerous
crew. Two recently discharged U.S. Army soldiers had, like me, saved up for the journey they
were embarking on. They were planning to get to Istanbul, go overland to India then Japan while
“fucking as many cheap whores” as they could along the way.
A two-hour stay in Naples where could do little more than try the pizza, a stormy pass
along Italy’s boot, a mercifully short dock on the Pireaus piers, then on to Istanbul.
~8~
ISTANBUL 1977-78
I think I started realizing the enormity of my decision to live in a foreign country in the
middle of the Galata Bridge after we had disembarked in Karaköy and were heading toward the
Sultanahmet4 section of Istanbul. In many ways this ant colony or beehive of activity is the
center of Istanbul life. “This is the Sublime Port,” I may have thought.
The bridge at that time was on pontoons and gently bobbed in the water—luckily I still
had my sea legs. Off to my left were the darting ferries taking passengers up the Bosphorus or
over to the Asian side. Then I could spot the Sirkeci Train Station where I would have arrived a
half century before had I taken the Orient Express. On the rise was the vast complex of Topkapı
Palace, the home of the sultans, the harem, the eunuchs, and innumerable treasures. Right behind
that on the skyline was the most hallowed of my desires to see, the 1450-year-old Hagia Sophia
or the Church/Mosque/Museum of Holy Wisdom with its ungainly four minarets. Behind that
grand lady was the Sultan Ahmet or Blue Mosque which gets six minarets. Right in front of my
eyes was the Yeni (New) Mosque where flocks of pigeons hold court. Behind that was the
Egyptian or Spice Bazaar, an olfactory, botanical, medicinal, and culinary paradise that has since
devolved into a tacky tourist trap.
Along the crest of the hill were the baroque Nuruosmaniye Mosque, Beyazid Mosque and
Tower, and Istanbul University. Further to the right were the Rüstempaşa, Şeyzade, and Fatih
Mosques. Nestled among those was Sinan’s masterpiece and the granddaddy of them all—the
Süleymaniye. There was a fourth century Roman aqueduct too and, far off in the distance, the
4
The section of the city is commonly spelled as one word, but when referring to the mosque of the same name it is
two.
~9~
Theodosian land walls. Further still was Eyüp Mosque and cemetery. If you are on the bridge in
late afternoon and the light is just right, you will understand why this crooked slip of water the
bridge spans is called the Golden Horn—supposedly its surface then shimmers like the precious
metal. Behind me were the Pera hills and neighborhoods where Europeans tended to settle. Their
architectural highlight was the Galata Tower.
Or maybe I was actually asking the question, “This is the Sublime Port?” For other senses
than sight are involved. Belching fumes from the ferries, automobile exhaust, spilled gasoline
and rubbish in the waterways, the stench of dead fish, and body odor (honest sweat, though, and
not the pungent ripeness I sometimes encounter on New York City subways) tried to but never
completely overcame the gentler scent of freshly baked simit, a golden brown pretzely ring of
dough imbedded with sesame seeds—sellers called simitçi carried towering stacks of them
through the crowds. Other odors (and visual delights) vying for attention eminated from steamed
mussels, pan-fried sardines, snacks or fresh vegetables sold from pushcarts or rickety card tables
set up on the densely populated walkways. On platforms spanning the pontoons, the smell of
more roasted fish and kokoreç (does that sound nicer than intestine?) rise up to join that of the
fermenting bait of the many fishermen lining the rails on both sides of the bridge.
Sounds seemed to be in a constant crescendo and never ebb. Ferry horn blasts, autos
beeps, hammering, and ominous crunching stain and strain the air. But it was the din of constant
one-man commerce, “simit simit,” “kasset, kasset,” “gazette gazette,” “Marlboro Marlboro,”
and countless other come-ons, that tickled or assaulted the aural senses. Not yet in my
consciousness was the persistent cackle of tinny, badly amplified Turkish or arabesque music
that would surround me in most every public space in the next two years—that was a constant
~ 10 ~
just as prevalent as the obligatory picture of Atatürk in most every room in the country and his
bust in every square.
It’s crowded here. It’s jammed. People bustling to and fro, getting to their busses, their
dolmuş (shared taxi), ferries, trains. There are battalions of the jobless and rootless young and
not-so-young men in their ill-fitting sports coats, vests and formerly flashy leather shoes with the
heel cup folded down to the sole to make a clog-like slipper, who around hang the edges of any
crowd and nervously finger their worry beads. You also have to dodge the excited fisherman
(and their flying tackle) who think they have caught a marlin only to find it was a stray plastic
bag. In those days, there were even dancing bears (hobbled so that they could not put weight on
their back legs and so “danced” when made to rise up) on the streets.
There were scarved women in trench coats and peroxided hussies; rotund villagers in
şalvar, a ballooning pant with crotch below the knee; but only a sprinkling of females in the
çarşaf, the nun-like full length hooded tunic with veil and similar to the chador or burka we have
become familiar with from television accounts of Afghanistan and other countries.
The men were dark—glossy black hair, permanent five-o’clock shadow, bushy eyebrows,
flourishing moustaches, ebony eyes. Some were fashion magazine handsome, more than a few
bowlegged. They were all looking, looking, looking when not jesting with their compatriots or
jostling in a rag tag mini-soccer match on a matchbook-sized piece of pavement.
Most interesting and sad were the hamals, the human pack animals. They carried huge
loads on a wooden plank on their back. A padded hump on the bottom nestled on the sacrum and
raised the platform just enough so that, when the man was bent over almost 90 degrees, the load
was parallel to the ground. The hump, the resting edge on the shoulders, and a single rope from
the wooden edge that went up and over the shoulder for the man to grasp were all there was to
~ 11 ~
balance the load as he wove through the thicket of pedestrians and the slurry of the traffic. And
such loads—they routinely carried a large refrigerator or a Matterhorn of merchandise.
This was Istanbul.
My Army buddies and I got through the crowds and trudged on. By the gate to the
Archeological Museum, a tall, swarthy (you’ll hear this adjective a lot), handlebar-mustacioed
Turk in a mid-calf leather jacket stopped us to welcome us to the city and offer assistance. Then
he went into a long harangue about staying away from drugs. Billy Hayes had already escaped
from his Turkish prison and published his “Midnight Express” account, but the movie was not
yet out and in my or the public’s consciousness. Still, I knew about the danger of a life sentence
for buying, selling, or using hashish. And anyway, I was looking forward to many other Turkish
delights.
Later that evening, I ran into that same man again. He and his girlfriend—a wan young
thing as taken by his masculine good looks as I—took me to dinner. Over postprandial tea, he
offered to sell me a kilo of hash for $1,000, secret it in a decorative camel-shaped pillow, and
mail it off to an ally of mine in the states. I wouldn’t even have to touch the drug at any point,
and would reap a ten-fold or more reward. He might as well have asked for a million. And even
I, an obliging American—I mean, he did take me out to dinner—recognized a scam so patently
obvious. Though I worried that I would be fending off drug dealers constantly, that never
happened again.
I was rooming with my two ex-military shipmates in the Hotel Güngör (literally day +
see), a typically Spartan backpack-crowd dive where I would stay almost a month. This area of
Sultanahmet had some of the most amazing archeological sites of the ancient world; it also had a
strip of overpriced greasy restaurants, the vaunted Lâle Pudding Shop—the premier hippy/
~ 12 ~
trekker meeting place, indefatigable carpet salesmen, louts trying to score the attentions of a
female tourist, but only a couple of square centimeters of greenery in the dusty wasteland that
used to be the Hippodrome. But I was just one door away and across the street from Hagia
Sophia and seemingly on the stairway to heaven.
I had chided the boys about ever finding a brothel in the country. After all, I had studied
the language, the people and the customs and couldn’t conceive of it. The Turks were a clean
people, I said, and good Muslims—prostitution was an abomination. When they showed me their
slip of paper with the scribble “genel ev,” I knew I had them. “That means ‘public house,’” I
exclaimed, “That must be some kind of government facility. And the government would never
condone such behavior.” They just snickered, took the slip, hailed a taxi, and were gone for a
couple of hours while I did my aborted drug deal.
Upon returning, they were ecstatic; the experience was beyond their expectations. Behind
a guarded wall near the Galata Tower, scores of little houses lined tiny streets jam packed with
men of all ages and income levels. The scantily clad ladies lounged behind picture windows just
inches from view. If you were interested and could pay the $5, you went up the stairs and had
your way. This was exactly what they wanted, and they wanted it every stop along the Black Sea
coastline, in Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and points beyond.
Two nights later they both had copious penile discharge and rampant dysuria. As their
Turkish was negligible, they begged me to help them find an all-night pharmacy and potent
drugs. Though it was raining kediler and köpekler and my Turkish was geared for more
fashionable salons (“Do you prefer to make your börek with garlic or eggplant paste?”), the boys
and I found an eczane with the 24-hour decal, roused the owner, and somehow imparted to him
the nature of the emergency. He probably understood little of my doggerel, but one look at my
~ 13 ~
patients’ hang-dog looks as they gently held their grieving genitals was enough to convey the
message.
The pharmacist by adamant gestures (waving index finger, swinging head side to side,
and thrusting hips done all at the same time) and loud imprecations conveyed the meassage that
they refrain from intercourse for at least a week—I don’t think they were in any shape for it
anyhow. But it did not stop them from returning to the genel ev before they left town just to bid
adieu to their lady friends. Still not quite believing them, I tagged along for anthropological
purposes. It was all of the above and more—imagine the red light district of Amsterdam
reinterpreted as a Fellini nightmare and you will get a sense of it.
I had another outing with them, an All-Boys-Night, if you will. We went to the Çağaloğlu
Hamamı on the next street over for a massage and Turkish bath. The inadequate heating in the
hotel made this almost a necessity, but it also fulfilled my Oriental fantasies certainly much more
than the genel ev. And the gauzy overlay of time has elevated that evening to the mythic—I have
never again had such a wonderful encounter in a hamam though not for lack of trying.
A Turkish bath is a sensuous experience, mind you. And up to then my knowledge of the
sensuous was almost strictly theoretical and garnered from books. I grew up in a crowded happy
home where one simply did not while away the time in bodily ministrations. My little burg was
settled by Bavarian Germans who are more known for beer drinking and eugenics. In college I
had a few forays into the land of marijuana and psychedelics but was hardly a devotee of mindaltering substances. Nope, I was a curious and closeted little number ripe for pleasure—but not
too much. The hamam fit the bill.
The entry, though all marble, was hardly auspicious—humid air (it was a bath house after
all), a cheap geometric patterned rug in electric colors, obsequious swarthy bare-chested men
~ 14 ~
with their palms already out for tips, piles of towels and wraps, and the omnipresent pumping of
pop music in the background were what we encountered. We quickly disrobed in our separate
little compartments and donned the demure peştamal (a thin cotton wrap worn like a sarong) and
takunya (ankle-injury-inducing wooden clogs with a single inch-wide leather band that are near
impossible to keep on or walk in).
We were led through the main bath chamber, a stunning marble domed delight, to side
rooms (the medium-temperature room or tepidarium of Roman times) and left to simmer for a
few minutes and ponder our coming wash and massage. After the two soldiers were called, I had
only a short time before my tellâk or masseur (a well muscled young man with hardly an ounce
of fat and with a prodigious carpet of black chest hair) came for me.
And what I vision I beheld back in the main room (the hot room or sıcaklık): my fellow
countrymen were still visible through wisps of steam and belly down on the hot “navel stone” in
the center. This heart of the bath is under the dome which is studded with star-shaped little
twinkling windows but over the subterranean wood fire that heats the air and water. My buddies
were splayed out and quite seemingly content (though emitting on occasional groan) as their
modern day janissaries—studs not quite to the perfection of my masseur but still formidable—
walked on their backs and legs. In times of fear the timid can get preternatural strength, but I was
still no match for my date for the night. He dragged me out and slapped me down on the hot
stone and began a number of bone and joint wrenching maneuvers more appropriate to a torture
chamber than a sybaritic session, but at least he didn’t try to take a stroll on my spine or legs.
The soft tissue kneading portion was mercifully short—I had either devolved into a mass of
quivering jelly or my walking wet dream of a partner was satisfied my gasping yelps of
pleasure/pain were indicative of total submission.
~ 15 ~
Then we, the dirty quarter dozen, were more rolled than towed to the periphery for the
bath proper. Seated in warm gray marble niches beside commode-sized basins of the same
material, I was doused with scalding water from a deep Frisbee-like scoop. I feared that Arctic
cold splashes would soon follow once I adjusted to the hot. Luckily I was spared that but got a
thorough lathering and another few more dashes of the scalding water as I gasped for breath.
By the way, the six of us were still attired in those light cotton sarongs which had now
gotten quite soggy and left little to the imagination. On one level I knew we were to remain
draped throughout the session, but another part of me equated bathing with getting fully naked. I
didn’t know how “we” were going to manage this.
It was quite simple really; my covering was untucked and partially unrolled and then sort
of bunched up between my legs. Switcho presto, and I was ready for the kese, an abrasive mitt
with which my man servant proceeded to sandpaper off a few layers of dermis. Mind you, I
hadn’t up to then neglected my toilette and had been thoroughly soaped and rinsed just seconds
before. But when the gray sheets of dead skin came rolling off and dropping to the floor, it was
hard not to think I was actually a pretty dirty fellow. More suds, more scalding on what was now
even more sensitive skin, and my man had had his way with me. He handed me the soap and
dish and indicated I should do my nether regions, the only bits of me he hadn’t tended, under the
sopping cotton. See, one can bath and be modest at the same time—the tricky part is to get all the
soap out of the cotton after the final bit of wash (lots of scoops of water do the job). He let me
catch my breath then took me back out, changing my wet dainties for a crisp warm wrap (there
had to have been a microsecond when I was in my natural glory), threw a toasty towel over my
shoulders and another as a turban on my head, then escorted me to my padded bench in my
~ 16 ~
changing room. I soon had a tulip glass of hot tea in my hands, and all I had to do was relax. My
friends got similar handling. Glorious.
That was the deluxe treatment and we paid accordingly and happily. On other occasions
at other venues, I have had to endure surly attendants constantly begging for tips, uninspired
massages, tepid water, and cracked and dirty marble accoutrements. I have had soaks in baths
designed by the master architect Sinan; I have also had to do my ministrations in woefully
tawdry public facilities in Beyoğlu when my apartment’s water supply went on the blink for
months. The first time was the best.
At least I didn’t have to put up with what my friend Kevin, whom you will meet soon,
encountered on one of his trip to a hamam. He purportedly slipped on an errant piece of soap and
went airborne, losing in the process his enveloping peştamal—knowing Kevin, I imagine it
would have been loose. The other patrons came clomping over as fast as their clumsy takunya
would allow. They then proceeded to cover him up before they toddled off again, leaving him
still spread eagle on the floor.
Hm, this was supposed to be tale of the glories of Byzantium, and it has already
degenerated into a chronicle of carnality. I did so want to avoid giving the impression that I, like
many foreign visitors before and after me, found this portion of the world to be a large candy jar
just ready for the picking. That I was coming to the Mediterranean for erotic encounters with
those I deemed inferior or sexually more available or pliant. I can’t plead ignorance of Edward
Said’s arguments at this late date—I actually bought a hardback copy of “Orientalism” soon after
returning from Turkey. (For the wrong reason, of course: I loved the cover.) But I have never had
much truck with his assertion that scholars and artists worked hand-in-hand with the colonial
imperialist conquerors of those lands. Or that ignorance of the “real” goes only from the
~ 17 ~
Americas and Europe eastward. Plus his prose is—let’s hope it’s not the pot calling the kettle
black—turgidly unreadable. As far as I was concerned, Turkey or “The Orient” was not rural
Indiana, and that was alright by me.
But let’s retract to a less profane plane and to the ostensible reason for my trip in the first
place—this whole Byzantine thing.
On my first full day in Istanbul, I could hardly believe I was going to visit my new
neighbor Sophie. This was a dream come true. I had studied the floor plan, the biographies of
the principal involved in its construction, pored over countless pictures of most every inch of the
building top to bottom, committed the elevations to memory, trembled at the thought of the
numerous earthquakes that threatened to topple the structure completely, grieved over its
conversion to a mosque some 500 years ago, grimaced at all the inept attempts at conservation
and rejoiced to learn that mosaics long thought gone were discovered when their plaster cover
was removed.
Foremost in my mind through all that was the historian Procopius’ first-hand account.
[The Church] is distinguished by indescribable beauty, excelling both in
its size, and in the harmony of its measures, having no part excessive and none
deficient; being more magnificent than ordinary buildings, and much more
elegant than those which are not of so just a proportion. The church is singularly
full of light and sunshine; you would declare that the place is not lighted by the
sun from without, but that the rays are produced within itself, such an abundance
of light is poured into this church.... Thus far I imagine the building is not
incapable of being described, even by a weak and feeble tongue…. No one ever
became weary of this spectacle, but those who are in the church delight in what
they see, and, when they leave, magnify it in their talk. Moreover it is impossible
accurately to describe the gold, and silver, and gems, presented by the Emperor
Justinian, but by the description of one part, I leave the rest to be inferred. That
part of the church which is especially sacred, and where the priests alone are
allowed to enter, which is called the Sanctuary, contains forty thousand pounds'
weight of silver.5
5
W. Lethabv and H. Swainson, The Church of St. Sophia Constantinople, New York: 1894, pp. 24-28.
~ 18 ~
That was what I had been waiting for.
The day (actually my first full day in Istanbul remember) was overcast with a damp sea
breeze invading every cranny of the city, the late winter smog was particularly bitter, and I
probably hadn’t slept too well in anticipation. But I just had to walk across the street to enter the
vaunted structure. My god, going into the main vessel from the narthex was simply breathtaking,
the interplay of light and space was incredible, the progression from pendentives and half domes
to the hovering central dome was pure lyricism, the capital carvings were as delicate as anything
I had ever seen, the mosaics were practically divine, the wealth of stone was magnificent, and the
scale was awe-inspiring. Except I wasn’t awe-inspired.
This structure that I longed to see and experience seemed, even with all her marvelous
accoutrements, almost an empty shell. Where was the “light and sunshine,” the rays that seem to
come from within, “the abundance of light,” the “gold, and silver, and gems,” “the sacred”? I
gave up a well-paying job (okay, I hated it) and a comfortable way of life (ditto) for this? I really
was a bit crestfallen that day and did not experience the overwhelming wonder that should have
been there. It was not until I had seen St. Mark’s in Venice—where a lot of Byzantium’s treasure
had come to roost—some 22 years later and was able to extrapolate that chaotic, wondrous, and,
most importantly, alive space to Hagia Sophia and imagine the church as the learned historian
described it and come to treasure it properly.
Is this the truth? Or Truth? And does it matter to anyone besides myself? I am looking
back at events that took place over 30 years ago and have experienced much in the intervening
years. Memoirs are self-serving exercises in a lot of ways. There can be the craving for revenge,
the yearning to put things in a better light, the vain hope that age brought some sort of
equanimity and peace, as well as the desire to be entertaining. There is the hope to speak the
~ 19 ~
truth, but also the knowledge that this is somewhat elusive. Some the great memoirs of my
younger days state this up front in their titles. Lillian Hellman’s “Pentimento” hearkens to the
original image in a painting that becomes visible when the top layer of paint gets transparent
with age. Gore Vidal’s “Palimpsest” uses a similar term, the faint remains or “ghost image” that
linger after something is scraped off a parchment manuscript, to convey the malleability of
memory. I am hardly immune.
And I want to lay some blame on the city itself, this Byzantium, Constantinople, and
Istanbul, in its multi-layered, mysterious, “Oriental,” and marvelous garb. This city I visit and
experience again and again. This chameleon city that never stops changing in a country of contrasts. Like my faded or even spurious memories, pentimentos and palimpsests are the remains
themselves scattered, half buried or barely glimpsed around the city. Most of the churches
suffered the fate of my grand lady and were turned into mosques. Not all the mosaics and
paintings were lost—many were just plastered over and revealed centuries later. The Church of
the Holy Apostles, though, was torn down to make room for the Fatih Mosque. To the victor go
the spoils.
The area around Hagia Sophia and Justinian’s two other churches in the neighborhood
was full of dilapidated working class housing when I lived in Sultanahmet. Now those renovated
spacious wooden firetraps are fashionable boutique hotels that cater to discerning tourists who
want an alternative to the modern skyscraper and a more “authentic” experience. I cannot point
the finger; I too was looking and still search for the same.
Actually, this whole Byzantine scholar thing is a sham. When I try to read Byzantine
history (or most any history for that matter), my eyes glaze over from all the wars, the multitude
of adversaries (Persians, Vandals, Goths of all stripes, Slavs, Arabs, Khazars, Balkan tribes, and
~ 20 ~
even Varangians—who in the hell are they?), dynasties (those Komnenians and Paleologians),
and all that iconoclast/iconodule nonsense. It is quite exhausting.
And then the art? I once wrote a paper for a senior year art history seminar that posited
that Early Christian and Byzantine art was “inferior” folk art because they didn’t have a tradition
of monumental sculpture. I thought it a grand and compelling thesis and fully expected my
advisor would urge me to develop it for an eventual dissertation. I am still a bit miffed at this late
day that he was thoroughly appalled by my, it must be admitted, witlessness. When the
Metropolitan Museum staged their “Glory of Byzantium” exhibit in 2004, I—who rarely missed
a Met show—couldn’t be bothered to attend. Enough of the icons already.
No, I am not a scholar; I am more like a celebrity seeker or, worse, a stalker. I imagine
that I could be friends with Justinian and Theodora. You know, kind of hang out with them. And
while stalkers, however deluded, live in the same century as their prey, I am about 1500 years
too late.
Now my friends are pretty extraordinary characters. Justinian was born into a peasant
family, rose to greatest of heights, reestablished almost all of the Roman Empire, rewrote the
Roman legal code that is the basis of jurisprudence in many countries to this day, and—most
importantly for us—built Hagia Sophia (and a number of other buildings that are to be
cherished). Now he didn’t have it easy by a long shot. He almost lost it all early on in the Nike
Riots of 532 when all the rival factions of the Hippodrome united against him and burned the old
Hagia Sophia to the ground. He almost scurried out of town and into obscurity, but his wife
Theodora bade him, “For an Emperor to become a fugitive is not a thing to be endured...I hold
with the old saying that purple makes an excellent shroud.” He had to break a few eggs (actually
about 30,000 unarmed civilians according to Procopius) to make his omelet, but he triumphed.
~ 21 ~
Ah, Theodora. She had a wild young life before she married Justinian. She may or may
not have been a common prostitute; she certainly did become a popular actress (she did a Leda
and the Swan number where she stripped, lay down on her back, and had attendents strew barley
on her bare belly) and a courtesan. But she gave all that up when only 22 and set herself up as a
wool spinner near the Byzantine palace where she caught the eye and heart of Justinian. They
stayed together—she the power behind the throne—until her death from cancer at 58.
Such wonderful characters. I like to do a kind of mental photo shop and put myself with
them in the imperial box in the west gallery of Hagia Sophia on opening day. We are all high
fiving each other and having such a wonderful time.
I did have my picture taken with Theodora, though. At San Vitale in Ravenna in 2009, I
made a perplexed Japanese tourist lie on the floor practically under my legs in order to get me
and the hovering presence of the mosaiced empress in the same shot. The lighting wasn’t good
and I was probably using the wrong camera mode, but there I am like an icteric toad, belly even
more distorted by the angle, grinning like a madman. But you can see her, serene and hieratic,
above and behind me. Friends indeed.
This Byzantine and Orient thing will weave in and out of my tale, but at that time I had to
recover from my chastening Hagia Sophia non-epiphany and concentrate on more mundane
matters. Before I came to Istanbul, a former Turkish language classmate, who had spent the
previous year living there and who was now back at Indiana doing his masters, provided me with
the names and addresses of a school where I might get employment as a teacher and a contact
who could show me the ropes. My next big foray in town was tracking them down.
~ 22 ~
The English language school, The Turkish American Association (TAA), was located in
Şişli,6 a fashionable neighborhood right above Taksim, the center of modern Istanbul on the Pera
side of the European portion of the city. I got an interview right off with the director, an
American woman who had married a Turk decades before and was now a widow. Her days as
the leader of the school were soon to end—she was joining her children who had moved to
Virginia. She had an appalling Turkish accent and faulty grammar but could make herself easily
understood, what with her stentorian manner. Though she did not have an opening at the
moment, she served me tea and told many a grand tale of living the life of an exile in Istanbul
and Anatolia. I think the thing she wanted me to learn from her insights was that all Turks were
like little children. Hm.
Her teaching staff, notwithstanding the name of the institute, was all Australian; but
Kevin, the Aussie I was trying to find, was no longer employed there. A swing by the apartment
in nearby Kurtuluş where he was supposedly living brought me to the door of four of the five
TAA faculty members but no Kevin. Though we all became fast friends and/or roommates later,
one of the current tenants gave me a frosty welcome and summarily told me I could find Kevin
“at the Hilton Hotel on Sunday afternoon…he works in the art gallery there” before shutting the
door.
Generally a new arrival is considered welcome fresh blood and quickly taken aside for
strategic lecturing—like the director and her warnings about the Turks—and hopefully enlisted
as a supporter of his or her side of an ongoing feud. The Kurtuluş crowd turned out to be fun
loving and generally sympathetic to each other. Living and working together and without much
fluency in Turkish, they were just a bit frayed at the edges. I never got to the bottom of their
6
Şişli is also the home of the Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk.
~ 23 ~
antipathy to Kevin, though I can guess. Whatever it was, it was soon mended, and he was back
in their good graces right after I came along.
So I had a day or two before the Kevin piece of the puzzle fell into place. I spent it
around my temporary home touring the warren of streets in and around the Covered and the
Spice Bazaars. These were the silent days of my early time in the city—the army guys had
boarded a boat to the Black Sea coast, and I moved into a private room at the hotel. Though I had
a strong base in pronunciation and grammar, my Turkish was still rudimentary and almost
useless in a conversation. Still less than a month away from my former life, I could not quite
believe I was here.
But Istanbul is never quiet. The streets and the forementioned markets are alive with a
cacophony of constant sound: the grunts of the hamals trying to deliver the stack of goods on
their backs, the beseeching of store owners for customers, the haggling over merchandise, the
greetings of friends and acquaintances, the barks of lottery sellers, the ever-present and loudlyplayed pop music, and the fractured English of the workers vying for the attention of a blonde
beauty or a wary customer. It hasn’t changed much over the years though the human pack
animals are gone, there are different pop music stars, and the workers’ English is much better.
The Covered or Grand Bazaar dates from 1461 and is one of the largest and oldest
covered markets in the world. The bazaar was vastly enlarged in the 16th century during the
reign of Süleyman the Magnificent and underwent a major restoration in 1894 following an
earthquake. It has more than 58 streets and 1,200 shops under one roof and attracts up to 400,000
visitors daily. It is well known for its jewelry, pottery, leather goods, and carpets, but it has
practically everything under the sun. The wares are mainly grouped by type which makes it easy
to comparison shop. But it makes one an easy mark for customer harassment—the salesmen
~ 24 ~
don’t like to take no for an answer. It is not just for tourists; many locals shop there also because
of the range of products or because they know someone in the business. Over the years, I think
the quality of merchandise has actually gotten more varied and interesting. In the 1970s Turks
were poor, and Istanbul was not quite the vaunted tourist destination it is now. All the goods with
few exceptions were similar and really pretty ghastly—alabaster ashtrays or Meerschaum pipes
anyone? Now the marketing is much more targeted and upscale, though most things are still
pretty flamboyant and flashy.
Down the hill at the Egyptian or Spice Bazaar, the opposite has taken place. It used to be
a beehive of butchers, bakers, and maybe even a candlestick maker. Fresh honey from the comb,
assorted sausages and cheeses, live or freshly butchered animals, batches of potent herbs hanging
from the ceiling, towering stacks of eggs from all manner of poultry (specimens of each for sale
in cages outside) and vats of yogurt tantalized the nose and revved up the taste buds. Now it is
full of sorry tourist gewgaws and plastic jars of face cream.
The streets between the two still have shops galore. You can still find patterns, yarn,
thread, suits, wedding gowns in all price ranges, circumcision outfits7, gloves, baby carriages,
knives, pots and pans, and every type of plastic container known to man. But fast disappearing
are those little ateliers where a man could solder a table base together, reproduce a turned
7
These circumcision outfits are a mini-obsession of mine. Muslims, well, Muslim Turks anyway, have their male
children cut when they are about seven years old. I liken this to a combination communion/confirmation in
Christianity or bar/bat mitzvah in Judaism and consider it a means of introducing the child into the larger
community (without anything similar for female offspring). Though customs vary widely and have changed
recently, the boy is dressed up in a little prince’s outfit, complete with a crown, a cape, and even a scepter. He is
paraded through the streets (or on the back of a truck in villages) and then is guest of honor at a dinner later
where the deed takes place. (In Turkish, circumcision is sünnet, someone circumcised is sünnetli, uncircumcised is
sünnetsiz, and the guy who does the deed is the sünnetci.) The boy may or may not get a sip of wine (though
alcohol is proscribed in Islam) but usually no anesthetic. It is quite a mark of manhood for him to take the cut
without crying. I have never been to one, though a short scene in Ferzan Ozpetek’s “Hamam” features one.
~ 25 ~
replacement chair leg for you, inscribe a bronze platter in Arabic, blow a stemmed glass, or
reupholster your living room set.
So Sunday came and I traipsed back to Taksim and to the Hilton. Sure enough there was
a gallery there manned by the intrepid Kevin. Hooked nosed and with a “g’day, mate” on his
lips, he soon had my life organized. I got the name and address of a school in Fındıkzâde (just a
short ride away from my hotel) that might be hiring, an offer of a share next door to the other
teachers’ apartment in Kurtuluş that would be available in a month or so, and an invite to Çiçek
Pasajı (Flower Passage) for a drink later that night. I didn’t know it, but I was set. It was that
easy.
Oh, Çiçek Pasajı! It was to become my home away from home and the center of my
social life in Istanbul. A sanitized and expanded version still exists (the original collapsed in May
of 1978 and was shut for a number of years before reopening) and is very popular. In the 70s it
was a warren of a half dozen or so little restaurants that served a bevy of delicious Turkish
appetizers and grilled fish along with glasses of rakı, the famous anise flavored liquor beloved of
Turks and affectionately called lion’s milk because it turns cloudy white with addition of water
and takes someone as strong as a lion to drink. The restaurants were in a microscopic
courtyard/corridor with two entryways and off the passage where vendors sold flowers as well as
fresh fish, fried mussels, candies, and fresh vegetables. An Armenian church was tucked in
behind. A crowd of celebrating men (rarely with women) already boisterous became even more
so as more glasses of rakı were downed. A wandering rotund female accordion player with the
most preposterous dyed blonde hair and eye shadow performed crowd favorites.
Kevin and I went to the adjoining beer hall that and many more subsequent nights.
Brightly lit with sawdust flung on the tiled floor, the large rectangular room was manned by
~ 26 ~
young men who handed out tall glasses of Efes Pilsen beer on tap and small platters of fried
potatoes (with a delightful tangy mustard) for a really nominal price. That fare could be
supplemented with plates of fried mussels or bags of nuts from vendors in the nearby passage,
but we never bought flowers. The clientele was, again, strictly male (with an occasional foreign
female) and usually quite enervated and joyous. They loved foreigners, and we loved them.
The next day none the worse for wear, I made my way out to Bilimsel Öğretim Merkezi
(Scientific Learning Center) or BÖM to see about work. They hired me on the spot; in fact, I had
a class to teach that evening. Furthermore, even though I did not have a TESOL (Teacher of
English to Speakers of Other Languages) certificate and could not legally work as a teacher,
BÖM would hire me as a “dialogue specialist” and get me working papers.8 Having given myself
six months to get settled or return, I was elated that I had a job, dibs on a place to stay, and at
least one friend in less than a week. I was also earning twice what I would have at TAA.
Go figure. The Australians were taking things out of the car trunk and hauling them to the
elevator so they could store them in their apartment. This American had to take his things out of
the auto boot, carry them to the lift, and place them in his flat. I am not sure who was more
surprised that night when I conducted my first class in British English, my students or me.
Luckily BÖM was not too interested in lesson plans or even that I actually taught anything—if I
kept the students happy…and paying the steep tuition, the management was happy. The students
got to mingle with the opposite sex and smoke cigarettes. The parents thought their kids were
improving their lot in life. And Fuat Bey, our sphinx-like director with pomaded hair, got very
rich. Something for everyone.
8
Most foreigners without the certificate worked illegally and had to go out of the country every three months to
renew their tourist visas.
~ 27 ~
BÖM was a dershane (lesson + place), one of many specialized school scattered around
the city that taught one or more subjects. We had groups of long distance telephone operators
from the PTT who attended morning classes. Some of those women were my best students and
certainly the best behaved. I had a few fairly poor students who barely eked out the monthly
tuition and who were really serious about learning, but many of the others were spoiled offspring
of upwardly mobile parents. The teachers were all fluent in English but taught grammar and did
exercises in Turkish with a smattering of English thrown in. The only total immersion thing we
did was to wallow in the clouds of cigarette smoke in the student and teacher lounges between
classes.
The school had a little tea shop run by a Kurdish villager who had recently immigrated to
the big city with his wife and baby. His main duties were to make and deliver fresh tea at a
moment’s notice (say if Fuat Bey had an unexpected visitor) and to have dozens of little tulip
glasses ready to fill with piping hot tea when the breaks came. We all bought a handful of plastic
chits with which we paid for those innumerable glasses of tea or hot Oralet, a Tang-like orange
drink, in lieu of the caffeine. The omnipresent hot apple tea and other herbal varieties only
appeared and became fashionable in Turkey years later.
Tea was black loose leaf from the Black Sea Rize province, though foreigners and
travelling Turks all kept a store of Earl Grey for special occasions. (Wily old ladies knew that
you could reproduce a fragrant Earl Grey from Turkish tea and a drop of bergamont extract from
the Spice Bazaar, but they still had to display the Twinings can to completely satisfy their
guests.) At a tea shop or at home, water was heated in a large kettle with a smaller kettle atop
like a lid. When it came to a boil, the water was poured over the tea leaves in the smaller kettle
which was then placed back over the simmering larger pot. After being steeped, a bit of the very
~ 28 ~
strong tea was poured through a hand-held strainer into the ubiquitous tulip-shaped small glasses
and then diluted with some of the simmering water—a not inelegant two-fisted process if done
right. When the supply of the strong tea base was used, the used leaves were tossed and a new
batch prepared. It was anathema to add new leaves to the old or to use tea steeped more than a
few minutes. So multiple batches had to be made and poured in a matter of a few minutes at a
really busy time.
Equally shunned was granulated sugar. Each tiny cup had to be accompanied by two
cubes of sugar. When the national supply of sugar cubes was once temporarily disrupted and the
other had to be used, it was taken as a sign of national moral decay and the cause of much hand
wringing.
To actually get my working visa I had to leave the country and visit a Turkish consulate
somewhere. Conveniently enough, there was one in Komotini, Greece, a six-hour bus ride away
through the lovely Thrace countryside and a journey I was able to do as an overnight trip. But
back in Istanbul, the staff at the hotel was unwilling to let me list their address on any official
documents. Since the apartment I was to share with Kevin was still not vacant, I spent the next
month or so in a hotel the school found for me in the working class neighborhood of Yavusselim
beyond the Fatih Mosque, an area known then and now for religious conservatism. It was also up
the hill from the Greek Patriarch church and other orthodox institutions and home to many of the
Byzantine remains I had come to study. Sadly, I never really investigated this area while living
there—too many days in the classroom and nights at Çiçek Pasajı.
When I did come home after class, I would shoot the breeze with high school students
from a boarding school next door who hung out in my hotel’s television lounge. They were from
little villages in Anatolia and here on scholarship. I didn’t learn much about the school or the
~ 29 ~
students since these conversations were in Turkish, and my language skills were still rudimentary
but improving exponentially as time passed. Though the school was part of a Muslim foundation,
the boys were more intent on a life of gainful capitalist employment than on religious experience.
They did, of course, try to get me to convert. But in those simpler days, the standard “it would
kill my mother” reply would suffice to cut the proselytizing off early. Nowadays, it is a much
harder sell.
Kevin had since made up with the other Australians from TAA, and I was enveloped in
their world. The group consisted of the sisters Marian and Anne, Bruce, Yvonne, and a Maori
from New Zealand named Leslie, all of whom inhabited the apartment in Kurtuluş I had visited
early on. Anne had been living and working in London but left in order to meet her sister in
India. Unbeknownst to her, Marian was travelling overland to meet her in England. And meet
they did quite by accident9—so the story goes—in a Sultanahmet café. Since neither wanted to
go back the way she had already travelled or had much money, they decided to stay and
eventually acquired Turkish husbands.
Marian was friends with Claire, a red-haired buxom beauty who was a former roommate
in Kurtuluş. She was now set up in a “luxury” apartment in Cihangir on the other side of Taksim
by her married Turkish boyfriend from Mardin who we called the Blue Jean King of Turkey
because his main source of income came from producing cheap dungarees. She invited her old
friend Jim to live with her there. Jim knew Yvonne from university and got her a job at TAA and
a bed in the communal apartment. Or was it Bruce who knew Yvonne? Kevin knew Leslie from
Sydney where both were bus drivers. Anyway, most all had been travelling from India to
England or vice versa and ended up rather accidentally in Istanbul. Most lived together (except
9
This was well before the days of the internet and cell phones. International phone calling was expensive, and
letters travelled slowly.
~ 30 ~
Kevin, Claire and Jim) and worked together (except Kevin, Claire, and Leslie). It was very
incestuous.
So Kevin was the odd man out but also the glue that held them together. He was the first
to get to Istanbul and work at TAA. He had set up the apartment in Kurtuluş before he willingly
left or was thrown out (accounts differed over time). He was the only one besides me who then
had any fluency in Turkish and who could manage affairs outside the little circle of school and
home on his own. And he was always arranging a party or trip. He was also the only bisexual of
the group—he admitted to liking women as much as men but alternated from being exclusively
hetero to exclusively homo. He was currently very heavily in the latter phase.
Kevin never asked me about my sexual leanings but undoubtedly surmised them when I
became a happy and willing accomplice in his excursions to Çiçek Pasajı and beyond and with
his plans for the apartment next door to the other teachers.
