Portrait of a Turkish Family

by Orga, Irfan

  We arrived at the centre of the city and hitched up our trousers before descending from the bus, leaping ungracefully into a spot that looked reasonably dry. Large stones formed the main street, treacherous stones that gave beneath the feet and deposited the unwary up to the ankle in muddy slush. We strolled on, passing more and more of the Tartar houses, beginning to be depressed by this flat, dreary city with its unendurably drab brown houses. We crossed the River Porsuk by a bridge and on one bank stood the Porsuk Palas Hotel, a big hotel with an open-air café fronting the river.

  Farther on we came to small, poor shops and houses and a mosque where the geysers had been trapped in iron pipes and the boiling water gushed forth steamingly on the raw air. We were unimpressed by our sight of the city and decided to explore the station road to see what mysteries it might conceal. But the station road was new like ourselves and boasted cement-and-red-brick, flat-topped houses with bare gardens wrested from the reluctant earth. A few cinemas rose garishly under the leaden winter sky and they bored us with their resemblance to a new, bleak city struggling in the throes of growing up.

  We retraced our steps to the Porsuk Palas Hotel and went into its plush interior, where hot coffee warmed us. We asked for a tric-trac set and played all the afternoon for there was nothing else to do.

  CHAPTER 24

  My Batman Averts a Crisis and Muazzez Finds a Beau

  I decided to bring my family to Eskişehir. The little, improvised Officers’ Club on the banks of the river had begun to pall and was, anyway, too expensive for the junior officers to patronise.

  My mother replied to my letter suggesting the move with such alacrity that I more than suspected she was worrying as to what I was up to all alone in Eskişehir.

  My batman was sent to look for a house and after over a week of searching he told me he had discovered an empty house on the newly built station road. He said it was a ‘good’ house and by that he meant ‘new’, for to him the two things were synonymous.

  ‘Is there water in the house?’ I demanded and he replied enthusiastically that indeed there was water, lovely boiling water that spouted from a natural geyser in the back garden.

  ‘And what about cold water, drinking water?’ I wanted to know.

  He looked shocked that I did not know there was no drinking-water in Eskişehir and said pointedly that we should have to do the same as everyone else – that is, fill vessels with the boiling water and leave it to grow cold. I was very dubious as to my mother’s reactions to such an arrangement, but since there was no alternative, I accordingly went with my batman to view this remarkable house which could not provide cold water but gave us as much hot water as we required. It turned out to be a newish villa, looking extremely small in the very large garden surrounding it. When we rang the doorbell a thin wispy little woman opened the door, wiping her hands hurriedly on her apron when she saw the magnificent sight of an Air Force uniform confronting her.

  She looked at me with an air of surprise.

  I explained that I understood that the house was to be let and she said that this was so, offering to show me over it. I was quite incapable of knowing what things my mother and grandmother would look for in a house, but manfully plunged through the small rooms, already foreseeing storms over the fitting of our cumbersome furniture. There seemed to be a great deal of unnecessary cupboards but, knowing the contrary ways of family, I could not be sure that even this would please my womenfolk. There was no bathroom at all: the woman looked surprised that I should want such a thing, and the toilet was so small that the customary fittings together with the bidet left barely room to close the door behind one.

  In the garden spouted the famous geyser and I was just on the point of asking what happened in the sudden event of one requiring cold water, when my eye lit on what looked undoubtedly like a pump. I turned accusingly to my batman and he grinned sheepishly, saying he had not noticed this on his first visit. The wispy little woman explained proudly that from this pump came ice-cold water the year round, but it was not for drinking purposes and at this my batman’s face lit up triumphantly, with a ‘I-told-you-so’ expression. But it fell again several centimetres when she continued that a man called once in a week with fresh water for drinking. This she said could be stored in an earthenware küp, a sort of barrel with a covered top and a tap.

  I was delighted to hear that civilisation had not entirely by-passed this city and afterwards told my batman that he was a blockhead. I arranged to rent the house, and my batman was set to find people to redecorate it for me and a few days later I discovered him lording it over two bearded, very wild-looking painters who splashed the paint on with a reckless disregard for where it might eventually land. My batman was directing them and instructing them in a very knowing way, lounging grandly beside them, but when he saw me he deflated like a pricked balloon. From then onwards I took care to keep out of his way, leaving the workmen entirely in his hands. Heaven knew, he had little enough chance in his military life to feel important.

  The day came for the great move-in. The furniture had already arrived from İstanbul and a lorry from the aerodrome deposited it at the house.

  Next arrived my mother, my grandmother and Muazzez carrying many hampers and parcels and already looking overdressed for their new place of residence. My batman and I proudly showed them the house. Their faces remained unitedly detached as though they had already planned to make all the difficulties they could. In an effort to arouse their enthusiasm I eagerly pointed out the obvious advantages of our unique hot and cold-water system. It failed to impress them. Then when they saw the way we had haphazardly arranged their precious furniture they ran clucking around, like three distraught hens, examining everywhere for scratches or other damage.

