On the sabbath we decided to indulge in a hearty roast chicken dinner with all the trimmings followed by a screening of the classic musical ‘South Pacific’ courtesy of Karen at Christmas. I adore the line “I’m as gay as a daisy in May”. They just don’t write lyrics like that anymore – they dare not. Oh, such innocent times. The Rogers and Hammerstein score is a particular favourite of Liam’s. He once had the the soundtrack with the lead sung by Kiri T Canopener. He’s so gay.
Thermal Knickers
New Year’s Day was spent nursing a hangover and basking on the balcony in the gorgeous warming winter sunshine. The benevolent sun enabled me to break the back of the Christmas laundry that was languishing in a suitcase. Our fabric conditioned knicker supply has been replenished just in the nick of time.
The house remains relentlessly chilly. We have yet to find an effective heating solution and so thermal pants are a must-wear. If only it were possible to construct a dwelling on a turntable to follow the passage of the Sun. After dusk we watched Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince on Digiturk. Liam is a huge fan and bought all the books (with the adult covers, of course). He watched silently mesmerised wearing the strangely sexy ‘Dennis the Menace’ jim jams my sister bought him for Christmas.
Tequila Slammers for the Last Hurrah
Bodrum was the venue for our inaugural Turkish New Year revelry. The pretty town has been draped in festive adornments and Harbour Square next to the Crusader castle is graced with a chic snow-white Christmas tree in the shape of a multi-layered hooped skirt. We jostled with the cheery crowd of many generations to catch the act performing at the free concert. An energetic Turkish diva pumped up the volume with catchy Turkopop tunes and the animated audience swayed in happy recognition.
As 2011 dawned, the midnight sky was set alight by a cacophonous pyrotechnic bonanza that dissonantly clashed with the rhythmic Turkic beat. Liam and I embraced and no one minded. With gunpowder spent and smoke hanging in the air, we looked about to observe the assorted assembly; the mobs of mischievous young men, the pantaloon’d grannies with their infant charges, the courting pairs of trendy young things and the gaggles of covered girls variously sporting elaborate head-scarves or Santa hats. We were the only yabancılar in view and we loved it.
We waded through the throng in search of a watering hole and happened upon Meyhane Sokak, a narrow lane off the bazaar and home to a cluster of small crush bars exclusively frequented by Turks. We delicately forced our passage through the rowdy horde, inching past a pretty thing in a sparkly, silver sequined ra ra skirt shaking her booty in wild abandon on top of a table and snaked around a busking band of moustached minstrels. Finally, we squeezed onto one of the tall bench tables lining the lane to enjoy the drunken scene being played out around us. I’m told that alcohol consumption, particularly by women, is generally frowned upon in wider Turkish society. However, there was little evidence of this among the tequila swiggers.
We sent and received various festive texts. I received a message from London life friends, Ian and Matt, who were enjoying their New Year in a bear bar in Brussels. What a tired old twink like Ian was doing in a Brussels bear bar is anyone’s guess.
Defeated by the cold night air and in need of bladder relief we ventured inside one of the bars to be pinned up against the wall by the maelstrom. We were much taken with a group of grungy fellows who wore their hair up in a bun – in the style of Japanese sumo wrestlers and Katherine Hepburn. Turkish appreciation of music is refreshingly unsophisticated and the melee whirled just as enthusiastically to dirgy Depeche Mode as to the Weather Girls’ infamous gay anthem “It’s Raining Men”. Forgive them Father. They know not what they do.
This was the clearly the last hurrah before a short, sharp winter.
Pigs in the Proverbial
As village life is quietly dull and the days are short, we are taking time to endlessly potter and enjoy our newly procured lives as decadent dossers. Daily activities are stretched to breaking point to fill the available time. The expensive entertainment system we extravagantly bought on our minimum wage is paying dividends. We are rapidly exhausting our DVD library with nightly showings of our favourite films and TV series from good times past; Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, Beautiful Thing, Love Actually, The Holiday, Calendar Girls, Postcards from the Edge, Golden Girls (Series 1,2,3 and 4); Gimme, Gimme, Gimme (Series 1,2 and 3) and a host of other manly favourites. We are like pigs in the proverbial.
Sleeping Beauty
Yalıkavak life is in hibernation mode, and the hatches are well and truly battened down. As a working town, daytime activities go on as they must, but by night the village falls eerily silent except for roving packs of abandoned hounds and the few venues scraping a scanty living from the rare hardy emigrey annuals who venture out after dark.
Dogs in Turkey are employed primarily to guard houses not to live in them and are discarded when no longer required, usually at the end of the season. The local council does its best to control the numbers but resources are limited and the supply overwhelming. For the most part, the animals seem healthy and happy, more of a nuisance than a danger. I suppose life on the streets is preferable (and certainly more natural) to being tethered to a post in solitary confinement and fed on kitchen slops. We’ve been sorely tempted to salvage a winsome mutt with a sad, down at heel expression but this would be unfair given our frequent sojourns to Blighty to placate our abandoned families.
