Bliss: A Novel (30 page)

The Aegean winds, which had pleased him like a child on his first days at sea, had soon become his worst enemy. He had become tired, but the winds remained as vigorous as ever, like strong young men hiding behind each and every cape. The williwaw—a very dangerous gust of wind that descends precipitously from the mountains to the sea—was especially formidable. You could recognize it by the whirlpools it created in the water and the way the boat heeled to one side. If you were not careful, this wind could hurl your sail into the sea. One day, in front of Çıfıt Castle, the wind squall had struck, and the professor had barely saved the boat from capsizing.

After ten days at sea, İrfan was tired of sailing from one bay to the next. He felt he was wandering aimlessly around the Aegean Sea like a drunken sailor as if nothing had changed in his life, but he realized this was not true.

As he was leaving a small grocery store one day, he saw some daily newspapers and bought them without giving it a second thought. He had not read a newspaper since setting out to sea. He had not even thought about the news. In Istanbul, he used to start the day by reading the paper. First he would check if there were any articles about him or if anyone had criticized his television program.

The writers of the daily columns pursued a running battle with each other through their articles in the papers. It was entertaining to follow their quarrels, which sometimes lasted for days. Some writers got so furious with their colleagues that if they had had swords, axes, or spears instead of pens, they would have brutally hacked each other to pieces. Their jobs were like the punishment of Sisyphus—to work and write from morning till evening just to have their articles thrown into the garbage every night.

When İrfan returned to the boat, he opened the newspapers and was immediately horror-struck by what he read. The newspapers could not be talking about his country. What he read there had nothing to do with Turkey. This approach to the world, the language used, the news emphasized, and the photographs printed there were completely foreign to him. It was then the professor realized how deeply the past weeks on the sea had changed him.

Drinking his cool beer, he ran his eye over the events that were taking place in the country: quarrels between politicians or boasts about their achievements, efforts to paint Turkey as a heaven on earth; news of a Turkish fashion designer who had taken New York by storm, of a Turkish singer whose album had sold out in Europe, of an American politician who said that Turkey was the most important country in the world, or about a Hollywood star who wanted to shoot a film in Turkey and eat “shish kebab”; morale-boosting lies, and the headscarf protests that had been a part of the political agenda for the last few years.

On the front page of one of the newspapers, there was a photograph of a policeman hitting a girl on the head with a truncheon. İrfan had become used to seeing such scenes at the university. He had passed by such protests many times. He tried to understand why the girl had acted in such a militant way. He could easily understand why women in an Islamic country, forced to cover their heads, might fight to remove their headscarves. But why did these girls torture themselves by covering their heads in the summer heat and risk getting beaten up for it? Natural and biological laws should have caused them to revolt against such coverings, not protest in favor of them. What possible reason could there be for such behavior?

The professor noticed a phrase in the article: “the attempt to break the police barricade.” These words hinted at an answer to his question. Suddenly, he understood what was really going on! The police barricade was not an obstacle to surmount but the goal itself. The police represented the regime, and they also protected it. They were the symbol of that vulgar, rotten system that all young people hated. And in each period of time, young people, full of honest, if rebellious, feelings, revolt against the system. In the seventies and eighties, students had tried to surmount the police barricade in front of the same university and had been harshly treated. But then, the students had been shouting leftist slogans: “Revolution is the only way! Down with oligarchy!” At that time, the way to revolt against the system had been through such leftist movements.

In the nineties, again there were police barricades and rebellious students in front of the same gate. Truncheons were raised once more, and tanks aimed water cannons at the students, who were screaming in Kurdish,
“Kurdare Azadi!”
and
“Biji serok Apo!”
They wore red, green, and yellow scarves and carried posters of Abdullah Öcalan, the leader of the PKK.

In the twenty-first century, the same square was, this time, full of girls in headscarves clashing with the police. Once again water cannons were used. In short, the police and the students played the same game time and again. The only things that changed were the slogans and the outward appearance of the students.

Youth needs to rebel and revolt in this way or that. In reality, these girls fighting to keep their heads covered were doing it just for the sake of fighting against the established regime; to demonstrate to their parents, to their school, and to the political system that they had their own unique personalities. And if these girls who were struggling to be allowed to cover their heads had been living in Iran, they would be fighting to uncover them.

Long live the spirit of rebellion! Long live revolution! Long live Kropotkin! Long live Bakunin! And long live Khomeini!

Lost in these thoughts, İrfan said to himself, “It’s none of your business, idiot! Just because you were born in this part of the world at this particular time, why should you make everything your problem? If you had lived in the fourteenth century in China, other problems would have meant the end of the world to you, and you would still have been wrong. In many years from now, that hill in the distance will still be there, but you will be gone. This sea will still be here, but you will be gone. Even that ruined house over there will remain, but you won’t. Stop it, for God’s sake! Stop this nonsense!”

İrfan threw away every one of the newspapers and opened another bottle of cold beer.

He had been on the Aegean for a long time, but he had only been to a single Greek island, Kos. He had docked his boat in the harbor, presented his passport and visa, and had officially entered Greece. Then, for the first time in weeks, he had spent a whole evening on land.

First, he had a dinner of octopus, red mullet,
horta,
and
fava,
at a famous restaurant, and then he went to a small music hall where some local musicians were playing the
rembetiko
. The music was intoxicating, and the women and men were indefatigable, dancing to the
zeybekiko
and the
kasapiko
till long after midnight. The professor realized how intoxicated he was only after he went out into the fresh air. He did not know whether it was the ouzo or the tipsy atmosphere of the music hall that had made him drunk. As he staggered along the deserted streets, he felt as if he were a penniless
rembetiko
musician, living in the time of the ascetic saints of music, Markos Vamvakaris and Tsitsanis.

