Summer in Dersim

DERSIM

I have never seen the Dersim region covered by an official English guidebook. (Maybe that’s changed with the newest edition of Lonely Planet) God knows why. Fear of the PKK, obesiance to the general Turkish taboo on even mentioning the region or just simply not on the plate of the authors they choose? Whatever the reason, they’re missing out on perhaps one of the best regions of the country.  We spent a few days in Dersim this summer and this entry will hopefully give you enough of a taste to make you want to go there yourself and help you do it, too.

Dersim (whose official name, for the moment at least, remains Tunceli for those with maps) is culturally contrary and complex. Almost entirely enclosed by steep mountains and filled with canyons and gorges,  it was thus, for centuries, too difficult of access for the government to effectively control. It was and is populated mostly by Alevi Kurds speaking a dialect of Kurdish called Zaza by the mainstream and Dimilli by natives of the region.

An aside—Alevis, in brief, are a kind of fusion faith of Islam with local Anatolian animism and Bektaşi mysticism, all with a dash of Zoroasteriansm and Christianity. (Think Mexican Catholicism) They don’t worship in mosques, but rather places called Cem Houses, and men and women lead the worship together, mostly with music and dancing. Ali is the most important figure—and like Shiis, in their ceremonies they remember the massacre of Hasan and Husseyn at Kerbala. They have been ruthlessly, at times, persecuted by the state and the majority, most recently when a mob, most likely with government collusion, burned down the Madimak Hotel in Sivas which was hosting an Alevi convention. 35 people died in the fire.

Most people in Dersim setttled because they were fleeing something—either they were Alevis fleeing the massacres of Sultan Yavuz the Grim or, according to one researcher, Zoroastrian Armenians fleeing the recently Christianized Armenia. More recently, some came because they were seeking refuge from the Armenian Genocide or because they were bandits who made their living raiding travelers from the mountains. Whatever the reason and because they were largely Kurds and Alevi and preferred to act independently of the central government, they were not well-liked in Ankara and thus, in 1938, the Turks decided to pacify the region—relocating thousands on forced marches into exile and murdering thousands more in a feverish ethnic cleansing. The scars are still evident in the region today. The 1938 massacres is what gives the region it’s air of taboo—nationalist still stridently deny it ever happened (but if it did they deserved it, of course) though the current government has issued a mild apology for the events. In 1936, the name was changed to Tunceli (and some of the original Dersim lands parceled out to surrounding provinces) as part of a Turkification process and apparently a change back to ‘Dersim’ is now on the official docket—but we’ll see. Using the word ‘Dersim’, at least as far as I can see, marks you politically as against the nationalists so be warned.

Enough history—onto the travels.

We rented a car in Elazığ and drove up from Kovancılar, through Mazgirt. The first place we stopped was Tunceli, a city built on mountainsides surrounding the famous Munzur River. The weather was excruciatingly hot and so we ducked into one of the cafes along the river and had a glass of cold Coke on the terrace. The view was beautiful—the blue-green river wound under a bridge just below the cliffs from where we sat. There are dozens of terraced cafes around here. Many at night feature live music—some kind of free style where any musician can hop on stage and some following a schedule of professional musicians.

The Munzur River



A roadside 'scenic point' on the Munzur

An aside--Dersim produces some of the best music in all of Turkey, perhaps in all of the Middle East. It’s some witchy combination of suffering and independence and awe-filled nature and mountain-folk resiliance, perhaps. Or maybe, as the pop-culture site Ekşi Sözlük (Sour Dictionary) suggests, it’s because as Alevis and Zazas and Kurds, they are a minority of a minority of a minority. Just a brief and rather inadequate preview of music is called for at this point, for if you travel there you should have at least a passing familiarity. First, let’s start with Mikail Aslan from Tunceli who sings mostly in Zaza (Dimilli) but also in Kurmanci, Armenian and Turkish. He uses a blend of traditional instruments like the bağlama and occasionally western ones, especially the clarinet. Here’s one of my favorites by him, a tad upbeat in what generally is a genre of melancholy. It’s called Way Way Ninna.  

Ahmet Aslan is his cousin from another Dersim city, Hozat. We saw him in concert last year at the Dersim Music and Culture festival and he was mesmerizing—one of those musicians who never really address the crowd and spend all their time absorbed in their art—a stellar live performer (even if he made the halay dancing crowds angry for not pandering to them). Here’s a rather melancholy one by him that I am fond of.

Here’s another rather melancholyone by Emir Erdoğan, a musician from the village of Zımteq in Hozat. In an interview, Erdoğan explained being a Dersimli thusly, ‘Dersim is the nationality of exiles. We suffered through two very serious forced exiles and in a sense, they’ve never ended for we are still in exile.’

Finally, I have to mention Aynur Doğan who sings in Zaza, Kurmanci, and Turkish. She is from Çemişgezek and has a voice like an atom bomb. True to form, the Turkish government banned her albums for a while and she was chased off the stage by nationalists at one of the concerts we attended a couple of years ago—a sure sign of quality in these parts. Here’s a sample.

There’s tons more but those four give you a taste.

The Munzur Gorge
 

 

From Tunceli we set out through the Munzur Valley. ‘Valley’ is a dictionary translation for the Turkish ‘vadi’, but only because Turkish generally doesn’t bother making a distinction between a valley and a canyon. Munzur Vadisi is a canyon—and the road winds along the blue-green Munzur River through a deep, forbidding gorge with cliffs of red, maroon, and umber rock that are utterly gorgeous. In my opinion, it rivals the canyons of America’s Southwest. The mesmerizing drive through the gorge alone is worth the trip. There are a few little trout restaurants along the river where people eat, drink and swim. This is one thing I love about the Dersimlis—they swim! The people over the border in Bingöl are afraid of water—either it’s too cold and it will shut down your kidneys or it’s too warm and will make your heart stop or it’s fresh water and so it sucks you under or it’s a dam lake so your foot will get caught on a house. But not the Dersim folks—they are in the water everywhere we look.



And here is where Seyid Rıza took the oath with his posse

Swimming at Halvori Boils

About 15 kilometers up from Tunceli Center you crest a narrow incline and start dipping down into a cleft between two steep canyon walls. There’s a turn off along the gorge wall toward a place the signs call ‘Halburi Gözeler’—göze means ‘spring boil’ and there are thousands of boils all along the river feeding the waters.  It’s a fantastic spot for a swim and a lunch—maybe one of the best places I’ve swum, ever. Certainly in the top 10.

To get to Halburi, you follow a sign to the ‘gözeler’ and veer off right onto a dirt road that winds down to the Munzur. After about five minutes, you spot a little cafe with tables set up amongst the tree roots that spider among the shallows of the river, so you can cool your feet as you drink your tea or beer. Here, the river bottom is all soft sand and clear at the shoreline, but brilliant cold green and deep in the center—you can jump from the cliffs on the other side with no problem. Across the water, bursting out of a cave in the cliff is a waterfall of ice cold spring water (the gözeler). The springs have made a bubbling pool inside the cave. I swam over to the waterfall and was joined by two local boys. In sun-drenched silence, we watched the trout play under a rocky overhang for a few seconds, then they asked my name and launched immediately into politics. They couldn’t have been more than fifteen. The conversation started with ‘Where are you from?’ and quickly jumped into ‘We are Alevis and we hate Erdoğan. Can you believe he wants to dam this river?’

