Son Bir Yolculuk
Part 1
By Jessup Eric William
1. Return
I was back in Istanbul. My arrival was scheduled for around 21:25, but as always with flights, this time and number was meaningless. To Arrive, to walk into familiar environs, into familiar arms and stand strong and relaxed at once, takes more time than any of us realize. I had arrived in Istanbul months ago before this story, over the course of 2015 and 2016, through friends and shared experiences. Now I was returning after a three month absence, in the beginning of July 2016, with a strange mix of excitement and nascent nostalgia for my old tribe of friends, and an apprehension that they had somehow forgotten about me and moved on.
But why would they have? It had only been 3 months, and here I was, invited back to Turkey for a wedding. After my plane circled Atatürk for a few extra minutes, then touched down, then was taxi-ed, followed by passport control, baggage claim, the Havabüs to Taksim, and the Dolmüş to Kadıköy, my true arrival time was just past midnight, to my newly found and long lost tribe. A pretty efficient run from one side of the city to the other all things considered.
Walking up the steep hill to my friends house in Yeldeğirmeni, I turned around a few times to see the Bosphorus shimmering past the narrow street. The sun was long gone. I should have arrived earlier.
While I had been out of the country, a plan had been formulated, not an easy task for my friends here in my experience.Yiğit and Şenay were getting married, in her family’s village of Samandağ, wedged between the Mediterranean Sea and Syria in the province of Hatay. Şenay was the Gelin (bride), and Yiğit the Damat (groom), and Ozan the Painter was the best man, and I was Ozan’s old yanbancı housemate, and Cengiz the Dentist met them all in İspanak bar a few years ago - stay with me here. And it was the Dentist’s apartment in the neighbourhood of Yeldeğirmeni that I was stepping into when I heard the song:
“Lalalalalalalalalalalala
la la la la
lalalalala la
lalalalalalalal lalalala”
The Man in Me by Bob Dylan. That meant the Painter was there, and the Damat, and the Gelin! This was our parting song, the one we sang drunkenly together and danced to on my last night in Turkey 3 months ago. Only 3 months, but it felt like an ending long ago, with all its emotional weight. And now we are all together, dancing to the same song. Before I knew it the whiskey I bought from duty free was open and a quarter of a litre was gone by the end of Man in Me, and it’s barely a 3 minute song.
But the celebration was short lived, and had to be delayed. Painter Ozan was flying with Damat and Gelin directly to Hatay that night, to prepare for the wedding. Everyone else still had a few days to get there. All the members of the tribe were scattered across Turkey and a few other countries, but we would all meet in Hatay 3 days from now. The Dentist and I were to leave that night, immediately after the end of the song actually. Then I noticed the quiet man in the corner not jumping, dancing, and taking shots. It was Ramazan, the Dentist’s friend and our ride. He had been enlisted to get us down south to where more friends were waiting for us, and we had to go immediately. The three of us said our goodbyes to the wedding party and the bottle of booze, I knew it wouldn’t be here when we got back. We threw our bags into the car and peeled out of Istanbul at around 1am. The Dentist and Ramazan took turns driving through the night. Before falling asleep, I thought, where was the Painter’s girlfriend, Yağmur?
And where was Tayfun, my precious drunken Care-Bear?
2. Sex on the Beach
I woke up to a great sight, Marmaris Bay. Crossing the last pass on the D400 to the city of Marmaris, one has a view of all of the Bay from the Milli Park Viewpoint. And it was brilliant on that morning. A bright sun brought out that special kind of blue form the sea, and that special kind of green from the trees that you only see that this latitude on Earth. I was reminded of California.
However, it took me some time to register all this, as I woke up with the brief surreal feeling of not knowing where I was or why I was there. A few blinks later and I realized that I’d been here before, 6 months ago on another road trip to Datça, another story onto itself, but I didn’t know why we were here now. Weren’t we going to the east of Turkey? Why go so directly south? I had asked very few questions the night before. Due to my lack of Turkish, I had developed some habits from my year here, such as daydreaming and getting used to not knowing what the fuck was going on or being said, and accepting that, and thus, not asking too many questions. I had already slid back into an old habit.