March slid into April, and the weather started to get better. I was in heaven, but things in
Turkey were rough. The country was in a particularly vicious periodic economic slump. The IMF
or some other acronymic global concern had put the screws on Turkey’s banks and business, and
it was impossible to import foreign goods or get extended credit. That hardly bothered me as I
was not withdrawing from such staples as chocolate, peanut butter, Hollywood movies, or
whiskey. But on a higher plane it meant that local businesses couldn’t get needed spare parts,
new machinery, or essential raw materials. As many countries are going through a similar credit
crunch nowadays, we all know how this can provoke insidious changes and stress in society.
The lira was set to 11 to the dollar but soon went to 12.5 and then to 14 a few months
later. The population—not yet privy to the knowledge that the climb would go on relentlessly to
six or seven million in the following decades—was aghast. “How can we afford bread?” was the
~ 31 ~
headline in all the papers and the exclamation of the man and woman in the streets. Actually
since the price of bread was controlled by the government, that wonderful Turkish necessity
remained within most everyone’s means. And so were state produced items like cigarettes, rakı,
my beloved Efes Pilsen beer, and wine. Party on.
Essential services were being cut back of course. Garbage piled up in what was already a
pretty dusty dirty city (but hardly to the extent as in New York City when it too was on shaky
financial ground around the same time). Worse were the blackouts, either planned or unplanned.
I would often be in the middle of an evening class when the lights would go out. The intrepid
staff was used to this and would quickly light and distribute kerosene lamps to all the rooms.
Pampered little thing that I was up to then, I was tickled by these occurrences and considered
myself a romantic rugged pioneer. And the interruptions gave me much needed breaks to think
up another topic of conversation for the bored students different from the usual “what did you do
last weekend?” or “what will you do this weekend?” depending on which tense we were
studying.
The streets at night, already dark and moody, became more so during a blackout. Gas
lamps were lit in all the shops and entrances and cast a shaky misty glow on the mostly deserted
lanes. My boat-like boots were handy for traversing the rough or sometimes nonexistent
sidewalks, though the dainty fashionable footwear of the average Turk negotiated the cracks and
potholes with equal alacrity.
I don’t know how phone service was affected as it was already so spotty. Some of the
teachers’ families, already a generation or two into solid middle class, had been waiting over two
decades for phone installation. But the heavily chlorinated city water I found to be more than
palatable was still on tap and flowed from reservoirs near the Black Sea.
~ 32 ~
My first trip out of Istanbul after the visa thing was up to Sarıyer almost at the end of the
European side of the Bosphorus for a celebratory birthday fish dinner. Since automobile
ownership has skyrocketed in Turkey recently, these same restaurants are much larger and quite
flashy and easily accessible nowadays. But back in 1977 for my friends and me, it was a long trip
in a crowded minibus and a half-mile walk beyond to tiny Rumeli Kavağı10 to dine on the water.
Then it was a limited menu, the favorites being either the white fish lüfer or the aptly-named
kalkan (shield), a delicious shepherd’s salad (chopped cucumber, parsley, onion, and tomato),
and wine or rakı. The meal started, of course, with meze or appetizers—the best reason for eating
Turkish in the first place. These include but are not limited to stuffed grape leaves, eggplant
paste, fried zucchini coins, stuffed or fried mussels, humus, olives, fava beans, white or feta
cheese, and baskets of Turkish bread.
Long, lowing liners would pass by on their way to or from the Black Sea, and lights
twinkled on the hills of Europe above us and in Asia across the way. Everyone was on his or her
best behavior. As was usual, the other diners were mainly male (another thing that has changed
over the years) who were quite curious about our group made up of so many females. But they
behaved themselves too.
I mentioned minibuses earlier. Up to then I was just using buses and my feet to get
around. The other alternatives besides the expensive taxis were dolmuş or minibus. Both these
ran along regular routes and, though they were twice or more the cost of bus, very reasonable.
Dolmuş (the past participle of the verb “to fill” and used as both the singular and plural here
though the plural should have an added –lar suffix) were passenger cars and the more
comfortable of the two as only five or so passengers could fit in. Their added flavor was that the
10
I still do that same short walk nowadays when I have the chance but usually from the Bosphorus ferry stop at
Sarıyer
~ 33 ~
driver had to receive fares and give change along with negotiating in the traffic, making the ride
a little more exciting. The dolmuş in Karaköy near the Galata Bridge were the only holdovers
from the 1940s left in Istanbul. Some of these valiant old Hudsons, Buicks and Dodges had been
stretched to have six doors (for correspondingly more passengers) and cruised silently and
elegantly through the streets like some of the big ships on the Bosphorus. Turks were known as
some of the best mechanics in the world and could keep these vintage wheels rolling long past
their supposed prime. 1950-era Fords and Chevys made their way to the Black Sea Coast town of
Trabzon, and I spotted icons from the 1960s in Kuşadası on other trips.
The minibuses, the bastard offspring of the dolmuş were brightly colored vans that raced
through the streets like bats out of Hades with loads of people and their belongings stuffed in
tighter than sardines. The driver didn’t have to bother with the money part; no, he was usually
turning up the volume of the tape player or changing songs while he jived to the pulsating music
while narrowly avoiding or passing all the other minibuses racing equally out of control. His
muavin or assistant did all the rest—flipping open the door (preferably before the bus had come
to a halt), yelling out the destinations of the van at full lung, pushing people into every available
cubic inch of the interior, arbitrating (though the driver had the last word) on who had to give up
his seat for the overweight head-scarved momma in her trench coat, making change, and
shouting out over the music and chatter the next stop to his captured audience and asking if
anyone would like to get off, then throwing open the doors and alighting on the pavement (again
well before the driver came to a halt), and yelling out the ultimate destination to the crowd of
people already storming the vehicle. These young men, so nimble in shoes that were worn as
slippers with the heel cup folded down on the back sole, were so effectively verbal that we liked
to call them muezzins, those who announced the call to prayer five times a day from the minarets.
~ 34 ~
The interior of a minibus was a gaudy tacky wonder. Especially popular were lacy
polyester borders with brightly colored one-inch pompoms stranded along the window tops.
Various embossed metallic decals of Koranic verses in Arabic were strategically placed to block
the view of an oncoming crash so that fellow travelers would not wind up screaming in despair
and terror. Soccer insignias were derigueur decorating items also. The more secular of the
drivers would have a bare-breasted babe torn from the daily papers taped strategically on the
dash though the aforementioned conservative momma would be the one with the best view of it.
Minibuses made for strange bedfellows.
This was the year of the little waving hand affixed to a little suction cup by a flexible
piece of metal. When placed anywhere on a window, these hands would gently gesture as the
vehicle weaved and bobbed through traffic. The initial model was inscribed with the words Güle,
Güle.11 There was soon an explosion of different slogans on the waving hands mainly fostered by
the minibuses, one of which could easily display a half-dozen or more. I had the best of
intentions to visit the auto supply shops in Sirkeçi near the train station and gather up a complete
collection, but—like my goal of scouting out all the old Byzantine churches—I kept putting off
the task. It seemed like I was going to be here forever and would soon be able to make the time.
Then the Güle, Güle hands, much like the Baby-on-Board plaques in the U.S. a decade later, just
disappeared.
Before April gave way to May, Claire threw a Children’s Holiday party. This day was a
big deal for the Turks who celebrated by dressing up their children and parading them around in
their finery and burdened down with candy and presents. My new friends went all out for the
11
This goodbye greeting roughly translates as “go smilingly, smilingly” and is usually said by the person remaining
while the valediction made by the person leaving was the veritable mouthful of Allahaısmarladık and a bit too
much to print on a little waving hand. It is no wonder that many have since adopted the briefer Italian ciao, though
I have also heard the multicultural ciao bye bye.
~ 35 ~
occasion, too, but took a different tack. Someone had gone over to Sultanahmet, found a French
couple who were driving a yellow van to India, and invited them to the party with the proviso
that we could commandeer the vehicle as a school bus for transporting the Kurtuluş crew to
Claire’s. İLK OKUL (PRIMARY SCHOOL) was soon stenciled on the sides and about a dozen
adults now transformed into the lads and lasses of yesteryear tumbled inside for a drive through
the neighborhoods and Taksim Square. Whenever we hit a snag in the traffic or a red light, we
had an impromptu Chinese fire drill (again my apologies to the Said adherents) to the surprise
and delight of onlookers.
The outfits were truly amazing. Who would have thought that our meager backpacks
would hold shorts with suspenders, little gingham dresses with lacey collars, so many knee
socks, and even a pair of brown and cream saddle shoes. (The nether reaches of the Covered
Bazaar was the source of these finds by the way.) Hair was pulled back into pigtails and
festooned with bows. Eyebrow pencils provided the needed freckles, and blackened paraffin
gave some that goofy toothless grin from first and second grade.
Yvonne left Istanbul soon after to travel on to India and then return to Australia. There
was a slight shuffling of the tenants in the apartment, but life remained pretty much on an even
keel.
The first day of May was a beautiful sunny Sunday that I spent in Kurtuluş whiling away
the afternoon before repairing to Çiçek Pasajı in the evening. We could hear the ruckus of the
planned May Day celebration/protest in Taksim Square about a mile and a half away but gave it
no thought. When Bruce and I passed through later than night we were surprised to see soldiers,
tanks, piles of discarded signs and debris, but no people. The smell of gunpowder still hovered
~ 36 ~
in and lent an ominous feel to the air. We were quickly ushered through to İstiklâl Caddesi12
which was also uncharacteristically empty of people. It wasn’t until we reached our beer hall—
thankfully still open unlike all the other shops on the avenue—that we got the news that the
police had opened fire on and killed some of the demonstrators. Feeling a bit like a second-rate
Sally Bowles but still not humming any of her songs, I joined the more somber crowd of drinkers
for an only mildly subdued night out.
It was only the next day that I learned the true scope of the carnage. While far from
Kristalnacht, it was certainly more grievous than Kent State. Some half-million people had
crowded into Taksim Square and Park and deep into all the adjoining streets to show support for
labor unions. When the chairman of the organizing committee started to speak, three shots rang
out. There was a moment of deathly silence followed by a rain of bullets from the 20-story Hotel
Intercontinental (now Marmara Istanbul) that touched off pandemonium as panicked protesters
tried to disperse with really nowhere to go.
Soldiers on armored carriers already stationed at either end of and on the main
throroughfares into the square also panicked and started firing noise bombs over the crowd while
soldiers and some mysterious individuals in one of the side streets emptied their automatic
weapons. People were crushed in the melee. In total 36 people were killed, hundreds wounded,
453 arrested and 98 subsequently prosecuted though acquitted.
The true or “true” perpetrators were never identified or brought to justice. What is most
probable is that the right-wing coalition then holding power expected trouble from leftists and
geared up security beyond what would have been in place normally. Whether they planned to
12
Though often compared to Champs-Élysée, the prestigious avenue in that also has cinemas, cafés, and luxury
specialty shops, İstiklâl Caddesi is narrower, rowdier, and much more plebian. Because of the constant pedestrian
traffic and the liveliness, this street is more like Las Ramblas in Barcelona, especially since most vehicular traffic is
banned. It goes from Taksim Square down to Tünel and is the backbone of the more modern sections of Istanbul.
~ 37 ~
disrupt the gathering as it panned out or merely overreacted cannot be known. They, of course,
lay the blame totally at “guerillas” on the fringe left who were definitely present and also geared
up for action. Certainly the Secret Police and the CIA had a hand in the pre-planning security and
what was essentially a cover-up of the incident.
By the way, I was asked numerous times during my stay if I was a CIA plant. That
seemed to be a more fitting explanation for why I had studied the language and come to Turkey.
Had they known that up to my departure from American I had been administrative assistant to a
former Assistant Director of the CIA, I don’t think I could have convinced them otherwise. Be
that as it may, I don’t know that I could have been privy to much sensitive information gleaned
at the bars in Beyoğlu—had I been a spy, I would have been lounging with the elite at the Hilton
Hotel. And my 130 lbs on my 5’ 10” frame and patched jeans hardly made me a suave 007 type.
After the May First debacle, the political and economic situation became ever more dire,
though it had little or no direct impact on my situation. I still had a well-paying job and was soon
to have a comfortable apartment, and both of these were in politically neutral parts of the city
that were safe. Only the very poor and the very rich neighborhoods sheltered leftists and rightists
whose internecine squabbles resulted in bouts of gunfire and assassination.
My struggles as always were internal. Kevin had by now scraped away all but a little of
my reserve and had even taken me to the only gay bar in town. This was the infamous and still
extant Vat 69, named after the famous blended Scotch whiskey and that we affectionately
referred to as Club 69. My first visit there was hardly auspicious. I had already put away a few
beers and gobbled down some fried potatoes and mussels at Çiçek Pasajı before going. By the
time we got to the club, my stomach was doing more gyrations than the clientele on the dance
floor. I spent the night lying on a banquette at the back of the club between bouts of rushing up
~ 38 ~
the stairs to vomit out my guts. To make the night even more bizarre, Leslie was holding court
with the toothless old biddy bathroom attendant for the better part of the night. She was teaching
him how to march like a soldier, present arms (in this case her mop which had to be kept handy
as I might befoul the premises), and salute. Though thoroughly amused, she was as demanding as
any Marine drill instructor and insisted he do it right. The combination of the smell from the
ancient two-step toilet my head had to hover over, the laughter of that duo in the background and
the penetrating disco beat was truly bizarre—I am surprised I didn’t swear off sex forever. The
management also assigned one of the bouncers to keep watch over me. I thought he was there to
protect my honor, though only a true pervert would want to get near the green-to-the-gills invalid
I had regressed to. It was years later that I realized they wanted to make sure I made it to the
latrines in time and didn’t puke all over the premises.
Ah, bathrooms. I must say the thought of anything less than American-style crappers put
me in a state of some anxiety. I had read, of course, the opening chapter of Erica Jong’s “Fear of
Flying” and knew what was in store. Already I had found the high perched tanks of French
toilets extremely deficient. What was I to do when I had to take blind aim with both feet planted
on the corrugated porcelain footsteps fore and to the sides of a relatively tiny target?
A. Get used to it.
B. Don’t complain ’cause it is a lot worse for a female.
And it wasn’t so bad notwithstanding my frequent asides that I have been to mosques
where the toilets haven’t been flushed in over 500 years. Tell me how many public restrooms in
the States are there that you would willingly spend a half second more that you absolutely had
to?13 I thought so. Actually, I had sit-downs at my hotel and school and later at my new digs.
When I got to eating about two pounds of fresh fruit a day, I was more ingenious in locating non
13
If you said the Madonna Inn in San Luis Obispo, CA, I would agree.
~ 39 ~
traditional appliances and actually had a map in my mind with their locations well marked—the
British Consulate library had a very pleasant water closet, and the cinemas off İstiklâl Cadessi
each had a row of gleaming thrones in semiprivate, i.e., doorless, stalls. That is not the only
reason I watched so many Ferdi Tayfur movies.
Ah, Ferdi Tayfur, the pop singer turned actor who was churning out two or three films a
year. Though actually much more attracted to the likes of leading men like Tarik Akan and Kadır
İnanır, I became one of Ferdi’s biggest fans and righteously defended his “art.” Long and black
of lock and moustache, Ferdi rarely buttoned more than the bottom three buttons on his amply
collared shirts thereby showing off his thatch of chestnut chest hair that I would rate only a 6.5
on the Turkish Hirsute Scale. Still it was endearing.
His movies were pretty much pressed from the same mold: up-and-coming-but-stillimpecunious young pop singer falls in love with girl, loses her, gets rich and famous, finds girl
again who is now unhappily married, she commits suicide, Ferdi kills her husband and adopts
her young daughter, and he closes the show with a tearful finale. The plot revolved around who
the girl’s father or husband was. Be he a gangster, there was more shooting than usual. Be he an
industrialist, it turned out Ferdi had built his dream home on the location that poppa or hubby
wanted for a seaside resort. There are sidelines involving amnesia, lost letters, adorable children,
and cousins of the second degree with cancer to spice up the lag time between bullets and head
cracking. And though there was a lot of kissing, split-screen depictions of Ferdi pining for his
woman, and vice versa, at different times of their lives were more abundant. Now don’t get so
high and mighty—look at the standard Hollywood fare, it’s hardly any better.
Kadır and Tarik, they of the smoldering good looks, never left more than one or two
buttons undone but, I bet, would rank at least an eight on the chest hair scale. Their movies were
~ 40 ~
pretty much the same plotwise as Ferdi’s but without the songs, the home on the sea, and the
suicide at the end. Their love interest usually got shot by the thugs the star was fighting,
sometimes before the movie really got started.
There was a Turkish art movie scene whose doyen was Yılmaz Güney, the Kurdish actor
and director who was languishing in prison as I was drooling over Ferdi Tayfur’s saccharine
lyrics and movie antics. Güney started out as a production assistant then morphed into a dramatic
(as opposed to the song-and dance-man Ferdi) actor with big box office appeal. After starting his
own production company in the late 1960s, he started directing films depicting the rough life and
concerns of ordinary village people from the eastern part of the country. His films rightly bear
titles like “Hope,” “Pain,” “Elegy,” and “The Hopeless.”
His leftish beliefs did nothing to diminish his popularity, nor did his arrest and conviction
for sheltering anarchists on the run. Released in a general amnesty in 1974, he was quickly
arrested again, convicted of murdering a regional prosecutor, and given a 19-year sentence. In
jail, he continued to churn out screenplays, but his films were banned by the time I arrived in the
country, and I only saw a handful many years later on video. They are bleak.
Güney escaped from prison to France where he was lionized. His 1982 film “Yol” (“The
Road”) won the Palme d’Or at Cannes and was seen worldwide and much admired. It depicts the
degrading and tragic life of some prisoners out on furlough and their families. He actually
directed from afar the director in the field, Şerif Gören, and got the credit. Though visually
stunning, it is oppressive in its portrayal of the life of the poor and a necessary antidote to the
fluff of my beloved Ferdi Tayfur soaps.
Foreign films were banned for different reasons than Güney’s—they were just too
expensive to import. One got through the blockade, “Cassandra Crossing,” a turgid “Murder on
~ 41 ~
the Orient Express” meets “The Bridge over the River Kwai” with an international cast of
second-rate actors (including O.J. Simpson), though the true star was the Garabit Viaduct by
Gustav Eiffel that was the stand-in for the fictional Cassandra Bridge. Having played for almost
two years, it was the only movie my students could talk about (they loved it) so I was forced to
see it in an attempt at gleaning some more conversational fodder for class. “Let’s see, what shall
we talk about today? Hm, Swedish terrorists, bacterial plague, heroin trafficking, bridge
maintenance, or Sophia Loren’s boobs? Okay, what are you doing this weekend?”
As much as its ancient foundations, all that was Istanbul
I loved my new apartment. Spacious and airy, we had six big rooms with a kitchen and a
bath and a half (the half was a Turkish two-step in its own closet). Though right across the hall
from the teachers, our portion of the floor was half again as large as theirs. Kevin arranged a
monthly payment system with the departing director of TAA and purchased a massive metal
conference table and six matching side chairs, a lovely upholstered wingback chair that I laid
dibs to as soon as I saw it, a sofa to seat four easily, a cast iron double bed for Kevin’s boudoir, a
serviceable twin bed for mine, an ironing board, an honest-to-goodness electric oven (alas, it ran
on 110 current while the rest of Istanbul was 200 or 220), and a mini-fridge.
Leslie and Kevin did most of the painting and cleaning before we moved in together.
Leslie, the only one of the group besides Claire to be under-employed, took the smallest room
rent free. The table, chairs and sofa went into the ample back corner room next to the kitchen that
had been designated as our dining room. It was here I could indulge in a quiet breakfast, my
favorite time of the day, each morning before class. It was sheer bliss for about two weeks.
The building housed ten flats on five floors. The ground floor was given over to the
owner’s grandson, Yahşi who ran a ceramic kiln and fine arts studio there. (He also owned the
~ 42 ~
art gallery at the Hilton where Kevin and Leslie worked.) His sister Biriçimsu (“a sip of water”
in Turkish) lived on the third floor on the north side which had the larger layouts. She too was
artistic and had a sideline making Tiffany-esque lampshades by dipping pieces of acetate in some
foul-smelling petrochemical solution and attaching them to a wire frame which she would paint
when dry. Since it all required noxious chemicals and reagents, she did this outside on the back
balcony most of the time.
Biriçim (we usually left off the “su”) was our ally, friend, confidant, translator and often
a companion in our extra-curricular activities. She was divorced and shared custody of her two
young sons with her ex. Her grandmother, an elderly and frail but still vibrant woman, had the
place below Biriçim.
It was not long after we moved in that Kevin and Leslie started with a parade of pickups
from the bars that usually stayed the night. Some would bed down with the boys, others would
crash on the sofa, and one or the other would sometimes stray into my room looking for
additional play. Once I woke to see a burly young man in my armchair naked and masturbating.
Truthfully, I was too scared to take the plunge but was secretly feeling very cosmopolitan,
daring, and wicked for once.
But it all got out of hand when they brought home two young rough trade villagers new
to the city who decided they liked our digs as much as I and stayed a few days. They took to
drinking, smoking and fighting until we had to forcibly eject them. Then unbeknownst to me,
Leslie left our place one morning with another trick alone in his room. When I soon also vacated
the place, the kid systematically stole all the salable clothing, including three pairs of my blue
jeans, a grevious loss. I was down to a single ragged pair that soon sported lots of Turkish
patches (none unfortunately with Koranic verses or Güle, Güle). Kevin and Leslie were pretty
~ 43 ~
blithe about the incident though I was fuming. Another might say, “He who sows the wind, reaps
the whirlwind.”
And the whirlwind soon blew in. Kevin’s extensive network of acquaintances, his
inability to say no to most any request, and two empty bedrooms were together a vacuum waiting
to be filled. Our chummy little family was augmented by a two German valkyries, one a former
taxi driver from Texas (where she had lived for a time with her American ex-husband) named
Helga and the other a manic depressive with a kewpie doll face whose name mercifully escapes
me. The latter was a short-term house guest who soon decamped to India after about a few
weeks, though not before she taught me how to make sweet milky cardamom tea—a hefty price
to pay for their obnoxious presence.
Helga was in hog heaven and rarely left the house except late in the afternoon when she
would retreat to the tourist areas to find a couple of slugs to drag over for a late night bout of
cigarette, beer and hashish consumption. They would rarely bring in any food but would raid
what bit others had in store. And heaven forbid she do a lick of housework; she was a guest.
Though perfectly welcome at their nightly alcohol and drug infested—but mercifully sexless
(Kevin and Leslie had cornered that market)—bacchanals after my night classes, I hit the hay
early. I was happy to miss Helga monopolizing every conversation with constant tirades about
how horrible Turks were. On rising I had to clean up their mess in the morning before I could
have a few quiet moments in the dining room.
The other room was taken over by a perilously thin and faded debutante named Lydia
from Philadelphia who brought along her equally thin and faded Turkish boyfriend Kenan. He
was a not particularly successful carpet salesman in the Grand Bazaar but had the connections
for getting everyone’s daily hash allotment. His supposedly privileged knowledge that buying or
~ 44 ~
selling only a small amount of drugs made one immune from harassment, arrest and prison, was
taken as gospel by my roomies. I didn’t for a moment believe that and was hoping that some of
sort of network of bribery and intrigue was keeping the police at bay. I was holding Helga as my
ace-in-the-hole—I would offer up her to keep out of jail myself. I could happily envision her as
the mad matron of a Turkish version of “Women of Cell Block 7.”
I remember the Istanbul of those days much as Orhan Pamuk does in his masterful
memoir, “Istanbul: Memories and the City,” a bleak but wondrous place, moody, atmospheric,
historic, and depressed. But he and I, though approximately the same age, were viewing these
streets and locales from vastly different perspectives—he as an upper middle class Turk educated
to admire the West and I as a decidedly middle class American with Romantic notions of what
the East held and was.
So life was good in Istanbul? Mine consisted of cleaning up the mess in the dining room
each morning, tearing clear across town in kamikaze minibuses to classes, pounding my head
against the proverbial wall trying to get my students interested in learning English, Ferdi Tayfur
movies between classroom gigs, Helga’s rants and hash smoke at night, and Kevin’s brief
encounters to spice up the night. So life was horrible in Istanbul? Well, I was picking up Turkish
at a furious pace, seeing bits and pieces of the city, and generally learning a bit about myself.
And there were more trips up the Bosphorus to see the flowers in Emirgan Park or further up for
delicious fresh grilled fish. Though magical at night, the Bosphorus was stunning in the day.
And then one could visit the Telli Baba (Wire/Thread and Father/Elderly Wise Man) shrine and
tomb near Sarıyer.
Telli Baba was a Sufi sheik who either helped in the conquest of Constantinople or
repelled Russian invaders from the Black Sea. At any rate, he established his dervish lodge at a
~ 45 ~
congenial and strategic spot on the upper Bosphorus. Like brides of the time did in their
headdresses, Sufi leaders used to wear silver threads in their turbans to signify that they were the
brides to their lord (or lady, that is—there are some strange currents in Sufism). When Telli Baba
died and was laid to rest in his türbe or mausoleum here, it became the custom to bring a silver
thread to lay at his grave when beseeching him for a favor—be it a child for a barren woman, a
husband for an old maid, a job for the unemployed, or a house for the homeless. Fishermen also
prayed there for their safety on the treacherous waters of the Bosphorus and the Black Sea.
Nowadays, petitioning pilgrims offer more mundane little ribbons that they tie to the gate the
shelters his tomb. They also leave notes, pictures, and little personal items.
In June I took a long day trip on a lovely Sunday to Edirne on the Greek border to see the
oil wrestlers of Kırkpınar. This competition was pictured in the film “Topkapi” (though it should
have an undotted “ı”) and did a lot to tickle my imagination. That scene may actually have been
the reason I studied the language and came to Turkey in the first place, notwithstanding all that
business about sixth grade and a city with three names.
Wrestlers (and their fans) have been coming to Edirne for the wrestling since 1360
making it the longest running sporting event in history. It was originally held to commemorate
two soldiers whose bout lasted through the day and night without a winner. Their fellow soldiers
found the entwined dead bodies the next morning and buried them somewhere in Asia Minor
before their went off to conquer more lands. Later, near the newly taken Edirne, they paused at a
congenial spot that reminded them of the grave site of the valiant men and so inaugurated the
series I was longing to see.
It was to Topkapı, too, that I had to go. But while Ms. Mercouri’s destination was the
fabled palace on the Marmara, mine was the ant hive of activity of the ad hoc bus station outside
~ 46 ~
the Theodosian land wall gate of the same name. (Topkapı also means Cannonball Gate.) I was
not the only one with the same idea—hordes of Turkish men, many of whom looked like they
could be able bodied contenders in the wrestling, were boarding buses west. I ended up next to
Mehmet,14 a genial young policeman about my height but forty pounds of muscle heavier who
possessed an extraordinary moustache. He and I became fast friends on the two-hour journey.
At Edirne, my new buddy wrapped his burly arm around me and ushered us on to a
minibus out to the stadium. I was in heaven—other than Melina Mercouri I couldn’t think of
anyone else with whom I would rather spend the day, if not a lifetime, than this Turkish hunk.
Right before the ticket office he unleashed me and beckoned me to wait. He proceeded up to one
of the windows and argued and gesticulated with an official. That man sent him to some other
flunkies flanking the entrance. Again more words and arm motions and occasional looks back
and points at me before he motioned me to come over. He tenderly handed me over to these men
who hastened me—to my astonishment— into the stadium alone. Mehmet had invoked the
sacred concept of hospitality to strangers and garnered me a private box front and center for the
whole spectacle. As lovely as this gesture was, I would have been infinitely more happy to be up
in the stands with him and his buddies. I would also have learned, maybe, some of the intricacies
of the sport. Alas, we were not to meet again.
So the wrestling. The hundreds of contestants, sorted by age and size and naked except
for knee length leather trousers, troop out to the sound of a pounding drum and the high-pitched
screech of a reed instrument (the davul and zurna of so many Turkish ceremonies), swinging
their arms in what could only be interpreted as some antediluvian salute to our Neanderthal
forbearers. Right before the match they douse themselves with gobs of olive oil and rub it into
14
He was the first of a long list of Mehmets I would befriend as this is the most popular name for Turkish males.
~ 47 ~
their skin, taking particular care to get down under those leather pants so his opponent can’t get a
grip on a buttock or a crown jewel.
These barely dressed, invariably hairy and tanned men glistening in the sun were quite a
sight. The wrestling itself? Well, a little goes a long way. It is a lot of gripping and grappling,
slapping and slipping. Victory is achieved when one can get the sun to shine on his opponent’s
belly, i.e., pin him to the ground, or—something I didn’t see—lift him overhead.
I soon tired of watching by myself and wandered out of my box and the stadium and over
to a little sideshow and circus on the grounds to watch happy villagers try to win kewpie dolls
and little children ride kiddy cars on an oval platform. All of us were happy.
Edirne, I found, was a very lovely place to visit. There is a small covered bazaar, a
hamam built by Sinan, and some Bulgarian Orthodox churches. I had time for a really nice
selection of mosques. The Eski (Old) Mosque, built on a Bursa model, is kinda boxy and
covered by nine vaults and noted for its large scale calligraphy. Üçserefli (Three Balconies) has
four minarets each with different bases. The tallest of these have the three balconies, each
reached by a different spiral staircase, for the müezzin to call from. In those innocent days, it was
very easy to get permission to climb up one of them and take in the view, if not to call out the
afternoon prayer.
But most people come to see the famous Selimiye, Sinan’s final and finest work—and the
one where he finally got to outdo the architects of Hagia Sophia by building a bigger dome (by a
few centimeters). With four unbelievably thin and graceful minarets, the mosque sits on a rise
and dominates the city and the Thracian countryside. Inside, the dome floats above four semidomes at the corners of the square created by eight large columns. The whole interior is swathed
in marvelous tiles and decorative painting.
~ 48 ~
The medrese or mosque school was alive that Sunday—no oil wrestling for these guys. I
got the third degree and the hard sell for converting to Islam. But it was earthly delights, not
spiritual, that I was longing for.
Back in Istanbul, life in the late spring and early summer was significantly more pleasant.
Neighborhood street markets and pushcart vendors provided a cornucopia of fresh fruit and
vegetables. It seemed like a different variety of delicious fruit was on offer each week. The
season started with sour cherries and continued with green plums, strawberries, sweet cherries,
red plums, peaches, apricots, melons, pears, apples, pomegranates, and figs. I was eating about
two pounds a day. Salad greens were plentiful, and vegetables were easily picked up and turned
into tasty sautéed treats on our simple gas ring. Toss them with some garlic-yogurt sauce and
serve with Turkish bread. Divine.
I was still hanging out with the Australian contingent, all of whom were very excited
about Jim’s big assignment: shooting photos for an ad campaign for the Blue Jean King, Claire’s
boyfriend. I wasn’t enlisted in finding a model—Jim’s taste did not run to hairy wrestlers—but
did get invited to the shoot itself that was held in Claire and Jim’s spacious, sparsely furnished
Cıhangır apartment. Jim had scouted the Covered Bazaar for his muse, and everyone was
clucking about what he would look like and if sparks would fly between him and Jim or someone
else.
Jim had sewn two contrasting solid-colored sheets together, posed the young carpet
salesman (alas, he was not the stuff of myth and quickly fell from our graces) in front of them,
and, David-Hemmings-like, took shot after shot after shot. We are all so pleased with his efforts.
But the Blue Jean King was not so impressed and hired some stooge to take a very bland shot of
a tubby be-jeaned young man which became the company’s face. Needless to say, The King
~ 49 ~
didn’t take over the world market but was still able to keep Claire in a style I certainly could
have become accustomed to.
Our last big outing together was a trip to Gallipoli, a rite or pilgrimage for all Australians
when in this neck of the woods. They come to pay homage to the scores of young men who died
here in the famous and tragic assault in World War I. It was here on the Dardanelles in 1917 that
the Allied forces attempted to wrest a slope of land from the defending Ottoman (soon to-be
Turkish) Axis forces. While the commanders of the troops from primarily Down Under are no
longer household names, the victorious Mustafa Kemal went on to lead the diminished forces of
the “Old Man of Europe” and to become the founding father of the modern-day country of
Turkey.
“Mustafa Kemal?” you ask, “who’s he?” We know this general and statesman, who
almost single handedly dragged the peasant peoples of Anatolia and Thrace into the 20th
century, as Atatürk, or “Father of the Turks.”
An imperious, forceful man, he had no
compunction about doing what he thought was required or commanding others to do the same.
Prior to the Allied assault, he even told his troops—who suffered greater casualties than his
opponents—“I am not asking you to fight; I am asking you to die.” And die they did in massive
numbers on both sides.
Gallipoli lacks the rows and rows of crosses that mark the memorials in Normandy but
shares a spectacular view of the landscape and water. Here I saw rugged Aussies get misty eyed
or cry openly when standing on the cliffs of this outpost and looking into the waters where wave
after wave of their countrymen were slaughtered as they attacked the higher redoubts of the
Turks. The Turks consider this hallowed ground also and are equally somber.
We took a boat back to Istanbul. That was my second time sailing into Byzantium. Now I
~ 50 ~
was a seasoned vet of the city and no longer a virgin. (Aren’t you glad I spared you the details of
my flowering or deflowering? Trust me, if the particulars were at all humorous or depraved, I
would deliver a, pun intended, blow-by-blow account.) Though not all was well and far from
ready to shout from the bow, “I’m the king of the world,” I was certainly a more confident and
contented man, and Istanbul was still her lovely, inscrutable, and mesmerizing self.
When off school, I had lots of pleasant summertime diversions. I was taking to spending
weekends with a former student of mine and her husband and another couple at a campsite out
on the Marmara. The ladies did the cooking, always marvelous, as us boys frolicked in the salty
sea and played chess on the grass. It was wonderful practice for my Turkish too.
Occasionally, some of the Australians or visitors and I would ferry out to the auto-less
Princes Islands for a day trip away from the hubbub of Istanbul. We also took advantage of the
nearer but dirtier beaches of Ataköy where we could see brown streaks of treated waste wafting
out to sea from big, barely covered pipes along the shore.
My two-week summer vacation was spent with Anne on a trip to Göreme in Cappadocia
in central Anatolia. Anyone who has seen tourist advertisements of Turkey has seen shots of the
unearthly landscape of this part of the country: the dry and practically vegetative-less vistas, the
phallic fairy chimneys, and the Henry Moore-like sensuous undulating hills of white volcanic
tufa that shimmer in the blistering sun. Mount Erciyes in the distance still towers over the
scenery and was the source of the layers of spew that covered the valley in the distant past. Then
the elements took over; rain and wind carved the chimneys and the valleys. Afterwards, man had
his way and fashioned dwellings in the soft rock that hardened after. They went up—window
piercings are still visible in the pinnacles. And they went down—in order to escape marauders,
they dug immense underground cities complete with air vents, escape hatches, granaries, and
~ 51 ~
every type of room necessary.
Cappadocia in 1978 was not the tourist mecca it has become; Anne and I felt we had the
place to ourselves. We used the ubiquitous minibuses to get around and were able to visit the big
sights of Zelve, Üçhisar, Ortahisar, and Ürgüp. In those days, the better preserved churches were
not yet open; the ones we saw in our outings and climbings had had their frescoes almost
completely destroyed by vandals. Though of course we blamed the “ignorant” Turks for the
desecration, it was actually waves of iconodules and iconoclasts who made and destroyed the art
works. The Turks, like all peoples, were more prone to scratch graffiti in a less prominent corner
of a work.
We slept in Anne’s tent at a campground above the village and walked into town in the
morning and the evening for grub and entertainment. At our temporary abode we had an
unpleasantly green-pea-soup of a swimming pool that nonetheless provided a refreshing dip after
our daily exertions. And exertions there were—we climbed rickety ladders and staircases carved
into the rock to perch in rooms whose outer halves had cracked off and fallen into the valley. We
trudged down dusty paths to get to abandoned villages carved into the stone that had been
inhabited for millennia and were now awaiting discovery by hordes of invading tourists with
cameras.
The highlight of my trip was a guided tour to some even more remote portions of the
valley from a student of mine who hailed from the town and also on summer break. He showed
up at the campground one morning with donkey transport for the two of us and took me on threeinch wide paths above the fray that were easily negotiated by the sure-footed beasts of burden,
though it seemed to me my swaying mass above those tiny hoofs would upset the center of
gravity and my beast and I would tumble down.
~ 52 ~
Summer came and went. Yvonne had long gone off to India. Bruce was the next to leave.
Jim took off sometime after Christmas to work in Greece. Claire accompanied the Blue Jean
King in his travels to clothing magnates in Europe. Anne and Marian had paired off with their
respective mates and spent most of their free time with them. Kevin was still playing the field but
with less abandon.
Leslie’s old flame Atilla, a soccer player in the farm league of one of the big clubs came
back to the city and was a frequent and welcome guest at our place. A young man from his team
was the sister of one of my students and wiled away his time “managing” his father’s auto parts
store down the street from my school. I would sometimes visit between classes and hang out
with Atilla and his friends listening to tinny music, watching the only television station in the
country, playing backgammon, and fingering worry beads.
This store like many others was grand and expansive with lots of shelves, a big desk,
several chairs, a phone and a television. The shelves would be empty except for a fan belt or two,
a boxed carburetor, and maybe a chrome wheel cover. To help a customer in need of anything
else, my friend would have to telephone any number of stores to locate the part. Because of the
lack of foreign currency and restrictions on imports, these merchants simply had no way to stock
more supplies. There was, of course, a lot of down time.
Our next memorable outing came in the fall when Biriçim took us to Eyüp, a fascinating
Istanbul neighborhood beyond the Theodosian walls near the headwaters of the Golden Horn.
The name Eyüp comes from Abu Ayyub al-Ansari, the companion and standard bearer of the
Prophet Muhammed. He came to Constantinople with the Arab army during the Muslims’ first
attempted conquest of the city in 674-8, died in the battle, and at his last request was buried at
the spot he breathed his last. One of the conditions for the peace treaty that followed was that his
~ 53 ~
burial site be preserved—though I guess its location eventually was a mystery. Seven centuries
later, during the storming and taking of Constantinople in 1452, the tomb was rediscovered by
Mehmet the Conqueror himself or one of his minions.
After the city was finally taken, Mehmet constructed a tomb over Abu Ayyub's resting
place and also a mosque nearby in his honor, the first in the now Muslim Istanbul. He also
donated a sacred relic, a stone said to bear the footprint of the Prophet Mohammed, to the site.
