Mixed Messages

Turquoise ear-rings , plastic buckets, pistachios from Iran, coal-stoves, 1000-count rosaries. I am in the bazaar in front of Rumi’s tomb in southern Turkey on a cold December morning. Errand boys scurry with trays of tea, summoned by walkie-talkies from carpet shops. Women bargain hard for leafy greens, shopkeepers act insulted.

I turn a corner and spot a man selling bureks from his handcart. A small man who almost disappears into his bulky brown jacket, he is calling out – Come, come, whoever you are, heathen, fire-worshipper, idol-lover, come!

To be honest, those are the words inscribed over the door of the tomb behind me. Truthfully, I have no idea what the burek-seller is saying. Here’s all the Turkish I know – MerhabaInshaAllahIsmisShahnazEtsizYemekVarMiGuleGule. Hello if god wills my name is Shahnaz does this have meat goodbye.

I point to the bureks. "Etsiz yemek var mi?"

In return, I receive a waterfall of Turkish. The burek-seller slows down by degrees as I look more and more puzzled, till his response consists of monosyllabic Turkish words, uttered staccato. I am still at sea though. A few men, drinking tea outside the felt-maker's store eye us.

Reduced to gestures, he points at a burek. I convey with my hands. What. Is. Inside. The burek-seller screws his face. Then he bends forward and lets his hands hang down. He looks at me eagerly.

After a few false starts, it is clear – he is a cow. Standing up, he makes fists out of his hands, and then, elbows astride, with one fist on top of the other, he twists them in opposite directions. He is now milking the cow that he was a moment ago. A burkha-clad woman with a bag full of radishes lifts her veil to watch.

The burek-seller nods sheepishly at the tea drinkers who are smiling broadly now. But he has gone too far to stop now. He stirs the milk. He scoops with a phantom spoon. He presses air carefully between his two hands. He touches a finger at the air and licks it. It is delicious. It is cheese.

The bazaar has stopped to laugh. The tea-drinkers are holding their stomachs as they guffaw. I cannot stop laughing myself and the burek-seller wipes off tears of laughter. I hunt out a lira coin for the burek. He bows his head, touches his hand to his heart, and gestures -- no money, this is my gift.

"Afiyet Olsun." He says then. May it be good for you. It was.