We descended into the last valley before the sea. The horizon line was interrupted by the islands of Marmaris Bay, Yildiz and Keci Adası. Like two slightly ajar doors, they both shelter and welcome boats into this natural harbour. Lord Nelson’s fleet anchored here before setting off for the mouth of the Nile to face Napoleonic France in 1798. Sultan Suleiman the Law-Maker and the Ottoman navy passed between the islands on their way to conquering Rhodes from the Knights of Saint John. Alexander the Great supposedly passed through the area as well, besieging a castle somewhere nearby. And, not to be outdone, 6 months ago the Painter had to run into the shadows of the night when cops questioned us. We had pulled up to a friend’s house with open beers. The Painter had been dodging his military service for 10 years, so he needed to let us handle it. Before slithering back to us after the cops left. Apologizes to history’s soldiers, Alexander, Suleiman, Nelson, and the Painter.
Marmaris came from the Turkish word mermer, which is from the Greek marmaron ...marble. Apparently the hills were thick with it. The Greeks of old though, the pre-byzantine Greeks, called the area Physkos, after some local ruler, or derived from physikos: that which pertains to the natural and instinctive. And one look at the beautiful hills, peninsulas, islands, and bay that make up this place, and the latter name origin starts to make sense.
After taking in the view and telling myself to look up all these historical facts on Marmaris later to include in this story, I asked why we were here during peak tourist season. The Dentist told me that we needed to meet up with Hadi the Driver, who was already down south in Muğla, in order to hitch a ride with him to Hatay. Ramazan was only here to help us get south. He would stay the night and then drive back to Istanbul the next day to keep working. He had driven through the night, 12 hours during the busiest traffic event in Istanbul, and in Turkey (probably top 10 in the world) to help us get to a wedding that he wouldn’t attend for someone he had just met the night before. Truly an act of charity worthy of the name Ramazan. And he had a sweet BMW.
The Driver was in Akyaka, a small town an hour north of Marmaris. We would stay with a friend of the Dentist’s who owned a t-shirt shop here. Once again, I felt proud to have friends who had friends.
After my request for a turkish breakfast fulfilled - I had been out of country after all - we found the t-shirt shop and I met Yavuz. He used to live in Istanbul and was one of the Dentist’s Fenerbahce hooligan friends. He moved down here for the tourist season to sell shirts, shorts, hats, and towels to the mostly British and Irish tourists that seem to only congregate here. Someone once told me that the Russians go to Antalya, and the Germans to Fethiye. This must be where the Brits and the Irish go. Besides Antalya, I don’t know if any of that is true, but it’s a convenient segregation. Then who goes to Bodrum? Who else has money? The Dutch? The Danes? Everyone?
Ramazan and the Dentist had driven all night, so we rested in Yavuz’s house until the afternoon. It was hot, humid, un-airconditioned and next to some kind of bird drop-in centre, but we were tired, and all slept through the thick air and cawing.
By mid-afternoon, we are thirsty though. We walked down to the seaside and grabbed the coldest beer from the closest Tekel. 6 months ago was March, and this place was empty, maybe almost as sleepy as it used to be before the tourism and construction boom of the 80s I imagined. Now it was Gibraltar East. It was rammed with British holidayers, children running around while their hard-nosed fathers, some with faded union jack and football ultra tattoos, ignored them. Soon, a surge of Turkish merry-makers would be added to the mix. Ramadan had just ended and Bayram was upon us. Would the traffic be just as bad as Istanbul last night? There was only one road in to Marmaris.
Near dusk we were tipsy, and made our way to Yavuz’s shop. He was next to a tourist bar/restaurant/dance club, which was across the street from another tourist bar/restaurant/dance club. They were the kind of places where you could see a family having dinner, an old red-nosed pensioner falling out of his chair, or young women in bikinis lamenting the lack of a stripper pole. All were drunk and sun-burnt to some degree.
