Kamo the Barber’s uneasiness and aloofness did not abate as the days passed. He had exhausted all the seas that would beckon to him, all the chasms he would clear, before he came here. His ill humor masked an ancient wound.
“So, this is what the depths of Istanbul are like,” he said, looking at the ceiling. “Just as I imagined.”
What had he imagined? Why was he so attached to this city when he had the choice of leaving? It takes three days to become acquainted with a city, but three generations to really know it. It took time to clear the solid walls separating acquaintance and in-depth knowledge, it couldn’t be achieved in a moment. Those same walls existed in both cities and people. If the depths of the city were dark, so were the depths of people. Damp and cold. No one wanted to descend into the darkness inside them and come face to face with themselves. No one except Kamo the Barber. He looked inward. He had got to know the depths of the city by examining his own soul. “Just as I imagined.” For some people suffering was the only teacher they needed. Kamo didn’t need three days, or three generations, for him to know the city intimately; three deep wounds had sufficed.
Uncle Küheylan, on the other hand, had come to a city he had dreamed about. Here he saw a whole new nature, a new man, in stark contrast with the nature of the village where he grew up. He spoke in the tones of delirious poets, wild-eyed explorers and crazed lovers, setting greater store by a reality he had never seen than his own reality. That’s why the underground was good for him, if he had seen Istanbul from the surface he may well have been disappointed. Misfortune did not lurk in every corner of this city that had turned into a site for seeing, tasting, and pleasure, but gone too was the enchanted world of tales of old. The city that the first generations had assailed with all their energy and creativity had been replaced by lust. The driving force of love for people, for art, for dogs, was lust. Like children running into the forest and getting lost, eating everything they lay their hands on but still feeling hungry. I couldn’t tell Uncle Küheylan those things. In a cell you had to know when to keep quiet. I couldn’t say that beauty in one place is immediately lost in another, or that so many youths search in vain for a dream city.
When I was a child the lifeblood of Istanbul pulsed in the streets, but it quickly filled first with roads, then with squares, then with growing numbers of cars and grand buildings, and disappeared from our lives. Perhaps it had started to disappear before, and I just hadn’t noticed. As I left childhood behind me, growing taller by the year, architecture got taller too; progressively higher buildings sprang up on every corner. And now, were the streets dirty or grimy? Were our lives, which we lived in the streets before there were tower blocks, dingy? In the past, when the city used to sprawl out in all directions, houses would never presume to grow vertically in floors and block out the sky. Buildings were limited to the threshold of where the sky was visible. I could sense that even as a child. I could see the sky in whichever street I happened to raise my head. At that time the city’s skyline stretched out, undulating like a line of small hills that were all joined together. There were large squares beside the domes and towers. No square was crushed beneath giant shadows.
When I had visited Ragıp Paşa Library two weeks previously I noticed that it was no longer the same eye-catching landmark it had been in my childhood. The Ragıp Paşa Library, which used to preside over Laleli hill like a solitary diamond, had grown smaller, and now cowered amongst the crowds, the billboards, and the cars. The ascending pavement meant that its main entrance was now two meters below street level. Passersby did not turn and look at it, or wonder what might lie behind that door. The moment I set foot in the library’s courtyard I noticed the absence of the bustle from the street. I felt as though I was in an ancient city. The marble laid hundreds of years ago, the carved stone, and the bronze engravings were part of a forgotten era. The birds flapped their wings gently, the rose bushes shed their leaves in preparation for winter. As I looked around me in wonder, it struck me that people had a right to live without stress, and that the place where they happened to be could make that possible. Time in this cool library flowed differently from time in the city. Here it moved neither forward nor backward but drew circles around itself, as though subject to a different gravity. I pondered questions that had never occurred to me before. How could the world in this courtyard be so different from the world that lay just outside? How could a door transport us from one time to another, as though we were moving from fire to water? Especially when these two worlds were inside each other, when we could see one through the other’s window and strain our ears from one to hear the other.