  When they had finished their perorations they firmly declared their intention of returning by the next train to İstanbul.

  ‘But you can’t!’ I appealed frantically, darting the most furious glances at my open-mouthed, gaping batman, who had never bargained for three obstinate women with whom to deal.

  Do something, you great dolt! I implored him silently and he correctly interpreted my distress signals and put himself forward to quieten the three disillusioned ladies. He told my grandmother he would arrange all her furniture wherever she wished, guessing that this would be the best line of approach with her. To my mother he explained that the house was beautifully clean, that he himself had seen to this.

  He was completely carried away by the signs of mollification in the faces before him and recklessly promised to do everything they wished.

  I could see he was fast getting my mother on his side – which in the circumstances was just as well, since he would be more often under her orders than he would under mine.

  My grandmother planted herself firmly on a packing-case and remarked that she had never expected to one day find herself living in a hen-coop. This inspired my batman to say that we could keep hens in the back garden and he quite dazzled my town-bred mother with the number of eggs we should be able to produce. Enthusiastically he said he would build a chicken-run for her – not even looking in my direction for permission. It was painfully obvious that already he knew which was the safest side to be on. He then told my grandmother he would find her the best washerwoman in all Eskişehir and that he himself would guard her like a child.

  My grandmother cheered up somewhat at this, her face implying that she and the batman would get on very well together after all. I left them to it and hurried back to the Air College, breathing with relief that it looked as if they might after all settle down.

  Life was far pleasanter with my family in Eskişehir. My time became regularised and sometimes I would invite friends to dine with me or to play poker. And always on these occasions the women would vacate the salon, leaving it for us, for my grandmother still felt it was not seemly for the ladies of the house to remain in the same room as the gentlemen. This was especially the case where Muazzez was concerned and my grandmother would whi
p her off swiftly, for fear the eyes of the men should alight on her. Poor Muazzez never dared to protest but years later she told me that had it been left to us to acquire a husband for her she would have remained single all her days – since we all seemed to combine to shut her off from masculine company.

  During the same year though she acquired a beau.

  There was a young officer who lived practically next door to us, and he had an elder brother who was in the Foreign Office in Ankara. This brother was what is known as a smart young man about town, invariably to be seen in striped trousers and impeccable morning coat. He took to visiting his brother in Eskişehir with great regularity so that even the not-always-observant I became suspiciously aware of his pompous figure walking the streets frequently. The mother of this elegant young man developed a rapid friendship with my mother and the result was that the gentleman from Ankara proposed marriage to my gratified sister. He professed, so I gathered, undying love for her and waived all notion of a large dowry. In fact he went further. He declared with great passion and feeling that he required no dowry at all, that my sister was sufficient dowry in herself. This attitude delighted me but my mother was shocked by such callowness on my part and said that her daughter could not be allowed to go penniless to such a proper, such an upright young man. She was quite firm on this point and I gloomily had to prepare myself to spend much money. I had no great affection for the prospective bridegroom, but Muazzez and my mother insisted that he was very good looking and a model of propriety. My sister was determined to marry him and flooded the house with tears if one so much as criticised him.

  A trousseau was bought and we clad her in bridal white with trailing flowers and my grandmother parted with her long-treasured jewels and my sister was married with great ceremony to the dapper young intruder from Ankara.

  Muazzez shone brightly that day and a big reception was given, for which I was expected to pay, and the thought of this did nothing to improve my general gloominess for the alliance. The loving looks frequently exchanged between the newly wed pair began to fill me with boredom; playful, frolicsome ladies coyly suggested that it would be my turn next and I fled from them. I was able to return to normal however after the party was over and the bridal pair had departed for Ankara, where they still live to this day in great state and elegance as befits their nobility. And either the years have mellowed me or Ali has lost some of his unreal suavity, for nowadays, on the rare occasions when we meet, we find much in common. Muazzez has retained her wearable beauty, but her figure has prodigiously thickened and sophistication has overlaid the earlier charm of her girlhood years.

  With the excitement of the wedding over, the house seemed strangely quiet and after a time my mother started to complain that she disliked the house and its prominent position on the station road.

  I found another house on the south side of the city, on the crest of a hill, and I transferred my family there. For a long time my mother had been uneasy in the other house, for the funerals of the crashed Air Force victims wound their way past – sometimes as many as two in a week – and always she had lived with the fear that one day I also would be carried past her windows.

  And in summer the dust was choking. Even with the windows tightly sealed, the dust would seep in, getting into food, between the sheets on the beds and leaving its fine white mark everywhere. But up on the hill there was no dust and no sound of the Funeral March and I hoped that in time my mother would lose this morbid dread she had of my crashing.

  On the hill too, it was cooler and in the evenings one could sit on the old wooden, vine-clad balcony and look down to Eskişehir lying below, still hazy with the dust clouds, the heat and the flies.