From that point on, Eyüp became something of a sacred place, purportedly the fourth
holiest site in Islam after Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem. The original mosque was destroyed in
an earthquake, and the current one was built in 1766 in a not unpleasing Ottoman baroque style. I
remember some rather nice robin egg blue stained glass and matching carpets. But it is the tomb
proper that is the big draw. People line up sometimes for hours to get into the ornate türbe
(mausoleum) which is lined with some astounding ceramic tiles.15 There is a large market
surrounding the complex where religious and tacky ornaments of all variety are on sale—much
like what I have seen at places like Fatima and Guadalupe.
As many Ottomans wished to be buried at or near the site, the resulting cemetery on the
hills behind the mosque above the Golden Horn became one of Istanbul's most desirable final
resting places. We walked up through the graves and got a quick but in-depth lesson on Ottoman
rank and status and evolving taste in gravestone design. The older graves were stelae-type
ones—like those in the imperial mosque precincts further in the center of town—with turbans on
top and the free-flowing Ottoman Turkish script on the body. The type of turban indicated the
standing or office of the deceased. The profusion of roots from the framing trees tilted these
stones in a pleasant, haphazard and thoroughly romantic way.
That little romp up the hill ended at the delightful Pierre Loti Teahouse. If you scout out
15
In as many as a half dozen visits, I have never had the patience to queue up and get a glimpse myself.
~ 54 ~
the gift shop before you sit down, you can buy a postcard reproduction of the 19th century view
down the Golden Horn and out to the Bosphorus with the whole panoply of the ancient city and
compare it to the one you have today. You also can buy images of Mr. Loti himself all done up
in the finery of a lost Ottoman past. He puts to shame the garb of the teahouse waiters who have
donned only oft-washed embroidered brocade vests and flimsy light cotton shirts with ballooning
sleeves in a feeble attempt at “authenticity.”
Pierre Loti was the pseudonym of French writer Julien Viaud whose popular tales of
Oriental intrigue were late 19th century sensations. In a supposedly autobiographical novel, part
of which supposedly took place at this spot, the hero fell in love with a green-eyed harem girl.
We had it from thoroughly discredited sources that Viaud was a notorious queen who loved the
notion of Oriental sumptuousness and had a hankering more for mustachioed Turkish soldiers
than voluptuous Circassian beauties. I like to imagine him here in this romantic spot in his
Turkish drag with his handsome manservant/lover at his side, smoking a hookah and gazing
down on the caiques in the water below and on the stalwart stones of the nearby necropolis.
Kurban Bayramı (“Festival of Sacrifice” and Eid al-Adha in Arabic) came in early
November that year. An important Muslim religious holiday that comes at the end of Ramadan,
it commemorates Abraham’s willingness to kill his son Isaac at God’s command, though God
intervened at the typical last moment and provided Abe with a ram to butcher instead of his son.
In Turkey this is a four-day holiday orgy of eating, a kind of Thanksgiving-on-steroids. But
instead of turkey, a lamb or two, in imitation of the ancient tale, is slaughtered. There are very
stringent laws concerning the meat: it is to be divided into three parts to be distributed to others.
The family retains one third of the share; an equal part is given to relatives, friends and
neighbors; and the final goes to the poor and needy.
~ 55 ~
There was considerable bustle preceding the holiday as shepherds bring animals to town
for everyone. While there were always grazing sheep out near the land walls and in the fields and
in grassy plots not far from the city center, there were now exponentially more. Not a few were
also tethered to doorways and window grates within the city proper. It was most usual to do the
sacrifice right in front of your home.
I went clear across the country to the far southeast to get my fill of lamb on this occasion.
My former student Filiz and her husband, with whom I had wiled away many an hour at their
Marmara Sea-side campground, invited me to his family home in Antakya. The day-and-a-half
bus ride, while tiring, was well worth it. Antakya, ancient Antioch, is a stone’s throw away from
the Syrian border and has lots of Arabic influences. The archeological museum has the second
largest collection (Tunis leads the pack) of Roman mosaics in the world—a truly stunning
assortment. It was important in Roman times, during the spread of Christianity with the Apostle
Peter and St. Paul preaching here, and well into the Crusades as its substantial walls which
surround the medieval city attest. It has one of the oldest mosques in Anatolia, a number of
tombs of Sunni and Alevi Muslim saints, numerous Orthodox Christian churches, and a
synagogue. The Church of St. Peter, supposedly the first church in Christendom, is a site of
Christian pilgrimage and is carved into the rock of the neighboring mountains. There are also
numerous tombs cut into the rock face and a network of refuges and tunnels that were not open
to the public.
In the pre-Christian era, this was a noted romping ground of the gods. For here in the
sacred grove of Daphne, Apollo—the god of light and the sun, truth and prophecy, medicine,
healing, plague, music, poetry, arts amongst other things and usually more level-headed—teased
the non-militant Eros for carrying a bow. The miffed little cupid in retaliation pierced the heart
~ 56 ~
of Apollo with the golden arrow of love and the nubile and athletic nymph Daphne with the lead
arrow of disdain. The god was so taken with the maiden who spurned his advances and took off a
running—she was a follower of Apollo’s sister Artemis and an intrepid runner. While being
pursued, her head start dwindled, and desperate not to lose her vaunted virginity, she beseeched
her father, the River God Peneus, to change her form. Why he chose to make her a bay laurel tree
instead of, say, a leopard or an eagle, I am sure I don’t know. Maybe he was busy making a lamb
stew from the leftovers of his Kurban Bayramı and was just then in the spice cabinet looking for
a bay leaf and couldn’t think of anything else. At any rate, it worked and Daphne went from
human to arboreal.
Grief-stricken Apollo, more loyal than his Daddy Zeus who tossed off his lovers willy
nilly, made sure she would remain forever green and that her leaves would adorn the heads of
victorious athletes and soldiers. I fondly remember that placid grove every time I use a bay leaf
or see the proud Olympic tradition of award a laurel wreath to a victor continued.
Hamid’s family was very prosperous and had two rams to sacrifice. And since we were
also high up on the butcher’s list of customers, he arrived bright and early, quickly trussed up the
first, slit his throat, and let him bleed into the street until the death shudder. To skin the thing, he
cut a small incision near the hoof, inserted a metal straw and blew the dead ram up like a
balloon, in the process loosening the skin from the body—that was even more bizarre than the
slitting of the throat. Then he quickly skinned, disemboweled, and sectioned the carcass. Same
for the second.
Now comes the tricky part: dividing up the butchered beast into the three portions for
family, friends and the poor. Hm, let’s do it by weight. A nice leg for us, another leg for grandma
(no matter that she lives with us), and let’s give the head to the needy. A roast for us, another
~ 57 ~
choice cut for Uncle Ahmet who I am sure will save us some succulent steaks, and all that icky
gastrointestinal stuff for those folk who really like and will be glad to get it. And so it went.
As guest of honor, I had the first bits, sliced and gently sautéed testicles in butter that
were not bad but a little too rich for my tastes. And that was just the start. It was roasted, fried,
skewered, stewed, ground, and grilled lamb for lunch and dinner for four days. All that meat was
accompanied by pilafs and marvelous vegetables from the area’s fertile fields which were still
producing in the late autumn. Though a skinny thing then at 5’ 10” and 130 lbs, I could still put
away a hefty portion of food. And I am of the clean plate school, having taken that admonition to
heart way way back. Unfortunately—or fortunately in this case—a clean plate on a Turkish table
is an open invite for a refill. Dinner’s end would have me itching to gobble down that last morsel
of bread, all that remained of plate number three or four, while the only other at the table,
Hamid’s three-year-old nephew, was still stubbornly pushing away the by-now cold remains on
his little saucer.
Back in Istanbul, as I mentioned before, the economy and foreign exchange problem was
so bad a lot of businesses had almost ground to a halt. And the political situation was becoming
more dire. Marian would come back from overnight stays with her beau Farouk with tales of
hearing nightly barrages of gunfire in his neighborhood (home of many of Istanbul’s politicians).
We didn’t really fear for her and actually were jealous because she could have her laundry done
by Farouk’s maid in an honest-to-goodness spin washer.
Kevin’s heath took a nasty turn with a bout of hepatitis A that landed him in the charity
ward of the Italian hospital for several weeks. Broken financially and out of a job, he could no
longer afford his share of the upkeep on our apartment, and we voided the lease. I took some of
the nicer items with me when I moved across the hallway with Anne and Marian. Kevin who had
~ 58 ~
also overstayed his visa by several months had to spend the last of his cash to pay a fine to get
out of the country when he decamped to Thessaloniki. Still sore at him for the way he had turned
our place into a flop house for nasty druggies, I was more in a good riddance frame of mind than
sympathetic. Leslie stayed around Istanbul for a little while and then took off for Iran of all
places—I don’t know what Khomeni and the revolutionary guard would have made of this
muscular but effeminate, exotic Maori. I inherited by default his boyfriend Atilla, the soccer
player; but, though each of us got what we wanted, ours was not a love to survive—what was to
last was my allegience to Trabzonspor on whose farm team he played.
The cooler temperatures of late fall and early winter heralded in a truly dire season.
Cooking gas was getting hard to find and subject to shortages. Kerosene for home heating was
even scarcer unless one had a contact in the business. A former student of mine called the school
out of the blue one day and arranged to meet me at our apartment. He was quite charming with
the sisters and appalled that we didn’t have heat. He reappeared a day or so later with a huge jug
of kerosene that got us pleasantly through the Christmas and New Year’s holidays but was not
enough to last all winter. Though his ulterior motive was to have a little fling with me—
something that was hurriedly accomplished standing up in a store room of his family’s vacant
Kasımpaşa home—he quickly scurried back into the closet, and I was bereft of my only source
for the precious liquid.
We made do, of course. We were away most of the day in heated classrooms, and we had
our frequent beer hall sojourns where the warmth of the crowded bodies was appreciated. And
one layered. Washing with cold water was invigorating and hardly crowed of deprivation. Then
there were occasional but welcome hamam visits where one could luxuriate and douse oneself
with gallons of hot water.
~ 59 ~
Winter also brought more substantial Turkish stews that went well with the rice pilaf and
bread. As I was still a reed thin (those Kurban Bayramı repasts did nothing to my weight), I
didn’t hesitate to take in the delights of huge twice- or thrice-weekly portions of out-of-the-oven
fresh baklava. Many mornings I would get a half kilo of su böreği (“water borek”), a marvelous
concoction of steamed or boiled dough that is then rolled thin, studded with feta (beyaz peynir or
white cheese in Turkish), egg and sometimes onion, then dribbled with olive oil or butter and
baked. Served cold, it got the day going right. Occasional mugs of salep, a sweet and delightful
beverage made from ground orchid roots, were also on hand at a fancy pastry shop on Istiklâl
Caddesi. It was so divine that one could forget that it had the look, texture and temperature of
snot.
Freshly brewed coffee was another item that was almost impossible to get as the beans
had to be imported. It was quite the thing for a hostess to serve Nescafe (actually any instant
coffee not necessarily the trademarked General Mills item), and buying a jar or two was always
high on the list of requests from someone making a trip out of the country. The highly potent
Turkish coffee could be had at a price, but most made do with tea—probably 20-30 of those tulip
glasses a day and well into the night.
Other members joined our little group. Americans from Long Island, Margaret who had
worked with Kevin at another dershane and her husband Wayne who taught at a prestigious high
school for orphans (i.e., fatherless children—some had living mothers) near Fatih, were very
welcome additions. Another American, Ed, who taught at Istanbul University was also some
fresh blood.
There was also Barry and Myra, a forlorn English couple marooned in Istanbul with a tale
that almost rivaled that of “Bleak House.” They had saved money and bought a van with the
~ 60 ~
intention of driving all the way to the Pacific Ocean. They rolled through Western and Central
Europe and the Balkans without incident. When they got to Istanbul, they had to get some minor
work done on the van. Though initially glad to have it done in Turkey as mechanics here were
world renown, they were aghast to find out that their new motor was stolen and a rebuilt one put
in its place. They promptly notified the police who just as promptly seized the van as evidence.
Now, two years into the ordeal, they still only got the occasional İnşallah and a Maşallah
(both variants of “as God wills”) in exchange for their mounting legal fees as the case slowly
wended its way through the system. Needless to say, neither was exactly thrilled to be here,
though both were excellent friends and companions.
By this time I had doubled my commute and was teaching in BÖM’s new school in
Bakırköy16 further out towards the airport on the Marmara Sea. () This put me in daily contact
with my fellow teacher Sue, a former Peace Corps volunteer in Turkey, who had returned, some
said, only to get a husband.
Sue was quite a character. She spoke readily understandable Turkish with a harsh nasal
American accent and was prone to use English word order rather than Turkish among her other
grammatical shortcomings. And she rarely shut up in either language. She was a no-nonsense
Midwestern lass who knew that anyone in charge would try to take advantage of her and so was
well prepared for that eventuality. Sue was short and squat, had a pear shaped figure, and
waddled in a manner that—along with her other attributes—reminded one of a cross between
Elmer Fudd and Daffy Duck.
The Turkish teachers at the school were mainly a bunch of new recruits straight out of the
English Department of Istanbul University and livelier and more fun than the ones in Findikzâde.
The new school was more modern and comfortable with highly touted but feeble air conditioning
16
It is also known for the insane asylum Billy Hayes was sent to in the book/movie “Midnight Express.”
~ 61 ~
but ample central heating. The teachers lounge and tea room still were mainly smokers’
hangouts.
Christmas came and Christmas went. Sue and I tried to teach our students some songs for
caroling. We also planned a whole sugar plum fairy type of Christmas celebration at the school
that neither of us had ever experienced in the States. But that fizzled out when our overwhelmingly Islamic students refused to celebrate on December 25, insisting Christmas was
actually January 1. We did have a tree and did our singing at school, and I made some apple and
currant strudel from store-bought yufka (filo pastry). We had a steamed plum pudding at home
thanks to our dwindling store of kerosene. The Australians who associated the holiday with
summer heat and picnics were not too impressed with the sprinkling of snow we got on the eve. I
spent a most pleasant evening at the Pangaltı Hamam and was fast asleep in my sleeping bag
before Santa left the North Pole.
New Years was more convivial. Ed led most of the foreign group in a bar and drink filled
night through Beyoğlu, Galatasaray, and Cihangir. At one point we did a conga line on the
walkway next to the Bosphorus and somehow managed not to fall in. A few nights later the same
group had a dinner of seared meat at an ocakbası (“head of the hearth”) in Taksim. I have always
wondered why this pleasant type of restaurant where the grill in center of the room and all the
diners stare at and drool as their dinner is being prepared isn’t more prevalent. It makes for a lot
of conviviality and great eating.
Though more widespread now, Aksaray had the only Karadeniz pidesi (Black Sea flat
bread) restaurant in town. And certainly winter was the time to sample the wares there. Much
like a pizza or calzones, long slabs of meat and vegetable filled bread come steaming out of the
~ 62 ~
oven and are quickly sliced and served. A glass of cold ayran (a ubiquitous drink of yogurt,
water and salt) and you have a very satisfying meal.
I found the early months of 1978 to be particularly tough, probably because of the
combination of persistent cold, the damp sulferous polluted air, the general depressed air of the
city folk, and—though I wouldn’t admit it—my missing Kevin. I took to spending nights with
Wayne and Margaret in their comfortable flat in Wayne’s high school. As much as I shunned it
at our Kurtulus’ digs, I freely took advantage of their ample store of hashish—the drug-induced
oblivion at least took off the edge of my emotional ills for a while.
Another gay man had arrived in Istanbul and was teaching English in yet another school
(which brought another group of foreigners into our sphere). Though not yet 20, Jeremy had
extensive sexual experiences back in England and was eager to augment that with further
adventures in Turkey. Though pudgy, with already thinning blonde hair, and not especially
attractive, his open and scholarly air (and that blonde hair) was particulary attractive to the many
gay-curious men he met through his posh school and the very gay Episcopal pastor of Istanbul.
Still, he had enough time to help me accept my same sex attraction and its physical delights. He
could be quite tender and patient when it suited him.
Jeremy’s lust made Kevin’s ample store look almost paltry. Jeremy was always on. He
once demonstrated a particularly favorite habit, jerking off men on the bus up to his house in the
more fashionable neighborhoods above Levent. Thinking it was impossible, I was stunned when
we boarded the bus, moved to the back, and then had several men soon sidling up to us with
rampant erections barely concealed in their trousers. While I was panting for air in the charged
atmosphere, Jeremy deftly unzipped a young man’s trousers and quickly and efficiently brought
him to climax—we didn’t have that many stops before we had to disembark. He accomplished
~ 63 ~
this feat surreptitiously as he had simply cut off the pockets inside of his unbuttoned coat. The
loose flaps covered the action but not the obvious look and grunts of pleasure from this particular
john. I was convinced and didn’t need to see the palm full of semen that Jeremy proudly
proffered at our stop.
Maybe I was looking for more than a carnal connection because I certainly didn’t cotton
to such pickups. Jeremy’s roommate was an intelligent lesbian from Australia. She too was
looking for love but had few outlets other than her classroom to meet women—available men, I
think I have demonstrated, were easily had at many venues. She would nightly give out an
incessant whiney recitation of just which student she was sure “this time” was a possibility
because of a witnessed lingering glance or a particularly forward caress of a fellow student. If
this was the case, then many of my female students would have been happy down on the Aegean
Isle of Lesbos. I was often discomfited by a woman’s seeming barely sublimated erotic twirling
of another’s hair or close almost entwining bodies in my own classroom. The boys didn’t do that.
February brought me another two-week vacation as well as two new teachers (and still
life-long friends) to the BÖM system. Gail and Eileen were passing through town on their way
around the world after finishing a two-year stay in rural Nigeria with the Canadian Peace Corps.
They would sit the winter out in Istanbul, recharge their batteries and finish their tour at a later
date. They, like I did previously, had to leave the country again and reenter on their work permit.
So I accompanied them to Komotini in Greece and then went further into Macedonia to visit the
Australian Jim who was now in Thessaloniki. My friends Margaret and Wayne had already left
Istanbul to visit Kevin in the same city.
Expecting the TEOFL teachers there would be a close knit community like in Istanbul but
still seething at the debacle of the Kurtuluş apartment, I nevertheless expected to avoid meeting
~ 64 ~
Kevin. Imagine my surprise when I knocked on Jim’s door late that night after being on a bus all
day and had it opened by Kevin—I had been given the wrong address. He, Wayne and Margaret
welcomed me warmly—bygones be bygones—and we spent pretty much every minute of the
vacation together.
And what a time we had. This was my first real trip out of the country in a year. And
Greece did not have the balance of trade problems that Turkey did. That meant Hollywood
movies, foreign food items, and generally none of the austerity that gripped my newly adopted
country. It showed in the happier faces of the shopkeepers and the people. Also, women were not
shunned here—they were in the bars and restaurants, often unaccompanied by men and without
the extra layers of clothing. And everyone seemed to be smiling.
Kevin’s place was at the top of the hilly city in a neighborhood aptly called the acropolis.
His apartment was a single room with a small kitchenette and a small bathroom—none of the
expanse of our Kurtuluş place. The main room was given over to an immense bed where the four
of us slept. The Greeks, who probably knew Kevin’s sexual proclivities and ample appetite,
could not quite make out the dynamics of the “sleeping” arrangements. But they need not have
been perplexed. The lack of central heat necessitated a heavy bulk of blankets to maintain the
warmth—the weight of those was enough to smoother any amorous inklings. We also were
pretty drunk by day’s end and ready for the oblivion of only sleep.
We all were on limited budgets and tended to spend most of our ready cash on vats of
rich Greek yogurt which we would top with strawberry preserves. We would also tote a
monstrous plastic jug to the back door of the local taverna every morning and get it filled with a
long days’s worth of retsina, a resin flavored wine that is delicious when you get used to it.
~ 65 ~
My temporary flatmates were intent on quitting smoking and figured that if they could
keep their fingers and hands busy, they would be able to stifle the urge for a cigarette—so we
decided to learn how to knit. We bought thick knitting needles in the neighborhood and fivepound balls of sisal twine down at the boat docks and proceeded to make handy, expandable,
beach bags in a simple garter stitch. We all sat in a semi-arc in front of the single electric heater,
and it didn’t matter so much if we added or dropped a stitch, something that happened with
increasing regularity as the retsina store dwindled down. I learned how to knit, but the others did
not, of course, quit smoking.
It wasn’t all knitting and imbibing; I had the chance to see some American films. At the
time a huge Lillian Hellman fan (see “Pentimento” above), I eagerly took the chance to see
“Julia” with Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave. Less interesting was Barbra Streisand’s treacly
remake of “A Star is Born.” And I guess it took a few years for Mel Brook’s “Blazing Saddles”
to reach this Balkan outpost as that was the last film I took in. And I guess I had been away too
long, or Istanbul was craziness incarnate for me—I didn’t appreciate the wonderful insanity of
the latter until subsequent viewings back in the states years later.
So after a grand two weeks and saddled down with Twining’s Earl Grey, peanut butter,
Nescafe, chocolate, my knitting needles, two additional bundles of sisal, and vegemite for the
Aussies, I made my way back to Istanbul.
The Australian phase of my stay in Turkey now segued into the Canadian. Before I had
lived but did not work with my drinking mates. Now the tables were turned. And it made for a
more congenial, less oppressive, situation—or maybe we were just more desperate as things
started getting so grim in Istanbul and almost nightly carousing was our only antidote. We didn’t
have many other diversions.
~ 66 ~
As teachers in a private dershane in Istanbul, we weren’t the ones suffering as Turkey’s
political and economic situation worsened. We were earning two to four times as much as a
government official or a mid-level businessman who supported a wife and several children.
Additionally we saved money by being frequent guests at dinners and parties. I had to be careful
not to invite my students anywhere—they were honor bound to pay for me whether it be a tea or
a full meal or entry into a museum. The same thing happened at Çiçek Pasajı, and at least part of
a night’s boozing sometimes ended up on another’s tab. My rent wasn’t onerous, and I did not
have to dress the part of an upstanding professional and so did not have to budget for much
clothing or hair care. But then I did not have the passive, non-working wife to scout out bargains
for me and keep an eye out for cutting corners.
Anyway back at the regular grind, Gail was assigned to my old Fındıkzâde school, and
Eileen joined me and Sue out in Bakırköy. We taught by day and reveled by night.
Fuat Bey had set Gail and Eileen up in a massive but unfinished and unfurnished
apartment near my old school where they had a grand view of a large intersection. I never tired
of watching the dare-and-feint maneuvering of the cars as they tried to make it through. Six lanes
would be going to and from Aksaray on what is now named Turgut Özal Caddesi, and four more
perpendicular to that. Movement would be all east-west until the cars in the opposing direction
slowly but surely inched their way through to block one, then two, then three lanes. If their
brothers on the other side were similarly successful, the flow would then go north-south until
they too were slowly strangled by their foes—then the process would start all over again. No
traffic light, you ask? Of course there was—but obeying it was for sissies. Viewing from above,
it was like the warp and weave of a particularly crazy Turkish carpet. Sometimes a black-draped
~ 67 ~
villager in her ҫarşaf would fearlessly cross the street, seemingly without looking, and we would
gasp as vehicle after vehicle narrowly missed making her road kill.
One night the three of us were there after class and preparing to go out when the smell of
smoke stained the air. We opened the front door, found the stairwell engulfed in smoke, and
made our way to the balcony. Soon the neighbors were alerted and came running to assist. Men
climbed and sat on others’ shoulders and—with much feeling of Gail and Eileen’s legs—handed
them down to the ground from our first floor perch. Before I could swing my legs over the
railing, they all ran off while ignoring my yells. It was back to the stairwell, a quick look to
determine there were still no actual flames, a gulp of fairly smokeless air, and a nervous
maneuver down the darkened steps to join my buddies, and a great story to tell to the minions at
Çiҫek Pasajı that night and many another.
I got to be very good friends with one of the Turkish teachers, a strange upper middle
class Muslim woman named Serap. Like Barry and Myra with their impounded van, she had a
heavy load to bear. Hers, though, was a tragic tale of love. She had gone to high school and
university and fallen in love with a Christian Armenian man named Armen. Though he loved her
equally, their respective families were firmly and decisively against the match. As he was still in
England completing a master’s degree, the final showdown was just postponed. I was not the
only sympathetic ear to all her woes but probably the most constant.
Serap in her own way was just as wily as Sue when she put her mind to it. After
befriending me, she asked me if I would mind letting Armen bring his car into Turkey under my
passport. Because of the vagaries of Turkish law, Armen could only legally bring back an auto
that was purchased in the country he had a visa for, i.e., England. Not wanting one with the
steering wheel on the right, he had bought a used Opel in Germany and was now was stuck.
~ 68 ~
Serap was quite persuasive: it was only for a short time—Armen would find out the appropriate
person to bribe and I would be quickly rid of the legal responsibility of having the auto under my
name. And in the meantime, I could use it whenever I wanted.
What’s wrong with this scenario?
A.
I actually hate to drive. I had lived in the land of the automobile as a licensed
driver for a dozen years without the need or the slightest desire to have one.
And traffic in Istanbul was insane—no rules. And parking? Forget about it.
Still, I could see myself tooling down the highway in my used Opel,
undoubtedly with a number of Güle Güle hands waving in the rear window.
B.
This was serious. If Barry and Myra’s experience was not enough, I knew that
having that stamp in my passport would be a probable nightmare.
If
something happened to the car, I would be liable for ten times the purchase
price or blue book value of the vehicle. And while I was the “owner,” I was
stuck in the country until I drove it out.
C.
I barely knew Serap and had never met Armen.
Still I hesitated not a second before I said, “Sure.” The actual mechanics of getting the car
in were appropriately “Byzantine.” I had to make my way to and cross the border to meet Armen
and bring it into the country. And, of course, finding the appropriate official to bribe turned out
to be a lengthy and ultimately fruitless endeavor.
I am not sure what Armen, who got his Masters in Business Administration in England,
actually did for a living, but he was usually available to pick up me and Serap after our morning
classes and drive us around for most of the afternoon. I got to observe their relationship first
hand: they may have been desperately in love, but they didn’t seem to like each other much.
~ 69 ~
There never seemed to be agreement about where to go, what we should do once we got there,
how long to stay, etc., etc., etc. Then there were the off-stage little dramas. Armen would be
upset if Serap’s family invited a man of marriageable age over for dinner, a fact that Serap would
not hide from him, of course. Serap too stirred the pot a bit. Once she enraged him by asking him
to get circumcised as if that would endear him to her family anyway. And so it went. So in a way
I did get to enjoy “my” car.
After months of this stalemate, even Armen was getting antsy about the vehicle. His next
brilliant move was to find another foreigner living in Turkey to buy it. A pleasant English
woman married to a Turk was our customer. So Armen, the woman, her surly non-English
speaking Turkish father-in-law and I drove the three hours to the border again. She and I would
drive out and drive back in, exchanging the stamp for the car in our respective passports. Pretty
easy, eh? Well, it seems additional forms or possibly bribes were required. Endless discussions
were made at the Turkish side by Armen and the officials with occasional blasts of invective
from the father-in-law. We didn’t even leave the country. We drove to another border gate and
got the same treatment. Plan Two foiled.
A few more months passed and Plan Three was put into effect. Since Armen had to go to
England to complete a few things for his degree, we would go out of the country together. The
vehicle possession would be expunged from my record, and I would just walk back in and get a
bus back to Istanbul. Armen would continue on to England and could, as far as I was concerned,
just drive the thing into the English Channel. As this still involved some subrosa bribery or
chicanery, Armen chose a little used border crossing into Bulgaria where the chief customs
official was a distant relative through marriage.
Since he unfortunately chose to go on a Sunday when his tenuous contact was un-
~ 70 ~
reachable by phone, we were forced to spend the night in the little town near the border. Since all
the decent hotel rooms had been requisitioned by the military on some weekend field maneuvers,
we had to settle for a flea-bag joint17 that made those Sultanahmet tourists dives look palatial.
Everything went swimmingly the next morning.
I did get more than a few rides, drinks, and an in-depth exploration of Turkish border
crossings (and crabs) from my liaison with Armen. I got dibs on a new apartment in a building
his mother owned in Beyoğlu, just a stone’s throw from my beloved Ciçek Pasajı. And what a
building—this was an Ottoman mansion with a marble façade, a two-story entrance hall with an
inlaid marble floor in a sunburst pattern, a double carved marble staircase that led up to my door,
and graceful marble niches along the wall. The paintings in the niches, though classicallyinspired, were crudely-detailed figures. I even had a fabulous carved marble mantle on the
fireplace.
I felt a bit like Pip in “Great Expectations” whenever I entered, though, because the place
and the neighborhood had seen better days. The chandelier was gone from the entry, and my two
rooms were fairly bare. My kitchen under the central stair was wedge-shaped. My bathroom was
so small that I could do all my ministrations from one position. The neighborhood seemed to be a
minor garment district. Other buildings held ateliers whose workers also slept and ate in digs
tighter and more humble than mine.
I held my first and only party there for my 28th birthday. Many of my fellow teachers, a
few of the students, friends, and acquaintances crowded into my humble abode. Someone
brought a sound system and tapes. Everyone brought food. We had bottles and bottles of Güzel
Marmara wine, Yeni Rakı, and Efes Pilsen beer. There was dancing aplenty until my neighbors,
17
It wasn’t fleas that I had to worry about, though, but body lice. I discovered I had those new tenants a few weeks
later—but that is another story I will spare you.
~ 71 ~
wanting some well-earned sleep, started pelting my windows with an ever increasing shower of
pebbles. Everyone deemed it a huge success and wanted it soon repeated.
The winter was long and bitter, but we survived. Spring had me, the supposed Byzantine
scholar, finally visiting the Kariye Museum (Church of St. Savior in Chora) for the first time
with the gang. A late eleventh century structure more or less, it is a cross-in-square that becomes
an even bigger square with the addition of a large mortuary side chapel and two narthexes. The
whole shebang has six domes. The chapel is decorated with stunning frescoes of the Resurrection
in which Christ is pulling Adam and Eve from their tombs. The picture also has John the Baptist,
David, Solomon and the other righteous kings. There is also a Last Judgement, a Virgin and
Child, two Moses panels, and a band of angels.
As incredible as those are, it is probably the mosaics in the narthexes that truly astound.
A fairly full iconographical encyclopedia of Christendom covers the vaults and most of the
walls. The colors of the tesserae have lost none of their glow over 800 years.
That was one of the few Byzantine structures outside the environs of Hagia Sophia that I
visited up to then and I have been trying ever since to make up for my lacadasical approach to
exploring Istanbul’s past. I had purchased John Freely’s recently published masterful “Strolling
through Istanbul” near the end of my stay, but at that point I was seeking rest and relaxation
outside of Istanbul. I did have a lone trip to the Church of the Pantocrator (Zeyrek Camii) and
got to see a single soot-covered chapel full of pigeons and their shit—the highlight of that trip,
though, was trying to find the local imam and getting the key to gain entrance.
The Australians and I had always wanted to visit any of the still-functioning Greek or
Armenian churches in town. Our many friend of those faiths were always promising to take us,
but those outings never materialized. Our purported brothers-in-Christ were, it must be said,
~ 72 ~
fairly secular, but we couldn’t help but think we were considered too foreign for their kith and
kin.
It was hard to miss the Theodosian land walls surrounding old Istanbul. They started at
the Marmara Sea and continued for an uninterrupted six-and-and-a-half kilometers, about four
miles, to the Golden Horn. We passed through one of the many gates twice most days and
whenever we left town by bus. They are truly astounding even in their ruinous state and were
built (actually rebuilt) in 447 in a mere two months—the fact that Attila the Hun was on his way
to take the city undoubtedly spurred the efficiency and quality of the construction. In a
remarkable show of cooperation unlike their usual polarization and turbulence, the different
factions of the Hippodrome chariot races and circuses each constructed a section. And the walls
kept everyone else out until the Ottomans figured out a way to break in at the weakest spot a
thousand years later.
The inner walls were five meters wide and 12 high and studded with 96 towers that rose
18 to 20 meters and from which the highly effective Greek fire bombs could be hurled. The outer
wall was two meters thick and eight-and-a-half high and also had 96 shorter towers alternating
between those of the inner wall. Wide terraces of different heights were on either side of the
outer walls. Fronting them all was a moat ten meters deep and 20 wide that could be flooded
whenever invaders were nigh. Earthquakes, assaults, those looking for building materials, and
time had all taken their toll; but much of the wall could be walked and enjoyed when I lived
there. One came across shepherds with their flocks, camping gypsies, tucked away patches of
gardens, and pockets of recently arrived villagers fromAnatolia who had set up makeshift homes
next to and even within the walls. Nowadays as many sections have been reconstructed, a visitor
is less likely to sprain an ankle while exploring but views a less colorful scene.
~ 73 ~
I had been to Yediküle (Seven Towers) near the Marmara end of the walls a couple of
times as it was so easy to reach by train. This curious structure is a sort of fort made from four of
the towers of the land walls to which Mehmet the Conqueror added three new Turkish towers
inside and four new walls to connect the whole shebang. It was used in Ottoman times for
storage and as a prison. Inmates carved names, dates and graffiti in six different languages on
their cell walls. A particularly unfortunate Frenchmen advised in rhyme, “Prisoners, who in your
misery groan in this sad place, offer your sorrows with a good heart to God and you will find
them lightened.” (Freely, “Istanbul” p. 252)
The Golden Gate, one of ten (five military and five public) along the length, was used for
triumphal entry of Byzantine emperors into the city before it and its flanking towers were
incorporated into the Ottoman edifice. The last time it was used for that purpose, though, was in
1261 when the Byzantines chased out those nasty Venetians who had taken over and raided the
city. After that they didn’t have any victories to celebrate.
At the other end of the walls above the Golden Horn was another of my favorite
Byzantine ruins, the Palace of the Porphyogenitus or Tekfur Saray. This late 13th century
imperial residence was built into the land walls and badly damaged in the Ottoman siege. After
repairs, it served as an imperial menagerie, a brothel, a pottery and tile factory, a poorhouse for
Jews, and even a bottle factory before it again was a ruin. Though the arcade and two rows of
upper windows of the exterior have been restored, the floors and interior columns are gone. But
conveniently extant column bases have provided me with living-caryatid photo ops through the
years (1978-2004) with me and different friends posing in unsuitably contorted ways.
As winter gave way to spring, I had put in a whole year in Istanbul. Now I was the old
hand with the language, customs, transportation system, and the regulars at Ҫiҫek Pasajı.
~ 74 ~
At the end of April, I had a school break at the same time Ed planned his exit from
Turkey via Bodrum and the Greek island of Kasand so accompanied him. We first visited his
student Cemil in his hometown of Bursa. Since I have maintained a friendship with Cemil to this
day and have oft been reminded of that weekend in this charming industrial city in northwestern
Anatolia, my memories have been augmented and even elevated to mythic status. Since Cemil
was one of six brothers close in age, two more adult males in her house did not perturb his
mother in the least. But we got the full throttle of Turkish hospitality.
Though we hit all the architectural highlights primarily built by the Ottomans in the
century before they conquered Istanbul, my most vivid memory was our visit to an old hamam in
Ҫekirge, a section of town with numerous hot water mineral springs and a spa center for many a
millennium. This bath had a big rectangular pool in the center under the dome and some
wonderful old tiles. On that chilly spring Sunday morning, it was crowded with males from
toddler to geriatric, all of whom were reveling in pleasurable activities—though I would bet that
none were as pleased as I was to be accompanied by two burly handsome men.
In the middle of our ministrations, panic spread through the crowd when a late-middleaged female art historian burst into the place to have a look see. The staff tried to stop this
unheard of activity, but she ignored all their pleading. “All the men are covered,” she shouted,
“and anyway I am here to see the tiles and not the men. And what do they care about an old lady
like me anyway.” Since Cemil stepped up to translate, we chatted with her for a short while. But
true to form, she just wanted to see the tiles and get out of there.
That afternoon we took the tram in front of Cemil’s house up Mount Uludag’, Turkey’s
second highest mountain and most popular ski resort. That short respite from the press and noise
of the city was most welcome before we left on an overnight bus down to the Mediterranean.
~ 75 ~
Bodrum has a long and glorious history. But in those days, it was a fairly lazy small town
with a few run-down hotels and pensions and a scattering of dusty shops. We took a ramshackle
minibus to the next cove to the west, rented a tent and had a couple of days camping alone on the
beach. A villager would bring his camels down to the seaside every morning and delighted us to
no end by having one of his dromedaries smoke a cigarette. The early May water was far from
warm but easily tolerated; we spent a lot of time swimming in the buoyant salt water. We would
go to town once a day to eat and shop, roam the imposing Crusader castle in the bay, and kibbutz
with the locals. Though the site of one of the Eight Wonders of the Ancient Wonders, I either
didn’t visit the ruins of the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus or was, more likely, not at all impressed
by what looked like an abandoned rock quarry—the Crusaders had recycled all the stones for
their fortress on the water.
Ed went off to Greece enroute to America, and I returned to my duties in Istanbul. I was
devastated to find out that Ҫiҫek Pasajı had completely collapsed while I was away, killing a late
night worker. I now count that occurrence as the beginning of the end of my stay in Turkey.
Spring gave way to summer and along the way I gained a new roommate soon after I
moved to Beyoğlu. An old college friend of Eileen, Bruce was a laconic Canuk who was very
easy to live with and an always-willing drinking partner—we soon found other beer
hall/restaurants to take the place of our old recently deceased friend. As he taught at yet another
school, we didn’t have to spend all of our time together and get on each other’s nerve. While his
occupancy certainly put a damper on any at-home private entertaining, his jovial presence more
than made up for it.
I did make my first and only bar pickup while still living alone. After we left the
deafening Club 69 which allowed for little conversation, my mate-for-the-night started regaling
~ 76 ~
me with harrowing tales of his commando days in the recent Cyprus war. Already nervous at
how the night would unfold, I was sure I would be butchered after being painfully skewered like
some human shish kebab in an orgiastic frenzy—that I would not die a virgin18 was a slight
consolation. Though a super macho battle-tested infantryman, he wasted no time in throwing his
legs in the air when we got to my place and was given to much cuddling for most of the night.
Turns out he was now a hairdresser, not necessarily a gay profession in Turkey, but still telling.
We planned another birthday party at our house for Eileen and Bruce on a Sunday in
June. But the day before, I had about five people stop by before a fete at the British Consulate
right down the road. A few minutes later, I got a knock at my door, and two policemen barged it.
