Shooting Stars and Flying Fish: Swapping the boardroom for the seven seas

by Nancy Knudsen

  When the countdown to midnight begins, out marches an efficient regiment of waiters bearing champagne flutes, and the champagne is poured just in time. At the stroke of twelve, the band breaks into the seventies hit ‘I Will Survive’ by Gloria Gaynor, instead of ‘Auld Lang Syne’, which Ted and I are used to. We guffaw in surprise, but our bad manners go completely unnoticed in the general hilarity of kissing and hugging that goes on all around us. How can you not love a country like this?

  The year moves on. One day it snows, causing great delight for us as we watch nearly a metre of it fall in a twenty-four-hour period. The wind is high and outside our third-floor window is a wild fairyland – the snow pellets rip horizontally, bowing the heads of the few dark figures below who hunch into the wind this frigid morning. The birds are flying wildly in great swooping circles, small black birds, seagulls, other large nameless varieties.

  The street vendors don’t stay at home – in sleet and snow and freezing temperatures they stay out selling their wares. The many old women in headscarves who sell flowers on the street light small wood fires in kerosene tins to warm themselves while they wait for custom.

  During winter we return to Finike regularly to check the boat. We find the town without snow, but cold, sunny and windy. The restaurants on the marina shore are closed and bleak, the esplanade seems friendless without the parade of walkers and families which crowd the area in summer. We say hello to our faithful Blackwattle, waiting patiently with all the other unattended boats in the almost-deserted marina. We immediately turn on the diesel heating to breathe some love back into our abandoned nest. The weekend is usually spent catching up with friends, both Turkish and yachtie, and doing small cleaning jobs on the boat.

  It is the day I notice some pigeons have nested somewhere outside our bathroom window – I can’t see them but I hear their cooing – that I realise winter has passed. There are green buds appearing in all the trees. As spring approaches we have friends arriving to visit – Turkish and Australian and New Zealanders. Kassandra is returning too, to see her sculptor fiancé Cemil, whom we have come to love. We look forward to every visitor, as we haven’t seen friends from home for so long. They trail through, almost end to end – a week, three days, two weeks at a time. Ted Nobbs becomes an enthusiastic tour guide, dragging willing or polite friends around just one more corner, and still one more corner, to see the sights of Istanbul.

  ‘But don’t you miss Australia?’ one friend asks.

  Ted looks at me, wonderingly, and has no reply.

  ‘Don’t you miss anything?’ persists the friend.

  ‘Vegemite,’ says Ted. ‘And we send for that.’

  I smile and think of my children, but find myself musing, I could easily live in Turkey.

  But one of the reasons to want to come back disappears. Kassandra has found that the cultural differences between Cemil and her are too great for the romance to last. Soon, she is back in Australia, single again. I am sad for her, and sadder still for Cemil, but she knows best.

  ———

  Spring’s arrival is like an explosion on the streets. I had not realised how many peach, plum, cherry and pear trees there were until the blossoms started to appear. Soon the streets are awash with colour – roses too, wisteria, poinsettia, many other flowers strange to our eyes. The local councils plant 3 million tulips every year and for a month the city blazes with yellow, magenta, purple and cherry-red tulips. The warm weather comes in waves, two or three days at a time, until one day there are no more freezing days and we know that summer has really arrived.

  Ted comes home one day and announces that the university wishes him to renew his contract for another year. Once it would have been a shocking suggestion – our planned three-and-a-half-year sojourn around the world is a long-held dream. Should we delay our onward journey? We love Istanbul and the Turkish people, Ted loves his job teaching at Bahçes¸ehir Üniversitesi, and we have adored our opportunity to discover this old culture, and get to know some of its beauty – and its warts, moles, diseases and old scars. After only a little discussion, Ted accepts the offer of the additional year. ‘Maybe I’ll never go home . . .’ he grins mischievously. However, we know Blackwattle will be there waiting for us to resume our voyage in a year’s time.