According to the Dentist, all the servers were young Kurdish boys. They all had the same wind-swept pompadour, which you could see bobbing up and down and shining in the patio lights as they ran around in work. Their dark skin and stoic expressions stood in contrast to the chattering pale, pink, or red tourists that surrounded them.
Then, the robot entered the restaurant dancing.
It looked like some kind of homemade transformer. With one hand in the air, and it’s fake metallic pelvis gyrating, it awkwardly pranced between tables. A few tourists clapped along in amusement, a few girls covered their mouths, probably saying “Oh My God” before looking away and rolling their eyes. Most ignored it all together. But still the music played, and the robot danced. The Kurdish servers all had smiles, probably happy that it wasn’t their turn in the suit tonight.
I looked over to the other restaurant and saw a slightly jealous-looking manager leaning on the patio wall, staring at the dancing robot of his competitor. Yavuz told me that this happens every night, and soon it would get worse, and the by-law officer would be out with his decibel meter, ready to take a bribe when things got too chaotic. How could it get any better I thought.
And then it did.
Suddenly the music turned epic, the lights all changed colour and a spotlight formed on another server emerging from the dimly lit bar area. “O ha, someone ordered a Sex-on-the-beach” said Yavuz. “What’s that?” I said, but then found out.
Upon the server’s head was a fish bowl, filled with some neon cocktail; some alchemist’s last regret. The server slowly stepped forward to a fanfare of reggaeton whistles and a heavy bass. Three servers followed behind him, dancing and thrusting in unison to the “lyrics”.
Sex
Sex
Sex on the beach!
Sex
Sex
Sex on the beach!
(more whistles)
They had ordered a sex on the beach. The back-up dancers continued with the repeating lyrics as the main server, the human serving tray with the fish bowl still on his head, danced as furiously as physics would allow. The blue liquid swirled and sloshed as he did some kind of crab walk/squat to the whistles and rhythm. Carefully looking I noted, that not a drop had spilled.
Then the fireworks started. Sparklers shot out from the bowl. Four in total. The young kurdish bowl boy continued, drops of sweat surely forming on his head, but not one drop fell from the bowl of tourist fuel on his head.
All in all the extravaganza took about 90 seconds. An impressive ceremony for a drink. We had all stared, laughed, and mocked the proceedings, but all of a sudden our bottles of Efes seemed rather ho-hum. We all took a swig of our warm beer silently. Maybe we all wanted a sex on the beach now. The server finally took the bowl off his head and placed it on the table of an awaiting tourist mother. She, her husband, and young son had endured the presentation ceremony. She seemed happy, her impatience subsiding.
Then, across the street, from the other tourist bar/restaurant/dance club - Whistles! Lights! Kurdish Boys! Sex! Sex! Sex on the beach!
And a fish bowl. No, two fishbowls!
Yes that’s right. Two fish bowls sat double-stacked on top of the head of the man I saw earlier admiring the DIY robot. His act of revenge was upon them. He had thrown down the gauntlet, but not the fish bowl!
Here he was, gyrating, squatting, and crab-walking better than the spritely young server on our side of the street, with an empty fish bowl on top of the full one that was upon his head. This cocktail, equally as unappealing as the last, was a different colour, though likely from the same unlicensed laboratory.
Two minutes later, after the same pyrotechnics, music, and back-up dancers, the neon green concoction was off his head and on a table. “Did anyone even order that?” I thought.
But before I had time to look, from our side of the street again...
Sex!
Sex!
Sex on the beach!
Our boys had met the old lion’s challenge, with three bowls upon the head! Gauntlet for gauntlet, his taunt had been turned into a full-fledged dual for supremacy of the hearts, minds, and kidneys of the mildly-interested tourists of this 20 metre stretch of road, in Marmaris; Suleiman’s launchpad, Nelson’s shelter, Alexander’s stop-over, the Painter’s near-miss, and the home of the Sex on the Beach International Bowl Head Balancing World Championship.
Then the manager re-emerged, four bowls deep!
With no tourist to order the drink, he took to the street, doing his act in between the mild traffic. That poetic song - I’ll call it “Sex on the Beach” - now blared out-of-sync from both locations, with one set of the verse (chorus?) being replaced by another in a crescendo of sophistication, civilization, and beautiful instinct. Such Physikos!