It seems I had gotten the reputation in the neighborhood for running a brothel and my own little
drug cartel19, and they were called in to bust me.
Notwithstanding the guns on their waists, I was appalled and annoyed that they were
invading my space, as the Turks—medical students all—were envisioning their careers going
down the drain. The cops did a cursory search of the place and our belongings. There was an
“aha” moment when they found an aluminum foil wrapped package in my book bag—such foil
was hard to come by in Turkey and was used, I have been told, to wrap hashish. My holding was
much more innocent: I had a private lesson out on the Princes’ Islands that morning and took
along a hard-boiled egg for the trip and forgot to eat it. But the coppers did not go empty
handed—they surreptitiously lifted a few hundred dollars worth of lira Gail had in her purse for
gift buying prior to a short trip to England. As they parted, they warned me not to have more
than two people at a time in the future. They needn’t have bothered.
18
What constitutes virginity for a gay man? It is more than penetration (active or passive). Some would say that
just coming out is tantamount to losing one’s virginity as it is so far reaching. Though making my first pickup was a
big step, I am not at this juncture pleading total innocence.
19
Years later in New York City, I met a man who lived right across the street from me. He remembered me well
from the neighborhood and assured me (much to my chagrin) that my reputation was spotless.
~ 77 ~
We had to do a lot of readjusting and planning. A teacher Bruce worked with offered her
place in the hills behind Bebek up on the Bosphorus as an alternative. Remember, this was
before cell phones and the internet, and hardly anyone in Istanbul had a private phone. It was
already late in the day and only hours before the planned gathering. Luckily many of the
attendees were also at the fete and soon learned of the wrench thrown at the bacchanalian fest we
had hoped to host. Still, the party that did transpire was a fun gathering, if a bit wistful.
This lack of communication was a constant source of trouble and concern—there always
seemed to missed connections, delays, wrong turns and dead ends. Part of this, of course, was
that most of us did not have a basic working knowledge of Turkish. Even I, after a year here and
an old hand, was flummoxed at times realizing that my meaning or understanding of a particular
situation was not perceived as intended. When one of us would relate a tale that illustrated that
fact, we foreigners would sagely shake our heads and mutter, “What did you expect? He’s
Turkish.” But oh, how incensed we would be when we heard a whisper of “yabancı” (foreigner)
from the lips of someone who was born, raised and expected to stay here for the rest of his life.
No wonder the resentment built up on both sides. Still I thought I was immune to and generally
above all that.
After my Bursa/Bodrum sojourn, I started spending a lot of time at Cemil’s apartment.
His roommate Bayram, a fellow university student and a magnetic, charming, handsome Kurd
from Malatya in the East, took me under his wing much like Jeremy had. But Bayram eschewed
the carnal and focused on my Turkish and political education. While my language skills were
good, he had me perfect my pronunciation, grammar, and diction. We would recite and discuss
Nazım Hikmet20 poetry and other grand works, and he would gently correct me and push me on
20
Hikmet was a marvelous lyric poet born in 1902. Though a committed Communist who spent a lot of his life in
prison or in exile, he is beloved by most Turks and died in Moscow in 1963.
~ 78 ~
to greater fluency. We would have long conversations full of participles, those perplexing
clauses, and conditional tenses that I bet the average Turk hadn’t mastered. Topics would tend
toward the tyranny of the government, the poverty of the people, and the need for socialist
reform.
Though the personal chauffeur of Turkan Şoray, Turkey’s most famous movie star, he
always seemed to have time for me. We had long walks around Istanbul, and I spent many a
night in the twin bed across from his as our conversations continued long after the lights were
out. Luckily, the effort to keep up my side was taxing enough that I slept soundly and did not lay
awake in anticipation of his crossing over to my side for what would have been the capstone to
our relationship.
This was the closest I came to falling in love in Turkey. That it was unrequited was a
matter of grave concern to me. Though I am sure he was aware of my sexual orientation, he
would not let me bring up the subject of homosexuality. The one time I tried, he very sternly
rebuffed me. I guess it didn’t fit into his socialist dialectic. By the way, I didn’t find out until
months later that he spoke excellent English.
That summer was magical. It was rounds of parties at night, meeting up with new people
eager to celebrate nothing in particular, trips up the Bosphorus or out to the Princes Islands, and
longer journeys to the beach towns of the Aegean and Mediterranean. I finally got to Ephesus to
see that fabled archeological site. Again I camped out with a visiting American in a field across
from the beach in the center of the town of Kuşadası, a town ever more sleepy and dusty than
Bodrum.
After Eileen and Gail quit teaching but before they went to India to complete their roundthe-world journey started some two years earlier, Eileen and I went to Antalya. We spent about a
~ 79 ~
week camping out right on the water a short distance from the city. We were joined in our long
and languid twice-a-day dips in the glorious Mediterranean by an 18-year-old villager we
nicknamed Tarzan both for his barely understandable Turkish (Bayram and I had not practiced
all the accents in the country) and his impressive naturally muscular physique. Between those
swims, we would head into town to catch transport to some of the archeological treasures in the
area, stroll along the picturesque port, gobble up the best ice cream we had yet found in Turkey,
and buy supplies for simple meals back at camp. The memories of that trip never dimmed, and I
took to planning my retirement in Antalya.
My friend Claire, tired of living off the Blue Jean King and probably wanting some
diversion, took Eileen’s place at my school. Soon after, there was a reshuffling of staff and
schedules, and she was abruptly fired for no apparent reason. My resentment at Fuat Bey’s
administration bubbled up to a new high, and I quit in protest. By this time I knew I could not or
would not make a life here and was already planning my escape.
The last major event of my stay was a visit from three of my older sisters in August.
Margaret was then 46, Sarah probably 40, and Patty and a friend of hers from Indiana were in
their early 30s. I met them in Athens—I didn’t think they could quite handle Istanbul and Turkey
straight off. That part of the trip went perfectly, and I was delighted that I had a week to explore
the city before they came. We then took a boat to Samos, the Greek Island off the coast of
Kuşadasi. What a disaster. Arriving at 10:00PM, we and many other passengers found out there
were no hotel rooms to be had at any price. We had to sleep in a field, an activity even a young
intrepid traveler used to roughing it found very unpleasant. My charges took it all in stride and
even boasted that they would not mind, but would now welcome, the Turkish toilets they were
dreading.
~ 80 ~
At Kuşadası we easily got a hotel and were met by an acquaintance of mine from the area
who not only had a car to ferry us around but use of an empty apartment at Altinkum, a popular
beach resort not far away. It was Ephesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary’s home but also the ruins
of the Greek town of Priene, the Roman city of Miletos, and the incredible Temple of Apollo at
Didyma. And swimming and lazing around and me proudly proffering the bounty of Turkey’s
harvest and culinary traditions.
Then I wowed them with Cappadocia. We visited all the sites I had been to the year
before and also went to the underground city of Derinkuyu. The area has miles and miles of
underground tunnels and “cities” of varying sizes. Dug into the soft tufa rock that hardens when
exposed to air, these vast cities had air vents, storage vaults, escape hatches, and dormitories and
rooms for hundreds. Some think that a vast network of connecting underground cities of varying
sizes lie beneath the Anatolian plateau.
Our trip back to Istanbul had us changing buses in Ankara late at night. When I
purchased the tickets in Ankara for the second leg, I was assured by the clerk that they were for
the next bus leaving in about 30 minutes. Even though I knew better, I bought the tickets without
inspecting the departure time. When I got back to my sisters, I noticed it was for a bus some
three hours later, well past midnight. I stomped back to the agency and demanded a refund which
of course was not forthcoming. I tried to appeal to the very strong Turkish love of family and the
need to protect womenfolk. But my sisters could well have been my grannies and great grannies
on the way to the hospital, and the answer would have been the same.
That is when I had a complete meltdown, and I do mean complete. I actually went for the
clerk shouting that I was going to kill him. Though I didn’t get a lick in, it took three guys to
hold me off. I let loose a screaming invective damning the clerk, the country, and all the people
~ 81 ~
in it, and how I was sick and tired of all their shady dealings, their empty promises of friendship,
and essential untrustworthiness. Thanks to Bayram’s tutoring, I don’t think a syllable of my
lengthy tirade was lost on anyone in the place, except of course my poor sisters who knew me
only as a mild mannered younger brother not given to violence of word or deed.
I can only imagine their reaction. Picture a painfully skinny guy brick red from weeks of
sun and swimming in the heavy salted seas, in micro shorts, tee shirt and flimsy sandals in the
middle of a bustling bus station in the middle of Anatolia almost in the middle of the night.
Picture his jugular veins popping from his neck, the arms of three hairy mustaschioed strangers
entwined in his, and from his mouth an extended stream of highly charged unintelligible shouts.
Now if I get carted away or stroke out, they would be alone not knowing a word of the language
or anyone in the country.
I guess my responsibilities to them (and my shame at unleashing an essentially
unwarranted attack on the integrity of a whole country that had welcomed and treated me well
for well over a year) had a calming effect. Plus I knew deep down I could scream all night and
still not get an earlier bus without charge. So we did what any waiting group of Turks would do,
we had a cup of tea and watched the blurry television set for the interim.
Knowing my place was too small for all of us, Sue nicely offered to put them up in her
new place in Koca Mustafapaşa, one of the more conservative neighborhoods of Istanbul—boy,
were my sisters seeing the “real” Turkey. It was a whirlwind of shopping and touring during the
final days. We all went out to a belly dance show at a fancy gazino one night. Our friend Natalie
wrangled a back stage interview with the show’s star who invited us to her house the next week
for tea and to discuss the purchase of authentic belly dance outfits for Natalie and my sister who
had been taking lessons back in Indiana.
~ 82 ~
The dancer turned out to be a really sweet and demure Greek woman well into her 40s
who still lived with her mother. Since her costumes were either not for sale or too small, she
called a friend who could help us out. That young lady, an actress and dancer, had us over and
parted with two of her old costumes—I got a well made, brilliant orange sequined number that is
probably still seeing action in Southern Indiana. But before I left the country, I spotted her nude
photos in one of the daily rags. Her nipples were covered with stars, but they did no airbrushing
of the marks left by her recently shed undergarments.
I had another month or so in the country but cannot remember any more great adventures.
I spent the last few days with one of the first Turks I met when I arrived. And I ruined that
relationship when I made an awkward romantic overture on my last night in town. Talk about
leaving on a bitter note.
So I was leaving Istanbul, my home for almost two years. I laugh now to think that I was
a “changed person”—of course I was and wasn’t. I had experiences unimaginable a few years
prior, but that is what living is all about. I was pretty well most of the way out of the closet,
certainly a wonderful thing by itself. I had fluency in Turkish that would not get me anywhere
except many more visits to the country and some wonderful friendships.
And what of my knowledge of the city? It was intimate but certainly cursory. I knew the
bus and dolmuş stops, the best places to get a cheap grilled cheese sandwich, and many of the
bars in Beyoğlu. I had a working knowledge of the political processes and personages and could
name most every film celebrity and identify their pictures. I had visited some of the many
archeological sites of the country and delved into minority issues a tad. I could swear in Turkish
and effortlessly lift my eyelids just a tad like a Turk to indicate a negative reply.
It would take a lifetime more of study to fully grasp the essence of Byzantium/
~ 83 ~
Constantinople/Istanbul and I would always find there was more to learn, more to ponder, and
more to absorb. Two years, and I had only scratched the surface. But, gee, what a surface.
~ 84 ~
Journey East 1985
It took me almost seven years to get back to Turkey.21 And when I did, I went as a
“normal” tourist, i.e., one who was earning an American, not Turkish, salary and could indulge
himself. The dollar was now worth 50 Turkish lira, up from 15 when I last was here, and I felt
like a Croesus. I still had a lot of contacts back in Istanbul but wanted to see the eastern part of
the country and even toyed with the idea of staying out of Istanbul, other than the airport,
completely. I still had this love/hate thing with the city that would never fully resolve.
I had fully expected that this would be a trip back in time as I would be visiting the
poorer, more conservative parts of the country and home to monuments of earlier eras. None of
the Beyoğlu nightlife for me this trip. What I didn’t know was that I would actually be getting a
glimpse at the new Turkey—the Islamic, not secular, backbone of the country that had barely
registered on my radar before and which would be more apparent in world affairs and in my
trvels back in future years.
Turkey didn’t have an easy time of it after I left in 1978. The economy and political
system became, incredibly, even more fragmented. For the third time in their history, the military
took over the country. Thousands were detained or imprisoned, and over a million-and-a-half
were blacklisted. The only liberal thing going around was torture, and both the Communists and
the right-wing zealots were victims. But the violence that was producing ten assassinations a day
was curtailed, and the economy gained some stability with the ultimate goal of uniting Turkey
with the global economy. Unfortunately, this meant wage freezes and sloughing off thousands of
public sector jobs, àla Margaret Thatcher.
Turgut Özal, Turkey’s current prime minister, was the architect of the resurgent
21
The events are based on a journal I kept during this trip, so I can be fairly certain of the timing and occurrences
herein and not be a slave to memory.
~ 85 ~
economy. Born in fairly humble circumstances in Malatya in the East and of Kurdish
background, he was educated in the United States where he developed a life-long admiration of
most things American, especially our “can do” spirit of getting the job done. He was also the first
prime minister born in the Turkish Republic. And, though a committed Islamist, he was able to
sidestep the more fundamental believers in the country. Unfortunately, he also ushered in an era
of fabulous wealth creation and rampant corruption.
Gail and Ahmet, who by this time had married, were back in Turkey near Edirne—he
was doing his military service, and she was expecting their first child. Bayram, Turkan Şoray’s
chauffeur, had just finished his university degree and was also doing his military service in Muş,
not far from where I would be journeying. He very much wanted to go to Nemrut with me and
had gotten permission from his commanding officer for leave.
So in early May, I flew to Istanbul, took a taxi to the bus station at Topkapı, and boarded
a bus to Kırklareli to meet Gail and Ahmet. Arriving well after dark, I spent a luckless hour
traversing the streets trying to find their address. The few people around (before the whole
neighborhood was aroused) didn’t seem to know the names of streets and—though my Turkish
was still excellent—were much more interested in finding an English speaker for me as if he or
she would miraculously conjure up the proper abode. As luck would have it, Gail and Ahmet
were off visiting his relatives in Antalya and would not return for a few more days.
After a night in a hotel, I hotfooted it to Edirne the next morning where I bought a ticket
for an overnight bus to Trabzon through Ankara that night before going to the famous Sinan
Mimar Hamamı for a grand wash. The high point of this was not the building so much as
befriending a 23-year-old housepainter recently out of the army. Şahin and I spent the rest of the
day together, sipping tea, watching his friends fish in the river with homemade tackle, and
~ 86 ~
visiting the market. When my guide took me further afield to a sleazy brothel, it confirmed the
feeling I had that this trip was going to be a tad bit different than my prolonged stay years earlier.
The ladies there were pleased to see us so early in the day—it was nigh noon. As Şahin
was well known to them and I, of course, was not, they swirled around me like bees to honey.
One (my buddy assured me she was a really hot number) could not keep her tongue out of my
ear. This was one of the few times I wished I knew no Turkish, though the “saxophone” they
were offering me required no translation. As my discomfort mounted and my demurrals for
favors did not diminish, it was obvious that we should move on.
As prayer time approached, my good little Muslim steered us to the fabulous Selimiye
Mosque where he did his namaz with particular grace and fervor. He then took me to meet one of
his instructors, a hawkish intolerant fellow who instantly bombarded me with injunctions to
convert. When I gave the stock answer of how I could not do that to my mother, this mullah-intraining disdainfully hissed that I should be my own man and not stay tied to my mother’s apron
strings. Hm, yes, things in Turkey have changed somewhat.
Watching a convoluted and badly dubbed detective movie in an open air teahouse was
certainly a more pleasant diversion for me than hobnobbing with prostitutes and batting away
proselytes and was about the last thing Şahin and I did together before I boarded the bus around
dusk.
I used not to have trouble with such long trips, but by the time I got to Ankara the next
morning I knew my bones could not handle a journey of equal length to my next destination.
Right next to the bus station was a Turkish Airlines office; yes, there was an upcoming flight to
Trabzon that I could catch easily by means of their courtesy van to the airport. The cost was a
meager $34; I might have considered doing it at five times the cost. I was soon on the eastern
~ 87 ~
Black Sea coast.
Expecting a verdant jewel, I was surprised to find a dusty but bustling city. The spring air
off the water still had a chilly tinge to it. The ancient city, now the present one’s center, sits on a
high flat summit (its name derives from the Greek word trapeza for table) above the sea and
between two ravines. Its history is intimately connected with the Silk Route, Mongol invasions,
internecine rivalries with different trans-Caucasus nations, and ongoing religious feuds. After the
crusaders sacked Constantinople in 1204, the Byzantine Empire was essentially ruled from here.
After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Trabzon was the most important of the three remaining
Byzantine states, and its legacy endured for several centuries after until the Pontic Greek
Orthodox inhabitants were deported to Greece during the population exchange between Greece
and Turkey in 1923. Local Muslims who spoke Greek dialects continued to live here.
Of the many Byzantine and orthodox remains in the area, two are must sees. The first is
the Church of Hagia Sophia, a masterwork of the 13th century. After being converted into a
mosque, it had subsequent use as an ammunition storehouse and a field hospital. Lovingly
restored in the late 50s and early 60s, it sits rather forlornly amongst some ugly suburbs but with
a beautiful view of the sea. Basically a Greek cross-in-square with a dome supported by four
columns, it has glorious frescoes and some mighty fine interior relief work. Unfortunately, I
found the place all shuttered up and only got to see the exterior and spar with the 14-year-old
self-proclaimed “Black Belt Judo Champion of Turkey” in the long grass in front of the narthex.
We were almost an even match.
The second site is the Sumela Monastery (aka Sümela) some 25 miles out of the city and
not far from the village of Maçka. Dedicated to the Black Virgin (or the Virgin of the Black
Rock), this stunning snow white building framed by the dark stone of the mountains is perched
~ 88 ~
on a narrow cliff 1,000 feet above a river valley. Entry is by a narrow staircase carved into the
rock that takes you up above and then down into the monastery complex proper. The magnificent
view is rivaled only by the scope of destruction of the many frescoes that once covered almost all
the rooms. Equal opportunity graffiti, be it Greek, European, American or Turkish, abounds and
covers almost all the surfaces not defaced by a furious toss of a heavy rock. Many of the defilers
helpfully carved in their nationality and the year along with their names so you can trend the
mutilation through the ages. I might have figured out the plan of the monastery as I jumped and
dodged into every crack and crevice, but the caretaker—who had not warned us that our visit
was limited to a half hour—called us out and locked up the place before we were finished
exploring.
We went back to the village and had tea with our taxi driver. The tea shop owner was
very fond of all things American. Especially enamored for the famous American poet Emma
Lazarus, he could not believe I had not heard of her and began spouting the Turkish version of
her most famous work, “Heykeltras,”22 as he paraded around the tiny room with his right arm
held high and his left fist clenched on his sternum. After repeated renditions of this fabled poem
and peering at his posture, it finally dawned on me that he was referring to the Statue of Liberty
and Ms. Lazarus’ “The New Colossus,” which actually sounds pretty good in Turkish.
I wonder if the 1950s and 60s Chevrolets still ply the streets of Trabzon as they did in
1985? One of my biggest thrills was seeing about 40 of these vintage cars during my stay.
Though there was more, always more, to see, I was soon off over the mountains to
Erzincan and Erzurum on a bus filled with fierce looking villagers who managed to pack what
could have been all their worldly possessions in the baggage compartments, though the bus being
loaded next to us had door frames and wall sections tied to its roof. The way was incredibly
22
I may have missed something as this translates only as “Sculptor.”
~ 89 ~
stunning—the mountains whose summits were still cloaked in snow were coming into their
springtime glory with the many shades of green vegetation taking over and rushing waters down
below. Early flocks led by shepherds with rifles and big dogs were fanned out over the hills and
valleys and heading to higher ground. We had an unimpeded view as the narrow roads, more
than a little washed out from the rains, had no guardrails. The bus drivers in Turkey are a macho
lot, and ours was not an exception. We made great death-defying time to our first destination
except when we had to wait for road-blocking flocks of sheep to mosey off our course.
Rocked by periodic earthquakes and surrounded by mountains, Erzurum is Turkey’s
highest city. Strategically located on the fabled trade routes to India, it has had a long and violent
history. Known in Turkey as a conservative backwater, it was where Atatürk resigned his
position in the Ottoman Army and became a citizen of the new republic. This is also the
birthplace of the ubiquitous döner kebab, a term that needs no translation anymore. I would have
liked to stay longer and see some of the Seljuk and early Ottoman buildings and shrines but only
got to see the bus station before taking off for Ağrı and Doğubeyazit.
Our luck didn’t hold, and we had two breakdowns. Also there was confusion at every
stop, as the panicked travelers kept taking nose counts, getting different numbers, and screaming
for the supposedly missing Ahmed or Mehmet. Towards evenings, there was much debate about
where the exact direction of Mecca would be on a moving bus on a curving road so that the
passengers could arrange their prayer rugs on the floor or seat and do a proper namaz. Luckily
one of the breakdowns came soon after, and the religious could do their duty as the secular
banged on pipes and tightened bolts. We limped into Ağrı too late for me to go further.
Though my seven-year hiatus from speaking Turkish daily didn’t seem to dent my
proficiency, the accents here in the East were almost impenetrable at times with sharp
~ 90 ~
curtailment of the ending syllables and a guttural harsh intonation of all words. And the further
east I travelled the harder it was to comprehend. But I could make myself perfectly understood.
I didn’t get to see any of Ağrı except a second rate hotel room and the bus station the next
morning. While waiting for a bus to Doğubeyazit, I was enlisted to make a sign for the bus
company and penned a “TRAVEL INFORMATION—IF YOU NEED ANY HELP WITH
YOUR TRAVEL ARRANGEMENTS, ASK FOR İZZET KAYA AT VAN GÖLÜ TURİZM”
placard that may still be hanging up in their dusty cramped office. I do wonder if İzzet ever
learned any English.
It was another plodding 60 miles with stops in every village along the way before I got to
Doğubeyazit, but at least I was treated to occasional peeks of Mount Ararat (Ağrı) through her
enveloping cloud cover along the way. The $20 taxi ride out to Işak Paşa Sarayı (Palace) on the
Turkey-Iran border was a total rip off but eminently justifiable as I would have had to walk it
otherwise, and time was scarce.
The palace is one of the most romantic and fascinating ruins I have ever visited. Set on a
plateau above a vast plane of arid land and ringed by numerous volcanic peaks—the granddaddy
of them all being Ararat to the north—this 18th century palace-cum-fortress is a grand amalgam
of Persian, Seljuk, Ottoman, Armenian and Georgian architecture. The visitor enters via a
magnificent gateway (whose gold plated doors are on view in the Hermitage Museum in St.
Petersburg) into a big courtyard from where access can be had to inner courtyard, the harem, the
men’s quarters, the mosque, the colonnaded dining hall and stairs up to the roof. Domes,
minarets, a türbe or two, fabulous brick work and reliefs make up the bulk of the design and
decoration. I do hope they have cleaned out all the pigeon shit from the many rooms by now.
Then it was back to the bustling frontier town affectionately known as “Doggie Biscuit”
~ 91 ~
to the majority of non-Turks and a further wait for transport back to Ağrı. Lots of Iranians come
over the border to drink the alcohol that is forbidden them in their own country. Another draw is
Ararat and the chance to find Noah’s Ark which legend has it landed on her slopes after the flood
waters receded. One of the locals I chatted with assured me he knew a guide who had located the
hull just the year before. Turkish pilots have spotted it from the air. But American astronaut
James Irwin and others have turned up empty handed after much searching. Though in a very
sensitive military controlled area, you too—with some advance planning—can trek up the slopes
and try your hand.
Back at Ağrı’s dreaded bus station, I got to sample the area’s famous aşure, a dried fruit
pudding that is very nice before heading off to Van, my next destination and another grueling
five-hour bus ride away. I rolled into that city around midnight. Before I was able to check into
my hotel room, I had to help the night clerk pen a love letter to his Swedish “girl friend.”23 I also
had to meet the owner’s son, a particularly unpleasant, already-gone-to-pot young man with
greasy hair, lifeless eyes, flabby frame, pimples and a bad shave.
For the assistance with the letter, the clerk shared his stack of newspaper pin ups with me
as a night cap. In amongst all the sultry babes with fire in their eyes was one of the famous
queeny singer Bülent Ersoy who had undergone a sex change operation since I had last lived in
Turkey. She was now an incredibly ugly but even more popular as a singer.
I expected Van to be one of the high points of the trip but was sorely disappointed. A trip
to the ruins of another castle/fortress on a crag, larger but not as scenic as Işak Paşa, and look at
the famous immense lake of the same name, and I had pretty much done Van. I came across
some nomad children whose families were camping near the fortress and who looked so
23
Many a Turkish fellow had a foreign female’s picture and address in his wallet and harbored fantasies of
obtaining through her the good life and unlimited sex in another land.
~ 92 ~
picturesque from a distance—all colorfully dressed and with a healthy outdoor glow. Up close,
though, they were filthy dirty with matted hair and parched skin. One even had ringworm. So
much for the conceit that country life is inherently healthier than city.
I spent a lot of time with Necmi, a local Kurdish postal worker I met in a beer hall. We
had long talks over cigarettes and beer about capitalism versus socialism, married versus single
life, life in general, sports, travel, and even Van flora and fauna. His friends were a more
boisterous lot and wanted to steer the conversation to whores, sex, group sex, free sex, and nudist
colonies before insistently inviting me to the local genel ev for some quality time with the local
ladies. When I demurred (well practiced by this time) and stayed behind, I got another long
lecture from a sad old man about the hypocritical nature of most Muslims—we were in a beer
hall after all—and why that was the main factor for the economic stagnation of the whole region.
This talk not-so-gracefully segued into the oft-heard litany of Turkish poverty and lack of
opportunity, topics that I was all too happy to avoid but seemingly couldn’t.
I was happy to get out of Van and head off to meet up with my old buddy Bayram, who
was, you will remember, doing his military service in “nearby” (another four or five hours by
bus) Muş. From there we would head to Nemrut Mountain to see the ancient carved heads atop a
mountain that I had lusted to see since I first saw tourist posters of them years before.
Ah, Muş is a backwater of a city you do not want to dally in.24 But I ended up spending
five days here when five hours would have been sufficient. Since the military was under high
alert due to some Kurdish unrest in the area, Bayram’s leave was postponed for a day or two and
then cancelled. Then I got a nasty bout of gastroenteritis that ate up more time. Most of my visit
24
The journalist Christopher de Bellaigue spent a lot of time in this area and wrote movingly about the eternal
conflicts between Turks, Kurds and Armenians through generations in his book, “Rebel Land, Unraveling the Riddle
of History in a Turkish Town.” On the first page of the prologue, he mentions his “(r)oom 205, the room they give
to foreigners.” I am certain that is where I stayed.
~ 93 ~
was spent reading Paul Scott’s entire “Raj Quartet,” dining in the officers’ mess with Bayram
and his fellow officers, and otherwise not straying far from a bathroom.
My friend had aged some but was otherwise still the magnetic, dynamic man I had
befriended back in Istanbul. He was still pretty virulently homophobic and, as a word of warning
I believe, told me about Bülent Ersoy’s troubles with the law and the crackdown on gays under
Kenan Evren who led the military coup in 1980 and subsequently became president. But after all
that we chatted aimlessly about French literature, religion, and the public’s fascination with
movie stars. We pointedly did not talk about the ongoing reprisals against the Kurds in the
southeast sector of Turkey. Bayram was Kurdish and very liberal—his homophobia
notwithstanding—and more than a little sensitive about his role in the military.
Finally, I was off to Malatya, another eight-hour bus ride. This one was as entertaining as
my Trabzon-Erzurum run and just as fraught with zealous Muslims praying in the aisles and
seats and mechanical troubles. About six miles from our destination we got a flat tire but did not
have a crank for the jack and had to flag down three busses before we got the implement. Then
when we found out all our tubes were shot, we had to flag down yet another bus. Then it took
another thirty minutes to get the borrowed tube and wheel on. While I was enjoying the circus
provided by the anxious driver and his assistants and the pleas for help, most of the other
passengers had hitched rides into town on those other busses. We limped in all the worse for
wear around midnight.
I found a comfortable but incredibly tacky hotel in the center of town. My room was
decorated with a framed poster of a young boy crying and with all manner of runners and doilies
and antimacassars. The lobby was full of handmade little trifles and gewgaws. I loved it.
Malatya is the apricot capital of the world and also Bayram’s home town (and the current
~ 94 ~
prime minister’s too, you will remember). I visited his village, met his family and had some of
their homemade cheese. But after my purchase of some authentic şalvar (voluminous peasant
pants whose crotch is below the knee), the dubious highlight of my visit had to be seeing John
Travolta in “Staying Alive,” the well-forgotten sequel to “Saturday Night Fever.” The film was
playing in an immense cinema, was dubbed into Turkish, and was a lousy print. I shared the
cavernous space with a handful of youth that were not the cream of the local crop. Afterwards I
didn’t even have the energy to go to the local beer hall.
No more busses, I flew back to Istanbul and was now ready to revisit my old haunts. I
even stayed in the Hotel Güngör, the first place I had stayed seven years before and which had
not changed at all. I traipsed over to Taksim and down İstiklâl Caddesi past the Vat 69 and Çiçek
Pasajı but couldn’t bring back the magic. The latter was bustling and frenetic in its new quarters
but seemed sterile and lifeless without the old crowd. My old house was still there of course and
still owned by Armen’s mom. I asked a current resident, who let me in to take a few pictures, to
give her my regards.
I went to the Italian church to see if the old priest was still there. I wanted him to know
that Kevin, whom he had helped years ago, was now happily married with two sons in Sweden. I
was parked in a waiting room for over an hour and then left unceremoniously.
I took the Tünel to the Galata Bridge— like Proust’s Madeline, being on that in the center
of Istanbul life brought back a flood of memories of my first days in the city and made my heart
leap more than a little.
Istanbul did look better—it could have hardly been worse. There was rudimentary
landscaping around the parks and avenues. Traffic had been diverted from the busiest sections,
and people were actually obeying traffic lights and refraining from running down pedestrians.
~ 95 ~
The minibuses were no longer able to stuff in as many as they could but had to offer a seat to
each passenger. The boisterous anarchy of the past had thankfully but sadly passed.
I finally got to meet up with Gail and Ahmet and share innumerable cups of tea with
them. We had a feast at his sister’s house to celebrate the night before the start of Ramadan. On
another day they helped me shop the Covered Bazaar where I stocked up on rugs, kilims, tiles,
brass plates, and lots of other tacky items. I also traipsed up to the Hilton and visited Biriçim
who was now covering Yaşi’s art gallery in the lobby.
I got in touch with Bayram’s old roommate Cemil and visited him out at the Defense
Language School and even spent the night at his apartment where we reminisced and drank tea.
His wife and son were back in Bursa for a visit. He also updated me on the military crackdown
and the prospects for the future in Turkey and seemed set, content, and ever so realistic.
I had desultory, for-old-time-sakes washes at Çemberlitaş Hamamı and Coğaloğlu
Hamamı that left me feeling more ripped off than clean.
I did of course go to Hagia Sophia. The area around my old friend was now much more
congenial and tourist-friendly. The entrance was through a courtyard and, as it should be, the
narthex. Maybe because the second floor galleries were closed for renovation, I still found it a
lifeless shell regardless of the magnificence of the interior and yearned for it to be a vibrant place
of power, if not worship, and not the museum it had become. Oh, well. Then it was time to go
back home, my real home.
~ 96 ~
Sea Coasts 1995
My next trip started up the Bosphorus in Bebek—this is the Istanbul many people know
from English language novels and memoirs, as most were written by teachers at Robert College
and Boğaziçi Üniversitesi (Bosphorus University) or their children. This fashionable and rich
section of Istanbul within easy access of Şişli and Taksim is also the home turf of Orhan Pamuk,
notwithstanding that he has written much more eloquently than I about the streets of Beyoğlu
and Karaköy.25 Almost all but the many shopkeepers and servants speak a foreign language,
usually English, well. Many of the boys had their own cars—even back in the 1970s when an
automobile was a supraluxury commodity, it was usual to see young bucks in Mustang
convertibles and Mercedes hanging out in front of the waterside cafes and restaurants. The
women wear blue jeans and have dyed hair—no şalvar or çarşaf in these quarters—and sport
jewelry and perfume galore.
It is also incredibly beautiful, though I wish I would have seen it before all the hills
leading up from the water were blanketed with the modern homes and villas we now see. That
housing boom is understandable, of course; a view of the always changing, never changing
Bosphorus is spectacular indeed. The towns along the Bosphorus used to be lined with wooden
mansions (yalı in Turkish) that were simple wood-framed houses with marvelous but understated
gingerbread decoration, not unlike fine Ottoman pottery and calligraphy. In the 1960s and 70s,
these grand homes were far from prized and were accidentally or intentionally torched to make
room for a modern abode or, ironically, to be rid of the onerous fire insurance tab and heating
costs those old buildings required. Today the few that remain have been restored and are the
25
Pamuk’s memoir “Istanbul: Memories and the City” is more approachable than his novels and is a stunning
paean to the city. I would like to think it tells the same story I try to but from the perspective of a native but
cannot—even in jest—compare myself to him. His novel “The Museum of Innocence” requires a bit more work but
is also a loving portrait of the city in the 1970s and, obviously, resounded with me.
~ 97 ~
most cherished homes in the country.
I was back in the country for another four-week vacation. I would be travelling down the
Aegean Coast with an old college friend and his partner from Washington, D.C. then return to
Istanbul. Then I was going to do pretty much the same trip in reverse with a friend from New
York City who had come to visit and travel with our host Stuart who was an elementary school
teacher at the American School in Bebek. Five gay men in Turkey—sounds like old times in
some ways, eh?
Besides the schools, cafes and fashionistas, Bebek has the remnants of Ottoman
fortifications built during the siege of Byzantium by Mehmet the Conqueror. Nowadays this fort
is a tourist and concert venue. But it is the Bosphorus that takes center stage. This strategic
waterway between the Black and Marmara Seas is as dangerous as it is beautiful. Deep and cold,
it has strong currents on and underneath the surface that have dashed ocean-going vessels on the
stone walkways lining the water, if not sunk them completely. Sky blue on a clear day, it is black
as pitch in a storm. The constant traffic of boats big and small under many of the flags of the
world (but mainly the crescent-and-star or the hammer-and-sickle) adds a curious monotony to
the currents. The wide sidewalks that line the water are also a source of constant traffic—
cyclists, fishermen, but mainly pedestrians of all ages and stripes.
This navigable neck of water was uncrossed until 1973 when the first bridge was
finished. A second opened in 1988. A third is planned at the northern end, and a tunnel
underneath is almost complete as I write these words in 2011.
But we did not tarry long on the shores of the Bosphorus. Mark, Mike, and I rented a car
at the Hilton Hotel and took off on a long day’s drive to that other long neck of water, the
Dardanelles. As we simply couldn’t see everything, we bypassed Gallipoli and crossed via a
~ 98 ~
ferry and entered Anatolia. We got to contrast and compare views of the two slivers of water
from a rooftop restaurant that night in Çanakkale but did not feel the need to swim it like
Leander and Lord Byron.
The next morning it was but a short hop to get to the fabled remains of Troy, and there to
greet us—other than fields of blood red poppies—was a modern copy of the famous wooden
horse. That was the high point, for truth be told this ancient city immortalized by Homer requires
a surfeit of imagination to conjure up those heroic days. Always one to play the blame game, I
think we can lay it in the lap of Heinrich Schliemann, the amateur—emphasis on amateur—
archeologist who put this site back on the map after centuries of swirling myth obscured it.
Schliemann was such an amazing man—a scholar/fraud, businessman/speculator. He
could converse in English, French, Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Italian, Greek, Latin,
Russian, Arabic, Turkish, as well as his native German—he wrote his diary in the language of
the country he happened to be in at the time. Starting out as an apprentice in a grocery store, he
soon progressed to the import/export trade and from there branched out to successfully speculate
in the California Gold Rush, corner the market in indigo, and make a further fortune as a military
contractor in the Crimean War. Not satisfied with indigo, he also cornered the Russian market in
saltpeter, sulfur, and lead (the ingredients of gunpowder).
So at 36 or 41 depending on which account you prefer to believe, he retired a thrice-ormore wealthy man, minus his Russian wife who had spurned him on to greater riches by
periodically withholding her favors until he made yet another stupendous deal and whom he had
shed in a highly favorable Indiana divorce in 1869. He then married a 17-year-old Greek lass and
threw all his energies—and much of his fortune—into finding the actual sites from Homer’s
“Odyssey” and “Iliad,” primarily Troy.
~ 99 ~
As we know, he was again spectacularly successful, even outwitting the Turkish
government by sneaking out the best of his finds, the so-called “Jewels of Helen” or “Priam’s
Treasure.” He went on to Mycenae and “The Mask of Agamemnon,” excavations in Ithaca, and
then returned to Troy after he patched things up with the Ottomans.
While he was a popular and famous man in his day, critics of his archeological
methods—crude even for the time—have not been so kind. Thanks to him and his work,
understanding the layout of the ancient city (actually many cities as there are at least ten different
levels) was permanently spoiled. But Troy should not be missed if you are in the neighborhood.
The east wall and gate are pretty remarkable, and there are some interesting remains of temples
and buildings. And then there is the horse, a photo op of much import.
There are archeological remains scattered throughout the region, and a complete
examination of them all would have you touring for months. We shouldered on to Assos for a
tour of the 6th century Temple of Athena and the theatre. The view of Lesbos and the Gulf of
Edremit were other stupendous delights that went well with the grilled fish at a seaside café.
Our next overnight was in Bergama, a not particularly interesting city. But the next
morning we climbed the hill in our car and were soon in the ancient Roman empire, though
Pergamon started its fabled life as a Greek city. While a ruin and with many of its treasures on
display in Berlin, this hilltop site is still breathtaking. The Altar of Zeus holds a prominent spot
on the horizon and is amazing even though missing its reliefs.