  Coming up anyway is the summer academic break – three months in which we can be on Blackwattle. Soon we are arriving at Finike Marina into the hot sunshine. I ache with the sunny joy of it. The German and French sailors have taken over the place, some are chartering yachts from the local Sunsail depot, others keep their boats here every winter. They crowd the walkways with laughter and foreign conversation (English is not foreign, of course). It’s ‘Guten morgen!’ here and ‘Bonjour!’ there, being just about all we can manage. Almost all the visitors are attired in the very briefest of bikinis. The women are of every size, from petite to solid to billowing rolls, and in every colour from whale grey to toasted brown. Ted doesn’t know which way to look.

  Our new plan is to sail the whole Turkish cruising coast this summer, and leave our boat for the second winter at the other end, in a town called Ayvalik, close to Gallipoli. It’s time to say goodbye to the Turkish shopkeepers, doctors, bakers, launderers, students and other people we would like to call friends in Finike, who have meant so much to us while we were here.

  On the water again. It’s like a song in my ears. On the water again. On the water again. Gone are the square and lifeless lines of house and flat and office and street, swapped for the lilting, moving, sparkling world of the sea. Blackwattle glides and swishes, gently falls and rises like a fish, and all around is the chameleon sea, the unruliness of the clouds, the chaos of the stars, the never-ending drama of the cliffs and hills of the Turkish coast.

  So we make our way west along the coastline in company with friends, Suzie and Robin, who have just arrived up the Red Sea on True Blue with Jay and Carol on Gandalf. Gandalf, along with another boat, had suffered fourteen bullet holes in their cockpit as they fought off pirates in the Gulf of Aden. Both couples are good company and add to our enjoyment.

  At night we are all close to the wind and the stars, and lulled to sleep with a gentle sway of the water and soft slappings on the side of the boat. In the morning, we wake to the crowing of cocks on shore and the sad crying of the mullahs calling the faithful to prayer – instead of CNN and the constant growl of traffic. Outside, there are the early fishermen, the bobbing of the cormorants, the tiny fish below the boat – instead of black figures trudging to work, rubbish in the gutters, the crunch of cars on gravel in the car park. It matters not whether it be Istanbul or Sydney, a city is a city is a city.

  First stop Kekova Roads, surrounded by exotic bony hills of strangely shaped rock and ancient Lycian tombs and remains of sophisticated civilisations. They had running water and elegant streets and lovely large ceramic containers for cooking, storage and washing. High above us is a crusaders’ castle, with crenellated walls and the Turkish flag flying high and proud above the surrounding villages.

  The villages, just two tiny ones, rise up the hills like climbing roses, adding colour to the green and grey of the trees and rocks. Up close there are long higgledy-piggledy wooden wharfs, handmade by the local restaurants, ready to take our dinghies, dispose of our rubbish, give us clean water and, of course, receive us for dinner. We dine among boxes of geraniums. They are everywhere – along the shore, clinging to the rocks, outside the windows, and around our feet at the tables. The sun doesn’t set across the water until nine thirty, accompanied by meze, köfte and lots of Turkish red wine.

  In the morning we find fresh bread on the deck – deposited unasked while we slept, by the owners of the restaurant we dined in last night – and know we are not in Australia.

  Life becomes simple and light-hearted again as we drift from anchorage to anchorage along the Turkish coast, and we continue to learn as we go. From the outset of our voyage
we have had anchoring problems, first through lack of skill, but then, even with the finest skill, because our anchor would simply drag. I have become used to diving overboard in the crystal waters to check that the anchor has dug in well. Then I start checking all the other boats in the anchorage (a water baby always, I just love the excuse) and discover something very interesting. The CQR anchor, one of the most famous anchor types, and meant to be very trustworthy, almost always lies on its side. Swimming around the boats like a fish and coming up for air now and then, I calculate that if there was a sudden blow, all the boats with CQR anchors would drag.