Dams are a big problem in this region—but they didn’t start with the AKP. A similar river in my wife’s province of Bingöl, the Peri, has been dammed eight times since the early 80’s with a ninth one planned. The level of corruption is absurd—everyone knows these rivers can barely sustain one dam but someone is lining their pockets with the money from these projects. Most locals theorize that the government does it to disrupt the movement of guerilla troops.There are plans now by the government to dam the Munzur despite the environmental havoc it would wreak.

Halburi is spelled many ways, Xalwori on the Zaza sign near the restaurant and Halvori in a 19th century travel book I discovered—written by a Captain L. Molyneuz-Seel during an exploration he undertook of the region for National Geographic at the end of the 1800’s. Of ‘Halvori’ he writes, ‘About 300 feet above the river bed is the last Armenian monastery in Dersim, Surp Garabet Vank, and it only survives because the Kurds believe it possesses a miraculous relic of St. John the Baptist. To this day, Kurds make pilgramages to the monastery to be cured of diseases. Curiously enough, the disease which most frequently brings them to the monastery is said by the monks to be insanity. The community consists of one monk and his three nephews, without exception the dirtiest and most degraded looking people I have seen in all of Dersim.’

We saw no traces of a monastery here—though it would have been up on the cliffs above. The owner of the cafe, when asked about the name Halvori, said it was neither Turkish, Kurmanci, nor Zaza. We asked if he thought it was Armenian and he simply said he had no truck with the past. According to a book on Dersim by local Hüseyin Aygün, there were once 12 churches in the area. The book I speak of is Dersim 1938, the Official story and the Truth, and in it I find Halvori’s other claim to fame. It was here, at the very boils where I jumped into the river, that Seyid Riza and his alleys made an oath to resist the Turkish forces that were massacring Dersim’s villages. According to a book by Hüseyin Aygün, “In Spring, because of the military operations, all the clans were in an uproar. A meeting was held at the Halvori Boils in March. It was joined by Seyid Rıza, Seyid Hüseyin, and the Ağas Cebrail, Kamer, and Fındık. They arrived at the opinion that if the government’s intentions were bad, then they had the right to defend their lives. With this, they threw stones into the Munzur. They swore on oath, passing these rocks from hand to hand and tossing them in the water. A few months later, in the summer of 1938, Turkish soldiers gathered together all the villagers in front of the mills and massacred them, then threw the bodies in the river. For days, the river was clogged with corpses.”

There you have why perhaps so much of Dersims natural grandeur is also tinged with gloom and resistance. Here is this breath-stealing gorgeous swimming-hole in a beautiful canyon, and it’s filled with the ghosts of two genocides. It’s a jeweled, haunted, gorgeous, tough-skinned, welcoming and melancholy place.  

While traveling through the canyon you’ll see all sorts of banners, posters, and grafitti hanging from trees and strung—improbably—across cliff-faces. One of the one’s you will see most is Seyid Rıza himself, who, as mentioned above, was one of the leaders of the Dersim Rebellion against Turkish troops once they started ethnic cleansing the region. Turkey executed him for treason (if resisting a genocide is treason)—in a manner that I think still reflects a still-current national zeitgeist of ignoring the law and exacting a revenge for people trying to stop you from murdering them. The trial was conducted in a language none of the suspects understood and no translators were provided. Because Ataturk was coming to visit and because the prosecutors feared he might issue an amnesty, they pushed for a verdict on a Saturday, when courts do not normally operate. Seyid Rıza reportedly did not understand what was happening at all until he saw the gallows. I don’t know if it’s apocryphal or not, but his last words were, “I have a 40 lira watch. Give it to my son.” To which the gallows men replied, “We will hang him, too.” Rıza—who had already lost one child in the fighting said, referring to his children, “I have lost the key to these mountains! At least, hang him before me.” And of course, the authorities did not comply. Another famous last line, oft quoted, was this, “Ben sizin yalan ve hilelerinizle basedemedim bu bana dert oldu ama ben de sizin önünüzde egilmedim bu da size dert olsun.” I could not cope with your lies and trickery and this became a terrible grief for me, but I never lowered my head to you, and this will become a terrible grief for you.”

The other poster face you will see is that of Ibrahim Kaypakkaya, the iconic image of him being that of a kind-looking, young worker type in a granpa hat. He was the leader of the Turkish communists and formed the organization TİKKO (workers and peasants liberation army) which was the armed wing of his version of the Communist party. They were active in the Dersim region, where he was finally caught after a battle with government forces and brought to Diyarbekir prison. There, as was most everyone who was brought to Diyarbekir’s prisons, he was tortured before being executed. MIT (Turkey’s CIA, not the university) called him the ‘most dangerous revolutionary in Turkey.’ He is revered now as a kind of Turkish Che Guevara for having spoken out against Kemalism and the rather monolithic ideology of the Turkish State.

The road to Ovacık

And speaking of communists, we speed past the occasional images of these guys toward our ultimate destination, the source of the Munzur River (The Munzur Gözeleri) which lies just 15km north of Ovacık, a town which recently elected the communist party to head the municipality. I know, crazy! The road through Ovacık is breathtaking—a flat red plane of farmland that runs straight into the stark wall of red and maroon peaks of the the Mercan Mountain range. “This looks like how I always imagined Uzbekistan or one of those countries,” says our traveling companion, Carolilna. There seem to be no trees on the mountains—just cliff and crag, rock and precipice. They are utterly breathtaking. We stop in Ovacık for some fruit and snacks—I don’t know that a see any signs of a communist government anywhere, but the beer if 50 kuruş cheaper and the grapes are good.

Communist Ovacık with a little nod to Gezi

The Gözeler are 15 kilometers further up at the end of the road. We park in a kind of festival atmosphere among vendor stalls and outdoor gözleme restaurants. The water is below. Each set of boils is enclosed by a wall that captures the spring water in a bright, clear pool. People fill their water bottles here, and the water is so cold that just holding my hand in it for more than five seconds freeze-burns my skin. We hike up a trail behind the boils where you find more springs popping out the mountain side in little streams, though there was not much snow this year and lots of dry streambeds spider-web through the meadows as evidence of the drought. The trail winds into the high pastures and valleys of the Mercan peaks and offers stark views of the valley below with its bright green poplars and willows along the water’s edge.



The shrine at the entrance to the gözler

The valley above the boils

At the entrance to the Gözeler is a shrine in the side of a mountain called a ‘Ziyaret’ in Alevi culture, which means ‘visit’ in Turkish. Some Alevi traditions are animistic—if there is a cave or a spring or a mountain top, then people will set up a shrine to the power that dwells there. Generally, you light candles and pray or make wishes. Some ziyarets are thought to have the power to heal. We see these ziyarets all throughout the Dersim region. A man at the boils sells us candles for 30 kuruş each. After we light them, he hands us a piece of lokma (parxaç in my wife’s region of Xolxol) which is a sacred bread appropriate for the atmosphere of the place.

