Forgetting my sunglasses for my three week trip to Turkey was not smart, even if it was typical. My wife Brenda had packed another pair, however. She pulled them out of the backpack/suitcase that we had carried around the Camino three years earlier. “Wear these.”
Even being a beggar in this instance did not stop me from being a chooser. “I can’t wear these,” I protested. “These are ladies’ glasses. I’ll look like one of the sultan’s eunuchs.”
That was about all that I could say that I knew about Turkey; that it was once ruled by sultans, and that castrated eunuchs took care of said sultan’s harem. Oh, and that the Greeks and the Turks disliked each other intensely, going back even before the times of the Trojan horse. I had learned that during my first trip to Greece with my wife, back in 1988. We had just gotten on a bus in a hot coastal town and were setting off into the mountains. My wife and I were sitting in the front seats, opposite the driver, in order to get a prime view of the upcoming countryside. The bus driver climbed aboard and started the engine just as the last passenger, an old man in his seventies, took his seat directly behind the driver. He leaned forward and quietly whispered something in our driver’s ear. I could hear it, but of course I didn’t understand a word of the language.
The bus driver understood it, of course. Even as he pulled out of the parking spot he started yelling at the old man, sometimes turning completely around in order to make sure that the old fellow could correctly hear every syllable. We started to climb, but the driver’s anger only seemed to fuel itself as we climbed the switchbacked road which wasn’t encumbered by any guardrails. The old man sat quietly with a straight and expressionless face, completely unaffected by the Pandora’s box which he had opened. I wasn’t quite so calm. I looked over at the steep cliffs we were mounting and tried to steer my eyes away from the abyss, hundreds of feet below, where we were most likely to end up. The bus driver’s diatribe lasted a good twenty minutes before he finally calmed down and the old man had not said another word, sitting silently in his seat without any change at all to his placid demeanour.
I regained my breath, and then turned back in my seat to speak to the young guy behind me. We had talked together in the ticket line before boarding the bus. He was Greek, but could speak English quite well after spending a couple of years in the United States. “What did the old man say?” I whispered very softly. I didn’t want anything to set off another ranting rage.
The old man said, “Your mother is a Turk,” was the reply.
So that was what I figured I was getting myself into. The slaughter of the Aussies at Gallipoli during World War I, the massacre of the Armenians at about the same time, the 1970’s movie Midnight Express about two young Americans put in a Turkish prison, my own nightmarish experiences with Turkish toilets in France; the Turks should surely fire their press agent. But what I saw and experienced of the Turkish people during the past three weeks changed my outlook entirely. My trip was a wonderful experience. But there’s an old expression that I first heard when I was just a young kid and that I didn’t fully understand until I had gained some experience with the passing of time. Like most old sayings it’s probably judged too politically incorrect to blurt out anywhere within earshot of anyone under fifty years of age : “Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.”
To which I will add an adage of my own making: Beware of Turks selling carpets !
-
Recent Posts
Recent Comments
Lavergne Fequet on A Life Well Lived dperras56 on No Plans for Now Murray on No Plans for Now Kenneth Mehew on No Plans for Now Lavergne Fequet on No Plans for Now Archives
- December 2020
- November 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- December 2019
- October 2019
- September 2019
- July 2019
- June 2019
- August 2018
- July 2018
- May 2018
- April 2018
- March 2018
- February 2018
- January 2018
- October 2017
- September 2017
- August 2017
- June 2017
- May 2017
- April 2017
- March 2017
- February 2017
- January 2017
- November 2016
- October 2016
- September 2016
- July 2016
- June 2016
- May 2016
- April 2016
- March 2016
- February 2016
- January 2016
- December 2015
- November 2015
- October 2015
- September 2015
- August 2015
- June 2015
- May 2015
- April 2015
- March 2015
- February 2015
- January 2015
- December 2014
- November 2014
- October 2014
- September 2014
- August 2014
- July 2014
- June 2014
- May 2014
- April 2014
- March 2014
- February 2014
- January 2014
- December 2013
- November 2013
- October 2013
- September 2013
Categories
Meta