Anatolian Days and Nights: A Love Affair with Turkey, Land of Dervishes, Goddesses, and Saints by Joy E. Stocke & Angie Brenner

Author:Joy E. Stocke & Angie Brenner [Stocke, Joy E.]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Emerald Book Company
Published: 2012-02-16T05:00:00+00:00

Ömer parks the car on a steep incline in a village of small cement houses perched on a mountaintop above a valley of poplars and lush tea plantations.

“This is the village of Saka,” says Faruk. “It means goldfinch.”

We step from the car and are struck by the chuck-clack, chuck-clack of shuttles slapping against wood. Outside a nearby stone and timber house, rows of freshly dyed red and black yarn hang from tree limbs.

A man in a red plaid shirt and baggy jeans waves from the porch of his steep-gabled house.

“Es Selamün aleyküm, may peace be upon you, Idris,” calls Faruk.

“Ve aleykümü selam, and may peace be upon you,” replies the man, whom Faruk introduces as Idris Saka.

Idris brings us up an outdoor flight of stairs to a room where two large fly-shuttle looms face each other. Three-foot-wide balls of white, black, yellow, and red yarn hang from ceiling beams and thread through weighted rods to create an intricate, geometric-patterned cloth that reminds us of Navajo and Hopi Indian weavings.

Idris’s wife, Aynur, sits at her loom in a crocheted shawl and woven headscarf. She lowers her eyes when we enter, possessing a shyness common among women in villages where Islamic tradition still holds and where women avoid contact with outsiders, especially uncovered foreign women in the company of men.

Her name, which means “moonlight,” captivates me, for she seems as illusive as a beam of reflected light. Yet when we share Meryem’s greeting, she looks up, her pale gray eyes as curious as our own.

She turns back to her work, and I gaze toward the treadles. Her bare feet press blocks of wood up and down in an even clack, clickety-clack. Flat and wide without arches, her feet have become blocks of flesh that conform to each treadle as if each one is part of a single wooden block.

Glancing at her hands, which deftly turn strands of yarn into sinuous red fabric shot with rows of yellow and black, I want to ask, “Do your feet hurt? How young were you when you started weaving?”

Later, in thick slippers, she shuffles into a small living room to serve tea while Idris talks about the bridge he helped build in Jordan in the years before his village became a weaving cooperative.

Aynur looks up and smiles when Idris says how happy he is now to earn money in Saka village and live at home with his family.

Faruk looks surprised when Angie comments that Idris’s surname, Saka, is the same as that of the village. “Did his family found the village?” she asks.

“Everyone from the village has the same surname,” explains Faruk, as if this would be obvious. “If I meet someone in Trabzon or Istanbul, or anyone in the world, with the name of Saka, I know they are from here.”

Aynur refills our glasses of tea. Her eyes remain downcast as she serves us, but we notice a hint of a smile as she brushes past.

“Çok teşekkür ederim. Thank you very much,” I say.

“Bir şey değil.

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