New heights were being reached. The two men circled each other on the road, one with three bowls on his head, two empty and one full of orange liquid (why was the colour different every time?!), the other with four empty bowls. An even match I thought. Would only one make it out alive? Who would it be? Who would go home with the 10 lira tip and a ⅘ rating on Tripadvisor?
Then, it all stopped. To the right of the ritual, the by-law officer emerged and set up his tripod and decibel meter. The four-bowled manager took off his 4 storey totem and ran over to him, pleading for a few more minutes of competition, to slay this young upstart. But it was past 11pm, and the decision had been made. They had crab-walked too close to the sun. Both combatants returned to their bases. Regular music returned and the tourists continued as before; tired, sun-stroked, and mildly interested.
Yavuz shook his head and threw out his cigarette. “Every night”.
3. Don’t
Ramazan had to go back in the morning. With his task complete, he dropped the Dentist and me at Içmeler beach and turned back towards Istanbul. He had driven for over 20 hours in two days to get us to our destination, and he didn’t even get to enjoy the beach. We were waiting for the Driver. He was coming from Gökova, about an hour north. The Dentist and I sat on the beach, drinking beer and watching the bikinis and guessing about what lay beneath the burkinis.
The Driver arrived in the afternoon and we headed out. We had one more member to pick up. Doğa, the Nature, was staying at some camp along the way. We met him along the side of the road at night and headed past Fethiye. I told my companions of the last time I was here, 4 months earlier. I was with the Painter and we stayed with his friend, a nurse named Figen who was possessed by John Lennon.
Years earlier, before the Painter was a painter, when he was young and wild - he’s not young anymore - Figen would take care of him and his group of drunkards. I don’t know how they met, but whenever they would roll into town on a bender, she was their big sister, doing her best to eliminate their vitamin deficiency and shelter them from storms of their own making.
On one of their visits, Figen told them of a dream she had once. Someone had shot her twice, and she could see it all through a pair of round, purple-lensed glasses. If you haven’t figured it out already, the shooter was Mark David Chapman, and Figen was John Lennon. Ever since then she told, the spirit of John Lennon has possessed her. To celebrate this news, the Painter put on a Bealtes song. Figen said turn that off, I’m not a big Beatles fan. If that’s not confirmation of Lennon within, I don’t know what is.
We wouldn’t be seeing Figen this time. We drove passed Fethiye and through a village to the northwest called Dont. We got out and took a photo of us wagging our fingers in disapproval outside the sign. Too bad the Painter wasn’t there to put on “Honey Don’t”.
It was past midnight and we continued driving, to where I wasn’t too sure, but we were closing in on more friends ahead of us, on the way to Hatay.
Note: John Lennon was in fact shot 4 times by Mark David Chapman, and in the back, rendering it impossible for him to have seen the gunman as described in Figen’s dream. So, who truly possesses Figen? It’s not Tupac. He was also shot 4 times.
4. Allah Akbar in the Morning
With Dawn, we closed in on the other half of our remaining tribe members. Unbeknownst to me, somewhere past Antalya but before Mersin, our friends were fast asleep in a tent. We had made it through the empty streets of Antalya with ease. The streets outside the resorts were empty. Fewer and fewer Russians were coming due to the recent tension between the two nations over a Russian Fighter Jet shot down in Syria by Turkmen. Which reminded me; Syria. We were going to the province next to Syria. Surely at some point we’ll have to cross a military checkpoint. That would be interesting. I wondered how many of my friends were dodging their military service too. Ozgur certainly was. Maybe that was why he flew to Hatay.
The only thing we saw in Antalya was a probable drunk driver, swerving a bit on the road. What an amatuer. We had been steadily drinking throughout the night when we stopped around dawn at a pebble beach outside of a coastal town. Under a tree was a tent, flapping loudly in the hot July wind. We parked far away so not to be heard. The Dentist got out of the car, tired and drunk, and ran up to the tent. “Allah Akbar Allah Akbar. Gunaydin Gavurlar Gunaydin. Allah Akbar Allah Akbar.” The tent flapped even harder as screams were heard within. Of terror or joy I don’t know. Our friends emerged as if from a clown car - Nazlı, Yağmur, Padawan, a skinny man who looked like he was in Rage Against the Machine, and a hairless man with arresting eyes - all came out one by one from the 2-person tent.
