Istanbul, Istanbul

by Burhan Sonmez

  I laughed as though I were in the Istanbul Palace with those older women, instead of in the cell. Leaning forward, I tried to repeat the last sentence, but I was laughing too much.

  Uncle Küheylan and Demirtay laughed even harder than I did. It was good for them to either sleep or laugh in the time left over from suffering. It brought the vigor back to their faces, and revived their voices that had been broken by torture. Like the courtiers, the more they looked at each other the more they laughed, forgetting where they were. Either that, or they laughed that heartily because they didn’t forget the cell for an instant.

  For the first few days no one could perceive what it was like here. No matter how hard he strained, he couldn’t make a connection between the cell and himself. Then he would start to think about time. Was the life we led in the city above us a few weeks, or a few hundred years ago? Was there a time difference between our lives and the lives led in the Istanbul Palace? The more we spoke the more we realized that we hadn’t landed here out of a void, but that we had come from some external time. But which time? We tried to find out by telling each other stories, by following the scent of the present moment.

  After one last guffaw, the student Demirtay fell silent. “Up until the last scene in the story everything came to life before my eyes, like a film. The ship sailing through the waves, the girl walking in the desert, the stars above the hovel, the cloud of dust in the distance . . . and then the film snapped. Once I started laughing I came out of the time in the story and returned to the time in the cell. The images in my mind vanished along with the last sentence.”

  “You said the same thing the other day about Uncle Küheylan’s wolf story. You bring everything you hear to life, like a film. Are you planning to become a filmmaker?”

  “I’d love to, so I could film these stories. If no one’s done it already . . .”

  Uncle Küheylan, who had been listening intently, joined in. “Is that a well known story?” he asked.

  “Hadn’t you heard it before?” I said.

  “No, I hadn’t.”

  “Uncle Küheylan, this is the first time any of us has told you a story you didn’t already know. We should be congratulated.”

  “Doctor,” he said, “I may know Istanbul well, but there are still plenty of stories about her that I haven’t heard. My father said he heard new names and incidents every time he went, he was always so excited when he told us his new stories. He said the streets and buildings of Istanbul grow by creating a sensation of infinity. Like a desert. In between the points where the sun rose and set there were a great many worlds, all of them different. In Istanbul, on the one hand people had the impression that they were holding the entire universe in the palm of their hand, and on the other, that they were disappearing here, their perception of themselves changed every day, along with their perception of the city. One evening my father met an old man on the shore of the Golden Horn. The man was holding a round pocket mirror. He kept looking first at the mirror, then at the opposite shore. My father sat beside him. He greeted him and waited for a while. I’m observing my unsightliness in the mirror, said the old man. I didn’t look like this when I was young, I was handsome. I fell in love with a girl and married her. We had children. We spent forty happy years together. When my wife died last week we buried her in a graveyard close to Pier Loti, on that hillside opposite us. Once my wife’s gaze was gone, my good looks too became a thing of the past. The years have slipped by so quickly. Now, whenever I look in the mirror, I notice how old and ugly I’ve become.”

  Uncle Küheylan bent his knees, leaned against the wall and, sitting up very straight, continued.

  “After my father had told us that story he said the number of people who used to think they were good looking but now find themselves ugly, and who regard Istanbul in the same light, is growing bigger all the time. Raising his hand toward the light, he said, I’ll show you those people’s time. He made a reflection on the wall that looked like a bird with broad wings. Look, he said, this is the bird of time. In the past it flies and flies and flies. When it reaches the present day its wings come to a halt. It remains suspended in the wind. Time in Istanbul is the same. It flaps its wings in the past. When it reaches the present day its wings come to a halt, and it glides slowly in emptiness.”

  Uncle Küheylan looked at his large hands. He stretched out his fingers as though they were large feathers.

  “Although I believed in the bird of time when I was a child,” he went on, “I found it hard to grasp the concept of the Istanbul my father talked about. It’s only now in the cell that I understand it. Every time I open my eyes I see a black winged bird above me. The bird of time circles above us without ever flapping its wings.”

  We raised our heads and looked at the ceiling. It was dark. It was deep. We became absorbed in it, as though this were the first time we had ever beheld such intense darkness, as though it would swallow us up in its vortex. Prior to us, who had crossed this darkness? Who had managed to stay alive, and who had taken their last breath here? It was as though we had been born underground instead of above it, with each passing day we became a bit more oblivious of the outside world. If the opposite of cold was hot we knew the word hot, but couldn’t remember what sort of thing it was. Like worms in the earth, we had grown accustomed to the darkness and damp. If they didn’t torture us, we would live forever. Bread, water, and a bit of sleep were all we needed. If we stood up and stretched out our hand, would we be able to reach the darkness above?

  “Uncle Küheylan,” I said, “one day we’ll get out of here. We’ll explore Istanbul together. Then we’ll sit on the balcony of my apartment that overlooks the sea. You’ll tell stories and I’ll listen.”

  “Why will I tell them and not you?”

  “You know more stories than there are in the Decameron, Uncle Küheylan. Do you like rakı? We’ll accompany our stories with rakı.”

  “That sounds perfect. Why don’t we prepare a rakı banquet this evening, Doctor?

  “Good idea. I’ll cook the food. I’ll make fish. But how will we know it’s evening?”

  “Given that we don’t know about time, then we’re its masters. Here it’s evening when we want it to be, and the sun rises when we want it to.”

  The student Demirtay sat up like a mischievous child. “Are you going to invite me, too? You won’t exclude me from the rakı just because I’m young, will you?” he said.