A German archeological team were working hard on reassembling the Temple of Trajan
while we were visiting, and from pictures nowadays on the internet it looks like they have done a
grand job on the temple columns, the stoa, and the Medusa heads. A vast and steep theatre graces
one side of the hill. Eighty rows of seats rise up and impress. We shared our nosebleed seats with
~ 100 ~
some foraging cows as we continued to marvel at the glories of the past.
The past, not so ancient, came back to me at our next stop, Kuşadası, a spot I had visited
often in 1978. Almost 20 years later, it was no longer a sleepy little village with dusty streets but
a bustling, thriving tourist mecca full of fashionable shops and goods galore. The area along the
beach where I had once pitched a tent was now all given over to mid-rise upscale housing units,
and the inviting waters of the bay where I used to swim were mainly off-limits. Progress.
Ephesus had not changed much, just gotten much more busy. Work was still going on at
the Library of Celsus, and it was shaping up wonderfully. Being that two of us had Catholic
upbringing, we did not miss Mary’s house, though my fondest memory was of the fresh tomatoes
we had for our picnic lunch.
Though long leisurely dinners and walks around town were greatly appreciated, one of
the high points of this portion of the trip, if not the highest of the whole journey, was our visit to
the makeshift Luna Park outside of Selçuk. Mainly designed for children, these amusement parks
also attracted fine examples of local youth, some at the edge of their bloom, who you would
never otherwise encounter (unless, like me, you spend a lot of time in beer halls and bus
stations). If you have not waged battle with such men in bumper cars under frenetic disco lights
and music, you have simply not lived. Add that to your Bucket List.
Then it was on to more archeological sites oft-visited. We headed down to Priene,
Miletus, and Didyma in short order before making my first visit to Lake Bafra and the ancient
city of Heracleia. A beautiful locale, it is the place Mary Lee Settle lived in for a couple of years
and poignantly wrote about in her masterful “Blood Ties,” a book I highly recommend. The
archeological site is fairly forgettable but a meal lakeside looking at Mt. Latmos is not. As you
dine and sup, you can muse about the handsome shepherd Endymion, the most famous snoozer
~ 101 ~
of all time. The moon goddess Selene first noticed him sleeping on the Bafra banks and made
love with him then and on numerous subsequent occasions, eventually bearing him 50 daughters.
And still he dozed on. He like the arrangement so much that he begged Zeus, who also had more
than a crush on him, to let him dream on forever. The Christians, as was their wont, changed the
demigod (of the Wet Dream per Settle) into a believing mystic who “communed” with the moon
at length and learned the secret name of God, which—alas—he took to the grave without
revealing.
Next was Euromos, once a thriving ancient city. Now the fine Corinthian Temple of
Zeus, a gift from the Emperor Hadrian, is almost all that remains. Of the original 32 columns, 16
still stand (though a few of those are unfluted or unfinished) and are surmounted with parts of a
simple architrave. Sitting quietly in a placid olive grove and seldom visited, “my” 26 temple is an
unexpected delight.
Then it was on to Bodrum, another town I had not visited for decades. And yes, progress
was made here too. The bay was now full of wide-bodied wooden sailboats (gület), those used
on the by-now popular Blue Voyage cruises.27 And the hills on that bay and the next were built
up extensively. But the crusader castle and the ruins of the Mausoleum of Halicarnasus remain as
do all my wonderful memories of times spent there years prior.
Now instead of camping on a deserted beach, I resided in style in a proper hotel halfway
up the hill from where I used to watch camels smoking cigarettes. I had clean sheets, hot water,
and a large crystal clear pool to lounge in if too tired to trudge down to the Mediterranean. The
good life.
26
I have strangely come to think I had somehow discovered and so possess it.
Though I have never been able to shoehorn one of these cruises on my many trips, I have it from reliable sources
that they are a great way to decompress from the madness of regular touring. Five days long usually, you cruise
the coast in relative luxury, eating simply prepared Turkish food, swimming in the Mediterranean waters, and
occasionally visiting on shore wonderful ruins.
27
~ 102 ~
Then it was on to a site I had been eager to visit for nigh on 25 years, the ancient town of
Hierapolis—or Pamukkale (Cotton Castle) as it is now called—near the Turkish town of Denizli.
Photos of the ubiquitous snow white cliffs and clam-like wading pools had been dream images in
my consciousness for years. And Jeremy, a friend from my earlier Istanbul days had entranced
me with stories of the maze-like courtyard pool in one of the hotels that was littered with ancient
columns and capitals and filled with naturally warm spring water—that he had been there with a
Turkish boyfriend of his and performed some acrobatic sex in amongst the watery ruins only
added to its allure.
Alas, that hotel was filled and didn’t allow visitors even a peek at the fabled spa. But our
back-up hotel was probably much more convivial and certainly cheaper. We did have our own
little dipping pool and shared a truly immense lap pool in which I was eager to keep up my swim
workouts. Unfortunately the management kept it Jacuzzi-warm, and I could barely manage to
swim to the end and back before needing a nap.
The cliffs are truly astounding, and the therapeutic properties (and the outlandish
landscape) have been visited by outsiders for thousands of years. No less than three Roman
emperors soaked up the atmosphere. The process is quite simple—mineral water comes over the
cliff, gives off carbon dioxide (oh, oh, global warming), and leaves a precipitate of white calcium
carbonate that formed over thousands of years the travertine stalagmite and stalactite formations
and the brilliant shell pools (those, I think, are human-assisted) all over the site. The view is
especially impressive at sunrise and sunset when the stone and milky water reflects all the colors
of the sky. In those days, the visitor had free reign to wander all over, though now the authorities
are understandably more cautious and keep the hordes to established and ever changing paths.
A small Roman theatre, an impressive colonnaded street that ends in a triple arched
~ 103 ~
structure dedicated to Domitian in 84 AD, and the largest necropolis in Asia Minor comprise the
ancient remains at the cliffs. While they are very interesting, they are only an appetizer to what
can be had about 20 miles distant.
Aphrodisias was an important shrine to fertility long before it was dedicated to the
Roman Aphrodite. Isolated on a lush plateau and surrounded by mountains, this is one of
Turkey’s most impressive archeological sites. Marble ruins (from fine local quarries that
provided materials for building and sculpture throughout the empire) peek out everywhere on the
now deserted site. Though the magnificent theatre is virtually intact, many of the other buildings
require a little—but not a lot—of imagination to reconstruct in your mind so that you can really
get a sense of what an ancient city was like. Here you walk by or through a double agora, various
baths and palaces, colonnades and porticoes, and temples aplenty. The 30,000-seat and wellpreserved stadium to the north is incredible and should not be missed. There is a lot to see, but it
can get pretty hot in the midday summer heat.
Then it was back to Istanbul by train. All was well at the beginning of the journey. The
lull of the moving wheels was quite relaxing; and the dining and bar cars, while not what I would
have expected on the Oriental Express, was perfectly fine for this Anatolian Express. Major
exceptions were the blankets that were about four inches too short: one was constantly waking
and pulling it down to cover the toes and then alternatively waking again and covering the chest.
I think we hit every small village from Denizli to our destination and were woken in each by
raucous offers of every imaginable delicacy and treat by ragamuffin children who should have
been in bed.
My still-excellent Turkish had failed me when I booked the trip—I thought we had the
whole first-class compartment for ourselves all the way to Istanbul. Since the price was absurdly
~ 104 ~
cheap, I should have wondered a bit. In the middle of the night, our fitful slumber was disturbed
yet again by a passenger who had a ticket to the other upper berth—the one we had piled our
luggage on, of course. I had to remind myself and my companions that our tickets were really
quite inexpensive. And it didn’t hurt that our new bedfellow was charming and accommodating.
We finally arrived not all that bedraggled at the fabled and cavernous Haydarpaşa train
station that dominates the Asian side of Istanbul. But this is the age of the bus in Turkey, and this
monument is a mere afterthought to the transportation system nowadays. We took a taxi back to
Bebek over the second Bosphorus bridge without stopping in the Selimiye Barracks, a wing of
which housed the British hospital where Florence Nightingale tended the casualties of the
Crimean War.
Mark and Mike had a frantic few days to do some shopping and additional sightseeing.
Mike had been reading about Turkish carpets and had his heart set on purchasing a Hereke
carpet, a famous type produced not far from Istanbul and noted for their intricate double knotting
and vibrant colors. Many large scale examples can be seen in palaces in Turkey and worldwide.
If you research the topic of carpet shopping, you are constantly warned about unscrupulous
dealers palming off inferior products as museum quality. My advice to a potential buyer is a
variation on the “Field of Dreams” motto, “if you like it, don’t sweat it, buy it.” Face it, unless
you are an expert in rugs and a truly implacable negotiator, you are not going to get a bargain—
these dealers have been doing this for centuries and have your number. The best you can hope
for is not to be totally fleeced.
Stuart had been there for almost two years and assured us that he knew of a store in the
Covered Bazaar where we would get a decent deal and not have to haggle—good enough for me.
But Mike, I think, still wanted that whole Oriental experience of the souk and the lengthy
~ 105 ~
transaction—and a really nice carpet to top it off.
Unfortunately, we went out the night before the rug acquisition with Stuart and my friend
Robert who had just arrived in Istanbul. Another teacher from the school, a rather pitiable
American who sat next to Mike, also tagged along. Now this man’s boyfriend just happened to
be a carpet salesman in the Covered Bazaar, and our new acquaintance kept up a constant patter
about the impossibility of getting anything more than a ragged rug at an extortionate amount that
would soon fall to pieces—and whose unnatural dyes would probably permanently disfigure
your floors. Not all of us had a pleasant dinner on the Bosphorus.
The damage that was done to Mike’s spirit was ameliorated somewhat when we were
invited back to that teacher’s place for a drink. His little hovel was covered in the dreariest kilims
of such dubious quality—all thanks to the absent Turkish boyfriend rug dealer and probably
purchased at quite the premium—that Mike was able to almost dismiss those imprecations.
(Stuart had met the man and deemed him a scam artist.) So while he didn’t get his precious
Hareke, he did get a beautiful and quite serviceable large carpet that still graces his living room
in Washington.
We, sans Stuart and that drudge, all toured the Topkapı Palace the next day. I do not
remember going there in the 70s so feel that this was my first visit. This was the cultural and
political capitol of the empire, as well as the home of the sultan and his many wives. Though not
as intimate and fabulous as the Alhambra in Spain, it served much the same purpose and is laid
out in the same manner. It is a huge complex spread out over the hill to the north of Hagia
Sophia and with a spectacular view of the nexus of the Golden Horn, the Bosphorus and the
Marmara Sea from its balconies. A series of courtyards and plazas link up the various buildings,
many of which have been converted into museums for the various costumes, jewelry, gifts, and
~ 106 ~
antiques in the collection.
But it is the Harem (“forbidden” in Arabic), a maze of over 400 rooms, that fascinates
and intrigues me most. It’s not for the Harem’s decoration, as fabulous as some of the rooms of
the Sultan are, but the stories connected to it. The images in our mind are, unfortunately, colored
by an offending Romantic artistic tradition28 that does not hold up if you read any of the
history—the Ingres odalisques, for example, are quite remarkable, but life in the harem for all
but the few favorites was hell. And even for the favorites it was pretty dicey; they had to keep the
Sultan and his mother occupied while they curried power and support from the Black Eunuchs
that ran the show.
By far the most outrageous institution was The Cage, the solution the Ottomans devised
to avoid bloody wars of succession. Up to the time of Ahmet I, a sultan executed all his brothers
when he gained the throne (the line of succession was through the sons of Osman, i.e. brothers,
and not the first male heir of the current sultan). But should a newly installed Sultan then die
without male issue, there would be a problem. So Ahmet decided to just put keep those pesky
siblings locked up and well stocked with concubines and entertainment should the time come for
one of them to take up more serious duties. Lots of concubines, lots of babies, lots of brothers—a
recipe for disaster. But should a concubine get pregnant by a prince (many had hysterectomies to
avoid that likelihood), she was drowned in the Bosphorus.
Unfortunately, spending time away from normal folk made those future sultans more than
a little crazy, if not outright nuts. Osman II liked to use prisoners of war and even his own pages
as targets during his archery practice. The janissaries had to turn the tables on him for that. His
brother and successor Mustafa I came out half starved and turned out to be nuttier than a
28
My apologies, again, to Edward Said and his cronies—but I just read Hilary Mantle’s “Wolf Hall” about the
English court during the Reformation and don’t find my forebears any more civilized .
~ 107 ~
fruitcake. Bring in the janissaries again.
But it was Ibrahim the Mad who takes the cake. But we can hardly blame him; the 22
years he spent in The Cage can make you more than a little paranoid. In fact, when the officials
came to name him the new sultan, he thought his time for the silk noose and strangulation had
come—he had to be dragged out screaming and never attained any magisterial poise. His rule
was an unending round of sexual excess and political misdeeds. He did try to please, though.
When his mother complained about the paltry fires in her quarters, he executed the grand vizier.
Ever wont to believe a rumor, he had all but one (his current favorite) of his 280 concubines
drowned to quell some supposed intrigue.
Oh, and do I like the Janissaries (from the Ottoman Turkish Yeni Çeri or New Solider)?
These were the Ottoman elite fighting units that formed the first standing army since the
Romans.29 They also were the Sultan’s household troops and bodyguards. Highly disciplined and
earning a salary and a pension, they were made up of captured Christian boys (at least up to the
17th century) and became an extremely influential and powerful social class. Eventually they
were able to pretty much rule the country. In 1826, Mahmut II wanted to modernize the troops
along the lines of modern European armies and met much resistance. So he burned down their
barracks with some 4000 Janissaries inside thereby marking the end to a long lived institution.
The eunuchs, boys castrated preferably before their hormones raged, were also prisoners
of war—dark skinned ones from Africa were the women’s slaves while the lighter ones were in
charge of the palace school, hence the black and white categories. Interestingly enough, Islam
proscribes castration, so the operation had to be done by Christians or Jews. And there always
seemed to be willing participants (to wield the knife, that is, and not necessarily to be on the
29
In medieval Europe, armies were conscripted and, most importantly, paid only during a war, albeit that was
quite a lot of the time.
~ 108 ~
receiving end) as there were hundreds of castrati in the palace.
And it seems there were different degrees of eunuchhood. I will append a passage from a
Turkish tourist website (it seems to be copied from another source that is not referenced).
There several different varieties:
Sandali, or clean-shaven: The parts are swept off by a single cut of a razor, a tube
(tin or wooden) is set in the urethra, the wound is cauterized with boiling oil, and
the patient is planted in a fresh dung-hill. His diet is milk, and if under puberty he
often survives.
The eunuch whose penis is removed: He retains all the power of copulation and
procreation without the wherewithal; and this, since the discovery of
caoutchouc30, has often been supplied.
The eunuch, or classical thlibias and semivir, who has been rendered sexless by
the removing of the testicles..., or by their being bruised..., twisted, seared or
bandaged.
All in all, not exactly nice work if you can get it. Anyway, they were the administrators of the
whole Topkaı shebang and just as influential, though in other ways, as the Janissaries. Since they
could wend their way through both the men’s and women’s quarters they were the source of
much of the intrigue and held lots of power over the other court officials. The black eunuchs
were part of the first group above (sandali) and supposedly posed no threat to the women’s
honor. But more than one tale lives on of botched operations and black babies (and undoubtedly
more drownings) in the harem. The last of the group outlived the Ottoman Empire, retired to
houses they purchased in the city, lived together, and were supposedly seen in coffee houses well
into the 1970s. Alas, I never met any.
The courtesans in the Harem were also captured from faraway lands, and a few notable
ones rose up to be wives and mothers of sultans. So the three major groups occupying Topkapı—
30
This is natural rubber or latex and must refer to strap-on dildos of that material.
~ 109 ~
the Janissaries, the eunuchs, and the Harem women31—were essentially prisoners of war forced
to convert to Islam. These captives were a welcome source of genetic and cultural diversity but
maybe not the best foundation for a lasting empire. Still, the Ottomans lasted for almost 1500
years.
The big draw at Topkapı for most folk, though, is the Sultan’s Treasure Room. I’d like to
think my friend the Greek actress Melina Mercuri had something to do with its popularity what
with her performance in the film of almost the same name as the palace (it has a dotted “i” at the
end). That movie concerns the almost-successful theft of a dagger festooned with four of the
greatest emeralds in the world. That and the other knick knacks are pretty amazing, but I like the
grisly stories of the palace inhabitants more.
Mark and Mike left, and I turned my attention and considerable tour guide expertise onto
Robert. Though hailing from rural Minnesota, he had morphed into a gay urban sophisticate who
appreciated the din of the street and the garishness of the wares much like an anthropologist. We
had a grand time at the Süleymaniye Mosque and gained access to the roof of the medrese where
we walked amongst the domes and had a stupendous view of the rest of the city and the nearby
aqueduct. Robert found in just a few days more picturesque workshops in the old part of the city
than I had in two years. Called han in Turkish (pl. hanlar), these vast, usually two-storey
buildings were used as lodging for trading caravans and as warehouses for their goods. All had
courtyards that were a nice but short getaway from the street noise and opened a window to the
city’s fabled past as much as the palaces and mosques do.
Stuart, Robert and I flew down to Antalya, tarried not, but rented a car and took off for a
tour of the seacoast. Our first overnight was a short way off at the seaside resort village of Kaş.
31
A great discussion of a subgroup of these, the Circassian beauties from the Caucasus regions, and their role in
the development of modern racist theory can be had in Nell Irvin Painter’s marvelous “The History of White
People.” She is more readable than Said and his cronies.
~ 110 ~
Translated as “eyebrow” or “something curved,” the town’s name is well earned as it is situated
on the broad expanse of the bowed bay. Big on the backpacking tour and popular with Turks too,
the town is crazily busy in the summer, but we were happy just to take in the sunset from its
largely intact Greek theatre overlooking the water and leave the next morning.
The next day was primarily spent in driving, though we did get periodic dips in the
turquoise glory of the Mediterranean by climbing down the cliffs to almost deserted crescents of
white sand.
Ölüdeniz (Dead Sea) was even more crowded and touristy than Kaş and anywhere else I
had dallied on this coast years earlier. But still, we didn’t have to put up with paragliders and the
obnoxious jet skis that now further mar the incomparable beauty of white sand, azure water and
dark cliffs studded with many an ancient Lydian rock tomb. We charged our batteries, headed off
the next day to Bodrum, and in short order did the same route, in reverse, as I had just completed
with my DC buddies.
By the time we arrived in Kuşadası, we had had our fill of other vacationers but not of
sand and sea. We passed through the crowded city and out towards Ephesus and found a
congenial, almost decrepit motel right on the beach. What it lacked in amenities was more than
offset by its seemingly deserted but fabulous location. As it was only a short drive to the city, we
hardly suffered. Our little room’s mildew flavor was soon aired out and offset by the heady
perfume of the Bougainvillea vine that enveloped our postage-sized patio. We did visit all the
sights of Ephesus and Seljuk and even had a go at the bumper cars at Luna Park. But mainly we
lazed in the early summer sun, swam to our hearts content, and engorged on all the fresh fruit
available in the markets.
Foremost in my memories, though, will always be the sandcastle we built under the
~ 111 ~
direction of Stuart and with the help of four young German children who proved to be able
slaves hauling in buckets of sand. The castle was a delight with all on the beach. And maybe an
apt metaphor for my relationship with Turkey, Hagia Sophia, and Byzantium—shifting,
changing, impermanent.
~ 112 ~
West to East and Back 2002
War was in the air for my next trip back, and the Turks were worried. America’s
impending invasion of Iraq was still six months away but seemed to be a foregone conclusion.
The fear here was that the intervention would imperil the flourishing tourist and export industry
that had sprouted up since my last visit 13 years prior. It would also upset the Turkish juggling
act of supporting the United States, keeping Israel as a valued trade partner, and maintaining a
prominent place in Middle Eastern and Islamic circles. As difficult as this was for the Turks to
do in the past, it was even more of a struggle as the now firmly entrenched government was proIslamic. But while I was acutely aware of the problems Turkey was facing (and a fervent foe of
my government’s attempts to change the balance of power in the region), I was here on what was
to be a fun-filled, action-packed three-week vacation in the beautiful late summer. And I would
cover a lot of ground.32
My Turkish was still more than passable. But now I was more the full-fledged tourist
than I was on prior trips when I was closer to and reconnecting with my Istanbul past. I was well
established in a relationship and a profession back in Manhattan and not about to jettison that for
another stay in Turkey unless it was to retire in luxury on the Mediterranean coast.
Late September/early October was a wonderful time to visit; Istanbul was looking good. I
stayed in a modest hotel behind the Blue Mosque on the way down to the Church of Sergius and
Bacchus (Küçük Aya Sofia) and the seashore. Modest is relative, of course. Ötel Taşkonak was
luxurious compared to my old Sultanahmet standby, Ötel Güngör, which was now an office
building. Like many of the other buildings in the area, this was one of the large wooden homes
32
Again, I travelled alone this trip and kept a journal—so there will probably be way too much detail in this
chapter.
~ 113 ~
that had been spruced up and converted into hotels for tourists. My room had two twin beds with
rose brocade spreads, a pine cabinet, a long kilim runner, and a private bath. It looked out on the
back courtyard and a prodigious fig tree. Discordant elements? Well you can’t go far in Turkey
without encountering a television set. I had one in my room and another blaring 24-hours in the
lobby. Across the street was a mosque whose recorded and amplified calls to prayer shook the air
around the quiet neighborhood—better than an alarm clock in the morning.
My favorite part of the hotel, though, had to be the rooftop patio where breakfast was
served. It had a vast view of the Marmara Sea, the offending speakers on the minaret, and the
constant raucous air-robics of dozens of seagulls. And the repast for the morning meal was
classically Turkish: feta or white cheese, olives, sliced tomatoes and cucumbers, hard boiled
eggs, bread, jam, butter, honey, and gallons of tea. Delightful
Lord, did I feel rich. In 1978 the exchange rate was a dime to the lira. Now inflation had
so warped the currency that a dollar bought 1,690,000 Turkish lira (TL). Those are staggering
sums, and shops had to have special calculators to handle all those zeros. My brain could not
really fit them in either, and I never got used to dropping ten million (about $6) without doing a
double take.
Rumblings of war and a devalued currency did nothing, nay it accelerated, the
merchandising of various goods in the multitude of shops that had sprouted up on every street in
the area, behind the Blue Mosque and around Hagia Sophia, over to the Covered Bazaar and
beyond, and down to the Golden Horn. Carpets, jewelry, and ceramics were the main items for
sale—but second-rate quality jeans (I couldn’t help but wonder if our old Blue Jean King was
still in business), and out-of-fashion leather car coats with faux fur collars, and every electronic
product known to man were also on hand. The touts, for the most part, were dark-haired, dark-
~ 114 ~
eyed young men who had the eye for younger foreign women and not this aging male (unless he
stopped to peruse the wares)—I got the less attractive hangers on with sputtering English who
were easier to ignore.
Istanbul looked good, I said. There was now greenery galore around the big attractions.
Though the traffic problem will never be solved, the logjam of jars in the old city had been
ameliorated somewhat with stricter enforcement of parking laws and ticketing for moving
violations. Divan Yolu all the way out to Aksaray and beyond was a slow thoroughfare for the
individual motorist as most of the lanes of traffic had been eliminated. In their place was a sleek,
quiet electric tram that shuttled people in and out of the area. So crossing the street was no longer
so much a treacherous enterprise, and a little bit of peace reigned over the area. But what hadn’t
changed was the constant presence of burly, hairy men and the constant gaze of black eyes from
storefronts, doorways, windows, and passer-bys. The fancy tea gardens and the sidewalk cafes
were populated by the same men, now better dressed and looking more prosperous, still sipping
tea, slamming backgammon pieces around, and always always puffing away on cigarettes. There
were women too, of course; and they did not uphold the conservative Muslim ideal, though there
were now more headscarves on obviously middle or upper-middle class young women.
I was still thrilled that I knew the proper stops for busses and dolmuş as I popped over to
Taksim and up to Kurtuluş to see if my former landlady Biriçim was around. She, it turned out,
had been living near Bodrum with her third husband for about five years. Her brother Yaşi still
ran his art business from the ground floor of my old building and hadn’t changed an iota. He
called his sister who updated me on several years of gossip about her family and my old
roommates. Anne’s Turkish husband divorced her and married another Turkish girl in Australia.
Her sister Marian had finally decamped from Istanbul with her family. Leslie had again landed
~ 115 ~
on his feet, gotten back to Australia and had already visited Biriçim in Bodrum a few years back.
The others were lost to history.33
Later I visited my other old home in Beyoğlu which turned out to be a big surprise. No
longer was it slum housing but had been lovingly restored as the headquarters and showpiece for
Turkey’s architectural heritage foundation ÇEKÜL. Knock me over with a feather. The kapıcı
(literally, door person) let me into the lobby which was now sparkling—but those niche paintings
were still ugly as hell.
My first floor apartment had been opened up and turned into offices. The staircase had
somehow been refashioned, so my old bathroom and kitchen were now just memories. The large
room now had exposed brick and not the cream and ochre painted plaster of my time. It also
lacked the magnificent carved marble fireplace—I imagined that Armen had taken it for his
Bosphorus yalı. A harried secretary anxious to get out for the night still let me roam around and
tell some tales of wild parties in that very room. (Yes, I exaggerated—there was only that one.)
Then she shuttled me out with an exhortation to visit again during the day.
I didn’t get back until the end of my trip, but when I did I was treated like minor royalty.
The institute had recently opened their new digs and were heady with the experience—headier
than even me. Scholars had found the original deed to build a mansion that the government had
issued to an Ottoman merchant and had tracked its history through city archives. My old
landlady, Armen’s mother, had since died, but her daughter told them of their history with the
building. Their archivist was eager to interview me about my time in the building and what I
knew of it and the neighborhood. I think he was a bit disappointed that it mainly functioned as a
33
I googled Kevin recently and found out that he had flourished in Sweden and beyond. He had two children,
studied art and design, and had a jewelry and furniture gallery in Vietnam. I emailed him at his business and was
informed by his business partner that he had died just a few days before I tried to get in touch.
~ 116 ~
jump off point for our outings to Çiҫek Pasajı.
I was tickled to get a poster copy of the original deed (now framed and hanging above my
computer), architectural renderings of the façade, and some English language brochures about
the foundation. From the latter, I treasure the following description:
A vivid example of the colorful cosmopolitan culture of 19th century
İstanbul, the stone-built apartment building had been inhabited for over 120 years
by well-to-do local Greek and Armenian dealers, physicians, actors and piano
artists…When local Greeks left İstanbul in the 70’s, the houses on the street were
abandoned to obscurity and neglect. The on-time dignitaries who used to attend to
the neighborhood had long been gone. The district was now taken over by poverty
and necessity…A short while ago, every single room of the ÇEKÜL House was
occupied by the homeless and the fugitive, and yet the same rooms are now
being warmed up by a variety of activities and eye-catching details.
[Italics are mine for emphasis.]
And the other building so dear to my heart? Of course I had to visit Hagia Sophia again
and did so on a lovely sunny day. The scaffolding under a quarter of the main dome did nothing
to mar the effect of the heavenly dome floating above. The marble and mosaics sparkled. I loved
it. Seeing this monument again was a stunning experience and also like coming across a
particularly welcome old friend. I mentioned before that I didn’t really appreciate Hagia Sophia
until I had seen St. Mark’s in Venice, something I had finally done since my last trip to Istanbul.
While wandering around the upper galleries, I met a Bulgarian archeology student who
seemed to be as interested in the building fabric and mosaics as I. After we discussed some of the
finer points of the plan and incidentals of Justinian and Theodora, I invited him to go out with
me to the Kariye Museum, another Byzantine gem, which also did not fail to impress the two of
us.
Nicolai was not much for busses or taxis and wanted to walk. He had heard of a
Bulgarian church in the vicinity which I was able to locate in my guidebook. The walk was a
long and circuitous route down to the Golden Horn during which we were able to get lost many a
~ 117 ~
time thanks to the help of well-meaning but clueless locals. The church turned out to be a little
Gothic jewel that I must have passed numerous times. It was also cast iron and had a magnificent
ornate cast-iron fence. I besieged the groundskeeper in Turkish to let us in to no avail; Nikolai
was similarly unsuccessful in Bulgarian. This part of Istanbul right up water from the Greek
patriarchy must have been a little Bulgarian enclave as a couple of the buildings had inscriptions
in tell-tale Cyrillic. I finally got to see up close the imposing Megale Schole, the Greek Girl’s
High School, a variegated banded-red-brick building high on the hill I had admired from afar for
years, but, again, could not gain access without disturbing some imam next door who supposedly
had the key—I certainly was in no mood for a lecture on Islam.
But right after passing the pitiful excuse of a Greek Orthodox patriarch’s compound
which lacks everything the comparable Vatican has, we did get a heavy but heady dose of
another religion of the Book. It was right at evening prayer that we reached the Ataturk Bridge,
the second bridge across the Golden Horn. This happens to be the center of a huge bowl formed
by three of the seven hills of the ancient city and Pera and Galata on the other side. The bowl is
also home to so many mosques and minarets that we inadvertently had the best seats in the house
for a startling concert. The high pitch whine of the Arabic from seemingly hundreds of
synchronized loudspeakers made the hills come alive with the sound of music, albeit not what
Julie Andrews had in mind. The clamor built and rolled and crescendoed and rattled—one might
imagine an Islamic Rapture heralded this way. Still, we didn’t convert.
I took Nikolai for a dinner at a nondescript restaurant across from the train station. I let
my empty stomach and my nostalgia for all manner of Turkish food rule my order and ended up
with enough food for seven—two appetizer plates (cold and hot), two different eggplant dishes,
French fries, a shepherd’s salad, the yogurty hydrarı, meat croquettes, and the mixed grill for
~ 118 ~
two (which included rice, bulgur, and Turkish pizza). My friend was appalled and questioned my
Turkish language facility when I told him I was assured the potions would be small. That it came
to much less than a dinner for two at a modest Manhattan restaurant was also of scant relief to
him. As it was actually all well prepared, we persevered mightily but put barely a dent in the
repast. As we were getting up to leave, the owner came by, looked at our many leftovers and
thinking we were unhappy with the meal, started shouting at the waiter. I had to soothe yet
another and promise to come back.
Nikolai, Ahmet—a Bulgarian Turkish friend of his who was in his last year of an
OB/GYN residency in Istanbul, and I headed up the Bosphorus by boat the next day, a lovely
Sunday. The boat was packed, and we were relegated to a stuffy corner in an upper room but
still with a stunning view. Poor Nikolai got so seasick we decamped at Sariyer instead of the last
stop on the other side, Anadolu Kavağı. We refreshed ourselves on the short jaunt to Rumeli
Kavağı, passing and giving our respects to Telli Baba34 along the way. His türbe, like all the
restaurants along the water, was now much more visited as the growing Istanbul middle class
now had automobiles and money for leisurely escapes.
I didn’t raise Nikolai’s eyebrows with doing the ordering this time, but my fear of a
Spartan repast was banished when Ahmet started murmuring, “hm, this would be nice…and
this…and this…” It was again a feast, but we left our plates clean unlike the day before. Nikolai
was more interested in spotting and identifying the flags on the passing ships with his eagle eyes.
On the trip back, we saw the restored yalis we had missed on the way up. As Nikolai35 did not
get seasick again, the trip was a rousing success.
34
The story of Telli Baba is in Chapter 2, page 44.
I kept in touch with Nikolai over the years. He came to St. Louis two summers for work but never got to New
York City. He switched majors from archeology to tourism administration and now runs a large hotel complex on
the Black Sea. Ahmet, I am sure, is a very successful OB/GYN practitioner in Turkey.
35
~ 119 ~
Then after innumerable teas at my tourist agency where I had to fend off their halfhearted attempts at carpet selling, I boarded a minibus which took a handful of us tourists out to
the brand-spanking new bus terminal. No longer did one have to trudge through the dusty (or
muddy if it was inclement weather) mayhem of Topkapı (the gate on the Theodosian land walls
as opposed to the palace of the same name at the other end of town) to get out of town. Now all
the major cities have huge and well organized terminals with spaces for the companies to sell
tickets, waiting rooms, wide numbered bays for the busses to enter and exit, designated
passenger walkways, and clean rest rooms. There were still the plaintive calls from soon-todepart bus personnel for that last minute passenger—“Kayseri, Kayseri, Kayseri” or “Antalya,
Antalya, Antalya,” but those seemed lost amid the organized splendor. Though getting in and out
of town was a pain, this new system lent a civilized air to travelling.
The bus system in Turkey is vital to the economy and incredibly well run. The drivers,
albeit an aggressive lot, run a tight ship. Well dressed and genuinely helpful assistants are on
board to serve snacks and drinks, and count noses at all the stops. The seats are comfortable and
clean. Movies are played on overhead monitors (or on individual ones on the back of the seat in
front of you on the luxe models). Busses are washed on a regular basis during the stops—it is
imperative that not a speck of dust mars the exterior. And the life of a Turkish bus lasts but a few
years after which it is sold off to other lands and replaced with the newest Mercedes.
While the bus may have been top of the line, my bones did take exception to an overnighter in an upright position, but nevertheless I arrived in one piece. The countryside leading up
to the tourist center of Cappadocia changed little in three decades—dusty towns with two-story,
unadorned cookie-cutter slab buildings; the few essential shops and offices with the same tired
signs; and the only activity was on either side of the main drag. In stark contrast, Göreme, Ürgüp
~ 120 ~
and the other nearby towns were busy, bustling, and with more than the veneer of comfort and
sophistication. Dusty hovels of old were now replaced by boutique hotels and gleaming shops.
Carved into the stone of the surrounding hills, homes that used to be the digs of the very poor
were now the renovated and upgraded dens of the more moneyed who wanted and could afford
this “authentic” experience.
I had almost forgotten just how striking the landscape here is. Stone cones rise up ten
stories or more, are topped by rakish harder stone hats, and march up the hills like alien soliders.
Sinuous shapes carved from the bleached tufa stone by the elements carpet the valleys. The only
green is from the occasional stunted tree, stand of shrub, or patch of grape arbor. Other than the
tourist trade, the major industry is agriculture, and the fields are supposedly still fertilized from
the droppings collected from the many pigeon roosts cut into the cliffs. Wine and pottery are
other enterprises. And, I was told, there is still animal husbandry—the word Cappadocia derives
from Hittite and means “land of well-bred horses.” Kayseri, the regional powerhouse, is only 50
miles away and is a center for the conservative Islamic entrepreneurial spirit that is driving
Turkey’s currently booming economy.
Judicious minds have halted the indiscriminate scrambling round the historic abandoned
(or relocated) dwellings that were cut into the stone all over the valley, and authorities limit
tourists to designated viewing areas and monuments. Some of the famous ancient churches
which I had not been able to see years gone by were now preserved, guarded, and open. And
other scenic places I remembered were now gussied up for the international traveler.
I had booked pretty much all the next week’s activities through that agency in Istanbul.
Emphasis on all: I was picked up at the bus station, driven to my already booked hotel, had
prearranged tours and transfers. It is a great way to avoid hassles and to pack in a lot of activity
~ 121 ~
in a short time. Since most of my fellow group members were either tolerable or amusing, I was
lucky to avoid the major pitfalls of group travel. But even the best companions can grate on one
after a while.
Our group leader, Atta, was a pleasant young man with a charming English accent, a
broad forehead, and thick wavy hair. It was my mission to get in his good graces immediately.
On our first stop he gave us a geology lesson to explain the origins of the unearthly landscape
and then a history lesson dwelling mainly on the ancient Christians and their clever use of the
valley’s characteristics to carve homes, monasteries and extensive underground cities that were
fairly impregnable to invaders (not just Arab and Turk—there were other rival Christian groups).
After crawling all over the undulating hills we headed to an “authentic” home in one of
the cones. We got to go into and out of rooms and up and down precarious ladders. Even the
Italians in wispy sandals, the ample-bodied East European ladies, and their husbands with with
foot-long telephoto lenses on their cameras found the going quite easy. Photo ops for all.
Then it was on to Avenos to a pottery factory that was carved down into the stone, a kind
of mini-underground city with in situ columns and wall shelves. Atta gave us over to a thickwaisted wrestler type named Koray whose family had been in the business for seven generations
and who had the witty facile repartee down like a pro. A veritable primary lesson on ceramics,
his tour took us from the basic clay preparing process up to the intricate decorating of the works
with interesting asides on underpainting, firing, and glazes.
A lecture on Turkish hospitality, drink orders, and a demonstration of a foot-driven
pottery wheel by Koray’s cousin followed. At first he toiled and toiled, working the clay,
mounding then flattening it again and again, and then suddenly with a flourish quickly spun a
perfect pot out of the slimy mound. Then a volunteer was needed to attempt a similar feet. The
~ 122 ~
sweet blonde young Australian woman was an obvious choice and luckily was game. Our
Turkish hosts had her get her lump higher and higher into a penis shape that tickled us to no end
and also resulted in her getting filthy from the spun off slurry. Then she had to put her elbow in
the center of the wobbly phallus and wound up with a serviceable though rather tortured dish—
and completely covered with the red slip.
Koray innocently told her “Oh, your hands are dirty. I forgot to tell you we haven’t any
water to wash up today. You can go down to the river…it is only a kilometer away. Or you can
go off with my cousin. We will give you two hours.” She exited stage left with the potter but, of
course, came back in five minutes damp but otherwise none the worst for wear.
Koray
commented archly, “That didn’t take much time.” I found these remarks amazing: oblique
remarks about sex were usually restricted to vague paeans on beauty or Turkish manliness.
Then it was on to the gift shop, the raison d’etre of the visit for them if not for us. The
shop held a huge expanse of wares from the gaudy trinket to those approaching museum quality.
I went from dish to dish with covetous desire until I came on a panel of six tiles in a tendriled
design with salmon highlights and fell in love. I knew I was in trouble when Koray refused to
even quote a price at first. Though ready to buy it out of spite, even I blanched at the $600 tag
(with an additional $200 for shipping—hell if I would take it on a plane). I embarrassingly
tottered off to the less dear items and soon settled for an inferior panel of tiles for $125 which I
could pick up in Istanbul all wrapped for taking on the plane.36
Then it was more rock climbing, cave house exploring, beautiful vista viewing, lectures
on pigeon raising and guano collecting, and a buffet lunch remarkable for its variety if not
quality (fish, three kinds of meatballs, rice, different fava bean dishes, cheeses, sliced fresh
36
Alas, they arrived in pieces—I knew they would when I peeked out of the plane window and watched the
luggage handlers in Heathrow purposefully raising bags above their heads and plummeting them down on the
other bags as hard as they could. I now have a jigsaw puzzle of a tile set glued onto a backing.