There was lots of swearing in Turkish and English, and lots of hugs in both languages as well. I hadn’t seen these people in quite some time. Nazlı and Padawan were a couple. Nazlı was the Nutritionist, and she was blessed with a laugh like a sweet hyena full of helium. Padawan looked like a Zen apprentice who didn’t know what lunch was. With a wispy beard and a wispier frame, he came by his nick-name honestly. His real name was Orhan, and he was also the bartender at Roka, where we would often meet in Taksim. I was then introduced to the two new members of the tribe. The Skinny rock band member was also called Orhan. He was a scientist washed up too young, and now unemployed. The bald man, Volkan, was otherwise known as Sex Machine. The first thing Yağmur said was that he was Bi-sexual. He had a lean body, and a smoldering look to him with angular cheekbones. He was too short and slim to be a Terminator cyborg, but you got that feeling from him. It was hard to match his stare without looking away and blushing a little.
And then there was Yağmur, the Young-one, the Painter’s girlfriend. Even though she had just woken up, she seemed more drunk than us. She had been out of the country since February when she had left for an Erasmus semester in Lviv. I hadn’t seen her in a while and was looking forward to the reunion. She had often video called the Painter while I was still living with him to vent her frustrations with central Europe. However, instead of returning to Istanbul after the end of the semester in June, the Young-One had taken off to Berlin. After partying it up there, she made her way through Europe and to Turkey via Greece. She then met up with these other vagrants on the road somewhere in Izmir. The Painter had wanted her to come to Istanbul first before he left for Hatay, but the Young-One had other plans. She had asked the Painter if he had weed. When he said no, she decided to meet up with friends down south first, then to see him later in Hatay. Padawan had pot, and the Painter had not. Could you blame her, you can’t smoke on a plane!
We all went swimming out to a lone little white boat. It was all very Mediterranean. We gave the Driver - god’s own driver - a rest on the beach, before taking off again. We were now in tandem, along the coastal highway of Ak Deniz, the north shore of the southeastern Mediterranean sea. The roads were empty, but the Bayram crowds were waiting for us in Mersin.
We made the most of the new found freedom with new found joints. On a clear, straight stretch of road, the Driver pulled into the opposite lane and matched Sex Machine’s speed while inching closer and closer towards their car. The window was rolled down and the Nutritionist gave one of her war-ending laughs as she stuck her arm out with a burning joint, as the Dentist did the same from our car. The joints were successfully exchanged, and the gods of mischief were appeased for now. I sat in the back with no idea what was going on, but happy to be back with my friends, blissfully unaware of the plan, and regretfully unaware of the conversation and jokes.
Things carried on like this for a bit. I sat in the back and caught up with the Young-One. I heard about her time in Lviv, the all weekend clubs in Berlin, and how she didn’t seem to want to stop travelling. I got the feeling that she didn’t need the Painter anymore. I was expecting some fireworks between them when we arrived in Hatay later that night. She was already drunk and yelling constantly “we are not old! we are not old!” She was about 22, everyone else was 29-36.
Traffic tightened up as we entered Mersin. The highway ran right along the seaside, and the beaches were full. People and cars filled up the shoulder of the road and forced passing cars to slow down and merge. A cop car passed us and turned into a beach parking lot. We continued on, but soon stopped for a cold beer. It was about midday, and around 40 degrees, forcing us to buy beer as we drank them. We got out of the car with a big clank from the empties, and re-upped on smokes and Bomonti. As we got back into the cars, the cops from before passed us again. We were soon driving behind them and drinking our new beers, when they once again turned into a beach parking lot to show a little presence.