I crossed to the other side of the courtyard to look for the person I was meeting in the library. I walked up the steps and went into the reading room. I remembered the small dome perched on four pillars. The walls were decorated with blue and white tiles. I looked at the books and the handwritten manuscripts in the wooden cabinets. When I used to study here as a child I would raise my head from my books and let my gaze wander inside. I had no idea how long I remained musing. The air on my face felt cool. Suddenly remembering why I was here, I shot a look at the desks in the reading room. All of them except one were occupied by students hard at work. I didn’t know who the girl I was meeting was, according to my brief I would recognize her because she would be studying a book on anatomy. Several people glanced in my direction and turned away. I walked slowly, peering at the desks, but the girl I was looking for wasn’t there. I consulted the brown wooden clock on the wall. It was ten minutes ahead of mine. Was that clock wrong, or was I late for my appointment? My fear only lasted a moment as I recalled the past. The clock had been the same when I was a child, it had always been ten minutes fast.
I returned to the courtyard.
As I contemplated the courtyard separating the library from the street lying just beyond it, I thought of the sea flowing into the Bosphorus. Istanbul resembled the waters of the Bosphorus that flowed from north to south on the surface, but did the reverse on the seabed. It showed lives that were led in the same place but worked in different ways, lives that were lived side by side but in different eras, it showed that place can rule over time and that, like a vortex, time can be carried to different places. Architects perfected the art of playing with time before physicists. Architects, who built places in the form of tunnels, could make time pass through that tunnel and transport people from one era to another. And time in that small library adjacent to the crowds flowed in a different direction, like an invisible vortex in the depths of the Bosphorus, living its calm, gentle existence in the city’s undercurrent.
The hair and clothes of the girls around me all looked the same. I always thought young people looked alike, but that was even more true today. Was it because of my advancing years? Doubtless, given the growing number of gray hairs on my head. I stood on the porch and looked out onto the courtyard. I couldn’t see anyone carrying an anatomy book. Perhaps she was there with all the other young people and I hadn’t noticed her. But she could see me and would be able to recognize me. I took Jack London’s The Sea Wolf out of my jacket pocket, ensuring the cover was facing outwards so she could see the title. Several people looked at me. Were they wondering what this man old enough to be their father was doing there? I returned to the reading room. I walked up and down, ostentatiously displaying the book, and looked straight at the girls. They returned my look. Suddenly everyone stood up, pulled out guns and started shouting, “Don’t move or you’re dead meat!” Several people ran into the reading room from the courtyard and held a gun to my head. “Are you the doctor? Are you the doctor?” When I didn’t reply they hit me on the back of my head. I fell down. The Sea Wolf tumbled out of my hand and they kicked it away. My ears rang. My head spun.
I felt as though time in here had suddenly stood still, like a broken clock, but when I left the courtyard and heard the clamor of Istanbul I came back to my senses. The police who had laid this trap had surrounded the entire area. A large inquisitive
crowd stood on the pavement and watched. Was I a murderer, a thief, a rapist? The crowd pushed and shoved to get a better look at me. As the civil police frog marched me to a car, I looked at the people’s faces. Was I living in the same time as them? Uncle Küheylan was right in saying that when people built cities they sculpted themselves at the same time, as though they were made of marble, but if he had seen the people looking at me in the street he would have pondered, then asked: “What has time in the city turned these people into?”
We heard the sound of the iron gate. I stole out of my daydreams and returned to the cell.
“Do you think they’ve brought Zinê Sevda?” asked Uncle Küheylan.
As the iron gate creaked slowly we wondered which cell the interrogators would choose, who they would take away. There were so many cells here. No soldier in the war thought he would die and neither did we. We were all thinking the same thing: In a moment they would take someone out through the iron gate, but who would it be? The best way of evading that question was to think about better things. Maybe it was morning and our bread and cheese had arrived.
