The Bastard of Istanbul (28 page)

Though they welcomed her warmly, they were also quick to go back to their standard posture of unremitting languor, since nothing could upset the sluggish rhythm that prevailed in Café Kundera. Those in need of speed and variation could simply go out, for there was plenty of that on the streets. Here it was about mandatory indolence and eternal recurrence. This place was about fixations, repetitions, and obsessions; it was for those who didn’t want to have anything to do with the bigger picture, if there indeed was such a thing.

During the brief pauses between questions, Armanoush scrutinized the place and the people, intuiting where the name of the café came from. The constant tension between vulgar reality and treacherous fantasy, the notion of the
outside people
versus
us people inside,
the dreamlike quality of the place, and finally, the sullen expression on the men’s faces, as if they were desperately ruminating on what to choose—either to carry the weight of disheveled love affairs or become half real with lightness—everything evoked a scene out of a Kundera novel. They, however, didn’t and couldn’t know this, being too enveloped, too much a part of it, like fish that couldn’t possibly comprehend the immensity of the ocean in which they swam from the blurry lens of the waters surrounding them.

Likening the café to a Kundera scene only doubled Armanoush’s interest. She noticed many other things, including the fact that everyone at the table spoke English, although with an accent and grammatical flaws. Overall they seemed to have no trouble switching from Turkish to English. At first Armanoush attributed such ease to their self-confidence, but by the end of the day she suspected that the facilitating factor might be less their confidence in their English than their lack of confidence in any language whatsoever. They acted and talked as if no matter what they said or how they said it, one could not really fully express the innermost self and, in the end, language was only a reeking carcass of hollow words long rotten inside.

Armanoush also noticed that the overwhelming majority of the framed road pictures on the walls depicted either Western countries or exotic places; few had anything to do with what might fall in between. Having made this observation, she didn’t quite know how to interpret it. Perhaps the flight of the imagination here was oriented toward either moving to the West or fleeing into an exotic land far away.

A swarthy, slim street vendor sneaked in, almost hiding himself from the waiters, who might have chased him away. The man carried a huge tray of unpeeled yellow almonds on cubes of ice.

“Almonds!” he exclaimed, as if it were somebody’s name he was desperately looking for.

“Over here!” the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist exclaimed, as if responding to his name. Almonds would go perfectly with what he was drinking at the moment: beer. By this time he had already openly quit Alcoholics Anonymous, less on grounds of addiction than on grounds of earnestness, seeing no reason why he should call himself an alcoholic when he wasn’t one. It didn’t sound sincere to him. Instead, he had decided to become his own supervisor. Today, for instance, he’d drink only three beers. Having already guzzled down one beer, there were two more to go. After that, he’d stop. Yes, he assured everyone, he could manage such discipline without someone’s pitiful professional guidance. With that kind of decisiveness, he bought four ladlefuls of almonds and piled them in the middle of the table so that everyone could easily reach them.

Armanoush’s thoughts, in the meantime, were busy. She watched the lanky, lost-looking waiter take everyone’s orders and was somewhat surprised to see so many people drinking. She remembered her blanket comment the other night on Muslims and alcohol. Should she now mention the Turks’ fondness for alcohol to her pals in the Café Constantinopolis? How much of what was happening here should she reveal to them?

A few minutes later, the waiter returned with a large glass of frothy beer for the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist and a carafe of dry red wine for everyone else. As he poured the dark crimson liquid into elegant wine glasses, Armanoush took the opportunity to observe the people around the table. She figured that the edgy woman sitting next to and yet miles away from the bulky man with the bulbous nose must be his wife. One by one she examined the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist’s wife and the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist, as well as the Closeted-Gay Columnist, the Exceptionally Untalented Poet, the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies, and . . . she couldn’t help staring a bit longer at the young, sexy brunette across from her, who didn’t look like part of the group but seemed, if anything, awkwardly attached to it. Definitely a cell phone person, the brunette kept toying with her pink, glittery phone, flipping it open for no apparent reason, pressing on this button or that, sending an SMS or receiving one, absorbed by the small device. From time to time, she inched toward the bearded man next to her and nuzzled his ear. Evidently, she was the
new
girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies.