We carried on to a different parking lot to try and have a seaside sit with our new beers. As we left our cars, the cops pulled in and nodded to us, beers in hand. “We’re just patrolling around, making sure everyone is having a good Bayram.” Or so I’m told they said that to us. We said iyi bayramlar back and headed to the beach, but it was a zoo. So we got back into our cars and kept driving to get out of Mersin. Before we could though, we were overtaken by the cops one last time on the edge of town. The Driver sped up to pass them.
The Dentist was in the front seat. As we passed, he rolled down the window and stuck his head out, and while staring at the cops, chugged his beer. He held the pose for a good seven seconds. The Driver protested, saying “yapma, yapma”, but quickly sensed the moment and hit the accelerator, racing in front of the cop car.
We all turned back to see their reaction, nervously holding our eyes on them. I didn’t turn back to the front of the car to see, but I sensed that even the Driver was staring back with us. The tension built. When would they turn on their sirens and flashing lights, and end this sublime odyssey?
The moment was ours though! As we pulled away from the city and into the dry hills around Mersin, the cops slowed down and turned back into town. We erupted in a cheer, praised the bravery of the Dentist and finished our beers. We soon had to stop to get a new cold one each, including the Driver this time, for his sore neck no doubt.
If you start the day with a prayer, God will be on your side until the night falls. Allah Akbar Canım Gavurlarım.
5. The Peppers of Bayram
We were closing in on Hatay, and it was still early afternoon. After Mersin there only remained Adana in our way, but our joint passing and beer stops kept us moving slow, but I figured we’d get there by the late evening.
The Dentist got a phone call from Padawan that made him laugh and repeatedly say “hayir, hayir” in between coughing from the joint. After the phone call, he put his hands over his face, and broke the still unknown news to everyone (still unknown to me). The car erupted in the same reaction, laughter mixed with foreboding. After some time where it seemed that everyone forgot that I existed, the Young-One turned to me and said “Ahh, sorry for not telling you. As you know, it is Bayram, and you should go to visit your grandparents. Aaaand, Padawan has grandparents, they are here, so… we are going to visit them.”
This was not good. I was high, barely able to function in front of my friends, let alone grandparents, turkish grandparents, and everyone else felt the same. Before we could have any debate on the matter, we were there, off the highway and driving along some dusty farm roads between Mersin and Adana. As both cars pulled in, I thought that the sweat from the hot afternoon sun was our only cover for the sweat of being high and drunk and about to meet someone’s old farmhand antecedents.
I was relieved to see that everyone else in the other car felt as we did. The Nutritionist, Padawan’s girlfriend grabbed me nervously. “What are we doing here?!” What answer could I give? If she didn’t know, where did that leave me? Only Padawan seemed unfazed. That lean piece of smiling lightening led the way through the garden to the teraz where his grandparents were waiting for us. When he greeted them, he bowed down and kissed their hands before touching his forehead to their knuckles. Everyone got in line and followed suit. I was last.
The grandmother wore a long, loose-fitting gown that tightly clung to her neck. I can’t remember the colour, but she had the ubiquitous colourful headscarf that women all over the countryside of Turkey wore. She was plump with a joyful expression on her face, especially her eyes. The grandfather stood upright. A thin neck held up an oval shaped head with a dusty flat cap on it. He had a weathered face that held eyes with a piercing stare that seemed to have nothing to pierce. He wore baggy brown pants, and an even baggier white shirt under a vest. I got the feeling that he onced filled out these clothes more, back in his labouring prime. Now though he seemed like an aged younger brother, still wearing his older brother’s clothes.
I don’t know who started it, but there were tremors of giggles as we shuffled in front of Padawan’s grandparents to perform our sacred duty. With each finished kiss and forehead tap of their hands, the giggling intensified until only I was left. Shaking from awkwardness, alcohol, and THC, I could barely hold back the tears as I too attempted to kiss their hands. The grandparents gave me a queer look, I don’t think they were expecting an unnamed yabancı to kiss their hand today, let alone one that looked like he was administered a beta version of a truth serum and about to crack. My gang let me look like a damn fool for a few seconds, continuing their giggle fit at my expense, before Padawan stepped in, “you don’t need to do that, come, sit down.” Little did I know I was saved from one fiasco for another.