People climbing rocks above the willows at the boils

Folks dancing the govend/halay in the meadows above the boils

Among the pools of the boils are picnic tables and families enjoying a days outing. People barbecue and play volleyball or just sit and chat on the bridges.

We stay the night near Ovacık in a bungalow cabin called Elbaba Camping. It sits up from the river and has wonderful views of the Mercan mountains. The owner is named Mahmut Bey and he’s a bank of information on everything from geology to biology to local history. We learn from him just how much of the region we have missed. North of here is a waterfall called the 40 Stairs Fall (Kırk Merdiven Şelalesi) which is one of the highest in the world. Also nearby is Mercan Canyon, even more stark than the Munzur Canyon, he promises, and there’s even a third canyon accessible only by strenuous hiking. Over the peaks of the the Mercan mountains are 7 crater lakes and another gorge called the Havaçor. Mahmut Bey offers hiking tours to all of the above which, unfortunately, we did not have the time to take advantage of.

Mahmut Bey is an interesting guy. His campgrounds/hotel is full of birds—ducks, geese, chickens and pigeons, all of whom come waddle-running when he whistles. For a while, he had a sort of pet bear that he fed honey to just outside the hotel grounds. ‘It got to where I would find him sitting out on the roadside around dinner time!’ Mahmut Bey explains. ‘But I stopped doing that. A biologists told me that it would hurt his immune system because he would stop hunting and only focus on what I fed him.’ He also knows a lot about the local flora of the region—with books upon books about the different herbal treatments they are useful for.

El Baba Camping

 

Elbaba has a firepit and Mahmut Bey’s staff set up a large screen to watch movies. We watched Animal Planet as we chatted around the flames and sipped beers. In short, we loved Mahmut Bey and Elbaba and would highly recommend him to anyone staying in the region. It’s worth a few days in that mountain air.

Taking a right out of Tunceli City brings you to the Kutu Deresi, or Box River. The river is famous for ‘flowing red’ during the Dersim Massacres of 1938. Now it flows a bright pretty blue among small reddish gorges of it’s own. We stopped at a little cafe along the Kutu and had a delicious fried trout by the water. I swam of course—the water was so cold it took the breath away but the scenery was, as usual, breathtaking.

A cafe along the Kutu Deresi

A delicious fried trout

A distant waterfall from the roadside, on the way to Nazmiye

 

We continue up the river toward Duzgun Baba, a holy mountain to the Alevis, passing waterfalls and gorges and picturesque little villages of stone houses. The turn off for Duzgun Baba winds up a tiny curving road past flocks of goats and little creeks until the pavement gives out on the slopes of Duzgun itself. At the base of the mountain you can have tea or sacrifice a goat if you want, and then begin your ascent. The climb is not hard—you never have to do anything too serious or strenuous, but you should be fit and wear long pants—there are thistles and thorns everywhere. At the top is a gorgeous view of all the surrounding region—kilometers and kilometers of mountains. There’s also a ziyaret—a long pile of rocks that’s supposed to be mark the place that the saint disappeared.

From the climb up Duzgun Baba



From near the peak of Duzgun Baba

The ziyaret at the top of Duzgun

From the slopes of Duzgun you can see Mt. Silbus in the distance

The story of Duzgun is this. In Zaza, his name is Bava Duzgi and he was a shepherd during a time of severe drought. Only Duzgi’s goats seemed to be flourishing during the drought and curious as to how it was possible, Duzgi’s father, a Dervish, followed him up the mountain to watch him pasture his animals. There he saw his son wave a staff over the earth which immediately began to flower. One of the goats noticed Duzgi’s dad as he fed and sneezed. Duzgi looked up to see what the goat was bleating about. “What’s up? Did you see my father Mahmut?” he asked and then caught sight of his father out of the corner of his eyes. ‘Ashamed of having called out his father’s first name,’ the signboard at the mountain somewhat mysteriously explains, ‘Duzgi ran up the mountain and vanished. In three steps he cleared five kilometers and those three footprints are still visible on the mountain today.’ He is considered the strongest saint in Dersim and according to the aşık’s (Dersim’s traditional bards), he is the head of 366 saints. The mountain possesses certain powers, thanks to the saint. It can give a person a son, for example, and also can solve personal problems among people. If you have an issue with someone, you simply climb to the top of the mountain and pray for advice.

After Duzgun we drive  back down and take the road toward the town of Nazmiye. At the town center, we turn left to head up toward a place called Der Ova—a ‘waterfall’ recommended to us by one of the locals. We’re not sure exactly what to expect as the road gradually gets rougher and rougher and we shift into lower and lower gears. The scenery reminds me of the Painted Desert of Arizona—rocks and cliffs suddenly give way to these cone-hills of chemically colored sand, earthy maroons, reds, oranges, greens and yellows. A ‘kalekol’ or ‘police fortress’ looms up on our right. It’s a new one—freshly constructed. This is the Turkish government’s answer to the so-called Kurdish peace process, dozens of new military bases all throughout the region. The military presence has been heavy since we crossed the official Tunceli border, actually.  A couple of panzers were stopping cars just outside of Mazgırt for instance.

Anyway, we arrive at Derova and find a trout farm on a creek and a trail up to a large cliff wall that stretches maybe a hundred meters along the forest. A waterfall tumbles over the full length of the cliff and  a cafe has been constructed along the base of the falls. Some of the tables sit in the water.

The falls along the cliff wall at Dereova Cafe

A flower near the falls

 

A view from the tables in the cafe
 

We stop and have tea here, listen to a random performance by an old moustachioed aşık and then hike up into the mountains on a flower filled trail streaked with more mini-falls and streams. Like everywhere else in Dersim, the place is so tranquil and beautiful that we end up staying for a couple of hours instead of the intended few minutes, and then that doesn’t seem enough. There’s a story about Derova in Molneux-Seel’s book on his travels in Dersim. I quote:

“Der Ova is a corruption of the Armenian, Der Ohan or ‘Father John’. There was once a monastery and Armenian community here and this is the story of how it came to be abandoned. Forty years ago (1860ish) here lived a certain Armenian Melik, very rich and wealthy who had acquired such renown for his wisdom that the Kurds, whenever a dispute rose among them, used to appeal to him and accept his decision. One day, forty Kurds from Kutu Dere came to him and asked his decision in the case of a dispute that threatened to cause a bloody feud among them. During their stay at Der Ohan, the Kurds one day ventured to address some words of love to the beautiful daughter-in-law of the Melik as she was drinking from a well. The young Armenians were so incensed at this that that same night they massacred the entire Kurdish deputation. Then, fearing terrible vengeance, they collected their animals and possessions and took refuge in some villages around Erzincan. The fugitives numbered about 300, only a few old men with their wives stayed. Of these one survivor remains in the village to this day. The old man has two sons and two daughters, whom have all married Kurds and become Moslems.”