“I had a tattoo done yesterday.”

The words were so out of context that Armanoush could not instantly grasp if they were addressed to anyone, let alone to her. Yet, either out of sheer boredom or in an attempt to befriend the only other recent addition to the group, the new girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies was talking to her: “Would you like to see it?”

It was a wild orchid, as red as hell, snaking around her belly button.

“That’s cool,” Armanoush said.

The woman grinned, pleased. “Thank you,” she said as she patted her lips with a napkin even though she hadn’t eaten anything.

In the meantime, Asya too had been observing the woman, albeit with a far more disapproving gaze. Having met a new female, as usual, she could do one of two things: either wait to see when she would start hating her or take the shortcut and hate her right away. She chose the latter.

Asya leaned backward and picked up her glass between thumb and forefinger, observing the red liquid. Even when she started to talk she didn’t remove her gaze from the glass.

“In point of fact, when we come to recall how long-standing the practice of tattooing is . . . ” Asya said, but didn’t finish her sentence. Instead she started a new one. “At the beginning of the 1990s, explorers found a well-preserved body in the Italian Alps. It was more than five thousand years old. It had fifty-seven tattoos on its body. The world’s oldest tattoos!”

“Really?” Armanoush asked. “I wonder what kinds of tattoos were done back then?”

“Often they tattooed animals, the ones that were their totems . . . probably donkeys, deer, owls, mountain rams—and snakes, of course, I’m sure snakes were always on demand.”

“Wow, more than five thousand years old!” the new girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies enthused.

“But I guess he didn’t have a tattoo on his belly button!” he cooed back to her. And they laughed together, followed by a kiss and a cuddle.

There were a few tables scattered outside on the sidewalk. A grim couple settled themselves at one of them, and then another couple, with stressed-out, serious urban faces. Armanoush watched their gestures with curiosity, likening them to characters from a Fitzgerald novel.

“We somehow tend to associate tattoos with originality, inventiveness, and even modernism. In point of fact, having tattoos around your belly button is one of the oldest customs in world history. Let me remind you that by the end of the nineteenth century a mummified body was discovered by a group of Western archaeologists. It belonged to an Egyptian princess. Her name was Amunet. And guess what? She had a tattoo. Guess where?” Now Asya turned toward the scenarist and looked him directly in the eye. “On her belly button!”

The scenarist blinked, puzzled by so much information. His new girlfriend seemed just as impressed when she asked: “How do you know all this?”

“Her mother operates a tattoo parlor,” interjected the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist without tearing his eyes from Asya. He sank into his chair, resisting the urge to kiss her angry lips, resisting the urge to ask for another beer without ado, resisting the urge to stop impersonating the man he was not.

His mood went unnoticed by all but one. Armanoush detected the warmth in his eyes when he looked at Asya and sensed he might be in love with her.

Asya meanwhile seemed to be in an entirely different state of mind, getting ready to launch another attack on the new girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies. Leaning forward with a hard look on her face, she said: “Tattoos can be very dangerous though.”

Asya waited a few seconds for the word
dangerous
to sink in. “The instruments used in the process should be thoroughly disinfected, but the truth is you can never be a hundred percent sure about the risk of contamination, which, of course, is a serious issue given that the most common technique of tattooing is inserting ink into the skin via needles. . . .”

She had uttered the word
needles
in such a menacing way that everyone at the table felt the chill. Only the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist watched her with an impish sparkle in his eyes, fully enjoying the show.

“The needle is repeatedly driven in and out of the skin with a rhythm that approximates three thousand times a minute,” Asya continued. She took out a cigarette from her pack, repeatedly pushing it back and forth as if illustrating the act, until she finally lighted it. The new girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies tried to smile at the overtly sexual gesture, but something in Asya’s eyes stopped her halfway through.