Kamo the Barber raised his head and looked at the grille. “I wish they’d hurry up and come,” he said.
“They must have brought food. Are you very hungry?” I asked.
Kamo didn’t reply, he took no notice of the smile on my face. He focused on the light coming through the grille.
“Were you able to sleep?” I asked. “We talked for a long time.”
“Your talking didn’t bother me, but that dog’s barking kept waking me up.”
“Barking?”
“Didn’t you hear it?”
“No,” I said, “what would a dog be doing here?”
“You were too busy chatting, you didn’t notice it. The sound came from far away, beyond the walls.”
“You were dreaming.”
“I know the difference between dreams and reality, Doctor. Every time I heard the dog barking I opened my eyes to make sure I was in the cell. The barking was as real as this cell.”
Uncle Küheylan placed his hand on Kamo’s shoulder. “You’re right,” he said, “the barking must have come from far away and we didn’t notice it.”
Kamo looked first at the hand on his shoulder, then at Uncle Küheylan’s face. “It sounded like the barking of the white dog. The white dog’s loud bark.”
Uncle Küheylan removed his hand.
When we heard talking outside we all turned toward the door.
“These are the ones I’m taking,” said one of the speakers. As he didn’t say their names he must have been showing the guard a piece of paper.
“They’re all in the same cell,” replied the guard.
“Which cell?”
“Number 40.”
We looked at each other. We put our hands under our arms, for one last shred of warmth. We waited in silence.
The footsteps clattered on the concrete floor like stones. It was difficult to tell how many of them there were but there were more than usual. The corridor stretched endlessly, the interrogators’ words echoed on the walls and in our ears. We hoped they would walk past but they stopped at our door. They slid the iron bolt and opened the gray door. Light flooded in.
Kamo the Barber stood up before any of us.
Pushing him, the guard said “You stay put, asshole. Everyone else, out.”
3RD DAY
Told by Kamo the Barber
THE WALL
“As the sun was near to setting, a traveler clad in a black khirkah, clutching a long staff, arrived at the village nestled amongst the mountains, shrouded by clouds, which, from a distance, with its stone houses and treeless gardens, resembled a rocky wilderness. First he greeted the walls, then the dogs, and then the old men sitting in the shade of the wall. When they asked his name he replied, I am the prophet. He politely declined the villagers’ invitations to their houses. Seeing the cracked skin of the bare feet of the traveler, who had come from afar, and the trail of bloodstains he had left in his wake, they pressed him to accept, and offered him food. He drank only water and announced in soft tones, I will be the guest and eat the food of whoever believes I am a prophet. The children eyed him with curiosity, and the elders laughed. The traveler spent the night outdoors. In the morning he told them once again that he was a prophet and cried out passionately to the villagers who asked him to perform a miracle: Words that reflect the heart are the greatest miracle! Don’t look for any other miracle, believe in the word! No one believed him and the traveler spent that night too outdoors. He drank water and slept side by side with the dogs in the shade of the wall. When he spoke the next day, the children joined in with the elders’ laughter. The traveler remained serene. If that wall spoke would you, who refuse to believe me, believe the wall? he asked. Yes, we would, they all replied in unison. The traveler was a man with a black khirkah, patched trousers, and bare feet. He had no possessions except for his staff and the saddlebag slung over his shoulder. He turned and addressed the wall: Hey wall! Tell the old men and the children that I’m the prophet! Although they were skeptical, the villagers waited in silence. The wall began to speak: He’s lying! This man is not the prophet!”
How long have I been in the cell by myself? They took the Doctor, the Student, and Uncle Küheylan and left me here. As I was alone I spoke to the wall. I sat and looked at the opposite wall and told stories, laughing by myself. Time passed much more pleasantly when there was no one else here. I didn’t have to deal with anyone else’s suffering, or put up with their bullshit. I knew about human souls. They wanted the truth but they didn’t understand it. What could they believe, after all that sweat, all those possessions, and all that worship: the miracle of the wall speaking or the words the wall said? “He’s lying! This man is not the prophet!” Weren’t people themselves lies?
