Journey

Two summers ago I spent every day walking dogs and feeding cats to make enough money to travel abroad. The next summer I used the money to go to Turkey. I ended up in Istanbul in July. It was hot, confusing and noisy. I loved it. I loved every single thing about it. I left after a few weeks to go to Greece with my final destination set on Italy. In Italy I shared a room with a young Russian woman who had been a connection through my mother. Her name was Agrippina and she did not really understand for what purpose I was there. She had a point, because even I was not entirely sure how I had chosen to stay in Italy for the semester. I suppose I figured if I had a connection abroad, I might as well make something or it. I could not tell if Agrippina liked me or not, it seemed as though everything I did was somehow senseless in her eyes. I did not mind this too much, but what really bothered me was how I had felt since leaving Istanbul. It was a feeling in my gut I could not dismiss I felt it as soon as I sat on the bus watching it leave for Thessaloniki. Without saying anything to Agrippina, I booked a ticket back to turkey. I told her a week or so before. She didn't seem to care too much.

The first week of September I packed everything I had, which was limited to a mid-sized rolling suitcase from Costco and a worn out backpack, and left. I had a 24 hour layover in Munich, Germany, where I stayed at an odd youth hostel called The Wombats and wandered around the city through dark rain eating food that made my gut want to cry until I found a cafe to sit in for several hours where I repeatedly ordered hot chocolate. The next morning I left for the airport at 4 am, and a few hours later found myself sitting on my suitcase in the bustling middle of Taksim square. A bright sun glared over the moving shapes of people bustling past each other. Taksim square didn’t look like a square at all but more like a confused circle whose only definable borders seemed to be an immense Starbucks, an almost invisible mosque with a few old people hanging out outside and a bunch of thick streets veering off into various isolated directions. I rolled my one suitcase to a spot near a statue of Ataturk, next to where the Roma women sold flowers out of buckets, feeding simit bread to flocks of hungry pigeons. I cried on top of my luggage, not sure entirely how to explain the tears but knowing they were tears of an unidentifiable relief. But they weren't really tears that had any reason behind them other than that of feeling free from some sort of Euro-American touristic fake candyland. Florence had been stifling in every way and I was happy to be back in a place that felt somehow so much more humanistic, hot blooded, and perfect in its flaws.

I will never know how I bravely conquered those first few weeks of utter nomadism, bouncing from couch to couch, apartment to apartment, hopping on ferries from Asia to Europe and back. I spent all day of every boiling day searching for places to live. I suppose it was a mixture of luck, persistence and humor. At one point, amid looking for one bedroom apartments on the European side, I called a mysterious number one morning. A man with an American accent answered the phone amid a noisy background. I asked if I could look at the apartments he had placed on Craigslist. He brushed me off quickly and told me to call back. I called back that evening. He seemed irritated about my insistence. He grudgingly began describing the apartments, clearly tired either of the vacant living situations, real estate, and possibly people in general. I pushed it further, asking if I could look at the one bedroom in Cihangir, an artsy part of the city. He sighed heavily and his tone slowly changed. "Okay, so what kind of economic background are we talking here? Do you- do you have any idea whatsoever what you're doing? Do you have any idea what kind of danger you're getting yourself into here? Look, you're just going to have to make a call to mommy and daddy and tell them you need a plane ticket home unless someone is willing to put out the money necessary. You're just like all the others that came here without doing their homework." "Where are you from anyway?" I shot back. "I’m from New York. The Bronx." he growled. I told him I was from Southeast Washington D.C., a city with much higher crime rates per square mile. I then began to feel insulted and the phone chat turned aggressive for two people who had never met each other. "Look, I am determined to live here. I’ve made my decision. I am a city kid, I know how to hold myself, as a foreigner and a female." "Oh so you think you can handle living here? What are you from the ghetto? Are you a black girl? huh? Whats your economic range anyway?" I told him I wasn't willing to pay more than 700, which was reasonable for a student. "Fine end up living in some place like Tarlabasi. Wait until people find out a YABANGEE girl is living in an apartment over there. An American girl was killed last year. She was living over there in Tarlabasi." he said this as if it there were no other option for me. I couldn't handle the conversation anymore. I asked one last time if I could simply look at the apartment. There was silence on the other end. "Fine." the next day I found myself walking down a street off Taksim looking for Gregory. I noticed him immediately. He was the tallest person on the street, quite muscular with straw colored hair and square face and large features. His face looked as if he had had Botox done a few times. He almost didn't seem real, like some man from a 1990s beach postcard who used steroids. His speech was odd as well. He would make vacuous positive conversation, clearly for marketing purposes, yet every other minute or so he would grumble insulting comments or ignorant remarks towards anything he found repulsive in some way. He brought me to two apartments. Both of which were the kind of apartments wealthy expatriates would rent as temporary living quarters during their time away from the financial district of New York or some such situation. The first apartment he brought me to was at the base of a series of hilly steps leading to god knows where in the sprawling confused mess that makes up Cihangir.