We head back to Elazığ on a different route—turning right out of Tunceli toward the town of Pertek. We don’t have time to stop in Pertek except for a bathroom break—but the restaurant we choose is so friendly what we can’t just take a leak and leave. They start to show us all the pictures of Dersim on the wall and explain each one. We finally have to beg a time crunch to escape their enthusiasm. The town if full of large adobe and stone houses that I have seen nowhere else in Turkey and sports a mosque that looks a lot like the black and white mosques in Diyarbekir. The road to Elazığ, as it turns out, is on a ferry across the Murat Dam. In the middle of the pale powder blue lake is the grand Pertek Castle which looms up picturesque as we cross the water. A scenic end to a scenic trip. On an another trip, I think Pertek would be worth a half-day stay. There’s a hot spring and the castle here and some grand mountain scenery.

Pertek Castle from the Ferry

The more people we talk to the more we find out about how much there is to see in Dersim. The town of Hozat, for example, you can find the 4000 year old Iron Age caves of Kalecik Village or the 3000 year old newly discovered ancient ruins of Rabat Castle. We will definitely be heading back.

 

Travel Info:

Transportation: You can rent a car—which in my opinion is the best thing to do—in Elazığ. We rented from Seyran Rentacar, run by Ömer Bey who was an excellent host. He even drove us around to do a few little errands before he took us to the airport to pick up our friends who were joining us on our Dersim trip. The car, in the summer rush (when nothing anywhere was available, reserve ahead!) was 120 TL a day. The phone number is 0530 263 9136. Ömer Bey speaks enough English to set you up. There are also minibusses that go to Tunceli from Elazığ airport and then minibusses from Tunceli center that go to all the places I’ve mentioned above.

For lodging—we stayed in student dorms, but also in Ovacık, at El Baba Camping, run by the excellent Mahmut-Bey. The food is good, breakfast is provided (and very local), and he provides information on rafting and leads his own treks. He speaks German but very little English—still, it’s enough to book. http://www.elbabaturizm.com.tr/konaklama

 

Türkiye'nin nesine alışmak en zor geliyor? What is the most difficult thing to get used to in Turkey?

(English below)

Bunlardan biri olmaya çalışıyorum aslında

Birkaç yıl önce, eşimin kuzeni bir sunucu olarak Istanbulun radyo kanallarından birinde bir gece programı yapıyordu. Bir akşam, saat 11de, sırf zevk için ben onun konuğu oldum. Temamız ‘Bir yabancının gözünden Istanbul!’ Şarkılar arasında dinleyiciler aklarına gelen her hangi bir soru sormaya davet ettik. ‘Eveeet arayın konuşalalım, konuşalım arayıııın!’ İlk sorulan soru şuydu: ‘Türkiye’nin nesine alışmak en zor geliyor size?’ Mutlaka ‘kellepaça!’ yada ‘kokoreç’ söylememı bekliyormuştur ama cevabım şimdi de o zamandakiyle aynı: Alışveriş gittiğimde her yerde aynı çocuk eleman olarak çalışıyor. Ne tür dukkan olsa olsun, neyi satarlarsa satsınlar, ama hep aynı jöleli saçlı, sağ elinde cep telefon, sol elinde sigara, siyah deri ceketi giyen kirli sakallı delikanlı kapı da kıpır kıpır müsterileri karşılıyor. İstisnasız!

Işimizi kolaylaştırmak için böyle bir çocuğa ‘Burak’ diyelim, zira Türkiye’deki ilk öğrettiğim sınıfımda bu tipe benzer bir ‘Burak’ vardı. Neyse bu Burak tipi bana her şey ama herşey satmış oldu--balı, vesika fotoğraflarını, tabakları, ekmeği, ve oyuncakları da. Evimizin karşısındaki çiçekci? Burak. Deri ceketin altında gömlek düğmeleri karnına kadar açık ama çok nazik, zarif bir buket yapabilir. Bir gün eşimin sütyeni alması lazım diye bir iş çamaşır dukkanına daldik, tabii ki Burak kasadaydı. Amerika’da olsaydık böyle bir tipin bir sütyen satmasını görseydim hemen polis çağırdım çünkü, emin olun ki, ya timarhane yeni kaçan bir sapık olurdu ya toplumun güvenliği için bir timarhaneye gitmesi lazım olurdu.

Bir Burak’ı görünce hemen Asi Gençlik filminde James Dean’ın oynadığı serseri ‘Jim Stark’ aklıma geliyor. Kılık kıyafet aynı zaten. Jim bir sahnede kasabanın en vahşi zorbayla dalaşıyor, herifin boğazına bir bıçak dayanıyor ve karnından yarayacağını tehdit ediyor. Böyle bir serseriden eşinizin iç çamaşırı alınır mı? Ama Türkiye’de aynı tipin dün bir pastane’de çalıştığını gördüm. Hatta ondan bir uğur böceğinin şeklinde çok şirin bir kek aldım. Bir de o yapmış.

‘Dilimleyelim mi?’

‘Yoooo kardesim, kesmeniz gerek yok. Merak etmeyin, biz evde yaparız. Bıçak yer de birakın, ne olur?’

Amerika’dan getirdiğim şuursuz kanaatimin yüzünden,her böyle siyah deri ceketli sigara içen çocuğu gördüğüm zaman, tepkisel olarak cuzdanım halen cebimde olup olmadığını kontrol ederek, adımlarımı hızlandırıp kaçıyorum. Yani, bu ülkede alişverişi bir türlü halledemem.

Birinin giyim kuşamı resmen sinyal, yani subliminal mesajları yayıyor ve bu mesajlar bilinç altında bir otomatik tepki uyandırıyor.  Üstelik kültürünüze göre aynı giysının farklı mesajı verebilir.

Mesela, bıyıklar.

Türkiye’de bir bıyık maço sembol olarak kabul ediliyor—neden olmasın? Bir iki istisna hariç (örneğin beş sene önce çalıştığım okulun sosyal öğretmeni) kadınlar doğru dürüstce gür bir bıyığı beceremezler. Ayrıca, Türkiye’de bir bıyık bir erkeğin siyasal kimliğini bile tespit edebiliyor. Başbakan gibi dar ve biraz Şarlo’nun oynadığı karakteri ‘Büyük Dikatör’ü anımsatan bir bıyığınız varsa, AKPlisiniz, belki de kendinizi liberal muhafazakarlardan biri olarak tanımlıyorsunuz. Dudaklarınızı gizleyen tropikal ormanı gibi pos bıyığınız var mı? Solcusunuz, Kürt bile olabilirsiniz. Barış Mançovari sarkık bir bıyığınız varsa, kesinlikle bir milliyetçisiniz, belki MHP’ye oy veriyorsunuz. Bir website buldum bile, Osmanlı zamanında hangi bıyığın hangi mesleğe uymasını anlatıyor. Mesela ‘karanfil bıyığı’ diye bir şey varmış. Şairlere ait olan ‘kararınca uzatılmış, üst dudak yine tam şekliyle görünür’ bir türmüş. Amerika ise, bir bıyığın sadece iki anlamı var. Ya geysin ya pornucusun. O kadar.