~ 123 ~
pickled vegetables, and at least ten different kinds of sweets). After that lunch in Üçhisar, we all
congregated on the terrace to view Pigeon Valley and the spectacular 40-story pinnacle that
dominates the valley. A short way off was our next stop, a six-story “home” cut into one of the
cones. We giggly mounted ladders and went from room to room, each decorated with flat rugs
and cushions and with built-in shelves. At the top was the so called honeymoon suite where we
proceeded to have an orgy (of picture taking only). The next scenic overlook had its 15 minutes
of fame when it was featured in “Star Wars” as the home turf of Jaba the Hut.
Another treat was the Göreme Open Air Museum, a remarkable collection of homes and
churches in a small plot (too small anyway for the ten tour groups that got there simultaneously).
The churches were all decorated in either iconodule or iconoclast frescoes—some quite
elaborate. There were dining rooms, storage rooms, kitchens, and graves also.
Then it was on to the rug cooperative which was run like the pottery factory. We were
greeted by and given over to a charming courteous man who explained the different materials
going into a rug, silk gathering and spinning, weaving techniques and carpet patterns. This
enterprise supposedly takes local girls in and teaches them carpet making techniques and acts as
a sales outlet for their wares. The number and quality of the carpets which we saw later (and our
guide’s well fitting suite and debonair attitude) belied the whole investing-in-the-local-economy
schtick designed to get us to indulge in some guilt-laden shopping. But before the hard sell came
we had the hospitality talk and round of drinks.
Then they started bringing out carpet after carpet in ever increasing quality while
commenting on the style and weaving quality. When they brought out a Turkoman rug in dark
reds, oranges, and blues my heart was possessed yet again of covetousness beyond that of the tile
set I had to forego. Having budgeted exactly $0 for carpet bagging, I blanched at the $800 price
~ 124 ~
tag. But by then the salesmen had sunk their hooks into me.
I was taken to a back room with three men (all dark, hairy, and handsome which added to
the pleasure/pressure). Combined, they easily wore down my reserve, though the picture they
drew of my sitting in my suburban living room with the rug on the floor was fatally flawed. For
the final deal, they brought back our original guide who stood off to the side with the other three
gentlemen and parried in easily understood Turkish. “He likes it so much but is worried about
the cost.” “Yes, but we are already giving it to him at just above our costs.” “Yes, but he really
likes it, and our inventory is high for these particular ones.” And so on. I felt like a client of a
high class prostitute: I knew I was getting screwed; but since it was done so professionally, I lay
back—figuratively, of course—and actually enjoyed the process.
The $800 got down to $780, I got my little package with a certificate of quality, and I
rarely pass my little gem (in a sleeping nook in our house in Montauk along with the tile puzzle)
without a stab of pleasure at its beauty and quality.
The next morning I was off in a bus with 20 or so new fellow travellers for a journey east.
The next in the line of guides was Tarcu (remember c is pronounced as a j) who looked like a
1970s country music singer: big black handlebar moustache, tight jeans, a big buckled belt, and a
checked shirt with the top three or four buttons open to reveal his hairy chest.
Our first stop was a little beyond Kayseri at a 13th century caravansary. The imposing
main gate had that squinchy type of sculpted relief that many mihrabs in mosques do. Decorative
pilasters were worked into the walls. Beyond a long barrel vaulted corridor was an immense
courtyard. A little mosque, storage rooms and the baths were to the right; the stables were to the
left. On the far side of the yard a small doorway done in a style similar to the front led into the
living quarters, a huge central space with a barrel vault about 50 feet high that was punctured by
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an immense round cylinder on squinches and topped by a conical Seljuk dome. The side aisles
were separated by big round arched bays and barrel vaults. Sound nice? Yes, for a bird. The
pigeons had turned the whole place into a vibrant, pulsing, guano-filled roost. All the stone work
was black from centuries of soot from braziers.
After we climbed the walls and manned the battlements like little children at play, we
headed back to the bus for a four-hour ride over the Tarsus Mountains. Our trip was punctuated
by a lunch stop at a restaurant in the middle of nowhere where we all sat at a long trestle table
and mulled our choices of either lentil or yogurt rice soup and vegetable stew either with or
without meat. The most basic of meals had loads of fresh bread and watermelon slices to finish
off. I was hankering for a beer and asked one of the waiters to bring me one; one of my fellow
guests asked for a soda. The boy returned with the cola but no beer then went over to Tancu and
pointed at me. Getting more than a little annoyed that he hadn’t understood my perfectly good
Turkish, I was chagrined to learn that the place was dry and that I had made yet another breach
of etiquette.
We got to Kaharamanmaraş, better known only as Maraş,37 in the middle of the
afternoon—well timed, for we were here to try their famous ice cream at a high end pastry shop
adorned with lots of hanging carpets, brass ewers and such. The remaining wall space was given
over to a veritable “Who’s Who” photo gallery of Turkish elite eating or staring in wonder at
pillars of this fabled ice cream.
Pillars, you say? Surely I jest. But no, this is not ordinary ice cream is so dense, it is eaten
with a knife and fork. Made from goat’s milk and oregano, it is beaten for hours until it has an
incredibly thick consistency. An annual competition (hence, the pictures on the wall) is held to
37
This wonderful city got its sobriquet which means heroic because of a successful defense against the French in
WWI. Derived from the Arabic word for scratching, Maraş used to be the center of rice growing and consequently
had lots of mosquitoes and malaria.
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see who can make the strongest sample. The winner the year before made a long thick rope of
this gloop that was used to tow an automobile.
And the taste? Well, the tangy, almost sour creamy taste was rather nice, especially with
a dusting of crushed world-renowned Maraş’ pistachios. Since my visit, vendors of this special
product have sprouted up all over Turkey and purvey a much inferior product that may rely on
gum Arabic or some other binder that turns it into an almost lick-proof gluey blob. At twice the
price of the delicious creamy sorbet available everywhere, I cannot fathom its popularity.
I spent the next five hours next to an English woman who was travelling alone and
lectured me for most of the way about how American dietary habits and obesity were taking over
the world. She also warned me about the Texas belle in the front of the bus who had shushed her
when she dissed Bush and Blair and their onward march to war. She professed that said belle had
met Bush, looked him in the eye, seen his soul, and knew he was a good man. My god, these
Texans.
Next stop was Kahta and the Ötel Mesopotamia which we struggled into after dark. Still
most of us had the pluck to have dinner out near the lake created by the damned up waters of the
Euphrates. Outside under cool arbors and serenaded by latter summer frongs, we feasted on slabs
of steaming flat bread dipped into hot pepper and yogurt sauces. Our delicious grilled fish came
in sizzling iron skillets with grilled tomatoes, onions and peppers. Desert was fresh melon and
figs. Simple and unbeatable.
The Galatasary-Barcelona match was ending round about the time we got back to the
hotel. Though the Turks lost, the street noise was still at high level. But I can’t blame them for
my insomnia which I treated with a long dose of D.H., not the more appropriate T.H., Lawrence.
Still, I was awake well before our 3AM wake up call and raring to go on our next adventure, our
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ascent to the top of Nemrut Dagı.
As you may remember from earlier pages, I had wanted to do this adventure for many a
year and got very close in 1985. It those days it was a rugged many-hour affair of rutted roads
passable only by four-wheel drive vehicles, run by local guides, and done in the pre dawn hours.
Now, though still done in the early morning hours, we could putter up the mountain in under an
hour in minivans on a smooth, winding, asphalt road. From afar, the headlights from the long
procession of busses and autos inching up the switchbacks had made the peak into a makeshift
Christmas tree with strands of twinkling lights, though it was the glorious full moon that
magically lit up the desolate landscape.
After getting to the parking lot, we still had a 20-minute trail climb up on narrow, rocky
footpaths to the rebuilt stone platform in front of the tumulus or burial site of Antiochus I, the
son of Callinicus who founded the Commangene kingdom. Antiochus reigned from 70 to 38BC
and, like a lot of us, wanted to be remembered and, a little more improbably, be immortal. Since
we are still coming to his vast funeral folly he conceived and had built to this day, he did attain
what he so desired. Not as lucky in the political sphere, he sided with the Persians against the
conquering Romans and was deposed.
There were a lot of us—all those vehicles trudging up the hill, you know—waiting the
hour or so for the sun to rise over the Euphrates plain and illuminate the site a little more than the
beautiful ghostly moon did. We had already played hide and seek amongst the tumbled heads,
half again as tall as us, that were on the platform level. I must say, I was initially not greatly
impressed. But when the sun was fully up and lit the statues from which the heads had tumbled, I
had to admit all the hype was worth it. And you gotta remember the truly astounding thing: this
was all built on the top of mountain in the middle of—though the Commagenes might have
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called it home—absolute nowhere.
The platform on the east where we had congregated used to be a sacrificial altar. This
fronts a mound of rubble half as high as a football field is long. On top of that are the
unfortunately headless statues, six each on the east and west sides, which are representations of
Apollo, Fortuna, Zeus, Antiochus himself (remember the whole immortality thingy), Hercules
and another unidentified figure. More reliefs and inscriptions are thought to have existed on the
north and south sides but have since eroded away. Also on the west are stone reliefs of Anitochus
shaking hands with his buddies Zeus, Hercules and Apollo. Another relief showed a lion and a
planetary map of Jupiter, Mars, Mercury and the moon. We were assured that astronomers have
been able to pinpoint to the day when these bodies were in just such an alignment and which
happened to be June something in so and so BC and coincided with Antiochus’s birthday.
After a long ride on bumpy windy roads through what we could now see was far-fromdesolate land, we came to the site of the summer palace and fortress of Antiochus’s daddy. Up
the cliff via a dusty path is a stunning relief of some king in royal garb (it may or not be papa
Callinicus) shaking hands with an out-of-shape but still humpy Hercules. Next to it was a round
four-and-a-half foot high tunnel that went down 150 meters at a 45-degree angle. I was the only
one to try to negotiate it and got halfway down before claustrophobia got the best of me. Near
the tunnel entrance was a still very much readable inscription in Greek and Latin that states
Callinicus was buried here and that the site was consecrated to him. These guys built for
posterity.
Also built for the ages was our next stop, a very gracious single-arched late second
century Roman bridge. My tour mates were inordinately impressed by this and took more
pictures here than they did up in the mountains. One of the Australian women had different
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groups of us pose on the end as she took pictures from below.
On our way back to the hotel for, for me anyway, a much needed breakfast, we passed yet
another tumulus with a marvelous eight-foot carved eagle on it. Built—my guidebook said—for
Antiochus’ wife, it was the type of thing that would have gotten a major nook in an American
museum but here was out in the elements and protected only by a few strands of barbed wire.
And we passed it by without a nod and barely a glimpse.
Fortified with that ample Turkish breakfast, we rolled on to Atatürk Dam, the third
largest in the world, which is providing power and water to this agriculturally important area of
Turkey. Unfortunately, it swallowed up lots of little villages and some major archeological sites
in the process. Turkey now controls much of the flow of the mighty river to the chagrin and
possible detriment of its downstream neighbors.
We started coming upon acre after acre of cotton fields spread out in the distance, their
branches splayed with tufts of white, and their green leaves turning purple. This explained the
beginning of a Yasar Kemal short story whose opening sentence has haunted me all these years:
“Mor, mor, mosmor” (Purple, purple, deep purple). While our bus’s airconditioning was not
keeping up to the task, we were still better off than the workers of all ages and of both sexes
bent down picking the stuff by hand.
We did stop to pull a little ourselves. The balls were quite soft and break out of big pod.
My bit was as large as three or four commercial cotton balls and had seven or eight seeds which
were extremely hard to extricate from the fiber. I now no longer wonder why Eli Whitney’s
cotton gin was such a remarkable invention. We kept passing trucks piled high with impossibly
huge bales for most of the day.
Then we were in Şanliurfa (which used to be just Urfa before it too it got the Glorious
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sobriquet following another WWI battle) just in time to check into our hotel before lunch.
Already behind schedule, we were given ten minutes to settle in and meet in the lobby—it took
45. Much was made of the need to give one passport per room to the clerk for registration. Some
rooms turned in several; some none. My travel mates were worried about getting them back and,
I guess, being sold as slaves over the Syrian border. Some just had to have a shower. When one
woman showed up in a scarf and with exortations about respecting the conservative views of the
public, others rushed out to purchase a head covering at a nearby shop or back up to their rooms
to retrieve one from a suitcase. Then they had to ooh and aah and practice different draping
techniques. Ah, the agonies of group travel.
We finally traipsed right across the street (meeting no angry imams or other religious
fundamentals along the way) to have our Urfa kebab, a kind of Turkish make-your-own burrito.
You had to peel roasted eggplant, scrape up the delicious pulp, spread it out on a big sheet of hot
thin pide almost like a tortilla, smear on some soft roasted tomato, sections of roasted onion,
ditto with the roasted green and hot pepper, add some grilled meatballs, roll it up and partake.
The locals were quite adept, of course; I just took to shoveling the individual elements down my
throat as fast as I could with gobs of that incredibly tasty bread. Again, no alcohol—we had big
glasses of ayran, the yogurt drink that goes so well with food.
Then well-fed, we sped off, dodging those overloaded cotton trucks, to Harran, one of the
oldest continuously inhabited communities on earth—over 6,000 years. Five miles from the
Syrian border, it is known for its beehive shaped houses and as the home of Abraham’s wife
Sarah.
First stop was a leftover from the crusades that has alternately been a castle, caravansary,
church and mosque. Heavily damaged by the Mongols in the 13th century, it was a huge
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complex of two stories with multiple halls and vaults and chambers. The ten-sided tower with
multiple staircases was the highlight—we really got to exercise those bus-restricted limbs. Then
it was hospitality tea in an Arabic tent on the ramparts. The women got more scarf tying tips that
delighted them to no end, but we men were adorned with burnooses that put the ladies to shame.
I was so taken with the handmade camel hair and copper wire headbands that I purchased one
forthwith along with an Arafat style scarf to complete the costume. The Texan, husband of the
Bush enabler, was equally taken and did not remove his for the rest of the day.
Then we went to a model beehive house consisting of eight steep and high hives arranged
in rows of two, four deep, each one opening into the other. They were deliciously cool in the
desert-like heat and decorated with rugs, furniture and tools. All that was missing were people,
animals, and the attendant smells. The base of each hive was made of stone and brick held
together by a mud and straw mortar. The conical roofs were laid in ever so slightly decreasing
circles of brick to a ten-inch opening at the top. The outside of the dome and both sides of the
base were covered in stucco, again from mud-and-straw, that has to be renewed yearly.
Nearby was our next item to tick off, the remains of an eighth century university. An
impressive 40-meter tower that used to be an observatory and then a minaret dominated the large
expanse. And to think the tower used to be at least twice the height. The main section took
service as a church then a mosque before being ravaged by the Mongols and earthquakes.
Though there were piles of cut stone tumbled all around, we could still make out the courtyard
and fountains.
Then it was back on the road to Urfa to see the complex of Hizir Ibrahim Halilullah,
better known to us as the Prophet Abraham. Now Muslims have some dish on the old guy that I
wasn’t aware of. It seems that he spent the first ten years of his life in a nearby cave hiding from
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the evil Assyrian tyrant, Nemrut (Nimrod)—no relation to the mountain we so recently visited.
After he came out of hiding, he was a constant thorn in Nemrut’s side like smashing the perfectly
fine idols in the king’s temple. When Nemrut finally had enough, he built a huge fire in the town,
had Abraham taken up to nearby cliffs, and flung off by means of a giant slingshot suspended
between two pillars (which are still standing guard above the complex) and into the fire as the
king and his kith and kin watched. Lo and behold, God saw Abraham headed for the flames,
changed the fire into water and the burning logs into carp; Abraham might have gotten a little
wet but was otherwise none the worse for wear. The large pool of water and the many
descendents of the holy carp are now ensconced in the large mosque and medrese compound we
had come to see and which was a stunning bit of tranquility in a sea of urban and desert blight.
The site is quite popular with pilgrims from all Muslim lands, the locals, and the few
infidels who happen to be in the vicinity. A number of domed buildings, walkways and
terraces—all done in a warm yellow stone that glowed in the late afternoon sun—surround the
pool. All manner of people but tending to the conservative, i.e., lots of beards and veiled ladies,
walk around, pay their respects or sit and watch the passing procession of other pilgrims. A lot of
the men wore şalvar, those immensely loose fitting trouser with the inseam shortened to knee
level.
We were immediately accosted by a bevy of boys, so called “tourism volunteers,” who
earn a few lira by showing visitors around. Tancu chose one of them, a boy of about 11, who
enthusiastically gave us a rote little history of the place that morphed from English to Arabic to
Turkish and was more charming than informative.
And the fish in the pools—a plentiful, lazy, and fat lot. Vendors sell little cups of food
that the fish will nibble at when tossed bit by bit into the water. But, of course, rambunctious
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youngsters get their kicks by tossing in the whole cup in the middle which stirs up a food frenzy
of flopping fish bodies that was quite impressive and hilarious.
Eventually Tancu sent our little guide out to get us back to the bus. The boy’s eagerness
and ineptitude at herding us back was similar to his abilities as a tour guide, but it must be said
we were an unruly flock. One or more would bolt from the fold to look in a mosque or go off to
the bathroom. As he retrieved that one, another would decide she needed to get some film, and so
on. Some who were already with Tancu moseyed off to peek into other buildings and had to be
fetched. It was an awesome task, and our little man was beside himself and on the verge of tears.
He kept muttering in Turkish, “Big Brother38 wants you. Big Brother wants you.”
Back to the hotel there was a long and fretful search for the bus driver so that I could
retrieve my pack and get to the city bus station for my connection to Konya. The parting shot
from my little group was that of Mr. Texas sitting and smiling serenely in the hotel lobby, still in
his burnoose.
The overnight bus ride was memorable only for a viewing of a Turkish slapstick comedy
that featured a Gomer Pyle-esque actor who spent the first half of the movie trying to get to
Istanbul where he had inherited a shop. The second half involved trying to get the shop out of the
hands of a nasty couple who had witnessed the death of the owner and knew—but ignored—the
old man’s wishes. There were fights aplenty, scene after scene of paint being spilled on innocent
bystanders (our hero was sometimes the intended target and at other times the perpetrator), more
fist fights with more innocent people being cuffed, and—in the penultimate scene—our hero
rolling down the streets of Istanbul in a turquoise wardrobe. So he finally gets ownership and
38
Turks have a lovely system of using kinship terms to denote respect to an older or younger person of either sex
who you know well or just meet on the street. Ağabey (big brother) is a term a child would naturally use to refer to
an older male even if there was no blood relation. If he was really much older, then amca (uncle)—a term I still
don’t get called thankfully— or even babam (my father) would be appropriate. Others are abla (big sister), kardeş
(younger brother), teyze (aunt), and so on.
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what does he do? He relaxes and lights up a cigarette only to drop it moments later on some
rubbish next to a can of kerosene; the shop gets blown up; and the final scene has all the
characters wobbling out of the carnage all covered in soot. Great stuff when in anther language—
maybe not so good otherwise.
Konya was a place I had been avoiding for decades as it was supposedly one of the
strongholds of conservative Islam in Turkey. Also in former years, the only way to see their
famous dervish dances was to visit in December39 when the town was unbelievably crowded. But
I could no longer ignore such an important place if I was to profess to be such an expert on the
country.
Mevlana (“Our Master”) was the better known name of Celaleddin Rumi, the Sufic
master who founded the Whirling Dervish sect. He composed a massive work of several
volumes concerning the soul’s separation from God—characterized as the Friend—in our earthly
existence and the powerful mutual yearning to reunite the soul and the Friend either before or
after death. He advocated truth and beauty in all things, the avoidance of ostentation, and the
practice of infinite tolerance, love, and charity. He condemned slavery, commended monogamy
and supported a higher role for women in public and political life.
Non-believers were welcome and treated with respect in strict accordance with the
Mevlana’s dictates on tolerance. His most famous quote, oft repeated, is “Come, come, whoever
you are, whether you be fire-worshipers, idolaters, or pagans. Ours is not the dwelling place of
despair. All who enter will receive a welcome here.” Who can resist such an invitation?
The Mevlana extolled the virtues of music and dance too. Their whirligig ceremony
(sema) was the means to gain temporary freedom from earthly bondage, to reunite with God and
regain his love. Lots of symbolism is involved: the camel hair hat of the dancers represented a
39
Now performances are given all over Turkey, the year round and are very popular with tourists.
~ 135 ~
tombstone, the black cloak a tomb, and the white skirt the funerary shroud. During the dance the
cloak is cast aside (escaping the tomb and earthly ties). While the music purportedly reproduces
that of the heavenly spheres, the spinning bodies of the dancers are stand-ins for the heavenly
bodies. The three stages of the dance were knowledge of God, awareness of God’s presence, and
finally union with God. As they turn, the dervishes chant under their breath a ditty about
remembrance, and the singers churn out a hymn expressing their desire for mystical union. Got
that?
The Mevlana’s gargantuan green-draped casket is directly under a fabulous fluted
turquoise-tiled drum topped by an equally fabulous conical dome of the same material. His
father’s casket, curiously enough, stands upright right next to his son’s. Legend has it that the
progenitor’s steadily rose up to its present upended position after the Mevlana was laid to rest
there in 1273—a measure of unusual respect as it is usually the son who should rise to his feet
when his father entered the room.
Most of the buildings date from the 15th to early 16th centuries and include cells for
prayer and meditation, an outside fountain for ablutions, a soup kitchen, and the circular hall
where the sema was first performed. The hall now houses a collection of musical instruments,
precious works of art, and a little casket with some of Mohammed’s hair inside. The main
building has a grand collection of old Korans, rugs, metalwork and tiles that one could peruse
after paying your respects to Our Master. In the more mundane rooms, junior dervish
mannequins go about their cooking and cleaning duties.
Postcard-wise, I was also very pleased with Konya. While my hotel was a stone’s throw
from the tomb, I had to pass at least 20 of the gaudiest gift shops along the way. And everything
(except the giant sized worry beads) had a whirling dervish on it: lamps, fans, rugs, glasses,
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plates, jewelry, and on and on and on. And all in lurid colors, of cheap construction, or in gaudy
frames. But they did have a healthy collection of tourist and tacky postcards. Also one could buy
cards of the Mevlana’s rules in seven different languages (Turkish, English, German, Japanese,
French, Italian, and Arabic).
Later as I was perusing a rack of cards with an undistinguished leech named Fahrettin
(nicknamed Fahro), a friend of his passed by and remarked in Turkish, “Hey, you should take
him to the postcard shop down the road.” Like a parched wanderer in the desert hearing about a
water source, my ears pricked up at that. The shop, conveniently located next to the carpet
business of the man who tipped me off, was a wonder—a lot like the old shops in Sirkeci I used
to haunt and that have since downsized or closed.
I quickly had another 60 or so cards: apes doing sundry human things, a row of seven
semen-less used condoms on a clothesline labeled with the days of the week and entitled “A
Week’s Work Program,” various film and pop stars, and quite an array of army and commando
cards. I also bought a camouflage notebook and commando stationery with matching envelopes.
To my eternal distress, I did not get the new recruit’s memory book.40 This truly
astounding item was like ones given to new parents that have pages for all the milestones. But
for the soldier, the milestones are his recruitment date, his postings, his commanding officers and
fellow recruits (with places to affix pictures), when he got his first rifle, the exercise you
especially loved or hated in basic training, etc. There are pages to paste in your first letter from
home and spaces for other memorabilia. It gets a little hairy towards the end when there are
pages to list your skirmishes and conflicts, wounds, injured and killed comrades, and even the
details of your first kill. I think it was the last item that kept me from the purchase, and I have
40
There is compulsory military service for all males in Turkey. It is usually two years, though recently college
graduates can do a shortened period of just a few weeks. For many village or poor boys, it will be the first time
they will be away from home, hence the proliferation of cards and memory books and all.
~ 137 ~
never spotted, not for want of trying, anything similar again.
I had to visit the carpet store to thank Osman for the shop tip and to pretend to look at his
carpets. It turned out that little Fahro was slated to be married in a month in a traditional
ceremony as opposed to a modern one. Though I questioned them like a rabid reporter hot on a
scoop, I couldn’t really figure out the difference. It certainly wasn’t a village wedding where the
bride comes in on a horse or donkey accompanied by a shrill pipe and a pounding drum—they
laughed at that notion. No, it seemed that the prenup activities were the deciding points. The girls
get together and paint designs on themselves with henna whilst making a lot of provocative talk
about stalwart men who were shy at heart and taming the savage beast. Bachelor parties in this
alcohol free zone tend to be even more sedate. The boys get together to build up the prospective
bridegroom’s strength by feeding him lots of Turkish delight, allegedly Turkey’s answer to
Viagra, and to get him to the mosque41 on time. The henna party sounds infinitely more fun.
I went off to the huge, possibly man-made Alaeddin Hill which has yielded artifacts as
far back as 7000BC. Alaeddin Camii was a simple but pleasing Seljuk era edifice. The interior
was a single huge room with 42 ancient columns with amazing and varied Roman capitals. The
mimbar was made from beautifully carved ebony. Eight Seljuk sultans were in a turbe outside.
Across the way was Karatay Medresi which now houses a bland ceramic museum. The
portal, though, was a soaring decorative wonder of banded stone, Greek Corinthian columns,
stylized Arabic script, and a pointed stalactite-ish arch. The interior was a large central space
spanned by a massive dome and decorated with a gold, blue, and black mosaic map of the
heavenly bodies (Mevlana inspired?). While there were examples of Iznik and Kutahya tiles, the
earlier Seljuk ones stole the show.
I missed the woodwork museum at the İnce Minare Medresesi because I was intent on
41
Actually, all weddings in Turkey are civil and performed at the local city hall.
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buying an official jersey of the Turkish national soccer team that had recently made it to the
semifinals of the World Cup, no mean achievement. Since I easily talked into having the name
one of the team hero’s printed on the back, a simple purchase turned into a tour of the backstreets
of Konya and an interminable wait getting the process done. I also had to fend off more young
men intent on practicing their English, professing their desire to marry a foreign woman and
escaping their dismal plight in life, and trying to drag me to yet another carpet shop.
Back to the hotel for a much needed nap after that all-nighter on the bus, I didn’t need to
set an alarm. At dusk, the appropriate time for me to rise anyhow, the town came alive with the
call to evening prayer. There must have been—I kid you not—20 minutes of loudspeaker-borne
chanting that shook the walls, before the usual five-minute harsher and piercing Arabic
command to head to the prayer mat.
But I headed back to Osman’s carpet shop to set up my next adventure. Earlier I had
mentioned that I wanted to visit the Byzantine ruins of Binbir Kilise (1001 Churches). Of course
he knew a taxi driver who had ferried important dignitaries and scholars to the place. When I met
Adbullah, a tall, lanky Turk in his mid 40s, at the shop, I took the fact that he, like me, only used
a half a cube of sugar in his tea instead of the requisite two to be a sign of his seriousness and
trustworthiness—and I make fun of George Bush thinking that he can look a man in the eyes and
perceive his worth? The quoted price for the excursion was half what I expected, and we agreed
to meet the next morning and that he could bring a friend along.
Of course, I had to try the local dish, Konya fırın (oven) kebab even though the
guidebook described it as an unappetizing pile of gristle and fat. Though the fat did blend in
nicely with the pieces of cubed pide bread underneath, I think the guidebook was actually
generous in its criticism—inedible is closer to the mark.
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My preset alarm clock, the call to prayer, began at 5:20AM and though not as long as the
evening one was more intense—oh well, more time to devote to breakfast before heading off to
meet Abdullah and to see the ruins. His friend turned out to be a woman a few years his junior
and clearly not his wife. My fears of being witness to a coquettish day of flirting or worse were
not realized; Sema (a popular woman’s name in Turkey and the same, you will remember, as the
dervish dance) was pleasant and fairly unobtrusive.
Most of the hour-long trip was on flat paved roads and near the famous Hittite site of
Ҫatal Hüyük. The last ten miles were on secondary, increasingly dustier roads as we headed into
the hills. Our first stop was the village of Maden Şehir, where many of the homes and walls were
constructed from finely cut stone with an occasional piece of marble lintel worked in. The stone,
of course, was from the nearby Byzantine ruins. The newer walls, constructed after a government
edict against poaching from the ancient remains, were made from irregular field stone.42
There was an immense three-aisled basilica half buried under about five feet of
accumulated earth. It looked like it was almost cut in half lengthways, but the half dome over the
east end was intact. The south arcades with the columns and arches sprouted out of the field and
gave rise to a now incomplete barrel vault. Another church down the road had just the intact east
end apse and the bare remnants of the western narthex walls. All the fine ashlar through the town
and in the surrounding fields was evidence of other fine building.
Then it was up the mountain where the main site was a quiet sentry overlooking the
splendid fertile plain. There must have been 60 substantial buildings dating from the 9 to 12th
centuries (though less than 1001, it was still pretty impressive) in various states of repair and
42
It is quite common to hear the unfair remark that Turkish workmanship does not hold a candle to
Greek/Byzantine and to point out buildings such as I saw here as examples. But the old churches and buildings
were the result of considerable governmental planning and resources. The Turkish buildings were done by simple
laborers with few tools or financial wherewithal.
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unrecognizable piles of stone from many another. One or two families had set up house and
raised donkeys and goats among the ruins, but it seemed like there had been no one else here for
years.
Abdullah’s “uncle” (see kinship footnote six pages back) was away, but his son spread
out the welcome mat for us. We were given fresh pide made by his wife the old fashioned way in
her in-ground wood-burning stone oven, fresh yogurt from their goats, but imported (from the
next village) honey. Though they had gotten electricity and a telephone just the year before, they
still didn’t have an electric stove, much to the chagrin of the young wife and mother. The soil—
too many stones—was too poor for having much of a garden, but they were otherwise pretty selfsufficient. They had a two-year-old toddler, another a year younger, and another in the proverbial
oven. It was a wonderful experience, marred only a bit by the number of flies we were constantly
swatting away.
Since the road had been extended past the next higher mountain, we decided to go along
it and try to see if we could spot a herd of wild horses that roam the area and graze in amazingly
lush bowl-like valleys amongst the peaks and continue on to Karaman. As we kept going up and
up the quality of the road dwindled in indirect proportion to the beauty of the landscape. We did
come upon about a dozen horses—a bit thin but otherwise not the worst for wear—who looked at
us curiously and even a bit defiantly. They, of course, didn’t want to have a lot to do with us.
Up and up, with the road bed giving way to mainly ruts and littered with the fallen stones
and the occasional boulder from the cliffs looming above. It was just like an SUV commercial
from the states that were viral on television back home, except we were in a four banger Turkish
taxi, not a four-wheel-drive behemoth. And a good thing too—anything larger than our little
coupe could not have negotiated the ever larger boulders we were swerving around in our little
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uphill with Sema screaming in the backseat. Then we went around a bend only to come across a
massive rock two-thirds the size of our car. Sema’s screams segued into a perpetual wail as
Abdullah and I got out of the car and tried to figure this one out. To the right was a narrow little
alley then a sheer vertical rise of some 80 degrees—it would take the geniuses at Pixar to get us
through that. To the left was a wider bit of purchase, a nasty looking lip of road that looked just
ready to crumble, and a sheer drop off of, say, a few hundred feet. But we surmised the roadbed
was just wide enough to accommodate our vehicle. It was either that or reverse slalom back
down the mountain a couple of miles.
With Sema beseeching the heavens, me acting as the traffic coordinator with appropriate
hand gestures and the occasional “gel, gel” (“come on, come on”), the boulder tantalizing close
to scratching the passenger side of the car, and the eroding lip holding about two-thirds of the left
sided tires, Abdullah persevered and saved the day. With the summit now in sight we bounded
out of there—Sema’s screams now simmered to simpers in the backseat—before another
obstacle came tumbling down on us.
So off to the Karaman Camii, a nice little Seljuk gem, to give thanks. As amazing as our
little brush with fate was, it was no match for the miracle that I beheld here. The Mevlana’s
parents, who hailed from this town as did their auspicious offspring, are in a mausoleum in the
backyard of the mosque—poppa seems to be in two places at once. Then after the Almighty was
hopefully appeased, we settled into more earthly pursuits. I got to see a mummy and some
archeological finds in the local museum, and from there we repaired to a high end restaurant that
occupied a former medrese. We entered through a monumental gate similar to the one in Konya I
described to a lush glass covered courtyard dotted with plants and fountains. Two arcades ran
down the sides, and off these were private dining rooms (former classrooms or dorms) outfitted
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with carpets, cushions, and nargiles off them. The exposed brickwork and Arabic or Ottoman
Turkish inscriptions were of high quality. Wild horses—at least not the ones I had just seen—
couldn’t drag me out of here before I had a drink and a rest.
Off on a photo op hunt, I crashed a large meeting in one of the private rooms. Later the
major domo of the group and the other participants filed by our assemblage lounging in another
corner, pressed the flesh and muttered their “so pleased to meet you”s. Turns out it was a guy
running for Parliament and desirous of anyone’s vote, even mine.
Besides its Mevlana bonafides, Karaman has other claims to fame. It boasts a type of
helva that is similar to marshmallow cream and a walnut Turkish delight that will make you
swoon much much sooner than a dervish ritual. It also has the mosque and tomb of Yunus Emre,
the most important Seljuk poet, and so one wonders why it isn’t on all the tourist routes like
Hagia Sophia, Ephesus, and Cappadocia. But out by the impressive city defensive walls,
something happened that really sealed my high regard for this regional gem: an old man said
something to me in German, I responded with an “Excuse me” in Turkish, and he apologized and
said that he had mistakenly taken me for a foreigner.
Now, how do you top an already perfect day? Easy—you find the perfect watermelon.
Luckily, Abdullah knew the local Watermelon King whom he reached after numerous cell phone
calls and who gave us permission to scout one of his fields for our pièce de résistance.
So we get to the field where there is an overabundance of blue ribbon tomatoes hanging
off their vines like grapes before the harvest. The peppers and eggplant were equally impressive.
And surely in those acres and acres the grand prize karpuz was ours for the picking. Now my
Abdullah was a guide of modest means, a daredevil driver of much repute, and a surprising
mystery man who actually carried translations of the poet Yunus Emre (the guy wrote in Persian)
~ 143 ~
in his glove compartment. But his most accomplished skill was in picking just the right melon.
We thumped over 40 in the field with my chauffeur getting dourer by the minute. He admitted
that it was an awful year for the crop but still…. We settled on two big suckers and went down
the road a piece to a roadside vendor and bought ten smaller ones that were a cross between a
honeydew and a cantaloupe and for which we paid a pittance. Alas, none were the least bit tasty
when we sliced them open on the main drag in Konya later.
Then it was my third overnight bus trip in six days to get to Balikesir and a local bus to
Altinoluk, my Agean seaside retreat for a short while. I soon had my cadre of buddies: right next
door to my little apartment lived a 28-year-old school teacher named Cafer. He was hosting a
friend of his, a younger architectural student named Özkan, and they had just set up their table
for breakfast. We were joined in our repast by the school’s music teacher, Yasemin, who was
sometimes to be the Fourth Musketeer to our triumvirate over the next few days.
This interlude, barely marred by relatively lousy weather, was marked by swimming,
eating, and low key partying. Yasemin hosted the first party that night where I was to meet and
try to withstand the lure of Serap Hanim, the school’s aging beauty of a science teacher. Though
my two male friends, as equally gay as I, had evaded her talons, they were sure the prize of a
“rich” American would spur her to wiles irresistible to anyone. I knew I could be in trouble; after
all, this was the land of Circe, and I had no magic potions. They teasingly said they were
seriously thinking of calling the school administrator so he could start advertising for a new
science teacher forthwith.
Serap turned out to be a real character. With shoulder length frizzy blonde hair, lots of
eye make up, and impeccable lipstick, she was wearing a stylish (I use this term loosely) warm
up suit with a revealing cotton chemise underneath—all the elements to really get my juices
~ 144 ~
flowing, eh? Though she would heartily have disagreed, she was clearly not a Miss Jean Brodie
but had passed out of her prime. She had a high-pitched girlish whine and did not consider any
other available females to be a threat.
After a repast fit for an Argonaut, Serap grabbed my empty Turkish coffee cup to tell my
fortune. Ah, I was to have or did have (I was a bit rusty on my tenses after all that food and wine)
two women in my life. The first, an American, whom I would/did love deeply would spurn me.
The second would be a foreigner, possibly Spanish (or from some other Mediterranean country
possibly?), with long dark hair and with whom I would be bound up within a year with true
happiness and many children to follow.
Great! I was off the hook—she was blonde. Then she innocently mentioned she was sorry
she had recently cut and lightened her hair which had the rest of the crowd smiling and nodding
their heads. I was more taken aback, though, when she then went on to say that I would be soon
fulfilling a long desired plan of climbing a big mountain. Since I was already contemplating a
trip to Nepal and Tibet in 2003, I was starting to worry that her prediction about the mate and all
them babies might have some validity. Then I remembered that I had mentioned earlier in the
evening that I wanted to climb into the steep ravines beyond the town before I left—a good
fortune teller would have picked up on that.
Unfortunately, I didn’t pay much attention to her forecasts about my work which she
divined from the dregs on the saucer. Since I was already in my seventh year at pretty much the
same job and anticipating no change, I now wonder if she divined the closing of my hospital in
less than two years and the next phase of my professional career. Only Allah—and Serap
Hanim—know.
Our evening closed with some hideous arabesque music with our group providing the
~ 145 ~
back up singing and much gyrating to the music. Cafer was easily induced to do a few turns in
drag before we called it a night. Before toddling home, I did raid Serap’s garden for an armful of
pomegranates that grew here like apples in Washington but left the quinces for the birds.
The next day was a washout beach day but memorable in that I was first introduced to
gözleme, a marvelous little treat made from a filled bit of thin bread much like a crepe. They are
all over Turkey now, and some of the variations are positively bizarre—again like crepes in the
States. I also saw the newly female (for me at least) Bülent Ersoy on television. At two or three
times her old weight and with swollen augmented lips that looked like an inflated inner tube
folded in half, she most resembled John Belushi’s famous impersonation of Elizabeth Taylor on
“Saturday Night Live.”