It was beautiful, ornately furnished with large windows covered in greenery looking out over the water. A construction man was drilling in the front hallway. Gregory ignored him, sauntering around the apartment describing the affluent Broadcast journalist who bounced from Manhattan to Istanbul and back, who didn't spend much time there and needed someone to fill the space. "Of course this isn't exactly in your league. I just wanted to show you the kind the places I rent to those who can afford it." He paused before speaking. "Maybe if you want to give a little call to mommy and daddy..." At that point I was ignoring almost everything that came out of Gregory's mouth. We left for the next apartment, a place Gregory described as "a quaint basement" and the lowest in quality of anything available. As we were leaving the apartment, I stopped to say goodbye to the man working. He was sitting, wiping his forehead with a handkerchief. He was covered in tattoos and seemed very young. I shook his hand, a seemingly unusual thing for the time, place and culture. To my own surprise I almost opened my mouth to say something, what probably would have been some sort of apology for Gregory's behavior or existence, but I kept quiet with only a look in my eyes that attempted to convey my thoughts.
The ‘dingy’ apartment was located in the swirling labyrinth of Cihangir's most fashionable neighborhood filled with coffee shops, antiques, vintage clothing stores and winding hilly streets. It was located on the ground floor of an expansive apartment building. Gregory told me he would negotiate the price down to 1,300 a month, as though it were a dump not worthy of anything more anyhow. We met with the landlord of the apartment, a short stocky woman wearing pink lipstick and a beret. She seemed to like Gregory and did not know what to think of me, an unlikely person to be standing next to someone like Gregory. As we left the building, Gregory motioned to where a security guard stood and said, “See theres even 24 hour security to make you feel safe…it might feel nice to have that when you’re coming home at night.” We stood on the street in silence for a few minutes. I wanted to be as far from Gregory as possible. I looked up and told him I would continue searching, most likely to take the shared apartment I had found on craigslist. He gave me his business card and said in a vague tone,” Well, wherever you end up living, if you decide to have any parties invite me.” We parted.

That evening I went back to Bostanci where Demet and Mesut were waiting for me. Mesut and Demet were a young Couchsurfing couple who hosted me for no less than a week, living up to every stereotype of Turkish hospitality I had. Despite returning home late, Mesut had cooked some sort of black sea specialty for dinner and saved me a plate.

The next morning I found myself wandering for miles throughout a tangle of residential areas on the Asian side looking for the address of the apartment I had found on craigslist. I wandered into an herb shop with what looked like dried eggplant skins hanging from the ceiling and carpeted buckets of colored spices. We used a blend of universal sign language and whatever else vocabulary I had to get directions. Apparently it was around the corner. I left the shop and turned right onto a narrow street of what I couldn’t distinguish to be actual apartments. The streets colors were earth toned and blended together in such a way that separation of doors, windows, and steps could not be made entirely clear. I was pleased to see there were a few trees dotting the sidewalks and even more pleased to see two different baklava gulluoglu on each corner.

I kept walking until I found the number 21 carved into the concrete wall of a place with a door made of green ironwork. I rang the bell for what I hoped was the top floor.  The door opened and I went up a winding staircase until I reached the last of six floors. I was greeted by a short young woman who introduced herself as Muzaffer, a surprisingly masculine name, and who I presumed to be her mother at the front door. I took my shoes off and entered into a small, cozy space where two couches were situated on both sides of the room, a television in the front and a large window behind a dining table. Before showing me the rest of the apartment she asked me if I had had breakfast. I replied that I did, but she nonetheless ran into the kitchen and began preparing something. I sat down on the couch. Within five minutes they both rushed back into the living room with a tray, running in and out from kitchen to living room carrying plates, silverware, napkins, fresh baskets of bread, butters, jams and other items I didn’t know the word for. They took the time to re-chop the fresh tomatoes and cucumbers from that morning and arrange the cheese in the proper breakfast way. The tray was eventually complete with fresh fruits, breads, cheese, sausage, eggs, sweets, the whole works. During this time I explained the same repeated story I had told everyone, often modifying details wherever I felt I wanted or needed them. They seemed to like me, although I could never entirely tell with those I couldn’t fully communicate with. We relied considerably on a strange digital dictionary to understand each other. I was enjoying their immense hospitality and warmth, but I didn’t know how to leave.

That evening I decided I could not continue living off of Mesut and Demet’s fridge. I needed to make some serious decisions. That evening I told Mesut and Demet that I would take the room I had looked at the day before. I moved in the next day. I took a long cab ride with my single suitcase. The room I moved into was heavily, almost overly furnished with what had belonged to Muzaffer’s sister who had moved out months ago. I felt my identity confused more than ever at this time. I felt I was living someone else’s life in my own body. I didn’t know whether to find odd solace in this idea or terror. I liked the idea of being someone else in a few ways, and the comfort of a quiet detachment from reality it offered.