Normal bir erkeklik aksesuarı olarak bıyıklar 70lerde modası geçmiş oldu. (Gerçi hiç kimse babama haber vermemiş) Bugünkü moda dünyasında bir bıyık bırakmak bir gramofonı satın almak gibi bir şey. Fakat, gey kesimlerde halen bir fetiş olarak duruyormuş. Belki Freddy Mercury ve Village People’nın yüzünden. ‘YMCA’ şarkısını söyleyen var ya? Hepsi gey ve hepsi pos bıyıklı. O zaman niye pornucularda da var diye merak ediyor musunuz? Hani, en heteroseksüel görünmek isteyenler onlar değil mi? Valla bilimiyorum, ama o sektörde antik zamandan kalma bir maço sembolunun statüsünü koruyor. Maşallah.

Her neyse Türkiye’de her bıyıklı adam gördüğümde ilk aklıma gelen ‘bu adam gey’! İkinci aklıma gelen ‘ya pornucu?’ Ondan sonra Örümcek Adam’ın tehlikeleri önceden haber veren Örümcek Hissi gibi benim ‘Türkiye hissim’ devreye girip, bu adam hangi partiye ait olduğunu çözmeye çalışmaya başlıyorum.’ İtiraf etmek zorunda kalsam bir hastalıktan mustarıp oluyorum—Freud’in tarif ettiği ‘bıyık kışkançlığı’. Babamın Alevi dedesi gibi pos bıyığına rağmen benim ki en gür halinde bile bir çölün solmuş ölmüş çalısı gibi oluyor, ki, bu ülkede beni bir hilkat garibesini ediyor. Muhtemelen bana da Başbakan ‘ucube’ derdi, görseydi.

Tamam tamam. Evet, doğru söylüyorsunuz. Karşılıklı oluyor. Eminim ki, Türkiye’den biri Amerika’ya gidip gezerse, aynen böyle bilinç altında varsayımlar yapar. İstanbul’da Amerikan erkek modasınin temsilcisi olarak (aman!) Türkiyeli öğrencilerim sürekli benim kravatlarımın yaydığı mesajlarını yorumlamaya çalışıyorlar mesela. Bir turkuaz kravatım var. Taktığım zaman öğrenciler beni biraz daha uysalca dinleme eğilimi gösteriyorlar. Fakat Japonya’dan aldığım elle cizilmiş kırmızı balıklı desenli kravatımı takarsam, oohoo, çok nostaljik ve duygusal oluyorlar. Sadece eski güzel günlerinden muhabbet edip hasret gidermek istiyorlar. ‘Hocam, hatırlıyor musunuz? İlk defa o kravatı gördüğüm zaman benim telefonum derste caldı ve siz bana müdüre gönderdiniz! Ne kadar bağırdınız bana! Ne kadar gençtim.’ Korkuyorum ki, benim giysilerim istemeden her yere sinyal saçıyorlar, hem benim kontrolum dışında çıkmış bir şekilde, yani ipin ucu kaçtı. Bazen fermuar kapatmayı unutuyorum. O ne diyor herkese? Bana sadece bir tür unutkanlık iletiyor, ama Allah bilir, bu kültürde bir savaş ilanı olabilir.

Amerikalı iş arkadaşlarımdan oldukça genç, bir öğretmen var. Yaşının yüzünden bazen sınıfta disiplin sorunları yaşıyor. Bir akşam efkarlarımızı dağıtmak için bir yerde bira içiyorduk. Çocuk kafa yiyordu. O gün öğrenciler son derece vahşiymiş, neredeyse onu gebertmişler. Kafamızı bayağı iyi olunca arkadaşımın sorununu çözmek için, onun daha ciddice daha efendi gibi muhafazakar giysi giymesi gerektiğini karar verdik. Böyle çocukların bilinçlerinin altında biraz saygı uyandırabilir sandık. Ertesi gün, bu zavallı arkadaş kırmızı beyaz kareli gömlekle okula geldi. Aynen bir masa örtüsüne benziyordu. Ayrıca, taktığı kravat üstünde bir kaniş yavrusunun resmi çizildi. Çok feci bir kombin, ama iyimser olmaya çalıştım.

‘Henüz ciddi bir şey bulmamışsın, ha? Bugün alışverişe gideceğiz.’

‘Yooo,’ dedi. ‘Bunu aldım, dün akşam. Orta yaşlının giydiği gibi bir şey, değil mi? Çocuklar bu gömleği görünce, bir amca yada bir memur aklarına gelecek.’

Ya bir köpek sofrada dolaşıyor diyecekler.

‘Ne zaman böyle giyenen bir adam gördün, allah aşkına?’ dedim. ‘Diğer öğretmenlerin ne giydiklerine hiç göz atmadın mı?’

‘Modadan bir şey bilmiyorsun,’ diye karşılık verdi. ‘Sen ki hiç fermuarını kapatmayı hatırlayamıyorsun!’

Harbiden, modadan hiç bir şey bilmiyorum. Evet.

Türkiye’ye geldim geleli altı yıl oldu artık. Bıyıksızlığımı bir yana bırak, bir yerli erkeğinden o kadar farklı görünmüyorum. Bayağı esmerim. Gözlerim, mesela, çok koyu bir kahve rengi. Saçım da öyle. Tenim beyazımsı, tamam, ama klasik bir İngiliz gibi şeffaf hayalet gibi değilim. Kiyafetimi hep Türkiye’de satın aldım—stilim ‘yerli’ yani. Yine de, her İstiklal yada Mısır Çarşı’dan yürüdüğüm zaman, tezgahtarlar aniden ama aniden benim yabancı olduğumu kavrıyorlar ve yolumu kesip ‘Hello! Hello! Buy something’ diyerek bana saldırıyorlar. Ama nasıl, nereden biliyorlar? Tip olarak Kıvanç Tatlıtuğ’dan katbekat daha klasik Türk’e benziyorum. Biraz Acun Ilıcalı’ya benzerliğim bile var. Nerden bu yabancı muamelesi? Çok abartılı şey istemiyorum, aslında. Yalnız günlük hayatımda biri bir kutu lokma bana satmaya çalışmadan bir günü geçirebilmek istiyorum. O kadar. Bu yüzden hiç kimsenin tarafından tanınmayacağım sırrını aramaktayım, bu altı yıldır.

Bu sırrın peşinde bir deney yaptım, bir gün. Kendimi Buraklaştırdım! İlk önce yapabildiğim kadar bir sakal bıraktım. Ondan sonra, bir gömlek giyip, karnıma kadar düğmeleri açtım. Onun üzerinde bir siyah deri ceketi omzuma attım, gittim Mısır Çarşı’ya. Kabadayı gibi bir taraftan öbür tarafa göğsümü gere gere yürüdüm, kaşlarım çatarak. Yemin ederim hiç kimse bana ‘hello’ demedi. Ben yerliyim sandılar, o yüzden mi acaba, yoksa sadece kaçınılması gereken bir  manyağim zannetikleri için miydi?