The boys were asking me constantly about things in the U.S., especially prices and
salaries. Cafer certainly did not think schoolteachers here are underpaid—a rookie made more a
month than he, with eight years of experience and working in a special school at better pay,
earned in a year. But they were most amazed that in a country as advanced as ours we “still”
used toilet paper instead of water ablution from built in bidet-like spigots in all commodes.
“Barbaric,” they shuddered just like Americans do when they contemplate the Turkish system. I
may as well weigh in on the subject again: both are appropriate. Ah, acculturation!
On to Bursa the next morning, a six-hour bus ride. Of all my fond memories of the place,
I really was eager to repeat that of the hamam. I went to Yeni Kaplıca and had a nice soak but
was disappointed. Either my memory was faulty, or I went to the wrong hamam. This had a
round pool in the center, not the long rectangular one I remembered. This one had fairly
undistinguished tiles and an overall whitewash feel to it, not the brown I could still picture. Still
not all was bad; I got to share my cubicle with a wildly handsome young man with whom I
~ 146 ~
chatted while we were both wrapped in towels. Small pleasures.
Bursa has its famous İskender kebab named after its 19th century inventor, one İskender
Effendi. It is essentially a döner kebab variant prepared from thinly cut grilled lamb, basted with
hot tomato sauce, served on pieces of cubed pita bread and generously slathered with melted
sheep butter and yogurt. If made properly, it is delicious—if not, mushy, glooby gook. Mine that
night was somewhere in between.
I was able to contact my old friend Cemil by calling a random person with the same
surname in the phone book—of course a relation—and found he was retired from the military
and living in Bursa and easy to reach. The next morning, I found Cemil aging well and a kind of
absentee mayor of a small village to the south of town and where we went that morning.
Cumalkızık was a remarkably intact 15th century Ottoman village whose houses were
constructed from stone and a mud mortar of slurry and straw mixed and let to ferment a few
months before application.
Most had steeply pitched roofs and second stories that were
cantilevered out a few feet. The state had declared the village a national heritage site, and so no
repairs or new building could be done unless in the same style. As no money for upkeep was
provided to the inhabitants who were getting by on subsistence wages, their prime complaints to
Cemil concerned the difficulty getting new things or fixing old.
A local teahouse owner was having problems with a film crew shooting a television
miniseries next door and had called Cemil to intervene. As we waited for the complaintants to
arrive, we sipped tea and listened to the villagers bitterly ruing the new electrical wires going up
but regularly getting blown down. “Where was the main cable the government promised?” they
carped. A string of poorly dressed men with bad teeth spewed another litany of gievances about
their poor lives. While I was in no haste to exchange places, I couldn’t help but recognize that
~ 147 ~
they had fertile soil, lots of water, and were in close proximity to a large city. Those were things
a lot of villagers in Central Anatolia lacked.
As Cemil and I walked around, he gave me some more history. The village was famous
for its raspberries and held a big festival every June. It was also the reputed birthplace of
gözleme, the crepe-like treat I had tasted just the day before. The hills around were full of
chestnut trees whose nuts were sought after for the famous sweet, kestane şekeri, an important
product of the region. The trees were now heavy with quince and persimmons the size of my fist.
As the dispute’s principals did not come to us, we went to them. Housed in a large old
house that was converted to a kind of extended bar and café, the crew was halfway through a sixmonth lease while filming a television series called “Kinalı Kar” (“The Hennaed Snow”), a fairly
stereotypic tale of a village and an unlikely hero, in this case a female played by a famed Turkish
actress I did not know or meet. I was introduced to her costar, a handsome young Omar Sharif
look-alike, who was abruptly called away before I had a chance to get his name, an autographed
picture, or his protestations of undying love. And, as the teahouse owner never showed, we did
not get to arbitrate the complaint.
It was back to Cemil’s boyhood home where my friend and his English teacher Ed and I
had stayed some 24 years earlier. Cemil’s memories of that visit were much different than mine
which were limited to our ascent of Uludağ Mountain via the tram and visits to the hamam and
Seljuk-inspired mosques. He remembered the bean soup his mother made and the Spring festival
which featured bonfires that lit up the hills at night. Local youth had to prove their worth by
jumping over the fires, while the women put a piece of jewelry in a pot. When their bauble was
drawn from the pot, they got to select a fortune from another pot. And it seems we all danced in
front of the Teleferik, the cable car not far from his house.
~ 148 ~
The bean soup and the dancing I can easily accept, but I certainly don’t remember or
could easily forget jumping over fires. I guess there wasn’t much in the jewelry/ fortune line for
our all male group. As I just got back from seeing him again and hearing these stories yet again,
I can now recollect the taste the bean soup, the fires dotting the horizon in the early evening
hours, and a much younger group of men swaying with the music.
As hazy as my memory seemed to be, it was nothing compared to Cemil’s brother who
was just as eagerly remembering the fabled weekend. When I casually mentioned that it was
early May,43 the brother’s face fell. It seems he had started his military service in March and was
well away from home and unable to participate in what was now obviously part of their family
mythology.
For me it was back to Istanbul for a final few days. I was now staying over in Taksim
Square in a posh new hotel—my sixth floor room even had a sliver of a view of the Bosphorus if
I craned over the microscopic balcony on my tippy-toes. Such luxury and only a stone’s throw
from my old Beyoğlu digs.
My days were filled with sightseeing and shopping for gifts and souvenirs, my nights
with touring what was now a flourishing gay bar scene. The internet made the latter an easier
enterprise than outdated and incomplete travel guides ever could. Outuk.com listed two kinds of
bars—“Western style” and “a la Turca.” The first and more numerous were places that played
European and American music and where the clientele was upscale and rich. Barbahçe which I
went to years ago and graced again this trip was still the number one contender of that category.
There the music was so loud you couldn’t think. The patrons looked extremely well fed and
groomed and tended to be young, thin, a tad too effiminate, and seemingly rich.
43
Since Cicek Pasaji fell into itself and was destroyed that weekend and I still retain the newspaper clip of the
event, I can be sure of the timing.
~ 149 ~
The others were “generally dingy and can be dangerous for those not clued into the social
dynamics. Keep in mind that many of the clientele may be relatively unenlightened about
sexuality…you’ll be well advised to go with a Turkish friend…but it would be a pity not to visit
one of the clubs at least once, for anthropological purposes if nothing else.”
Tekyon, the only other bar I visited, was the local bear44 hangout and an example of the
second type. Though I was one of the first to arrive at 11:00PM, a lively assortment of guys
arrived soon after. There were two tall break dancers, a flaming transsexual, a morose longhaired man who sat on the dance stand and smoked all night. An intensely ugly, fat and
obviously wealthy man showed up with his consort, a very attractive younger man with an
amazing body. Some Western pop music was played, but the fare was mainly Turkish folk and
classic music. Nevertheless, the dance moves didn’t vary much.
I was taken to the dance floor by a very handsome young unemployed singer who—like
most of the patrons—belted out the words to every song as we danced. Seemingly very taken
with me, he did not reveal his rent-boy status until I had already bought him a few drinks. But it
wasn’t money he desired. No, no, no, nothing so crass. He just wanted me to make his birthday
the next day really special, and I could do that by buying him some new shoes and pants. Not
quite seeing myself as a third-rate Richard Gere in “Pretty Woman,” I refused his blandishments
to go to a sleazy by-the-hour hotel45 in the neighborhood “for anthropological purposes if
nothing else.”
The old section of Istanbul across the Golden Horn, I guess, would always represent the
Byzantine while Taksim and Beyoglu would correspond to carnality, that other guiding aspect of
44
In gay parlance, bear refers to meatier hairy men. Bear bars generally have less up-to-the-minute music playing,
and the clientele more given to flannel than more fashionable duds.
45
Bringing guests to your hotel room in Turkey is usually strictly forbidden—and my single bed would hardly have
made a suitable love nest.
~ 150 ~
life here for me. Certainly my bar exploits this trip confirm that. In addition, since I was a single
gentleman of a certain age out alone, I was now also a target of touts for local prostitutes. It was
easy enough, though, to fend them off with the “thanks, but I’m gay” comment which I was
always thrilled to deliver in Turkish.
At the beginning of the trip, I was accosted on İstiklâl Cadessi by a pleasant young man
in a sports coat who wanted to practice his English over a drink. Though I rudely put him off, I
later took to thinking about him and actually cooked up a reasonable biography: that he was an
engineering student who had been accepted to a graduate program in England or the States and
who would actually be pleasant company. So when I ran into him again on my next to the last
night in town, I was pleasantly surprised.
He, of course, didn’t remember me but mentioned again the offer of a drink. I was
crestfallen when he mentioned “a nice nightclub down the street…they have some nice girls
there.” I mentioned the gay thing, expecting that to elicit a look of alarm. He, though, calmly
took out his cell phone and told me he could call a friend of his for me. After gentle, then not-sogentle, demurrals for that service, he offered to go back to my hotel with me for a fling. As much
as I wanted to know, I resisted the urge to ask if the price would be cash or a shopping
expedition. But really, I wanted to know if I looked that desperate.
To make matters worse, Çiçek Pasajı was jammed packed and numbingly noisy as was its
wont. I walked around looking for a fairly quiet table so I wouldn’t have to rub elbows with a
bunch of louts but could have a big glass of Efes Pilsen beer and some fried mussels for old
time’s sake. It took me three go-rounds before I spied such a table in a meyhane but couldn’t get
seated as they were holding it for a group. I ended up across the street in a spacious kebab house
that was quite peaceful, a direct result of not serving alcohol.
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My last day of Istanbul, as was appropriate, was full of pointless, mistaken pursuits. I
returned to the Covered Bazaar to purchase a DVD of some pop singers’ performances I wanted
to have as a souvenir. I had spotted one the day before but didn’t buy it, thinking I could find
better ones on İstiklâl but where the record store kids there said such discs didn’t exist.
I got my bearings in the cavernous market and honed in on the area I was sure I had been
in the day before. As the salesmen were wiping the sleep out of their eyes or splashing water on
the walkway in front of their shops, I walked up, down, and around but couldn’t find the hole-inthe wall shop. I widened my search area and found the kid—except it was another record seller. I
tried to explain in Turkish what I wanted but, since the term “bootleg” was not in my vocabulary,
could only explain “I want the DVDs that are made from television by thieves.” Though
understandable, my clever bit of doggerel did tend to get a few guffaws when I had to keep
repeating it as my search continued.
On my third go round, the young carpet sellers were now awake and laughing as I was
now in a frantic rush. One even said in Turkish, “Hey man, you need some help?” and was very
startled when I stopped in my tracks and let the reason for my search gush out in his language.
No one had ever heard of bootleg DVDs—a kind of amazing thing when you think about it. I
never did locate the shop and cannot fathom now why I would even want such a disc much less
spend any time in pursuit of it. Oh, the mysteries of the Orient.
Then I went to visit the Süleymaniye Mosque but actually ended up unknowningly at the
Şeyzade, an earlier work by Sinan in the general vicinity. My enthusiasm for its interior and for
the tombs behind that I thought then were Süleyman’s and Roxelana’s did not diminish after I
realized my mistake and continues to this day.
Then it was to Eyüp for a bit more nostalgia as I hadn’t been in 24 years. Of course the
~ 152 ~
place, one of the holiest of Islam, had changed in those years; only it hadn’t become more
modern but had reverted to a prior century. The dress of the females had become much more
conservative, and more fervid religious posturing was in evidence. The market was full of tacky
religious trinkets and wares. Still there was no evidence of intolerance or disdain from those I
rubbed elbows with.
Up at the Pierre Loti Teahouse, I had the view I wanted—the whole of the Golden Horn
and ancient Istanbul in the distance. And what should be coming up the waterway? A dozen
rowers in flaming Ottoman garb powered huge caique full of tourists under a gilded canopy that
glinted like gold in the sun. That’s Istanbul, I couldn’t help but muse—the ancient, the new, the
tacky, the sublime.
I went back to Şeyzade that evening to eat in a restaurant in the complex’s old medrese. I
sat in the corner of the courtyard with a perfect view of the mosque and dined on cold appetizers,
piping hot thin flakey pide, chopped vegetables, and hot peppers. The main dish, beyti kebab,
was new to me and wonderful: pieces of roasted meat and garlic wrapped in a different kind of
thin pide and served with hot peppers, tomatoes, bulgur, and yogurt. As the place was liquor free,
I had to wash it down with ayran but got my high as I watched the light dim as the sun set and
then electric lighting take over to illuminate the graceful massing of the domes and half domes of
the building. A classical singer off to my left complimented and completed the scene with his
melancholy tremulo voice and the drone of his saz, a long and lean string instrument with a
round belly.
I took one last, thankfully toutless, stroll up İstiklâl that night. I bid a silent goodbye to
Çiçek Pasajı and to the crowds on the street and to Istanbul the next morning.
~ 153 ~
Tour Guide 2004
But I was back two years later. By this time I had convinced my partner of 22 years
to go with me and another couple from our running club in New York. Since I didn’t keep a
journal of the trip, you will be spared all but a few of my impressions from the two-week
stay.
Changes in that short interim? None were so blatantly evident in Istanbul, though
the trend toward better traffic control, general civic upkeep, and a more solid and affluent
middle class continued. As I spent most of my time with my American friends, I did not get
in any lengthy conversations with the locals to see what their take on society and the
economy were.
The American invasion had not ruined Turkey’s economy—if anything it only
spurred it on. Istanbul’s Islamic mayor, Recep Erdoğan, was now the newly installed Prime
Minister of the country, and the fear that he would go as far as to institute shariah law
proved to be overblown.
Erdoğan is a fascinating character. As I write this, he is the first prime minister to
win three successive elections since Adnan Menderes in the 1950s. But that earlier prime
minister ran afoul of the shadowy but rampant military and was overthrown and executed.
~ 154 ~
Erdoğan, though, has quietly and effectively neutralized the power of the military—not
necessarily a bad thing.
Another pillar of Turkish society, the strict secularism of Atatürk, is certainly under
fire by this very religious leader. But since he favors a robust economy and still is seeking
European Union membership, he has broadened the democratic foundation of the country
by eliminating the death penalty, loosening many restrictions on free speech, and
proscribing torture in Turkey’s prisons. Women’s and minority rights are still in their
infancy, unless you compare the country to others in the Eastern Mediterranean and
Caucasus region. Then Turkey seems more like an ideal to strive for. Many say that his grip
on power will allow him the chance to ratchet back all those reforms, but that remains to be
seen. There will be more on this man in the next chapter.
We stayed at my now-favorite Ötel Taşkonak in Sultanahmet—the boys liked the
breakfast buffet, view of the Marmara, the pre-dawn calls to prayer and seagull symphony
almost as much as I. We prowled around that neighborhood, something I had not really
done two years before, and I was amazed by the change. Many of the old buildings had been
converted into spiffy boutique hotels but still retained their architectural details like wood
siding and bric-a-brac. And of course a better class of people than the usual run-of-the-mill
backpackers was in evidence. What hadn’t changed were the constant touts for carpets,
pottery, and jewelry.
It took my friends Mike and Dave (there are two Daves in this chapter) to discover
the Byzantine Great Palace Mosaic Museum, whose stunning collection I had been hearing
rumors about for decades but had actually never seen until then. I had also never been in
the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Art in the fine Ottoman Palace of Ibrahim Paşa on the
~ 155 ~
Hippodrome. The lighting and entrance of the Yerebatan Sarnıcı (Basilica or Underground
Cistern) had been upgraded, and the place—actually the whole of Sultanahmet was even
more a tourists’ delight than ever.
Hagia Sophia had a lot of scaffolding in the nave which obstructed but did not
completely inhibit the grand experience of simply being in that marvel. My friends were
impressed with her and with all the main monuments of the city we visited in the few days
we had in Istanbul at the beginning and end of our trip.
I don’t think my Dave quite liked the Covered or Grand Bazaar and was glad to be
out after a jaunt through. He certainly was more taken with some of the back alleys where
wares were piled up inside and spilling out on the walkways and where we had to avoid
large loads being pulled through narrow walkways, tea delivery boys, frantic mosqueattendees, and the ever present dawdling peripatetic shoppers. And all this with the
constant caterwaul of Istanbul commerce.
My friends and I, along with my old Turkish teacher from Indiana University who
was also a graduate student with me ever so many years ago, went to what was now my
favorite place in Istanbul, the alcohol-less restaurant in the medrese of the Şeyzade Mosque.
We were seated in one of the old classrooms on cushions at a low table and had a
marvelous meal and a rollicking time. In lieu of a disc jockey, a group of men did some
Black Sea folklore dancing, the most energetic in Turkey, for a wedding reception in the
courtyard and provided us our entertainment.
Our itinerary had us next going to Cappadocia, another place I had been only two
years ago. But this time we had a rental car and a luxurious three days, not the single one I
had budgeted my last trip. So while the poor boys did not get to throw a phallic pot at a
~ 156 ~
ceramics shop or listen to an extended carpet-making lecture and get the hard sell, they
also did not have to share the locations we dropped in on with busloads of other tourists,
though one never evades those intrusions completely.
I wanted them to see an underground city but got us lost on the road to Derinkuyu
and ending up in a dusty little village. Their “underground city.” was not very impressive
and was little more than a very large root cellar of the landowner. Though it had no disco
lights, thankfully, it did have a big round door that could be rolled over one of the
entryways to seal it off and had multiple rooms on one-and-a-half floors—my friends were
impressed enough that I left it at that.
We also dropped down to İhlara Valley, a place I had been hearing and reading
about recently and supposedly one of the most beautiful places in Turkey. For want of time,
we, alas, had to pass by a number of very important archeological sites, mainly Byzantine
churches and monasteries on our way and only got to see the few unremarkable churches
carved in the rock of the valley. The valley itself, though lovely with shallow but rushing
delicious looking water, was also a bit of a disappointment. We walked the length of it, sat
for a while in the charming but dusty village, and headed back.
Mike and his Dave had their hearts set on doing a balloon trip over the valley.
Though I could easily manage the 4:00AM waking time to get out to the take off spot, I was
not so eager to part with the $125 each we spent on the deluxe tour.
Though I was right next to the firing flame needed to keep the balloon aloft, it was
still quite a ride. These balloons are huge and, other than the noise of the gas jet, absolutely
noiseless. We sailed right above that Martian-like landscape and saw back valleys that we
could never have gotten to without some sturdy little mules and a lot of saddle sores. As we
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passed by Üçhisar and Ortahisar, it almost seemed like we could reach out and touch the
towers they are named for. We saw vineyards and little plots of other crops and waved at
farmers already at work. Many other balloons were out dotting the sky, catching and
passing one another. At the end, we got glasses of Turkish sparkling wine to complete that
studding experience.
On our way to Antalya, we made a two-hour stop in Konya to see the Mevlana
shrine. That was a tour-group-worthy lightning stop but still did give the others some of
the flavor of less secular places in Turkey.
Ah, Antalya! I had the idea in the back of my mind for almost thirty years that I
would retire here on the Mediterranean. And as I was getting closer to that numerical
reality, the idea was edging closer to the surface. I remembered the charming town center
and happily noted that it had changed little with the passage of time. But the rest of the
seacoast and the land round the city was chockablock full of uninspiring tall, high-density
residential buildings covering that glorious green seaside. We had to drive miles east to
find a suitable beachfront hotel for a couple of nights.
The water once we reached it, though, was glorious as of old. To get to it, we had to
go down a series of long wooden stairs that poked into and jutted off the cliffs. The even
bleaker building next door had a seemingly endless metal spiral staircase anchored in the
sea floor with a long plank walkway up top. No tripping down dirt pathways and tumbling
over rocks to get a swim, no way. Soaking in that warm buoyant salt water, I was almost
able to blot out the unsightly long line of construction on the coast and picture a life of
leisure in my dotage. I would just have to share it with legions of German transplants and
multi-generational Turkish families.
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Because we had a car at our disposal, my friends and I got to see more Roman ruins
in a day or two than Eileen and I had in a week. And in the intervening years, those sites
had been cleaned up for the intrepid tourist. Perge was an important Pamphylian trading
city whose most famous inhabitant was Archimedes’ pupil Apollonius, known for his work
on curves and conic sections—circles, ellipses, parabolae, and hyperbolae.
As far as curves go, it has a pretty marvelous theatre, but the massive horseshoeshaped stadium is the eye catcher. On a more linear level are the still-standing defensive
walls, a grand Roman gate, an impressive bath complex, and a tremendous 300-meter
marble colonnaded walkway, complete with shops to the sides, a water channel in the
middle, and chariot-made ruts in the gleaming stone. This ends in a nymphaeum or
ornamental water fantasy consisting of many columns, capitals, sculptures, perfect for
climbing up and over, and photo ops.
At Aspendos, Atatürk himself was so impressed by the well-preserved secondcentury Roman theatre which features an elaborate stage from which scenery can be
lowered that he declared that it should be a functioning artistic venue not a museum piece.
Performances of Turkish and European operas and ballets are still held in this open air
marvel.
Further down the road is Side, the one-time trysting place of Anthony and Cleopatra
and where one can find a little pension and stay among the ruins of Pamphylia’s most
important city. But you’d have to share the remains of fabulous temples, baths, gates, walls
and the theatre with hordes of other tourists bussed in for the day or staying in the high
density modern part of the town.
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Antalya, or more properly its tiny ancient quarter inside the Roman walls and
around the harbor on the Konyaaltı Bay, is still delightful. Though I have given up on the
seaside villa for my golden years, I still have a wisp of hope that I could have a little
postcard shop with a small tasteful apartment above in that area of town. I would be just a
short hop away from the wonderful Hadrian’s Gate, the Seljuk clock tower, and the dainty
fluted minaret. It would be a longer ride out to the Archeological Museum but a worthwhile
trip nonetheless, as it has a reliquary for the bones of Santa Claus, better known as St.
Nicholas of Myra.
Our long ride west to Bodrum was punctuated by occasional dips in the turquoise
sea from delightful crescents of sandy beaches not far from our highway. That proved to be
fortuitous as a recent summer storm overflowed the sewage system at our destination and
rendered the waters there unswimmable, but thankfully not malodorous.
In 1978 Ed and I had the beach of the second bay east of the town all to ourselves. In
1989 that same beach that was enveloped by all manner of buildings, and my friends and I
had a fabulous hotel in the hills above. This year our quartet traveled two more bays
eastward and we were still crammed into dense seaside tourist life. Progress!
Still, the little section of old Bodrum around its famed crusader castle or fort and
boat harbor is still a stunner, though to get to it you have to wade through a panoply of
shops for every tourist item known to man. The castle—a vast wonderland of towers,
courtyards, and dungeons—had been renovated and outfitted with signage and
information panels in several languages that went a long way to explaining all the different
areas of the place and its history. Another welcome addition was the Glass Wreck Hall, a
reconstructed Byzantine trading vessel that was enroute to the Black Sea with a cargo of
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glass making supplies (hence the name) when it sank around 1025 in deep waters near
here.
The Mausoleum of Halicarnassus site also had explanatory panels, but it was still
just a hole in the ground. All the cut stone, as I mentioned before, of this Wonder of the
Ancient World that stood for 1600 years before being toppled by an earthquake went into
the construction of the castle, and its marble fronting was burnt to make lime for mortar.
And its decorative friezes and the grand chariot and statues of Mausolus and his wife
Artemesia that used to top the structure are now in the British Museum. I was most struck
by a colorful and proud rooster on the grounds that made me ponder how a life of
retirement in upstate New York as a poultry breeder might hold more allure than one on
the Mediterranean pedaling postcards and mavi boncuks.46
On the flight over, I read an article in the Turkish Airway inflight magazine about a
village near Bodrum noted for its Ottoman houses, silk production and colorful peasant
weddings. As a visit seemed in order and our map indicated that it was just right outside of
Bodrum, we set off that Sunday for Çomakdağ or Kızılağaç.
Who would have thought there would be two Kızılağaç villages in the vicinity? The
one I had located on the map was an uninspiring desolate dump of one-story concrete
block residences with only some desultory grape arbors on a few to relieve the dreariness
only an iota. Nary a wonderful 400-year-old Ottoman home, a hint of silk worms or work,
nor evidence of any wedding festivity.
There was, though, a pickup truck blaring its horn and speeding around the town. In
back was a ragtag two-man band and a boy in his circumcision finery. I was ready to forget
46
Literally “blue beads,” mavi boncuks are the ever present evil eye charms of almost infinite variety all over
Turkey.
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the wedding and hoping to finally get to see this particular rite.47 I had Dave give chase as I
tried to whip up an acceptable self-invite in Turkish for four maybe-not-so-obvious gay
men to the festivities. We followed them around town at a distance for about ten minutes,
but their enthusiasm for their auto marathon easily outpaced mine for the ceremony. Then
it was back to the article and the map to find our original destination.
I was off by about 40km. Our little Shangri La was well off the beaten track and a
well kept secret. Though the first turn off the main highway was marked, we soon came to a
bunch of branching secondary roads with no further directions. Luckily, at all this and
future similar crossroads, there was a teahouse full of lounging old men who could direct
us up the dizzying heights on ever increasing curvy roads to the next crossroad/teahouse
combo and finally to our ultimate quarry.
While most of the adult inhabitants were down in the fields taking in the cotton
harvest, there were still enough people around this delightful village to make our visit one
of the more memorable times of our trip. A schoolteacher, whose government salary, I
guess, made his presence in the fields unnecessary, acted as our guide. Though there was
no slated mock-wedding planned for the day, we did get to see the self-same silk weaver as
hard at work as she was in the magazine article. We got to see painted doors, ceilings,
cupboards with carved detail in other houses; the second-story porches that jutted out
47
Muslims, well, Muslim Turks anyway, have their male children cut when they are about seven years old. The
ceremony could be considered much like communion/confirmation in Christianity or bar/bat mitzvah in Judaism
and a means of introducing the child into the larger community (without anything similar for female offspring).
Though customs vary widely and have changed recently, the boy is dressed up in a little prince’s outfit, complete
with a crown, a cape, and even a scepter. He is paraded through the streets or on the back of a truck in villages
and then is guest of honor at a dinner later where the deed takes place. The boy may or may not get a sip of wine
(though alcohol is proscribed in Islam) but usually no anesthetic. It is quite a mark of manhood for him to take the
cut without crying.
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from the walls; and ornamented stone chimneys with their distinctive toppings. A large
heap of picked cotton at one intersection was an open invite for a fiber bath by one or more
of our company. Then to cool off from such excitements, we had a few cups of the hot
beverage at the village teahouse as we watched the elderly men come and go, listened to
the clicking and clacking of their backgammon discs, and tried to stay out of the everpresent wisps of cigarette smoke.
Then it was a long day’s journeying up the Ionian coast to Heracleia, Euromos,
Didyma, Miletus, and Priene that I have described previously in chapters. Though I have
seen these sights some half dozen times, they still inspire and impress. Then it was off to
Kuşadası and yet another occasion for me to marvel in regret how my dusty little village of
yore was transformed into a tourist megapolis. Gone were the 1960s Chevies that used to
taxi people around, as were the grimy but colorful camels and the dancing bears.
Ephesus was much the same, if now more crowded. Mary’s House attracted bigger
crowds too, many of who were Muslims and left little fabric bows as petitions for a wish on
a wall outside. Justinian’s basilica of St. John in Selcuk, though still pretty much a ruin after
extensive restoration, was nonetheless impressive as was the tranquil double-domed Isa
Bey Camii, and the fort on the summit. The Artemision, another Wonder of the Ancient
World, is still only a single tottering column, but the nearby Archeological Museum has two
wonderful statues of the goddess complete with a cascade of testicles on her body—and I
had always thought they were little breasts.
We had a three-day stay at a second-rate, but still comfortable, hotel complex that
catered to package-vacationing Brits. Along with the traditional Turkish breakfast, we
could get bacon, bangers, fried tomatoes, and beans. But what we liked best was the
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sparkling and cool waters of the lengthy swimming pool—the Aegean beaches don’t hold a
candle to those on the Mediterranean.
We made a day trip to Pamukkale. Those graceful limestone cliffs were as stunning
as ever. I was a bit sorry but actually happy that haphazard traffic on them had been
curtailed. Now visitors were limited to a strict path and could not wander all around and
eventually destroy this natural wonder. And visitors there were aplenty. Busses unloaded
copious charges of mainly East Europeans loaded down with ample bellies and cameras
with prodigious telephoto lenses, but micro swim suits. The Girth and Mirth Club, true
believers in the water cure and culture, had come to share the site with us.
Gone were the hotels on the summit, even the luxury one with the pool in the lobby
studded with ancient lintels, capitals, and lengths of columns one could frolic amongst. But
the pool itself, the one I had longed to swim in for almost 30 years, remained and was now
public and open to all—me and all those cavorting Slavs. It was a glorious experience.
We took in the well-preserved remains at Pamukkale and nearby Aphrodias and by
that time had seen so many Roman ruins that they kinda blended together like the bloated
bodies in the public pool.
Then it was on to the Izmir airport where along the way Dave happily buried the
speedometer needle to the right on an almost deserted interstate highway, a short flight to
Istanbul, and back to our little hotel with the sea gulls, calls to prayer, and the fabulous
breakfast roof terrace.
We got a trip up the Bosphorus for a grilled fish lunch at Anadolu Kavağı in addition
to seeing many of the sights already described in previous visits. But the next highlight had
to be our trip to the Galata Mevlei Tekke, a dervish monastery smack dab in the middle of
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the cosmopolitan European section of Istanbul near Taksim Square. There we were one of
the select few who could take in the hauntingly beautiful whirling dervish dance and
accompanying ethereal music and chanting of a female choir. These performances, once
only done in the middle of December in Konya (or in other Dervish tekkes like this one), are
now regularly performed for tourists the year round. Very impressive—and I bet one can
see it on You Tube now.
My old teacher had invited us to her house that night but seemed to have forgotten
(and I had not confirmed by telephone or email). So when we arrived, she was ill prepared
for our visit. As she hastily prepared some snacks, her elderly demented mother
“entertained” us with exhortations to be good to our parents and not to forget them and
would not be silenced by her daughter. All in all a weird night, and another cause for
reflection about how much had changed: I couldn’t forget her mother from years earlier
when she was the a marvelous hostess who prepared and served up a glorious dinner and
sparkling conversation. Then my teacher was a blushing pregnant bride; now we were both
middle aged, and she long divorced and soon to have an empty nest.
And another good bye to Istanbul.
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No Country for Old Men 2011
I guess if you title a chapter well before the events take place, you shouldn’t be
surprised if those events take a preordained course. Yeats and age had caught up with me;
and it seemed to be an appropriate appellation before and after this visit. As an alternate, I
had toyed with using as the title the first song I learned in Turkish and still my favorite,
“Neden Saçların Beyazlanmıs, Arkadaş” (“Why Has Your Hair Turned White, My Friend”), so
that ditty might be considered a subtitle.
At any rate, I had announced beforehand to all and sundry that this would be my last
trip—no more of this nonsense of retiring there. My Turkish was dwindling, few friends or
reasons to visit were left, and I had pretty much seen most of what I wanted in the country.
This would be a trip to tie up a few loose ends. And Turkey would not be the country for me
as a geriatric.
My dance card would consist of a lengthy stay in Istanbul to see all the extant
Byzantine churches (one of my original goals when I first came in 1977 and woefully not
executed), a trip to Edirne for the olive oil wrestling as a tip of the hat to my life-long
fascination with hairy men and Turkish masculinity, and a short sojourn to Bursa to see
some pre-conquest Ottoman structures (along with those in Edirne) and so be able to
comment on their history. I then planned to fly across the country for a long-desired visit
to Kars to see some Armenian churches once thought to be antecedents of Hagia Sophia’s
remarkable architecture. I could sum up exactly what Hagia Sophia has meant to me and
expound on the whole Armenian question that still bedevils modern Turkey.
As luck would have it, I was invited to a wedding in Bursa a few days earlier than I
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intended to be there, and I decided scuttle down to Bodrum to see my old landlady Biriçim.
These deviations upset my planned itinerary just enough to put Edirne and Kars off the
table.
I arrived in Istanbul on June 30 still ready, I thought, for the final events necessary
to close this book. And things had changed a lot—the subtheme of the book. Though my
Turkish had gotten a lot rustier, it was still serviceable and rarely failed to surprise and
impress my hosts.
Changes? There were myriad. The subway I took from the airport to Aksary on a
route not much different from the one I used to take to and from my school in Bakıköy was
now almost fully up and running all over town. Gone were any open spaces where sheep
used to graze and farmers had a little bit of garden. Now it was all new housing and
business development, major thoroughfares with swooping exit and entrance ramps. The
people on the train did not have that haunted look of those Istanbulers of 30 years ago
when desolation, poverty, and political unrest were constant companions. Though hardly
rich like Manhattan, the people here—especially the young—had a spring in their step that
comes from knowing the wolves are far from the door.
Aksaray, a transportation hub that lacked an iota of charm, had not changed except
that it was, amazingly, almost pristine. No longer were there piles of blown dust in the
gutters and corners, stinking drunks and beggars near the mosque, or the mini-tornadoes
of trash that whirled whenever a slight breeze picked up or a large lorry blasted by. The
sidewalk merchants were still congregating all round but had, for the most part, swankier
products to hawk. Though late in the evenings, independent sellers here and down by the
Galata Bridge spread out large displays of knock-off shoes, brazen undergarments, and the
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latest cheap plastic toy to tempt any and all children walking by.
The paths in the open spaces were now paved and would not become the muddy
trenches of old whenever there was rainfall. The grassy areas were now more numerous
and well trimmed and unlike in the old days when a gang of workers came by only monthly
to scythe the long vegetation.
Gone were the hamals or human pack animals of old, all but a fraction of the push
carts fruit and vegetable vendors blocking sidewalks and traffic, and the legions of youths
in ill fitting clothing that used to just hang out at major intersections and sites looking for
work. No, people were walking to and fro with purpose. Those lounging in the parks were
just taking a breather from their daily routine. Most everyone looked not much different
than those I remembered from years ago except that they had graduated from Dollar Bill’s
Discount Clothing to at least the nicer racks at J. C. Penney and had gained a few pounds in
the interim.
Oh, I had noticed in my visits this century that Turks had grown taller. I used to
tower over the crowds on İstiklâl Cadessi and in the bars. Now, more often than not, I was
staring at the neck or even shoulder blades of the men I shared a crowded bus or subway car. But
the men still had those smoldering black eyes, the prolific five o’clock shadow, and a profusion
of hair peeking out of collars and cuffs.
And the women of Istanbul? I am hardly an authority on the subject for wont of
desire and design, but Turkey is still quite gender segregated—though much less so over
the years. I don’t or can’t actively seek out a lot of female companionship. Certainly, the
courting couples seemed more numerous and independent. And the women appeared to
me more forthright and less constrained, though there was no question this was still a
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male-dominated society.
As far as headscarves, I was at first overtaken by the sheer number of them. They
seemed to be everywhere, and the younger women seemed to be wearing them in higher
proportion than I remembered. Certainly, women had a more prominent presence in shops
and businesses, and most—but far from all—were inordinately secular. I spent a lot of my
time this trip in very conservative neighborhoods of Istanbul and spotted garb more fitting
for Taliban Afghanistan. And, curiously, the many Middle Eastern visitors, be they tourists
or evacuees from the Arab Spring countries, were even more conservatively attired.
Obviously wealthy women, invariably with three or four children in tow, were all over
Istanbul, Bursa, and Bodrum. If not covered in head-to-toe black garments, they were
immaculately dressed in—besides very elaborate scarves—substantial shoes, leggings,
socks, skirts, blouses, and jackets even in the summer heat. All that while their beaux were
invariably decked out casually in sandals, shorts, and t-shirts.
Eventually though, the headscarfed women didn’t seem to predominate. Was I
becoming inured to seeing them, or was the number not so large in the first place. And how
was it years ago? My friends and I used to laugh about the “trench coat brigade,” those
ladies scarfed and coated and looking very uncomfortable. But were the sheer numbers
that high? I guess one needed to have done a scientific count over the decades to be sure.
We will come back to the perplexing scarf issue again.
But back in Istanbul, I was soon at my hotel, The White Swan, located right across
the street from the Şeyzade Camii complex and near Fatih Camii and the Aqueduct of
Valens. Immigrants or businessmen from Iran, Russia and many of the Arabic speaking
lands populated this area’s many apartment buildings, shops, and hotels. It tended to be
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very conservative: headgear and trench coats were derigueur for the ladies with the men
sashayed around, as I mentioned above, not so encumbered. My hotel was a standard, two
or three star establishment that tried so hard but just missed the mark of good service.
First stop in the neighborhood was at the Şehzade,48 the mosque I have adopted as
“my favorite” in Istanbul as much to be different from everyone else as a nod to the early
genius of Sinan. Certainly, the story behind it is compelling: it was built in memory of
Mehmet, the first-born son of Süleyman, who died at 21 from smallpox. The sultan was
supposedly so distraught that he sat beside the body for three days before he would permit
burial.49 Now for years I actually thought this mosque was for another of Süleyman’s sons,
Mustafa who is actually buried in Bursa. His was another sad end; his stepmother, the
famous Roxelana,50 incited her hubby to murder him and her own second son Beyazit,
thereby paving the way for the infamous Selim the Sot to accede to the sultanate and, some
would say, begin the decline of the Ottoman Empire.
I was not pleased to learn that the restaurant in the medrese where I hoped to have
my third meal in as many visits was gone. But I was pleased to see that urban renewal in
the neighborhood was given to restoration and renovation of the old wood frame houses,
not demolition.
Besides the now defunct restaurant, I also chose to stay here on Istanbul’s Third Hill
because so many Byzantine churches are nearby. I revisited the late 12th century Church of
St. Mary, the Mother of God (still functioning as the Kalenderhane Camii). This large and
48
I have over the years confused this work of Sinan with his nearby masterpiece, the Süleymaniye.
Islamic funerals are supposed to occur as soon as possible after death, usually within 24 hours.
50
Roxelana, the daughter of a Ukrainian Orthodox priest, was captured by Crimean Tartars and sold into slavery.
She became part of Süleyman’s harem, eventually becoming his favorite, was granted her freedom, and actually
became his bride in the first royal wedding since Orhan, son of Osman, who founded the Ottoman dynasty.
49
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delightful, two story cross-in-square church has deep barrel vaults and a wonderful ribbed
dome. The inside is all finished in marble revetment and has some incredible sculptural
detail. Alas or maybe not, the painting and mosaics found here are now in the Istanbul
Archeological Museum though not on view.