  After advice from our ever-knowledgeable friend from True Blue, Suzy, who embarks on some serious research, we and True Blue purchase ‘new generation’ anchors with the brand name of Spade. We never drag again.

  Yes, we learn, but that does not mean that things always go well on Blackwattle. What Ted Nobbs needs to understand is that without sailing gloves, which protect my tender hands from rope burn, and without sailing sandals, which protect my even tenderer feet from colliding with nasty things on deck, I am a 175-centimetre Minnie Mouse. However, a quick change in the cockpit – sandals, gloves, sunglasses and hat on – and Superwoman emerges, able to wind winches with a single arm and tramp over anything on my super feet.

  So when he calls, ‘Hey, Nance, here quick!’ (everything with Ted Nobbs is ‘quick’, even if we are in a marina and he is busy reading a book) I have now learned to reply coolly, ‘Do you want Minnie Mouse now or Superwoman in forty-five seconds?’ As this account is meant for family reading, I omit his varying replies.

  Finally, brown and skinny, healthy from constant daily physical activities of sailing and bike riding, we arrive in the very Greek-influenced port of Ayvalik, with time to spare before our return to Istanbul.

  Dragging our bikes out from their home in our deck lazarette, we explore the back streets and coastal roads around Ayvalik, unendingly fascinated by the cobblestones, the age-old buildings, the complex stonework. The architect in Ted Nobbs is continually pointing out small details and leading me around the next corner, and then the next corner, and then just the next corner. We alternate working on the boat with these fantastic journeys.

  University is calling Ted and we have more friends coming to stay. It’s time to return to Istanbul, and we hasten like lovers to a lost sweetheart. We can’t wait to reacquaint ourselves with the city which has loved us so much, and which we have loved in return.

  But for the second year in Turkey, I need something more inspiring to do than merely working. After much research, I find an Australian university that pleases me, and undertake by distance learning a Master of Arts in Journalism – or ‘Professional Communication’ as the jargon goes. By chance, alerted by Sydney friend Frank Walker, I apply for the position of cruising editor with an online sailing magazine, and soon stop teaching altogether for the enjoyment of earning my living merely by the pen.

  As we embark on our second year in Istanbul, the three-month break has allowed us to see the city with new eyes, and we are captivated anew. This is a country without the dole, without an old-age pension, and yet hardly anyone lives on the street. Whether you live in an apartment block, a tiny village or a suburban spread, the block, village, suburb or family regards caring for the old and the weak as part of their collective responsibility – and this in a city of 20 million people. I find one of my greatest daily joys is to watch a city of so many people being nice to each other.

  In this second year, understanding more, we feel much more a part of the community. I am able to communicate in Turkish a little, we meet and spend time with more Turkish people as well as other foreigners – from South Africa, Britain, France and Denmark – who have opted to live here. We find we have developed a wide range of new friends by whom we are inspired and enthused.

  We live through another autumn, another winter, sinking deeper and deeper into the community easily, starting to feel the ties that bind us. Finally we face the summer and the end of our time here.

  The university is open to Ted’s remaining on the staff, I am happy to continue my university studies and work as a journalist. The journey in Blackwattle has not merely been about sailing. Ted left Australia as a practising architect and a racing sailor who knew little about cruising. He is now a teaching academic, and a talented hands-on seaman. I left Australia as an entrepreneur in the aviation and tourism industry, and an enthusiastic amateur sailor. Now I am a working journalist, with both the editing position with the sailing magazine and a list of published general articles, and I know I can sail Blackwattle solo across any ocean.

  How can we leave Turkey when we love it so much? But how can we not finish what we started? Blackwattle is fretting and deteriorating in her berth, anxious to be gone, and the season marches on. There are many adventures to anticipate, the crossing of the Mediterranean, the Atlantic, the Caribbean and the Pacific. But I feel a catch in my throat and a stone in my heart every time I speak of leaving. The knowledge of a self-chosen inevitability keeps me silent.

  In the end, it comes suddenly.

  ‘Ted?’