Genel olarak, bu yabancı olduğumu teşhir eden sinyal yaymamı durdurmak istiyorum, fakat, ne tuhaf ki ara sıra benim ‘yabancılığımı’ muhafaza etmeyi tercih ediyorum. Sözgelimi yeni evlendiğim zaman benim evde eşofmanla dolanmayı kesin reddim mesela. Türkiye’de neden her erkek eşikten geçer geçmez hemen bir eşoman giyer diye merak ediyordum. Hatta, sokakta gördüğüm erkeklere göre bir eşofman herhangi bir yerde ve durumda uygun bir giyimmiş. Benim Amerikan gözlerim için biraz fazla rahat, biraz sapık bile görünüyor. Bir misafir gelip eşofmanlı halimi görşe ne söylecek? Amerika’da bir eşofman giyersen ya spor külübünde sırf terli erkeklerin arasında antrenman yapıyorsun ya sapıklık yapmaya karanlık bir tiyatroya geldin ya New Jersey’lisin. Sakın bir kadın senin böyle giyinmeni görmesin. Sosyal hayatın biter!

Benim yaştaki bir Amerikalı evde kendine rahat hissetmek isterse genelde kot pantalon giyer. Valla. Türkiye’de ben de öyle yapıyordum. Fakat her eve gelen misafirimiz art arda soruyordu, ‘niye eşofman giymiyorsun? Daha rahat olacaksın!’ Yıllarca ayak diriyordum. Asla giymeyeceğim! Asla giymeyeceğim! Bir prensip, bir onur meselesi bile gibime geliyordu. Ama şimdi, nedense, benim eşofmanımı bulamıyorsam tepeme atıyorum. ‘O lanetli eşofman neeeeerde?’ eşime bağırıp, çaresizlikten dolaptan her şey fırlatarak bir acil arayışa başlarım. Bu ne demek acaba? Bana özgü Amerıkalılığımı yitirip asimile mi olmuşum? Bu eşofman ne kadar memleketimin törelerine ihanet ettiğim bir sembol mu oldu? Bilmem. Ben sadece eşomanımı istiyorum!

Demişler ki, kadınlar ve kızlar medya ve reklamlar tarafından çok etkileniyor. Dergi ve televizyondaki mankenler ve ünlüler bir kızın öz-imajını şekillendirebiliyor. Emin ol ki, erkek için iki kat daha geçerli, ama biz kabul edemeyiz.Ben bu fenomene ‘Cennet Kuşu Sendromu’ diyorum. ‘Gezegenimiz Dünya’ diye doğa belgeseli hiç izlediniz mi? You Tube’da da bulabilirsiniz. Bir kuş var, Yeni Gine’de. Cennet Kuşu. Rengarenk erkek kuşu kur yapmak için derviş gibi bir dans yapar ama bu dans yapmadan önce, hatta dişi hiç piyasa da yokken, hazırlık yapıyor. Bekar kuş dans için bir sahne kurup, kurduğu sahneyi bir çırpıyla süpüruyor. Ondan sonra gagasına bir yaprak alıp, bu yaprağı bezi olarak kullanarak etraftaki dalları bile siliyor. Mumların yakıp romantik müziğini koymasını bile bekliyordum! Erkek kuşu birkaç kız tavlama ötmeleri attıktan sonra, renksiz zevksiz dişi Cennet Kuşu bir dala konup, garibanımızın yaptığı dansı seyretmeye geliyor. Bu dans mühteşem bir performans ama. Tam bir dervişin seması gibi, dönüp dönüp, tüylerin renklerini tüm ihtişamıyla sergiliyor. Bu dans hatasız olması şart, çünkü öyle değilşe bir sürü aynı dans kusursuzca yapabilen erkek cennet kuşları var, ormanda, dişi onların yanlarına gidecek. (Maalesef, You Tube’da ki videoda dans bitince kız biraz düşündükten sonra, uçup kaçıyor! Bir teşekkür bile söylemeden.)

Insanoğlu erkekler olarak da biz çok benzer bir dansı yapmaya çalışıyoruz. Bir dişinin gözünü almak için envai çeşit kur yöntemleri deniyoruz ve fikir için etrafımızdaki erkeklere bakıyoruz. Biyologik açısından en az onlara kadar renkli olmamız lazım yani. Bu bir bilim gerçek değilse neden hepimiz tamamen aynı modayla giyiniyoruz? Benim tüylerim onun tüyleri kadar gösterişli olması gerekiyor, çünkü. Bugünlerde Türkiye’nin erkeklerinin tüyleri sık beyaz tişört olmuş. Benim çalıştığım lisedeki çocuklar üniform gibi giyiyorlar. Geçen yılın ilkbaharında ilk defa fark ettim—bir sınıfta on erkek öğrenci aynı beyaz tişört giyiyordu. Allah allah, bir maç mı var bugün kendime dedim. Bu nasıl bir forma! Ondan sonra sanki sokaktaki yanımdan geçen erkeklerin yüzde altmışı da giyiyordu. Bir iki erkek için spor salonunda deli gibi çalıştıktan sonra kazanmayı başardığı iri kaslarını gösterebilimek için bir şeçenek, ama çoğunluğumuz için, bu beyaz tişörtün en çok gösterdiği özellik ya bir göbek ya cılız bir gögüs ya erkek memeleri. Ama vücudun tipi ne olsa olsun, dar beyaz tişört modası büyüyor.

Türkiye’de yaşayan bir Amerikalı erkek olarak bazen kafam allak bullak oluyor, çok kültürlülüğümden. Benim kur yapma dansım çoktan memleketimin erkeklerinden öğrenmiştim benimsemiştim ama her gün etrafımdaki erkeklerden etkilenmeyeceğim demek değil. Yani aylarca ben eve gelirken aynı dükkandan geçiyordum. Her gün vitrinde aynı dar beyaz tişört’e benzer uzun kollu kazağa gözüm koydu. Giyinen idmanlı manken yaklışıklı olsa, bu kazakla ben de öyle olacağım. Gitgide kendimin bu dar beyaz kazakla sokakta göğsümü gere gere yürüdüğümü hayal etmeye başladım. Yakasını kaldırıp geniş omuzlarımda siyah deri ceketim olacak. Bir sakal bırakamaszam bir takma sakal satın alabilirdim. Bir şey olmaz. Eşim bir bakışta yanıma koşa koşa gelip, bir büyülenmiş dişi cennet kuşu gibi ötmeye başlayacak.

Neye üğradığımı bilimiyorum. Biraz hafizamı kaybettmişim galiba ama bir baktım, dükkandan çıkıyordum, elimde bir poşet var. Poşetin içinde, o kazak! Giydiğimde eşimin tek yorumu şuydu ‘Sen çok kuro oldun . Üstüne bir şey giy.’ Şimdi dolabımın dibinde duruyor. Ara sıra eşimin sakladığı yerden çıkıyorum. Yatağın üstüne serip, gözlerimi dikip hasretle bakıyorum. Eşim evde değilse, onu giyip mutfağa kadar kabadayılık takınıp dolaşıyorum. İçimden beni bir kur yapma dansa çağıran içgüdüm var herhalde. Bir kaç dakika sonra aynaya baktığımda aklımı başına devşiriyor. Çıkartıp yere fırlatırım ve orada duran beyaz ucubeye korkuyla bakıyorum, denizin en derin, kara sularından kaçan mutasyona uğramış bir yaratığa bakmışım gibi. 