Hundreds of thousands of Anatolian Greeks, who had had to immigrate to Greece from Izmir, the professor’s hometown, had created this mysterious music. This drunken music burned like acid, was as uncontrollable as the sea breeze, and as grief-stricken as the deepest part of the Aegean. Perhaps he found himself in tune with it because it came from a neighboring land.

In the marina, the professor had found his boat with difficulty. He had thrown himself on the bed in his clothes and slept until afternoon. He had woken up with a stabbing headache though he still felt drowned in the sound of the bouzouki and the brittle
rembetiko
music.

The professor felt he must go to those desolate coves again to regain his equilibrium. He longed for the solitude he had earlier complained of. In the deserted coves, a resinous scent wafting toward the sea in the serenity of the night would remind him of the pines’ existence. Then he would light the kerosene lamp and sit silently in the deathlike darkness that surrounded him while cold shivers ran up and down his spine. Afraid to make the slightest sound, he abandoned himself to the will of nature.

During the day, the professor would amuse himself by casting a line and enjoying fishing. He usually caught at least one of whatever fish were to be found in the channels between the islands but, no matter how hard he tried, he was not able to catch the colorful
lambuka
which were always swimming around the boat. In some places, they called the
lambuka
“dolphin.” The people of the Far East called this fish “mahi-mahi,” and the Aegean people called it “the naked fish.” As if intending to drive him crazy, the
lambuka
would appear every afternoon at the same time, taunting him. One day, another fisherman noticed his lack of success and told him to use a trotline. “Throw out the trotline and let one of them get hooked on it, but don’t pull the line in. Soon you’ll see that all the others will come.”

It happened just as the fisherman had said. When a fish seized the bait, the others enthusiastically tried to get themselves hooked as well. “Exactly like humans,” thought the professor.

One morning, he forced himself to write the first sentence of the book he had been struggling to begin. He had done all that research over the years, and now that he had his notes with him, he could begin. The first sentence went: “That day in the marketplace of Srebrenitza, Ibrahim, a ten-year-old Bosnian boy, was killed by a bullet from the rifle of a Serbian sharpshooter. He died without knowing that he shared the same fate as his Christian ancestors, who, centuries earlier, had lived thousands of kilometers away in Samosata.”

Then he added: “This was the fate of the Bogomil.”

After that he could not think of another word or idea to write down. He read the first sentence over and over again, enjoying it more each time. A book that started with that sentence would surely attract attention, but how would he write the rest of it? Thousands of words had to flow to be able to write a book, but it seemed that he did not have the talent to be a writer.

Until evening, the professor contemplated the first sentence of his book, but then a sudden, strong wind began to rock the boat. Then he gave up. He had to cope with the much more vital problem of finding a tranquil cove to take refuge in. With an injured leg, he could not risk the danger of being caught in a storm on the open sea.

He took out Heikell’s book, established his location, and discovered that there was, in fact, a nearby cove where he could spend the night. Perhaps it could not be called a cove, exactly, because, according to the map, the sea went inland like a twisting river. It would have been easier to enter it in daylight, but he had been absorbed by his book.

When İrfan found the entrance to the cove, darkness had already descended. It was a moonless night, and visibility was nil. He moved very slowly, taking extra care, as the chart indicated some perilously shallow water. İrfan looked at the depth sounder and changed his direction when the numbers began to decrease. He did not want to run aground.

As he went deeper inland, he felt as if he were moving up a real river, one that twisted and turned. He had turned on the spotlight, which allowed him to see a little of the coast and water in front of the boat.

At least there was no wind here. After moving very slowly for a while, İrfan discerned a pyramidlike hill in the darkness, and he realized that he was approaching the end of the cove. This was a magical place, which did not look like any of the coves he had been to before. He was excited, yet he did not know why. He began to move toward the hill. Perhaps he would be able to cast anchor soon. Maybe he would not even need to tie the boat to a tree in such a serene cove. Nothing stirred; the air seemed solid and tangible.

The professor scanned the shore, using the spotlight, and suddenly started with fright. In this deserted, lonely place, a man was shouting at him, “Turn off the light! Turn off the light!”

The man’s tone was threatening, almost as if he was about to grab a gun and shoot if he was not obeyed. İrfan switched off the light and was left in complete darkness.

Who was that man? Were there others with him? Why did he shout, telling him to turn off the light? Where was he?

The professor cast anchor. The sound of the chain frightened him. “I wish I hadn’t come to this ill-omened cove,” he thought. What a sinister river! He felt as if he were on a spellbound shore, like the one that had caused Ulysses so much trouble.

After he cast anchor, he sat silently in the dark. Would they be angry if he lit the kerosene lamp? With the help of a flashlight, the professor poured himself a glass of whisky and began to sip it as he looked at the dark hill that resembled the pyramid of Cheops. Not even the smallest light could be seen, and no sound broke the silence.

A few minutes later, İrfan heard a splash as if someone was rowing toward him. “Peace be with you!” said a man’s voice.

The professor was not sure which of that evening’s events was more surprising. Now, in the middle of the night, a stranger in a rowboat was hailing him with a religious greeting. The man was obviously not a sailor.

İrfan aimed his flashlight at the stranger. He saw a tall young man, with a fine-boned, slender face, a striking contrast to his sturdy figure. İrfan invited him aboard, and the young man jumped onto the deck.

“Sorry,” he said. “There’s a fish farm here for sea bass and gilt-head breams. If a strong light shines on them, they get scared and might kill themselves by swimming into each other. We’ve been warned to protect them from lights.”

İrfan relaxed a little and asked where exactly the fish farm was.

The young man pointed to the left bank. “We live there, too—in a hut on the shore. You can’t see it now, because the light is behind a tree.”

“Doesn’t the light frighten the fish?” asked İrfan.