Not far from that is the Church of St. Theodore (the Kilise Camii or Church Mosque),
an early 14th century structure. I could only view the pleasing stone and brick exterior and
admire the dome and apses and could not peek inside to see the marble and sculptural
detail. This church’s mosaics disappeared centuries ago.
On the other side of Atatürk Boulevard and up a steep hill (Istanbul’s Fourth Hill)
was the imposing Church of the Pantocrator (Zeyrek Camii), dating from the early to mid
12th century. It is actually two churches that were awkwardly connected with the addition
of a chapel between. As it was in the midst of a total renovation, I couldn’t get inside or
even see much of the exterior. I had gotten in to see one of the churches in 1978 by
garnering the key from the imam and having a peek inside a pigeon-filled dark space.
Also up on the Fourth Hill is the Church of St. Saviour Pantepoptes or Christ the All
Seeing (now the Eski Imaret Camii). This is a lovely example of an 11th century Byzantine
church with a 12-sided dome, a double narthex, and three apses. I was only able to round
up a bunch of noisy children who laughed and hooted when I asked where the imam lived
or how I could get the key. Though the neighborhood looked fairly prosperous, one family
was carding a huge pile of sheep wool on their stoop. A few streets over a decidedly downon-their luck group were weaving stands of black leather into belts. I was suddenly
transported back to the 1970s Istanbul when scenes like these were everyday occurrences.
Doggedly pursuing nearby old buildings on this and other days, I passed the
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seemingly straight Crooked Minaret with its unusual hound’s-tooth brickwork, the Çinli or
Tiled Hamam by Sinan, a Byzantine library, and numerous Ottoman buildings shoehorned
in amongst the dreary apartment buildings that have blanketed much of Istanbul.
Further out on the Fifth and Sixth Hills was the huge Cistern of Aspar, now a soccer
field and parking lot. Behind that on a scenic bluff overlooking the Golden Horn is the very
un-grim imperial mosque for Selim I, a fearsome warrior also known as Selim the Grim,
father of Süleyman and granddaddy to our Selim the Sot. The mosque, a square room with a
lovely shallow dome is beautifully proportioned, and is fronted by a grand courtyard and
surrounded by shaded terraces. Behind are some lovely türbes or mausoleums with some
understated but beautiful relief carvings and handsome tiles.
As we walk out towards the land walls and through a pious neighborhood full of
bearded and beanie-ed men and overly-robed women that would put you in mind of
downtown Kabul, not cosmopolitan Istanbul, we get to the Church of the Pammakaristos or
Joyous Mother of God (Fethiye Camii). Now part functioning mosque and part museum, it
used to be the church of the Greek Orthodox Patriachate until 1587. The museum part is
the side chapel of the original structure that houses some fabulous mosaics from the late
13th century. And I had it all to myself.
This area used to be home to influential and rich Greek merchants. St Mary of the
Mongols, the only pre-conquest church in Istanbul that has consistently functioned as a
Christian house of worship, is nearby. I was lucky a workman let me inside to see the gold
and silver iconostasis and smell the lingering scent of incense. The Greek Patriarch makes a
yearly procession here with a holy Virgin icon on August 15, the Feast of the Immaculate
Conception, from his church down the hill.
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I got more of a gander at the Megale Schole or Great School as I walked around the
neighborhood. This amazing and imposing Victorian Gothic red brick building with big
round towers, not much liked by architectural critics but adored by me, dominates the
neighborhood and can be seen from afar. Built in the 1880s, it educated many of the city’s
Greeks before being shut in 1971. I’ve read it has since reopened as a Greek girls’ school
with a woefully small student population. The apartment buildings around here are of
earlier vintage than most in Istanbul and much more interesting architecturally with
handsome carved moldings, cornices, and other details. And there was a lot of evidence of
restoration and renovation of the better and older ones. The many mosques in this quarter
are also well cared for and prosperous.
Then it was down and up to the incomparable Kariye Museum, the late 11th century
Byzantine church of St. Savior in Chora that I have described before. Intimate and small
while Hagia Sophia is large and impressive, this church represents the best of late
Byzantine building and decoration and is a gem to be savored and revisited often. The
double narthex has the most exquisite mosaics that extend into the side chapel. The
magnificent fresco of the Resurrection and the Harrowing of Hell from 1320-1 on the east
apse is an artistic and liturgical triumph.
I had originally intended to stay in the Kariye Hotel right next door this trip, be far
away from the tourist crowds, and have a quiet place to mull over the end of the Byzantine
and Ottoman eras and the development of the Turkish Republic. I guess I saw myself
working out the details of the mosaic programs in detail, visiting all the other Byzantine
churches as planned, standing atop the nearby Theodosian land walls staring off into the
distance contemplating the taking of Constantinople in 1452, and chatting up the locals. All
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this would somehow turn this personal memoir into some sort of grand synthesis of
history, art, architecture, politics, and—of course—life. But then the thought of missing out
on all the night-time delights of Istanbul—which I never seem to partake of anyway—had
me scuttling to Sultanahmet.
At least I got a meal at the hotel’s Asitane Restaurant, one of the many venues in
Istanbul that was trying to enliven the local cooking tradition by reviving lost Ottoman
cuisine. It seems that the recipes of the many culinary guilds were closely guarded secrets,
never transcribed and subsequently lost. Scholars and intrepid cooks have had to pore over
diplomatic dispatches and memoirs of foreign visitors to find out what was served at grand
banquets. To ferret out the actual ingredients, they rely on the preserved inventories of
those times—kitchen archeology, if you will.
While I had to forego the stuffed grape leaves with sour cherries and the liver
patties among other delights, I had the “Asitane Treats,” a medley of humus (with pureed
currants, pine nuts, and cinnamon), a cheese paste (with scallions, parsley, green pepper,
tomato, rosemary and paprika), creamed fava beans, and a pounded cucumber salad (with
onions and pistachios). Since the most intriguing item—eggplant stuffed with grilled quail
was off the menu that night, I had a succulent piece of braised leg of lamb with apricots,
raisins and almonds. An expensive but delicious red wine from the south east (not a region
I would have expected to have a vibrant viniculture) went well with everything. I had high
hopes for the desert, but the flat tasting walnut tart with baked peaches and ice cream did
not fulfill them.
While in the neighborhood, I finally went into the Mihrimah Sultan Camii, built by
Sinan for the favorite daughter of Süleyman on the highest promitory in Istanbul. In many
~ 174 ~
ways similar to the Selim I Mosque, it is a square with a single central dome. Nestled next to
the Theodosian walls, it has a rather grand and imposing but serene presence.
You must have guessed by now that I am not so taken by the imperial mosques of
Istanbul. The big ones—Fatih, Sultan Ahmet, Süleymaniye, Selimiye in Edirne, and even
Şeyzade—I unjustly consider Hagia Sophia ripoffs. I greatly admire their exteriors with the
rambunctious buildup of pinnacles, half-domes, and centralized domes against their
framing minarets; it is their interiors that leave me cold. Okay, the tiles are great but do
leave me yawning after a bit. Being no student or adherent of Islam, the mosques don’t
really make much liturgical sense to me other than their alignment towards Mecca. They
seem just like ornate gymnasia set up for prayer, prostration, and segregation of the sexes.
The basilica plan in Christendom which hearkens back to the cross of the Crucifixion and
whose interior space is used for sundry purposes presents a livelier, more interesting,
and—to me at least—understandable plan. And give me side chapels, figurative sculpture,
and glorious paintings.
Let’s go to Bursa where there are some grand pre-Conquest mosques. I had to go
there on this trip anyway for the wedding of the son of an old friend and stayed in a hotel
right across the street from and with an outstanding view of the Ulu Camii. Now this is a
building.
We have to thank Beyazit the Lightning Flash for this beauty. Prior to the battle with
a huge Crusader army in Bulgaria in 1396, he vowed to build 20 mosques if victorious.
Though he was eminently so, he kinda squelched a little on his vow and only erected this
20-domed marvel in Bursa—maybe he was waiting to build the other 19 in Constantinople
because he was almost assured of taking the city soon after. Unfortunately for him, though,
~ 175 ~
he had earlier ticked off the Mongol chieftain Tamerlane who was by then laying siege to
Anatolia. The Flash scurried back only to lose a battle at Anakara in 1402. Adding insult to
injury, Tamerlane paraded the defeated sultan around in a cage for a year before knocking
him off.
Before you get all misty eyed and sorry for Beyazit, you might consider that by
strangling his own brother to ensure his succession, he set a precedent, oft-used later, for
fratricide that had lasting consequences for the Ottoman dynasty. Nasty, nasty, nasty. But
then again, the ensuing civil war fought by the four sons of Beyazit for succession was no
great shakes for anyone but the Byzantines who were granted an almost 50-year reprieve.
Politics and bloody battles aside, we still have the Ulu Camii. As mentioned above it
has all those domes and 12 free-standing columns to hold them up. The place is immense.
The walls are adorned with large plaques of Arabic calligraphy that are stunning. The
walnut mimber and the gold leaf and tiled mihrab are fabulous. But the ritual ablution
fountain, here brought into the center of the building, takes the proverbial cake. It is a huge
blue pool held in a beautiful grained marble case with a three-tiered fountain in the middle.
Like in some of the best Moorish buildings, the use of water and the sound of its trickling
add dimension and serenity to this religious structure. The exterior is of a sandy limestone
and gently articulated with slightly inset arches pierced by two rows of windows.
Across the way is the famous Silk Han full of shops featuring the most outlandishly
colorful scarves the more conservative women need to enliven their otherwise dour
looking outfits. In the courtyard is a tiny but beautiful mosque perched over the ritual
fountain—entrance is gained via a delicate stone staircase that mimics a mimbar. And right
next door is the Orhan Gazi Camii of 1336, the earliest example of a T-shaped mosque
~ 176 ~
where two domed alcoves flank the main prayer hall. As in this and in many other Bursa
mosques, the decorations elements are tiles, calligraphic plaques, and the faceted and
inappropriately-named stalactite ornamentation (though I can’t come up with anything
better) of the niches and squinches.
Further down the road is the Yeşil Camii or Green Mosque, so called as much of the
walls of the mihrab and the adjoining alcoves are covered in tiles of a lovely blue green
color that match the carpets on the floor. People say it is like worshiping inside a leaf,
though I could not appreciate all its charm as the interior was undergoing restoration. It
too has a ritual fountain in the center and some wonderful relief carving. Right across from
that is the Green Mausoleum of Mehmet I, Beyazit’s son and granddaddy to Mehmet II, the
conqueror of Constantinople. It is more of a light blue or turquoise on the outside; inside
are some luscious tiles and decorative work of a deeper shade. Mehmet’s coffin is covered
with golden Arabic script and had his turban on one end.
I missed the two big mosques, Emir Sultan and Yildirim Beyazit (our friend The
Flash) and their supposedly splendid mausoleums that are further east. But at the other
end of town is the Muradiye complex, named after Murat II, 51 who was the son of Mehmet I
and father of Mehmet II. It consists of a nondescript mosque and a graveyard. Its claim to
fame is its ten royal tombs (out of a total 13 buildings) that were added in the century after
Murat’s death. The family tree and succession gets a bit confusing here, and I would suggest
you just go with the flow. Or better yet, make your way over to this wonderful city.
Murat, the last sultan to be buried in Bursa, has a grand but simple mausoleum.
Mystic as well as warrior, he requested that his body lie uncovered and under the stars “so
51
The Ottoman family tree and line of succession is very confusing as so many names repeat every other
generation or so, brothers follow brothers, and brothers strangle brothers.
~ 177 ~
that the rain of heaven might wash my face like any pauper’s.” So the oculus of the dome is
open, and his casket has no lid but just a layer of dirt.
More elaborate is that for Mustafa, the second son of Süleyman who he regretfully,
you will remember, had murdered at the behest of his wife Roxelana so that her son Selim
the Sot could gain the throne. Right next door is the even more gaily decorated tomb for
Cem Sultan,52 the favorite son of Mehmet the Conqueror and another famous might-havebeen in Ottoman history. After Cem lost the struggle to follow his father as sultan, he fled
abroad where he plotted to take back the crown with the help of Christian forces. Now his
brother Beyazit was no fool and simply paid to keep his brother a prisoner of his foes. It
seems the deposed prince was passed around like a pawn for 14 years as each new jailer
got a hefty ransom. Cem was reduced to writing reams of nostalgic poems on homesickness
until he was allegedly poisoned by the pope in 1495.
And we don’t want to forget two more tombs up by the fortress walls. For there rest
in separate türbeler, Osman, the founder of the Ottoman Dynasty, and his son Orhan, the
first Sultan. “The Rough Guide to Turkey” says that they are done in a “gaudy late Ottoman
style,” an appropriate description. If overcome by such finery, you can repair to and
recover in the nearby tea garden perched on a cliff above the city.
I wanted to repair to the Turkish bath I had been to in 1978 and which I had sought
out but did not find in my visit of 2002 when I ended up at the pleasing Yeni Kaplıca
Hamamı. I had gone to the tourist information office earlier to try to get more information
but was met with such a show of ineptitude and disinterest that I gave up. I finally figured
out that it must have been the Eski Kaplıca Hamamı that I sought. Since the guidebook’s
52
His brother Mustafa and two of Beyazit II sons—Cem’s nephews—are also interred with him.
~ 178 ~
description also does not match my memory and I had wandered around the area on that
previous visit, I was by now was so confused it didn’t seem worth the trouble to continue.
And a hot bath in the sweltering heat of July was hardly a pleasing prospect—even a threehour wait at the bus station which is how I spent my last few hours in Bursa seemed a
better option.
No, I am not going to forget the wedding. It was such a blast. There was marriage
fever all through this trip. On the way over, no fewer than three brides brought their
dresses aboard.53 On the boat over from Istanbul, I was startled when almost sideswiped by
a bride in full dress and make-up who practically tumbled down the stairs and into a
waiting car.
The rush was on for a number of reasons. Summer is the preferred season for
weddings; and more people travel at that time and want to combine the two. But with
Ramadan looming for the month of August, three-month’s worth of ceremonies had to be
shoehorned into two.
I was in as much a tizzy as any bride when figuring out what to wear. I did not want
to embarrass my old friend, Cemil, but also wanted to travel light. Expecting to be taken for
a curmudgeony elderly tourist anyway, I opted to bring a flexible outfit of a nice cotton
shirt, a pair of black jeans not khakis, my wool sports coat that also looked good with blue
jeans, and a fancy bow tie. I stood out all right; beside the groom and one of Cemil’s
brothers who wore a suit, I was easily among the best-dressed there.
I didn’t have to go far from my hotel for the evening and passed a number of salons
53
Even though Istanbul has loads of bridal shops from the tacky to the glamorous, this isn’t a case of bringing coals
to Newcastle. Rather, with relatives on both continents, two separate ceremonies with their attendant gift
exchanges are held, and sensibly one outfit for both suffices.
~ 179 ~
on my way. Though the directions were seemingly complete, the first salon I crashed was in
the basement of the building adjoining the one I was supposed to be in. There they had two
concurrent celebrations in separate large rooms. When I asked which was the Yıldırır one,
the maitres ’d just showed me the full-length photos of the couples. One set was handsome
and beautiful; the other bucktoothed and pockmarked. Though I had never met his son, I
knew Cemil could not have sired the second groom, no way, no how. Thinking to peek in at
the gathered crowd and maybe spot my friend, I was stopped by the lady guard who, I
guess, now took me to be someone who would steal all the Turkish delight because—from
the looks of the overly garbed ladies pouring into each festivity—it was obvious neither
was going to have any liquor. I was unsummarily shooed out, though I am sure I would
have been a sparkling addition to either.
But ours was right next door on an open-air balcony and certainly more pleasant
than being in the cellar. The actual marriage ceremony, essentially signing some civil
papers, was done earlier. We were just here for the fun. I met Cemil and his wife and family
right off. His younger son Cem (named after that poor prisoner prince poisoned by a pope)
may have been “left over dough”54 when conceived some 16 years after the groom but was
turning into a fine young man. Cemil sat me with some Army friends of his who spoke
excellent English and their wives. But I was able to keep most of the conversation in
Turkish. I met various of his cousins, three or four of whom were or had studied in the
States.
Alas, this was also a non-alcoholic event. Since most every wedding I have ever
attended had at least one maudlin or offensive drunk, I can’t say I was really sorry and can’t
54
Tekne kazıntısı literally means “the scrapings from the bowl” but is the dough left after kneading and making
bread. It is also a colorful phrase for a child born rather unexpectedly in the later years of a marriage.
~ 180 ~
imagine the fruit of the vine would have helped my conversational skills. Nope, we sipped
on tea and some grape juice and just had a slice of wedding cake—luckily I had a plate of
Bursa’s own İskender kebabı55 earlier.
The bride and groom eventually showed up in their finery and had to pass through a
shower of sparks from two Roman candles. Luckily the bride’s dress, a marvelous
concoction of a sparkling strapless bodice with shirred netting from the waist down that
looked like a swan’s body, was fire retardant what with all those sparks. The groom,
looking appropriately insouciant with his three-day growth of beard, had on a very formal
tuxedo and cravat.
The pinning ceremony soon followed and dragged on and on. The young couple each
got a long white ribbon draped on their necks and on which the assembled guests lined up
to pin a piece of jewelry or a large bill. I was glad I had foregone purchasing and toting from
Istanbul the Paşabahҫe plate I had intended for a gift and had an ample supply of large
denomination lira notes. The rolling in and cutting of the cake took a few more minutes.
Then the bride and groom initiated the dancing. The Turks are great dancers—some
would say they have to be as they don’t get many other chances to let down their hair. And
they have an uncanny style: they can move their shoulders with their arms outstretched
and do some fancy footwork all while keeping their hips immobile. Now, I can shimmy all
three or do one at a time. I can even get the hips and feet a going. But I can’t dance like a
Turk and gyrate just my shoulders in any rhythmic way. But though it wasn’t pretty, I gave
it the old college try anyway and managed to have a really good time. My only regret is that
I didn’t have much time with Cemil.
55
Slices of lamb döner kebab with hot tomato sauce over pieces of pita bread and generously slathered with
melted sheep butter and yogurt. If prepared properly, it can be delicious. If not, then it is leaden pile of goop.
~ 181 ~
After the wedding and a day communing with those dead gazis and princes, I took a
night bus to Bodrum to see another old friend I have kept in touch with, albeit haphazardly.
This was Biriҫimsu, my old landlady from Kurtuluş. When I telephoned from Istanbul, she
didn’t seem like her old solid, happy self but rather distracted and confused. I thought she was
just flustered from my unexpected call. While her English used to be excellent, she couldn’t
remember a word of it and put her 83-year-old mother on to give me her new address.
Biriҫim’s husband Mehmet came to pick me up at the minibus station in Turgutreis and
broke the news that she has been suffering with early onset Alzheimer’s dementia for about five
years but was now in a relatively good phase. Good in this case meant that she could go outside
by herself without getting lost and enjoy the seaside but was not really able to do much else. Her
short-term and her long-term memory were shot. I had been hoping to get her slant on all of us
foreigners living in her building way back when and to laugh about all the old times.
There is more to getting old than graying of the hair. She was a shell of her former self,
a gracious and proud woman. Though she knew enough to know how much she lost, she
was still smiling and charming. She no longer did any of her art work but had her house full
of items she had done in better days. So I finally got at least a photo of one of her famous
lampshades. And I finally met her mother, an accomplished painter in her own right.
Mehmet who also spoke almost no English was very kind and accommodating of my
presence. He wanted me to stay with them in the house and was upset when I insisted on a
nearby hotel: Turkish hospitality would require I stay with them. He didn’t cotton to my
explanation that I was an old bachelor who got up early and was too set in his ways.
He took me down to a pleasant seaside hotel right down the street and behind a
great public beach with trees, benches, acres of sand, and splendid views out to the Greek
~ 182 ~
islands. When I approved the fairly basic room, Mehmet tried to get the 60 lira price down
to 50. When the guy wouldn’t budge, he stormed out muttering that the place smelled and
he didn’t like the manager’s attitude.
His “friend” had another place on the other side of the small town in front of the
newly constructed marina. It was wedged in between two other equally uninspired hotels
on the large seaside road. Not a tree in sight, and the view of the marina was masked by a
row of high hedges—the only bit of greenery around. The tawdry rocky public beach was
about 100 meters down the road—hardly what I was looking for. But I was too tired by the
night-long bus ride and all the events of the morning and insisted on taking it. It was 70 lira
a night.
So two days down on the glorious water where the Mediterranean meets the Aegean
Sea, one dip in the water, two trips into Bodrum where I tried in vain to hire a small boat
for three days or to get a berth on a larger boat for one of the famous Blue Tours, visits to
Biriҫim and her family and dogs, two wonderful grilled fish dinners, and then a hurried exit and
flight back to Istanbul. Other than getting another take on memory and reminisce—in this case
tragic—this little interlude was a bust.
I had wanted to fly to Kars to see the ruins of the ancient Armenian city of Ani. This is a
place held sacred in my memory because of a chance remark in a seminar on Byzantine
Architecture in 1973 that some scholars believed that the building prototype of Hagia Sophia was
located here. It all had to do with the method of putting a round dome on a square base and
squinches and pendentives and what all. Not that these churches predated or were in any way as
grand as Justinian’s masterpiece. And it also didn’t hurt that Orhan Pamuk had written an
~ 183 ~
important novel56 that took place here. But I dithered too long in making plans, the $86 roundtrip
fare I could have gotten earlier if I had booked a ticket shot up to almost $400, and the thought of
torrid temps in that part of the country kept me in Istanbul.
Ah, Istanbul. Back in Sultanahmet at my mainstay Ötel Taşkonak (after a stay of two
nights in a fine neighboring joint called the Sphendon before a room opened up at the former), I
did little more than roam all over the city and contemplate the vastness of the history and legacy
of the place.
In my ongoing search for Byzantine monuments, I went out along the Marmara by train
to Koca Mustafa Paşa. Even though I used to pass the main mosque there up on the hill years ago
when visiting Sue and other friends, I never knew it was a former Byzantine church and never
entered. I didn’t even attempt to climb the hill and give it a gander now as it seemed such a
symbol both of my cluelessness of what was around me years ago when I lived here and also of
the Islamic transformation of much of Istanbul.
Instead I walked out towards the Theodosian land walls and was astounded to see four
still functioning Christian or Orthodox churches along the way. The object of this walk was—as
all the guide books say—“one of the greatest monuments of Byzantine architecture remaining in
the city.” Just a stone’s throw from Yediküle which I had visited easily a dozen times or more
and described in detail in an earlier chapter, St. John the Baptist of Studius was never on my
radar until recently. And this purported gem, a stupendous basilica, will remain so as it was shut
up tighter than a drum behind walls so high I couldn’t see a thing. 57 But there was a pleasant tea
garden across the road where I could sit and contemplate yet again the glory that was
Constantinople and that was in so many ways so tantalizingly close and still shut off to me.
56
“Snow” in English and “Kar” in Turkish, the title is a play on words for the city Kars.
I later appealed for entry at the museum offices at Hagia Sophia without any luck—those officials are not in
charge of this site.
57
~ 184 ~
I said at the onset that you have to see Istanbul at street level to really appreciate the city
in all its guises. I went out to Koca Mustafa Paşa again on a Saturday night for a grilled fish
dinner since it seemed quieter than the madness of the restaurant complex in Kumkapı where I
usually dined. And it was much cheaper than the fancy dives right on the Marmara I splurged on
my first night in Istanbul. I came back to Aksaray and became just another cog in the churning
machinery of pedestrians oozing in and out of the backstreets, clogging the cheap restaurants,
vying for looks at the discounted wares laid out on the sidewalks by mobile vendors, gawking at
the splendor of the spiffily restored and gorgeously lit Valide Sultan Mosque at the main
intersection, and generally just hanging out.
I had heard that the prostitution industry had decamped from Beyoğlu to here but was
still surprised when a middle-aged and sweaty man sidled up to me and harshly whispered, “Are
you looking for a Russian woman? A Turkish woman?” Before I could even register mirth or
surprise, he hesitated nary an instance and continued, “How about a boy?”
How about a boy, indeed. For I was not just walking around58 but headed for a gay bar in
the neighborhood. I couldn’t have imagined a place like Durak (meaning “stop” or “pause”) in
Istanbul. This was a gathering spot and watering hole for middle-aged and middle-class gay men
where Turkish traditional and classic performed live took the place of ear-splitting Western pop
so common in the gay bars of Taksim and Beyoğlu. I had been there on a week night when I first
got into town. Then I was one of only a half dozen patrons, three of whom would alternately take
the mike karaoke-style and belt out a popular number. Even after downing three of their
inexpensive beers, I was still far from ready to do a turn, though encouraged by the emcee who
58
Dolaşmak is the Turkish verb meaning “walking around” and used to be about the only thing my students
purported to do on evenings and weekends. Those were the pre-internet and cable days when the television fare
was slim, chances to meet a sweetheart were limited to “walking around,” and disposable income was an
inconceivable concept for most. On this trip I don’t think I heard the verb at all—though, admittedly, I wasn’t
chatting up many youth.
~ 185 ~
was very entranced that I spoke the lingo. When he asked if I had any requests and received my
“Neden Saçların Beyazlanmıs, Arkadaş,” I knew I had backed a winner. Pleasant—and
bizarre—as it was, I couldn’t see the venue lasting for very long with such a minimal clientele.
So when I got there on a Saturday night, I was astonished to find the place packed to the
rafters. In fact, I thought that I had come on a straight night as I couldn’t imagine, even in a city
of over 13 million, this many normal-looking gay men—I mean, they didn’t resemble the aged
urban guppies who still prowl the Christopher Street bars in Manhattan but, rather, just some
guys stopping in for a beer before they headed home (which may have been the case). After I
was able to grab a beer in this melee and find a perch with a view of the place and players, I
could see from those tell-tale hugs and caresses and just a few bent-wrist rejoinders that it wasn’t
the suburban bowling league out for a few.
The musical numbers did not belie the audience’s and performers’ “artistic” natures. It
was an all out “Glee-Goes-Istanbul.” Now, Turkish music is wide-ranging and incredibly
varied—you have Turkish pop, Western-inspired pop, folk, Turkish artistic or “classical” music,
arabesque, rock and even rap/hip hop. There are influences from the Balkans, the Caucasus, Arab
lands, the Mediterranean, Sufism, other Islamic sects, and Italian opera. They are all quite
different, though they all (with a few wonderful exceptions) sound pretty much the same to me,
with high-pitched wailing and a preponderance of reed instruments. The meyhane or beerhall
songs (“Neden Saçların Beyazlanmıs, Arkadaş” being a prime example) are my favorite even
though they can rate pretty high on the screech index.
I found the scene so amazing because it was so ordinary, just a bunch of guys hanging out
and seemingly unconcerned that they may have wanted to go to bed with one or another of the
crowd. No religious angst on display. No evidence of gigolos. No especially effeminate behavior
~ 186 ~
or any that was supermacho. Had Turkey grown? Well, I won’t fool myself and think this could
happen on such a scale anywhere but in Istanbul. But it was a reassuring and lovely.
I didn’t do much the rest of my time in Istanbul. After scouring the guidebooks (John
Freely’s “Istanbul Blue Guide” and his masterful “Strolling through Istanbul”), I found that I had
missed the Church of St. Theodosia (now the Gül Camii) on the Fifth Hill and Constantine Lips
(the incongruously named Fenar İsa Camii or Mosque of the Lamp of Jesus, though Fenar is
also the name of the neighborhood) on the Fourth. And I just knew that if I delved further I
would indentify even more. And I was already exhausted.
But I did visit, of course, Justinian’s extant churches. Sergius and Bacchus (now
Küҫük Aya Sofia Camii) had been renovated and reopened since my last two visits. I used to
think this was a more understandable building than its sister up on the hill and easier to
appreciate. I don’t know why I ever would have thought that other than they certainly are
similar. The dome is a wonder with 16 alternating flat and concave sections held up by
eight polygonal columns. The second floor galleries and the exquisite sculpture of the
capitals and entablature are masterworks and rival and remind one of Hagia Sophia’s. It is
just a delight. But it is not Hagia Sophia.
Hagia Eirine (Holy Peace to Hagia Sophia’s Holy Wisdom) is used now only for
concerts, and none were scheduled during my stay. I barged into the Hagia Sophia Museum
office and all but begged to get a pass in with a special group, but none were in the offing. I
could get an individual tour at a fee of $400; and, though I was titillated by the thought of
being inside by myself, I had to ask myself if I really wanted to see the interior that badly.
Eirene has a special place in my heart as I studied it in detail for a graduate seminar in
Byzantine Architecture in 1973 though I didn’t come to understand it or appreciate it as
~ 187 ~
much as Hagia Sophia.
Like Sergius and Bacchus, Hagia Sophia, and San Vitale in Ravenna, the structure
and beauty of this church depends on the massing of many differing structural elements
and the interplay of light. We get domes, apses, pendentives, piers, elliptical vaults, barrel
vaults, galleries, columns, and marvelous capitals. And here we get the only surviving
synthronon, a kind of stone bleachers for the clergy, in the apse. And all four churches
demonstrate the evolution of or, more precisely, the variations on centralized basilicas
versus those on a longitudinal axis.
No, I didn’t get inside. I just walked around and took in the exterior and the remains
of the Hospice of Samson and wondered if I could even make out the confusing bit of
archwork on the south western barrel vault that was the big—and unanswered—question
of my seminar presentation. It didn’t seem so important at that time and is even less so
now.
Yes, I went to Hagia Sophia. And it was wonderful. The day was glorious and bright.
There were enough people in the main vessel of the church to enliven but not overwhelm
the experience. And they—though probably ignorant of the vagaries of the architectural
historical quality and detail—were equally awed by the majesty of this ancient structure
that has withstood so many assaults. Hagia Sophia still reigns, in my mind anyway, as the
most stupendous building of all time.
I have gotten over the fact that I am not going to see her in the company of Justinian
and Theodora or that it will ever be a functioning church again as it was designed. I have
repeatedly stated that I didn’t fully appreciate her until I had seen St. Mark’s in Venice and
extrapolated that experience to Hagia Sophia. San Marco, a still functioning and intact
~ 188 ~
building, has a vitality and richness that is lacking at Hagia Sophia. But, as the kids say
nowadays, “Whatever.”
In a way I had made my peace not only with Hagia Sophia but also with Istanbul,
Turkey, and the Turks. This was their building, city, and country, no matter how large a role
they play in my life and world. The trajectory of my adult life, boosted by coming here when
I was young and impressionable, is irreparably tied to the history and fate of this country
and people—but not vice versa.
So I could take it in, this new and vibrant Istanbul, this regional economic and
political powerhouse that bore so little resemblance to the city of 33 years ago, much less
to the one of 560 or 1500 years ago. I walked and walked and walked around and used the
various means of public transportation and, to repeat myself, just took it in.
But always the city of surprises, Istanbul did not disappoint. As if to highlight that a
new generation had taken over, I spent my last two evenings in the city in the company of
the nephews of two dear friends.
I couldn’t help but see the similarities between the younger me and the first of the
two. Michael was the son of my oldest and best friend’s brother. Raised in a small, rural
Indiana town, he migrated to Indiana University and studied languages, though in his case
Arabic. He had been studying and travelling in the Middle East before he landed up in
Istanbul, worked at a language school for a year, and fell in love with Turkish and Turkey.
Now about to enter his second year of law school, he did another course in Arabic in Jordan
but then came back to spend the rest of the summer with his friends in Istanbul.
I also couldn’t get over the fact that he looked quite a bit like my friend did when he
was that age and that they shared the same given and surnames. As we sat across from
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each other in a restaurant in Karaköy on the Asian side, it didn’t take much for me to
imagine that it was my old friend and I discussing Turks, Turkey, and Istanbul as we never
had before. What was disconcerting was that “my old friend” had a better handle on
colloquial Turkish than I now did.
Çiya Sofrası, the restaurant we were at, had been written up in the New Yorker59
and had quite a reputation—like Asitane which I mentioned above—for fresh and local
ingredients and for reviving lost Turkish recipes, mainly those of the southeast and with
influences from Syria, Armenia, Persia, and from Jewish cuisines. My sage salad was more
confusing and interesting than good, and I don’t really remember much of the rest of the
meal. The pleasure was in the company and in the almost cognitive dissonance of memories
of an old life and the new that our meeting and conversation evoked. And there was
pleasure in taking the boat back to the European side under the twinkling night sky. Sailing
to Byzantium indeed.
The next evening and my last in Istanbul, I met Gail and Ahmet’s nephew whom I
had not seen since he was three years old in 1985. And now he was the age I was when I
first came to the city, a fact that underlined our differences more than any similarities. For
Burak was not like in me in any way: he was an excellent example of the New Turk—
confident, educated, and even a bit arrogant without being overbearing. He was doing an
Economics PhD in game theory, had already parlayed his knowledge of poker to a
handsome nest egg from online betting, had started a private music school, was in the
middle of opening another business, all while working with a large firm. He had his own
59
Elif Batuman, Letter from Istanbul, “The Memory Kitchen,” The New Yorker, April 19, 2010, p. 56
~ 190 ~
apartment and car and more independence than I would have ever expected from a Turk
who wasn’t born to fabulous wealth or who had extensive political connections.
He was more than respectful of the current prime minister’s policies and optimistic
about the economy of Turkey, its role in regional and international affairs, and his own life.
He didn’t pine to live in another country like so many of the educated Turks I used to know.
His speech was peppered with terms like niche marketing, personal growth, selfrealization, and resource management. (If I am making him sound like an ass, I apologize—
he is very personable, understanding, and pleasant.)
We had our little dinner just a stone’s throw away from Ҫiçek Pasajı, where his aunt
(and sometimes his uncle) and I used to gather. Then she would have been one of the few
females around. Now, almost as many women as men were at this and other restaurants and
sidewalk cafes. Many were sitting alone or with a young man, a thing unheard of a generation
ago. And instead of fried mussels and potatoes washed down with beer, Burak and I had pasta
and salmon. The times they are a changing.
We were going to repair to one of the fashionable watering holes down near Tünel that
are always getting written up in the New York Times Travel section and are more popular than
Çiçek Pasajı ever was. So we ambled down İstiklâl Caddesi like I had thousands of times before
and through the now vibrant little streets off the main drag that were full of boutique hotels,
charming shops, and fashionable galleries. Cosmopolitan young folk peopled the tables of the
cafes and restaurants, and the mood was buoyant and animated. But this was not for me. I think
Burak was a bit relieved to part early as he was in the midst of a pressing assignment at work and
already sleep deprived.
I continued on down the hill I had traversed so many times to get to the other side of the
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Golden Horn. Usually so dark and desolate with only a few men scurrying here or there or the
occasional housewife or doorperson sweeping a stoop, the hill was newly paved and brightly lit.
Open souvenir shops were wedged between the closed musical instruments stores that line this
throroughfare. Nothing furtive at all.
No? There was quite a bit of activity around a side street, and it wasn’t people looking for
the most popular bar. It did not take much a jog of my cerebral cortex to bring back those
memories of the Army guys and my first few days in Istanbul. Still I couldn’t believe that the
Genel Ev red light district was still functioning. I rather liked the idea of the New Turkey, if not
the Islamic-leaning Turkey, that would seemingly take a dim view of prostitution and blatant
human needs. So I didn’t take the time to investigate and so just plodded on. But my suspicions
were confirmed just a month later with a story in the papers60 about the continued popularity of
the venue with men of a certain class. Somethings never change. As one fellow in the article
exclaimed, “I’m a single man…I need this.”
I was satisfied just to get down to the Galata Bridge. Though it does not bobb in the water
as of old, it is the place to revel in the eternal. It’s all here—Topkapı Saray, Hagia Sophia, an
impressive array of imperial mosques into the distance, minarets and towers aplenty, history,
history, history all under the quiet night sky. Then it’s up the hill and into bed, a final Turkish
breakfast in the morn, and a flight out. I only wish our jet plane had a little wavy Güle Güle (Go
Smilingly) hand in the back window.
60
Sussman, Anna Louie, “Dimming the Red Lights in Turkey,” New York Times, August 21, 2011.
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NEDEN SAҪLARİN BEYAZLANMIŞ
ARKADAŞ
Neden saçların beyazlanmış arkadaş
Sana da benim gibi çektiren mi var
Görüyorum ki her gün meyhanedesin
Yaşamaya küstürüp içtiren mi var
Görüyorum ki her gün meyhanelerdesin
Yaşamaya küstürüp içtiren mi var
WHY HAS YOUR HAIR TURNED WHITE, MY
FRIEND
Why has your hair turned white, my friend
And why has it receded like mine
I see you in the beer hall every day
Living it up, drinking, and pissing everyone off
I see you in the beer hall every day
Living it up, drinking, and pissing everyone off
Bir zamanlar bende deli gibi sevdim
O bana dert ben ona mutluluk verdim
Yıllardır soruyorum bu soruyu kendime
Allah'ım bu dünyaya ben niye geldim
Katlanmayı bilmeyen aşkı çekemez
Aşka mahkum edilen garip gülemez
Ben de yanmışım vallah senin gibi arkadaş
Dünyanın derdi bitmez böyle arkadaş
Ben de yanmışım senin gibi arkadaş
Dünyanın kahrı bitmez bilmez arkadaş
Those were the days I loved so crazily
Giving happiness but getting only sorrow
Through the years I ask myself this question:
Why in heaven’s name did I come into this world
We can’t bear a love that is not reciprocated
Can’t laugh at a love that is already condemned
By God, I’m bound up in your friendship
A friendship that still can’t relieve the bitterness of the
world
Yes, I’m bound up in your friendship
A friendship that still can’t lessen the grief in the world.
Bir zamanlar bende deli gibi sevdim
O bana dert ben ona mutluluk verdim
Yıllardır soruyorum bu soruyu kendime
Allah'ım bu dünyaya ben niye geldim
Yıllardır soruyorum bu soruyu kendime
Allah'ım bu dünyaya ben niye geldim
Of be arkadan seçmek zor sanat
Katlanmayı bilmeyen aşkı çekemez
Aşka mahkum edilen garip gülemez
Ben de yanmışım senin gibi arkadaş
Dünyanın derdi bitmez, böyle bitmez arkadaş
Those were the days I loved so crazily
Giving happiness but getting only sorrow
Through the years I ask myself this question:
Why in heaven’s name did I come into this world
So, man, it’s an impossible task to choose after the fact
We can’t bear a love that is not reciprocated
Can’t laugh at a love that is already condemned
By God, I’m bound up in your friendship
But it doesn’t relieve the bitterness in the world, it just
doesn’t