“Blood poisoning and hepatitis are only two of the many fatal diseases you can contract at a tattoo parlor. The artist needs to break open a new sterile package each time and wash his hands with hot water and soap, and on top of that use sanitizing liquids and wear latex gloves. . . . Theoretically, of course. I mean, come on, who would bother with all that fuss?”

“He did all that. The needles were new and his hands were clean,” the new girlfriend remarked in Turkish with a tinge of panic.

Asya did not yield, continuing in English. “Yeah, good. Unfortunately that’s not enough. How about the ink? Did you know that not only the needles but the ink has to be renewed each time? You have to use fresh ink for each session, for each customer.”

“The ink . . .” Now the new girlfriend looked really concerned.

“Right, the ink!” Asya decreed with certitude. “There are many infections that can surface after a tattoo operation just because of the ink. One of the most common ones is
Staphylococcus aureus,
which sadly”—she frowned—“is known to cause serious cardiac damage.”

Though she tried not to lose her cool, upon hearing this piece of information the color drained from the face of the new girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies. Her cell phone beeped just then but she didn’t even look at it.

“Had you consulted a physician before getting it done?” Asya asked with a concerned expression that she hoped would prove persuasive.

“No, I didn’t,” the new girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies said. Her face now turned grave, etching new lines around her lips and eyes.

“Oh, really? Well, never mind, don’t worry.” Asya flung up her hands. “Almost certainly nothing bad will happen.”

And with that she leaned back. The Dipsomaniac Cartoonist and Armanoush smiled, but none of the others reacted in any way.

Deciding to join the game, the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist turned to Asya with sly amusement and asked, “But she can have it removed if she wanted to, right? It is possible to have it removed, isn’t it?”

“It’s possible,” Asya instantly replied. “However, the entire process is painful and daunting at best. You can choose one of three methods: surgery, laser treatment, or skin peeling.”

With that Asya took an almond from the pile and peeled off the skin. Everyone at the table, even Armanoush, couldn’t help but stare at the almond with horror. Pleased with her audience’s reaction, Asya tossed the peeled almond into her mouth and chewed heartily. The eyes of the new girlfriend of the Nonnationalist Scenarist of Ultranationalist Movies grew wide as she watched Asya chew the almond.

“I personally would never recommend the third. Not that the others are any better. You need to find a good—a
very
good— dermatologist or cosmetic surgeon. It costs a lot, but what can you do? Each visit is a ton of money and you need to pay for several visits. Even when the tattoo is removed, there will be a visible scar left behind, not to mention skin discoloration. If you want to get rid of that, you’ll need another cosmetic surgery. Even then there is no hundred-percent guarantee.”

Armanoush pinched herself not to laugh.

“Well, why don’t we drink?” the Dipsomaniac Cartoonist’s wife broke in with a tired smile. “And what better reason do we have to drink than Mr. Tiptoe? What was his name? . . . Cecche?”

“Cecchetti,” Asya corrected her, still lamenting the day she had been intoxicated enough to give the group a speech on ballet history.

“Yes, yes, Cecchetti.” The Exceptionally Untalented Poet chuckled and explained to Armanoush, “If it weren’t for him, ballet dancers wouldn’t have to tire themselves out walking on their toes, you know?”

“What was he thinking?” someone added, and then everybody laughed.

“So tell us, Amy, where do you come from?” the Exceptionally Untalented Poet now asked Armanoush over the customary muttering in the café.

“Actually, Amy is short for Armanoush,” Asya interjected, still in a provocative mood. “She is Armenian American!”

Now the word
Armenian
wouldn’t surprise anyone at Café Kundera, but
Armenian American
was a different story.
Armenian Armenian
was no problem—similar culture, similar problems—but
Armenian American
meant someone who despised the Turks. All heads turned toward Armanoush now. Their stares revealed interest tainted with alarm, as if she were a flamboyant gift box with unknown content. Inside the box there could be a present as exquisite as the outside, or there could be a bomb. Armanoush squared her shoulders as if steeling herself against a blow, but, being regulars at Café Kundera for so many years, the group had too deeply absorbed the sluggish characteristic of the place to get excited for long.