  ‘Yes?’ He is reading the English-language Turkish Daily News.

  ‘We could buy an apartment.’

  ‘Erdogan is still denying that he wants to be president, you know.’

  ‘Ted?’

  ‘Mmm?’

  ‘We could buy an apartment.’

  ‘What? Where?’

  ‘Here. We could buy an apartment here in Istanbul.’

  I now have his attention. ‘And what? And live here? What do you mean?’

  ‘Yes, why not? After we have taken the boat home.’

  A small smile starts to play around his mouth, slightly crooked.

  ‘Would you really do that?’ He leans back in the chair and stares out the window, over the distant skyline of the city, newspaper forgotten. ‘What about . . . ?’

  But there is nothing to stop us, and while we sit far into the night talking, dreaming, examining, there is hardly any more discussion. It’s as if the idea had been growing in our separate minds for a long time.

  We set out merely to go sailing, not knowing how the experiences would change us. We had both travelled extensively, yet inside the cocoon of our own limitations, the prison of our own worldview. Humbled by the rich happiness we have observed among those we previously pitied, ashamed by the arrogance of our naïve assumptions, we now long for a more fulfilling daily life. I look forward to continuing in a life where I feel I will be useful and valuable, and not counted merely by achievements or wealth.

  On another level, unless you are a hermit, joy in life is enhanced by the culture around you. If the driver behind you blows his horn in anger, even if not at you, it leaves a light scratch on the day. A rude shopkeeper will add another scratch, a pompous colleague another, a slightly false restaurant bill another. The scratches multiply into a wound, then another and another. They heal, they heal, but eventually they leave permanent scars.

  Living in Istanbul and Turkey has felt like floating in a warm buoyant sea, and each day has been a repeated joy, the good humour and generosity rubbing off on our colder but astonished souls. We hope, in short, to become better people by example.

  From now on we talk only about where, and how much. Dispensing with the ‘ex-pat’ real-estate agents, we go Turkish, and struggle with the language until we find a tiny apartment just off I.stiklal Caddesi, that broad lively walking street in the middle of the city, and purchase it.

  The other owners in the building are Turkish, traditional all. Our next-door neighbour is a large woman who still leans out the window to send down her shopping basket on a long rope from the second floor so that the street vendors can fill it with bread or vegetables. The money goes down with the basket. Inside, the apartment is crisp and modern; outside, the call to prayer competes with the church bells to
serenade us in the mornings.

  Our narrow street is full of antique shops and galleries, furniture-making workshops and small grocery stores. The old men still sit in the sun in the street playing backgammon and chatting, and watch over the after-school children who run and yell. Can life continue in this new and better way we have found? One never knows, but if we don’t stretch out for it, the dream may fly out of our reach and blow away in the afternoon breeze.

  We will certainly sail Blackwattle home, where family and children, in particular, are waiting, but then we have decided that life should be lived the way you dream, and we have found a dream in Turkey.

  11. The Lesser-known Med

  The Greek Islands, Crete and Malta to Tunisia

  It’s the end of June 2006 when we depart Ayvalik Marina for the long journey across the Mediterranean, the Atlantic and the Pacific to Australia.

  Simon flies in from Sydney and with the greatest of joy I show him our new flat and then we catch a bus to Ayvalik. I can’t wait to have him sail with us for a few days.

  We have made friends casually, as one does, with the owners of a little coffee shop in the town of Ayvalik. They have come to live here from the big city of Izmir, a couple of hundred kilometres away, to get away from the crowds, traffic and smoggy air.

  We ask them how they like living in this so-sweet fishing village. ‘It’s wonderful,’ says the wife. ‘A slower pace of life, fresh air, good for the children.’

  ‘There are disadvantages though,’ says the husband. ‘They don’t like foreigners very much.’

  ‘Really?’ I say. ‘People here have been so nice to us. What makes you say that?’

  ‘Oh we don’t mean you!’ says the wife hastily. ‘We mean us. We’re from Izmir!’