  CHAPTER 25

  Feminine Affairs

  Up on the hill, alongside of our house, lived the regimental paymaster, who soon became very friendly with my mother. They both loved anything to do with food and spent a great deal of their time exchanging recipes, or sending succulent dishes to each other, all of which my grandmother viewed with the gravest suspicions.

  He was a strange, odd person living an eccentric lonely life in his big house on the hill with only his batman to look after him. He did all his cooking himself. He devoted hours to this. Sometimes I would drop in on a winter’s evening to find a couple of stray guests lounging in the salon – officers perhaps merely passing through Eskişehir and wanting a bed for the night, and since he was noted for keeping open house they naturally and automatically made for his home. More often than not he would himself be in the kitchen, a large apron enveloping him and his short-sighted eyes peering anxiously into whatever savoury dishes he was concocting by way of surprise for his guests. Sometimes he would let me stay in the kitchen but at other times he would send me away from him, telling me that tonight’s dish was a secret, that I must not see what he was doing, since I might tell my mother and he did not want her stealing his recipes before he was ready to part with them.

  I would take the stairs to the salon to stretch unmolested on a divan until a shout from below would tell me that the meal was ready.

  There was a very ornate, rococo dining-room opening off the salon and sometimes he would have dinner served here when he wanted to show off, but dinner in the tasteless dining-room was a sombre affair. And he would not let us forget our politeness, chiding us severely if a drop of wine was spilled over his elaborate tablecloth, losing his familiar identity as our contemporary, becoming the Paymaster, a senior officer.

  We liked it best when he allowed us to eat in the unrefined atmosphere of the kitchen. Perhaps there would be half a dozen of us or so, and we would squat ungracefully over the huge open fire whilst he roasted slowly a whole lamb, cutting strips for us as they cooked. His batman would place glasses and rakı on the bare wooden table and oil-lamps would glow kindly for there was no electricity in the kitchen. The lamb finished, he would produce stuffed tomatoes or some such delicacy. There would occasionally be freshly grilled fish – he furiously exhorting us to eat it immediately and not to wait for each other for grilled foods should be eaten directly they are cooked.

  We would stuff ourselves to repletion, glad for once of the lack of women to curtail our gossip and our purely masculine jokes. When we could eat no more, we would stagger up to the salon, throwing ourselves inelegantly on divans and loosening our belts. Our host would turn on the lights in the domed ceiling and draw the curtains against the night. He would feed more logs to the already bright fire in the china stove, and presently the batman would appear with Turkish coffee to take the taste of grease from our mouths and a choice of cigarettes for the smokers. One of us would start up an old Turkish song and soon everyone would join in, well content with the world in that coarse atmosphere of unashamed belchings and loosened trousers. Disreputable and unglamorous we might be tonight, but the girls of Eskişehir would not know that tomorrow when they met us strutting through the city’s streets.

  Sinop, Samsun, Çarşamba – three cities on the Black Sea coast – and each of them had bought a plane to be presented to the Air Force.

  My unit was given the plane which had been subscribed to by the good citizens of Sinop, and I the task of flying it there.

  Samsun and Çarşamba had no aerodrome so the other two planes accompanied me from their different regiments to Sinop, where representatives from Samsun and Çarşamba would welcome them and name their respective planes.

  We were to fly over all three cities and give an aerial display then return to spend the night in Sinop.

  Everything went according to plan. We all three flew low over Samsun and Çarşamba, looping and rolling and spinning and diving, and when we got back to Sinop the aerodrome was crowded with well-wishers – peasants eager to see the planes close up, schoolchildren to shyly present gifts to us and pompous municipal officers. The Governor arrived in his striped morning suit and a tall, shining black hat and we were quite put to shame by such elegance.

  The Mayor was late for the ceremonial welcome, and th
e Governor showed signs of irritation. We all stood about waiting, we three pilots in Sinop and yet not in Sinop if you can follow my meaning. For until the Mayor made us welcome we could not strictly be regarded as being there at all.

  Presently a knowledgeable man in the crowd shouted that the tardy Mayor was sighted and we all looked in the direction in which he pointed and we saw a very old donkey carrying a very small man coming down the hill. The Governor made noises in his throat.

  ‘That is the Mayor!’ he said bitterly for he had been educated in Europe and knew what was what.

  Many of the happy people surged to meet the donkey and its precious cargo. The donkey suddenly began to trot briskly and reached the aerodrome at a terrific speed. The Mayor alighted from its back stiffly and welcomed us so affably and with so much enthusiasm that there was no longer doubt in anybody’s mind as to whether we were in Sinop or not in Sinop.

  When I returned to Eskişehir I discovered that Muazzez was temporarily installed in the house, her husband being in Rome on duty. The house had become like a private hospital with my mother in bed with one of her innumerable headaches and my sister complaining of pains in the most unlikely spots.

  My grandmother and my batman ran the ménage – one as autocratic as the other and both of them driving the hired servant into constant outbreaks of semi-hysteria. Once, long ago, a faraway Hacer had had to put up with similar treatment.