The grandmother, Annaanna, led us to an outdoor table. It was in a classic village house veranda. A rough pergola slightly protected us from the intense afternoon sun while the constantly watered tile floor cooled our feet. Now this may seem all well and good, but to my jet-lagged, drunk, and high body, this created some kind of dizzying heat engine, with the heat on my forehead making me sweat, and the cold on my feet making me sneeze and shiver. I sat down, desperate to keep composure.
The girls in the group got to work helping Annaanna. Small dishes of vegetables and fruit were brought out, and some sweets as is custom on Bayram. The guys sat down with me and kept giggle and looking around. The Dentist and Sex machine were sitting across from me on some well worn kilims, traditional turkish pillows, and the Driver was sitting to my right, chain-smoking his way to social composure. Little did he know he held one of the ugliest looks on his face that I’ve ever seen him give. He was a tired atheist, driving around a bunch of bombed wackos to a religious ceremony. He did not want to be here. He wanted back in the car, moving in his natural environment. The Dentist and the Sex Machine had smiles that would make the devil blush.
Just then, Dede, the grandfather return with gifts. He came up to me and casually threw down some long, snake-like green peppers in front of me. I looked at the peppers. I looked at him, but his eyes were off piercing the unknown again. I looked at the two devils across the table from me. “Do I eat the peppers?”. “Yes, of course, it’s a tradition” said the Dentist. “But are they hot”
“Find out”
I already felt like I was swimming upside down in tabasco. I really didn’t need this. I looked to the driver for guidance, he didn’t look like Satan in the desert. “Is it for Bayram?” I asked. “I don’t care.” He said in his limited concise English. “I don’t eat, you eat, don’t for me. I’m an atheist.”
Shit. So am I, but I’m not one to disrespect traditions in other countries. Would I be violating some ancient rule of polite guest-host relations? Would my refusal insult this proud, half-present old man? Was I being an idiot? Were they just in fact, peppers of no significance?
The old man was still standing next to me, his baggy pants billowing in the wind. I looked to the Dentist and the Sex Machine one last time for guidance. “Eat the peppers buddy” The Sex Machine gave his advice, and then proceeded to slowly put his hand down the Dentist’s half unbuttoned shirt, playing with his chest hair. The Dentist kept smiling. It was getting weird.
Annaanna had returned now too and was talking with the Nutritionist and the Young-One. They both gave off loud cackles. Were they at me? A few seconds passed and the table was silent. I stared at the peppers, they all stared at me, and the Dede just stared.
Finally, the kind-hearted Doğa, the Nature came to my rescue. “It’s okay, you don’t have to eat the peppers.” “Are you sure?” “Just feel free. Do what you want.”
With those words of encouragement, I refused the peppers. “Hayir teşekkuller” I said to the grizzled patriarch. The old man seemed to snap out of his trance and walked off.
“Oooo ha” said the two devils. “What’s wrong with you? You insulted him. You should have eaten the peppers?” I was in a paranoid panic and felt awful. Did I possibly ruin this man’s possibly last Bayram? He seemed close to heaven’s gate. The Nutritionist assured me it was ok, but the feeling lingers to this day. What secrets did those peppers hold? And why won’t my bastard friends tell me the truth of them. Any time I bring it up now, the Dentist gets that same old grin from that table again, and says “you should’ve ate the peppers man, not cool. Poor Dede”
Swine. Bastards! If the Painter had been there, he’d have explained things to me. If the Drunken Care-Bear had been there, he would have eaten the peppers in my stead!
I can’t remember much beyond that. I think we quickly got out of there as I wasn’t the only one on edge. We said our goodbyes and went back to our true state of being, movement. We got in the cars, went to a tekel again and kept on for Hatay. And I was still expecting that military checkpoint.
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Jessup Eric William is the pen name of an English Teacher in Istanbul. He came here on a whim in 2015 and has returned to live, write, and experience the city. He is interested in combining personal experience, journalism, history, and myth into one form of story-telling.
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