If the Doctor and the Student were listening they would say, “We know that story too, we tell each other stories we already know, we share what already exists.” Was there any other way? Are there any untold stories, or unspoken words left in the world? I told the customers sitting in my barbershop one spring day when no one wanted to go outside during a sudden spell of rain that lasted for hours, then I told them the story about the traveler. Of all my customers, the Architect Adaza laughed the most at the villagers’ bewilderment in the mountain village, spilling his tea over his tie. As Adaza looked into the mirror and laughed at himself too, he didn’t know that he would lie awake wide eyed that night. He left in a happy mood and returned early the following morning with bloodshot eyes.
“Kamo, tell me the truth. It’s been playing on my mind all night. Tell me, was that traveler the prophet?”
I calmed him down, and made him sit in the chair in front of the mirror with the blue frame. I ordered two glasses of tea from the tea shop next door.
“Adaza,” I said, “you’re asking me to explain, but will you take my word for it?”
“Yes I will.”
Our tea arrived. I took a sip, he paused.
“If I said I were the prophet would you believe me, Adaza?”
He didn’t answer. I offered him a cigarette and lit first his, then mine.
“You wouldn’t believe that I was the prophet,” I continued. “Okay, if that wall spoke, would you believe it?”
Adaza looked at the wall. He studied the picture of the Maiden’s Tower, the boat, the seagulls. He scrutinized the basil under the picture and the small radio at great length. His gaze switched to the flag and the poster above the mirror. He became lost in the ingenious smile of the girl in the poster, whose face and not her legs was what all the customers looked at. He became engrossed in the picture, as though he had lost touch with the girl for failing to turn up for their last rendezvous, but still cherished unforgettable memories of her. If he had honored their assignation, would they have lived together happily, somewhere far away from here? Adaza the Architect tore his eyes away from the poster, encountering his own face in the mirror with the blue frame.
“Lies!” he said, looking at himself. He paused. He took a deep drag from the cigarette and exhaled toward the mirror. As his face grew hazy in the smoke he repeated, “Lies!” A tear trickled down his face. Without another word he exited through the open door.
He never returned to my shop after that day. I thought he had found a new barber. My wife and his were close friends. One day she came to our house and told us that Adaza had left home and that no one knew where he was. After he left, their two daughters had fallen ill. His wife asked me to help her, to find Adaza and bring him home. When my wife Mahizer also pressed me to go, I went out to look for him. I looked in architects’ clubs, searched the bars in Beyoğlu, scoured the news on page three of the newspapers, and discovered at last that Adaza was hobnobbing with the homeless in the shade of the city walls. After searching the tunnels winding from Sarayburnu to Kumkapı like moleholes, meticulously checking every secret passage, asking glue-sniffing children and cheap prostitutes, I eventually found him one night at Cankurtaran, beside a fire near the railway track section of the city walls. A dozen homeless, penniless outcasts whom fate had spurned were sitting around the fire, passing around a bottle of wine, listening to the arabesque song that one of them was warbling. “Oh how pitiful is a fate like mine.” I stood beside a tree and watched them, keeping my distance for a while. As the song continued, “The world is all darkness, where is human kindness,” a train passed over the tracks. The ground beneath my feet shook. A flash of yellow light swept over the trees and vanished. By the time the sound of the train had died down, the song was also over. Someone said, “Hey traveler, talk to us like you did last night, tell us some new things.”
The traveler was none other than the Architect Adaza. With the support of his long staff, he rose to his feet. He was wearing a black khirkah. Like the traveler in the story, his feet were bare. He was like an orator addressing a venerable audience. He examined everyone carefully, then started speaking.
Istanbul, Istanbul Page 5