Son bir öğüt olarak bir şey söyleyim size. Bir süre yaşamak için yurt dışına giderseniz (özelikle erkekseniz) kendi stilinizle tam olarak nasıl bir mesaj verdiğinizi, yani, nasıl bir tipin dikkatini çekeceğnizden emin olmak için yerli erkeklerin kur yapma yöntemlerini gözemlemekle biraz vakit geçirseniz son derece faydalı olur bence. Yani Bostonda eski Türkiyeli öğrencilerimden biri gibi olmayın, sakın, o ki hem bayağı pos bir bıyığı bıraktı hem kahramanı David Beckam’ı özenerek ünlü futbolcunun o zamanlarda taktığı gibi her yer de şaç bandı takıyordu. Avrupa’da erkek modasının dünyasında çok şık bir şeçenek olabilirdi ama bu kombin, onun giydiği turkuaza çalan eşofmanla beraber, çok şaşırtıcı bir tipten ilgiyi çekti. Buraya kadar okuduğunuza göre bu tip artık tanıyorsunuzdur. Yani pornucuya benzeyen, ortayaşlı, bu öğrencimle aynı ‘giyim zevkisi’ olan bıyıklı erkekler. Kötünün iyisi, öğrencim mecburen onunla farklı cinsel yönelim olanlara biraz tolerans öğrenebildi. Ama onun kur yapma dansını izlemek için gökyüzünden uçup gelmesini beklediği kuşlar bunlar değildi herhalde. 

A couple of years back, I was a guest on a radio show here in Istanbul and a listener called in to ask this: ‘What was one of the most difficult things to get used to in Turkey?’ I think they were expecting me to say something like ‘şalgam suyu’ or ‘kokoreç’, but my answer was this. When you are shopping, no matter what kind of shop it is or what they are selling, the same young boy is out front with spiky hair and a black leather jacket, smoking a cigarette and typing into his i-Phone. Let’s call him Burak to make it easy. In any case, I’ve bought honey comb, cell phones, passport photos, and dishware from Burak. I’ve even gone with my wife to buy a bra, and 9 times out of 10, Burak is standing at the door ready to serve. It was the time we shopped for a bra that it really started to grab my attention. In America, you only see this type of guy in movies about the 50s or 60s, and he is always trouble, the last person in the world to talk to you about the quality of cloth in your fine linens. I think of James Dean’s character in Rebel Without A Cause—of the knife fight where Dean’s character hold’s a knife to the throat of the local bully and threatens to slice him open. In Turkey, this guy would have a kitchenware store and sell the knives at a discount if you pay in cash. Because of this image I’ve brought from home, whenever I see the guy in the black leather jacket smoking in the doorway, I tend to hurry by and check for my wallet, which means I get very little shopping done.

There are lots of little fashion differences that produce these subconcious reactions. Th e moustache for example. It’s a very manly thing to have a moustache in Turkey—and why shouldn’t it be? Most women--with certain exceptions, an old manager of mine for instance--cannot manage bushy facial hair. In Turkey, the moustache can even bestow on one his political identity. A narrow moustache like the Prime Minister’s—you’re an AKP supporter, probably a ‘liberally conservative’ Muslim. A bushy moustache that hides most of your mouth—a leftist, probably a Kurd. Barış Manchovari sarkık bir bıyığınız var mı? You are probably a nationalist in the MHP. I’ve even found a website that describes traditional Ottoman moustaches and how each one corresponds to a specific trade. The moustache in America means one of two things—you are a porn star, or you are gay. Moustaches went out of fashion in the 70s (something no one every told my father)—and having one is a bit like having an eight track. It remains a macho fetish among the gay community, I think, because of Freddy Mercury and the Village People. Why porn stars—who, you would think, would be the very opposite of a gay stereotype? Or not? I have no clue. Some sort of signal of atavistic machoness? In any case, when I see one of the ubiquitous Turkish moustaches my first impression is ‘gay’, my second is ‘porn star’, and when my second culture spider sense kicks in I start to try and figure out what political party the guy belongs to. To be honest, I’ve been here so long that I now suffer from a disease that I can only call Moustache Envy. Despite my father’s leftist facial hair, I cannot manage but the most paltry of moustaches which, in Turkey, makes me somewhat of a circus freak.

I imagine that the same sorts of subconcious assumptions go on all the time when someone from Turkey visits the U.S. My students are endlessly commenting on my ties for example, which seem to give off messages that I’m completely unaware of. When I wear a certain turquoise tie, I notice that the kids tend to be a bit quieter and when I wear a tie that has a hand painted Koi fish on it, they veer toward nostalgia. ‘Remember teacher, our first day of class? You wore that tie then and you said the funniest thing to me!’ I fear I am giving off all sorts of subliminal signals I have absolutely no control over with my wardrobe. God knows what my indifference to zipping my pants is saying. To me it says, unutkanlık. To them it might be some kind of declaration of war.

One of my American colleagues is a bit on the young side, and struggles sometimes with discipline problems in the class room. Over a couple of beers, we decided that a more serious, conservative wardrobe might subconsciously inspire some discipline. The poor guy showed up the next day wearing a red and white checked shirt that looked for all intents and purposes like a table cloth. On top of that, he wore a tie with pictures of dogs on it. ‘I think this is definitely something an older man would wear,’ he said. ‘When the kids see this they will think of a father or uncle.’ Or, I thought, they will think there’s a dog loose on the dinner table. ‘What older man have you ever seen wear something like that?’ I asked. ‘Have you looked around at the other teachers?’

‘What do you know?’ he retorted. ‘Half the time you don’t even remember to zip your pants!’

What do I know indeed.

I have been here for nearly six years at this point. I don’t look all that different from a local, except for the lack of facial hair. I have dark hair, dark eyes, am pale enough but not bleach white. All of my clothes were bought in Turkey at this point, too, so my style should be local, and yet whenever I walk down, say İstiklal or through the Mısır Çarşısı everyone knows instantly I’m a foreigner and attacks me with ‘Hello hello buy this.’ In day to day life, one wants to get through the day without anyone trying to sell you a box of lokum, so I have long been after the secret of not being recognized. I did an experiment once. I let what facial hair I could grow, grow. I put on a button down shirt and opened it halfway down my belly, then threw on a faux leather jacket. I strutted through the Mısır Çarşı with a bored scowl, and low and behold, not one person ran after me saying ‘hello’. Did they think I was local? Or simply an idiot?

And yet, bizarrely, at other times, I try to preserve my foreigness—my initial refusal to wear sweat pants at home for instance. Why does every man immediately change into sweat pants, I wondered, as soon as they get in the door? They look kind of sloppy, to my mind, and what if company comes over? What if somebody sees? The only time you wear these things in America is if you are among other guys at a smelly gym or if you are from New Jersey. An American man my age generally wears jeans when he wants to feel relaxed at home. And yet in-law after in-law kept asking ‘Where are you sweat pants? Don’t you want to be comfortable?’ For years, I dug in my heels. It seemed a matter of principle. Or honor even. And now, for some reason, I get angry when I can’t find them. ‘Where are my damn sweat pants?’ I’ll bellow in frustration from the wardrobe as I throw everything aside in a desperate search. Have I lost my unique Americanness and become a local? Is this a mark of how disloyal I am to my own homeland’s values? I don’t know. I just know I want my sweat pants.