Animal-loving emigreys are appalled by the callous treatment of man’s best friend. After all, it’s well known that Brits love their pets more than their children. So, fund-raising and re-homing of street dogs is a regular aspect of emigrey life. A concern for street children seems less prevalent.
Camp as Christmas
A bare larder and a drained wine cellar forced us out in the rain for rations. I was intrigued by the Christmas trinket aisle at the local supermarket where all manner of yuletide paraphernalia can be purchased. We fondled the multi-coloured shiny balls, flickering fairy lights, soft toy Santas, naff papier-mâché nativity scenes and twinkling, tinselled trees, all manufactured by the enterprising Chinese. It seems Turks have appropriated many Christmas traditions and grafted them on to New Year. It gladdens my impious heart. The core Christmas value of giving and goodwill is a universal message that transcends religion. I treasure the lucky luxury of spending time with family and friends. Tragically, this is not an easy time for the lost and the lonely. It’s no co-incidence that, right across Christendom, suicide rates soar.
My Juicy Mandarins
After a calm Christmas Day with Liam’s folks and a boisterous Boxing Day with mine, we left frosty Blighty where the cold had given us colds to return to balmy Bodrum. On the dry night flight home (my first ever sauce-free flight) we chaperoned Sassy Nancy, who has finally forsaken the sticking plaster life of a social worker to seek winter solace in the ample arms of her long-term amour. We chattered away the four hours where she laid bare her tempestuous dalliance with wedded Captain Irfan. He’s a giant of a man (and giant in every department, apparently) who has assembled a flotilla of autumnal ladies vying for his favours. Nancy is undisputed chief concubine, his Nell Gwyn to her improbable Charles the Second. Nancy has the ripest mandarins on the peninsula.
Irfan skilfully manages to keep all his romantic plates spinning with an occasional wobble when he finds himself inadvertently double booked. The ensuing choppy waters serve only to nurse his ego. Business is slow during the inclement months so Nancy can expect his undivided attention.
Irfan was expectantly waiting as we emerged from the terminal building. He was everything I had imagined – charming, jovial and the size of Luxembourg. Nancy threw herself into his generous arms, giggling like an adolescent school girl as he spun her round like a failed audition from Strictly Come Dancing.
Irfan offered us a lift home to avoid the extortion of a taxi fare and would not take no for an answer. He is a large man with a small car but managed to insert us and our large suitcases into his micro hatchback. Nancy sat on a case on the front seat with her legs sprawled and her feet resting on the dashboard; a position she will be repeating later.
Emigrey Spongers
Maurice invited us to his gaff for festive drinks on Christmas Eve. I was delighted to discover that Bernard from Majorca was in town. Bernard is the El Presidente of the ‘First Wives Club’, the fellowship of the ring of exes with whom Maurice has remained friends. Liam thinks the whole concept of staying on good terms with old flames is unnatural. I have membership card number five. It’s fair to say that Maurice has a distinct type, since we are all stout short arses. His current squeeze is no exception. We are the six gobby dwarves to his stocky Snow White.
Meeting up with Bernard again reminded me of my encounter with the Spanish chapter of the guild of emigreys many years ago. Bernard runs a bar in Mallorca and Maurice and I visited him one wet, windswept winter. We were invited to Sunday lunch with an east country couple called Doreen and Jim from Norwich. Jim was doing hard labour retiling Bernard’s bar floor for which he was being handsomely paid. I asked what brought them to Spain. “Too many foreigners coming into the country and sponging off the social” came the depressingly familiar reply. I nearly fell of my chair when Jim boasted, without the slightest hint of irony, that he was claiming incapacity benefit.
We’re Not All Hairdressers
I caught up with Maurice in our favourite Soho dive. We used to be an item and met in the very same bar one damp Friday after work. We spent two years together. We guided each other through some hard times and shared some extraordinary emotional moments of healing and revelation. Maurice is an engineer which is a little unusual among the brethren.
What’s for Tea Tonight Dear?
I trudged across half of old London Town to take tea with Philip. He and his partner, David, run a fancy fromage shop in Twickenham which is doing brisk business judging by the brigade of chattering class Guardian readers queuing around the block. Unfortunately, they just missed out on the EU contract to supply Parmigiano Reggiano to the Irish needy. I managed to extract Philip from the pong for an all too brief catch up.
Philip writes a fabulous foody blog called ‘What’s for tea tonight, dear’ which is a beautifully crafted, chatty read full of mouth-watering recipes. His innate intelligence is beautifully blended with creativity, wit and style. All this pales into insignificance when compared to his astonishing ability to drink me under the table.
Perking the Pansies 