  Uncle Küheylan and I looked at each other. We donned doubtful expressions.

  “Uncle Küheylan,” continued Demirtay. “If you like I’ll go down to the beach where the fishermongers are. I know where they sell the best fish. I’ll get salad from the greengrocer’s on the way back, and a big bottle of rakı from the corner shop.”

  “It’s still early.”

  “What are you talking about? What if it’s almost evening, what if the sun has descended onto the rooftops? What if the streets are full of screaming schoolchildren on their way home from school?”

  “There’s no need to rush, we need to think about it.”

  “Uncle Küheylan, if you invite me to your dinner I’ll tell you the answer to yesterday’s riddle.”

  “The riddle?”

  “Then, if you like, I’ll ask you another riddle . . .”

  Uncle Küheylan paused, then spoke slowly. “You’ll go down to the beach. You’ll select the choicest fish. And on the way back you’ll get salad and rakı. Is that right?”

  “There’s no need for you to go out and get tired. You can sit and chat on the balcony overlooking the sea and tell your stories. I’ll do the shopping and be back before the evening crowds. And in the meantime I’ll eavesdrop on the people talking in the street and the fish market and on the bus, I’ll find out who rigged the latest horse races, where the latest fire broke out and who is the latest singer to get divorced. I’ll get a newspaper as well.”

  “Don’t forget to buy lemons,” I added. “I’ll lay the table. I’ll pour the rakı. As th
e city lights go on one by one, I’ll put the stereo on and play you my favorite songs.”

  “Yes, let’s listen to songs,” said Uncle Küheylan, “But if I try and sing when I’m drunk, don’t let me. Some people are famous for their beautiful voices. I’m known for how badly I sing. The villagers who heard me sing changed their minds and went in the opposite direction.”

  Uncle Küheylan laughed heartily.

  “I’ve got a terrible voice too,” I said. “When I’m drinking rakı I only listen to my wife. There aren’t many voices as beautiful as hers.”

  “Does she like rakı too?”

  “She did. She died a long time ago. When her disease started to spread, she secretly recorded her voice onto cassettes. She knew that was the best way for her to sit at the same table with me for the rest of my life. In the evenings, after I put on the stereo, I sit at the table and fill my glass. I become engrossed in contemplating Istanbul. The lights on either side of the sea look like the magical lands in fairy tales. The walls and towers of Topkapı Palace rise up like the palace of the fairy king. The hazy lights are a fine veil that gently envelops the walls. On the left the lights of the Maiden’s Tower, the Selimiye Barracks, and, if I’m lucky and it’s a clear day, the Princes’ Islands in the distance, twinkle. I can’t work out when I drained my second glass and started on my third. My wife’s voice singing a classical Turkish song crackles out of the stereo. She’s singing about separation city. Separation is a city far removed from hope. Not a single bird, nor piece of news, nor greeting reaches us from there. There are only hopeless cries, futile waiting, and a mournful rather than comforting evening. The rakı in the bottle decreases, while the stars in the sky increase. Just then my wife starts a new song. Everywhere there are flowers blooming. The evening sways, like a crystal chandelier. There are ferries’ horns in the distance, and seagulls drawing lines in the sky with their wings . . .”

  I raised my head and looked up. Was the bird of time circulating above us, was it marking the way for us in the darkness? Would we ever be able to leave here and go to a balcony, would we really be able to chat looking out at the sea, engrossed in contemplating Istanbul?

  “Uncle Küheylan, nowadays I’m like the man your father met at the Golden Horn,” I said, continuing, “When I remember my wife I think I also get carried away by the thought that the happiness of the past belongs only to the past.”

  Demirtay looked at me quizically. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen you sad, Doctor,” he said.

  “Sad? I don’t know about that. I try to think nice thoughts in here, and when it comes to sorrows, I prefer to drown them at the rakı banquet.”

  “I’m invited to your banquet too, aren’t I? I can tell from the way you’re talking.”

  I didn’t reply. I waited for Uncle Küheylan to speak.

  Once he had scrutinized Demirtay a bit harder, Uncle Küheylan told him what he wanted to hear. “You’re a bright kid. Come and join us tonight. We can all drink rakı together.”

  Instead of being happy, Demirtay leaned forward looking irritated. “Uncle Küheylan, could you stop calling me a kid? I’m obviously not a kid if I’m going to your rakı banquet.”

  “It’s just habit, Demirtay. You’re a fine young man.”

  Satisfied, Demirtay withdrew and leaned against the wall. “Are you going to invite Zinê Sevda too?” he asked.

  “Good idea. I’ll ask her along too.”

  A sea breeze blew in under the cell door. All three of us fixed our gaze on the door. The breeze that had brushed against the concrete and flowed inside, brought the smell of the sea with it and deposited it on our bare feet. It was the harbinger of news from a salty, seaweedy world. We felt the cold rising up from our ankles. It was a momentary sensation. Sometimes we would catch the scent of the sea, sometimes of pine, sometimes of orange peel, and we would do our best to cling to that sensation that slipped away in an instant. Before it abandoned us in the cell and returned to where it belonged in the Bosphorus, we would inhale it eagerly, drawing the scent into our lungs. We were never satisfied, we always craved more. Perhaps we would also be able to hear the howling of the storm, if we had just a little more faith in our fantasies and abandoned ourselves just a little bit more to our longing, we would be able to hear the sound of the waves swelling in the north wind, and the engines of the fishing boats.

  “Doctor,” said Uncle Küheylan, like an elderly fisherman calling out through the waves, but whose voice broke up in the storm, “what was that book you were talking about just now, the book with all those stories?”