I think we human males go through a similar ritual. To attract and keep our females we do all sorts of courtship rituals and take our signals from what the other males around us our doing. We are always looking around you at the other birds to evaluate the competition. Why else would we all suddenly start dressing the same? How else can you explain the sudden proliferation of the tight white t-shirts for example? I noticed it first at school last spring, how our high school boys wore it like a uniform and then, it seemed that nearly half of Istanbul’s men were wearing the same outfit. For a few of them, I suppose, it shows off well toned muscles. Mostly though, it accents pot bellies or man boobs or bird-chests. But it doesn’t matter your body type—the tight white T-shirt phenomenon grows.

As an American, I’m a bit confused. I get my courtship ritual dance from the boys back home but I can’t help be affected by what I see here, too. Yani, for a long time I have been compulsely walking by a clothing store just up the street. Every day I look at the same white winter shirt that covers the well-toned plastic body of the store mannequin. Slowly, I started to envision myself strutting down the street wearing it, my brown leather jacket thrown over my wide shoulders, my collar turned up, my muscles bulging. My wife would purr and sidle up to me, like an entranced female paradise bird. Before I knew what I was doing, I entered the store and was having Burak take it off the mannequin and put it in a bag for me. When I first threw it on my wife’s only comment was ‘You’d better wear a shirt over it or else it’ll look too kuro.’ Now it just sits in my wardrobe. I’ll take it out once in a while and stare at it longingly. Perhaps there’s some sort of deep instinct summoning me to a courtship dance. And then reason kicks in and I stare at the thing in horror, like its some mutated sea creature washed ashore during a storm.

Let me end with one last thing—if you ever go to another country to live, and especially if you are a male, spend a little time watching the courtship displays of the local men just to be sure of what kind of mate you’re attracting. Don’t be like one of my Turkish ex-students in Boston for instance, who, not only sported a moustache but wore a hair band in homage to his idol, David Beckham. The bomb, in Europe perhaps, but this in combination with some pale blue sweat pants led to several offers of a date from older porn star looking men who had remarkably similar tastes in clothes. On the bright side, I suppose, he did learn to be more tolerant toward people of different sexual orientations—mecburen. But I don’t think these were the birds he’d hoped would come swooping down through the trees.

 

Liars and Cheaters Galore

Why yes, son, I'd think you'd make a fine addition to Robert College. Trust me--why would I lie?

 

Cheating, fraud, charlatanism, and my favorite would of all skullduggery--a buggering of the truth—or in Turkish, dolandırıcılık, hile, copya çekme, dolavere. I’ve never felt it was such a part of daily life as I have felt in Turkey—not that we don’t have it in the United States, but, in view of all the cheating, lying, political charlatans now trying to justify every vile action that spews out of their wretched administration—just because something happens somewhere else does not make it okay.

Today, one of my students screamed at me that nothing at our school was fair. In other schools, he ranted, it doesn’t matter if you do your work or not, if you fail or not, other schools give you a 100 so that you can get accepted into good high schools like Robert College and Koç. All of this a justification for why he was trying to sleep on his desk. His parents have been relentlessly hastling all his teachers, badgering them with the same argument. The mother and father had a meeting with me a few months ago suggesting that, while they knew what they were asking wasn’t ethical, couldn’t I just give their child a 100? I felt dirty for weeks after that comment, and every time I look at their offspring now it is with a deep feeling of contempt and pity. And yet today, after his outburst, he seemed about to burst out crying and so I went to the counselor to report that he might be under some unusual stress at home. Her answer? Well he’s right of course. Schools in Istanbul like Doğa Kolej, Bilfen, and Uskudar American’s SEV reportedly have real tests that they give amongst themselves and only they know the scores, and then they have deliberately easy exams that the worst student is guaranteed an A on. And then they make all the other grades from homework to quizzes, 100 without a thing to base it on. (During an interview at SEV I was warned not to get my panties in a bind worrying about ‘ethics’ and ‘fairness’. We faked grades and if you don’t like it you can hit the road I asked) ‘Is it possible that Robert College and the other prestigious schools don’t know this? Why on earth would you accept anyone from any of these schools and risk your reputation?’ The answer was less than credulous—they don’t know, they only base their admissions on the scores coming out of the Ministry of Education. The inspectors for the government are the same—completely naive about the faking of grades. Of course, one wonders how in the world a person whose job is inspecting schools could be so blithely ignorant of what every 12 year old in Turkey knows.

Of course, what could they say since the government itself is built on lying, corruption and trickery. The elections this year were just one sad example—even the election observers of the party we support had to be told why cheating and coersion was inherently wrong and not just wrong when the other guy did it. And the other guy—bullying, sneaking into the polls and forcing elderly people’s hand to your candidate, bribery—and mostly all out in the open. Never mind the recounts in Ağrı, where the ruling party, unwilling to lose, forced 15 recounts and when they still didn’t win, declared the election null and void and called on a re-election.

And I still haven’t quite gotten over the engineer—a  woman in charge of designing and building highways in Istanbul—told me that she had stopped speaking to her best friend for good because she would not let her copy her PhD thesis. She had copied from a more ‘loyal’ friend and when I told her that I thought she had been in the wrong—gently, carefully—she stormed out of class in a huff. She never came back, or I would have asked her for a list of designs and structures that her paws had touched so that I and anyone I cared about could be sure never to go remotely near them. She needed that thesis—fuck it if the rest of her career put countless lives in danger from her incompetence and boobery.

But what saddens me is the impact it has on my students—most of whom I care deeply about. What does it tell them if someone pads their grades? I don’t think you’re smart enough to make it on your own. So I’ll just give you this grade and you’ll never have to earn a thing in your life. Forget the look of glee on the face of the girl who has studied so diligently for the past 3 months that she pulled her grade up from an F to a C for the first time in her life! Never mind the smile of pride of the boy who, doing the same thing, went from a 26 on his exam at the beginning of the year to a 76. I’d rather have these two build me a bridge at the age they are now than that lunatic who copied her PhD thesis or any of the people who were stupid or dishonest enough to accept it.  At least I could trust they would try to find out what to do.

And what hope does Turkey have of cleaning up its system when kids learn at a young age—supported by parents, that cheating is how you get where you’re going, that not only is it a secret passage to your success, it is your right. You deserve the special favor. My students in Turkey are every bit as brilliant, talent, curious, and creative as the kids I’ve taught elsewhere—why are their elders so hell-bent on telling them they’re not good enough and can only lie their way to the top? Thankfully, our school has not adopted this skulduggery—and I hope the rest is just rumor. But I’ve learned in Turkey that rumor is almost more reliable than the news sometimes. Because of course, the news takes part in the same lying and cheating as well.

And if you do work for Robert College or Koç or wherever else—why in the world do you accept these students? How long do you think your the hot air of your reputations will sustain you when you start sending lazy, skillless cheaters to the top schools of the world? Lazy skilless cheaters that came to you with potential, a potential which you helped ruin and deny?