While attempting to speak Turkish, Iain Morris lea
Lessons in Language and Culture
Turkey
You have to emphasise the consonants in Turkish, spitting them out
like pips. I learned this at the Essenler otogar when trying to buy a
bus ticket.
“Selchuk,” I volunteered.
“Selchuk?” came back the quizzical response.
“Yes, Selchuk.”
“Selchuk … tsk.” And then a shake of the head.
I pointed to the small town near the site of ancient Ephesus on a map
laid out on the desk between us.
“Ah, Sel-juk,” beamed the salesgirl, suddenly much the wiser, and I
was issued with my ticket.
Then there are Turkish vowels: long vowels and short vowels; vowels
formed in the back of the throat and vowels spoken sharply. Perhaps
the main distinction is between the dotted and the dotless ‘i’
letters. Words like ‘Istanbul’ and ‘Izmir’ look different in Turkish,
the capitals themselves acquiring dots, and are
pronounced ‘Eestanbul’ and ‘Eezmeer’. Such little differences can
lead to considerable confusion in spoken Turkish.
Still, I had resolved to learn a few basic words and phrases during
my time in the country, and had acquired a pocket-sized phrasebook
for this very purpose before leaving London. During my first few days
in Istanbul it mouldered at the bottom of my backpack, and the little
I learnt was from staff at the Paris Hostel. ‘Hello’ was simple
enough – ‘merhaba’ – and ‘please’ sounded like it should be a make of
German handgun – ‘lutfen’. But the translation of ‘thank you’ was a
real tongue twister – ‘tesekkur ederim’. Try saying ‘tea-sugar-edirm’
and you’re on the right track. Almost.
I tried putting my handful of words to use as much as possible, with
mixed results. At the otogar, while waiting for a nightbus to Selcuk,
I ordered rounds of coffee – ‘kehveh’ – and engaged the waiters in
conversation, throwing in the odd Turkish phrase when things seemed
to be going well. Doing so usually ended the conversation.
A shopkeeper named Selim wandered over, offered me a cigarette and
told me he was trying to learn English. I said I was trying to learn
some Turkish and we hit it off immediately. Selim and I were unable
to exchange more than customary pleasantries, but he took great
delight in reading the English translations from my phrasebook to his
shopkeeper friends, his exclamations becoming more preposterous by
the second.
“I want to luurn Eengleesh. Can you deerect me to the carwash. Git
undrezzed now, please …”
His friends howled with laughter, banging the coffee tables with
their fists and scattering cigarette ash everywhere. Despite their
show of approval, it was clear they didn’t have a clue what was going
on.
But encouraged by the adulation of his audience, Selim launched into
a virtuoso finale. Discarding the phrasebook as an unnecessary prop,
he rose to his feet and drew a deep breath.
“My name is Selim. I come from Turkey. I am an Eengleesh teacher in
Turkey. I leave in Eestanbul … no, I live in the fucking otogar, I
work in my uncle’s fucking shop and everyday I see the same fucking
people.”
I departed feeling like a psychiatrist concluding his first session
with a new patient.
On the bus to Selcuk, we were treated to a film in which the actor
and comedian Martin Lawrence travels back in time to medieval
England, where he helps a small band of freedom fighters to overthrow
a tyrannical king (and presumably establish a democracy). The movie
had been dubbed into Turkish but with a little concentration I was
able to follow the convolutions of the plot. Turks love Hollywood.
They will spend all day berating America for its overbearing ways,
its imperialist interventions in Middle Eastern affairs, its
corporate irresponsibility, and then slap on a movie starring Mel
Gibson and Goldie Hawn and settle back with a crate of Budweiser.
But they can’t be bothered with subtitles, or perhaps can’t see them
for all the clouds of cigarette smoke, so the dubbing industry is big
business here. Children with any exposure to television must grow up
thinking Turkish is the most widely spoken language in the world. And
visitors to the country get to enjoy the ironic spectacle of armour-clad knights speaking a language they would have been committed to eradicating.
Western popular culture has permeated Turkish society in other ways
too. During a toilet stop midway through the journey, I overheard the
theme tune to ‘Who Wants to be a Millionaire?’ playing inside the
service station and was astounded to discover that the gameshow had
been exported to Turkey like a McDonald’s franchise, with not only
identical music but also studio design and show formula. Even the
host looked like a swarthy version of Chris Tarrant: the same moon-shaped face and ear-to-ear grin. In fact, only the language was
different, and perhaps the title, given the current value of the
Turkish lira (‘Who Wants to be a Trillionaire?’). This struck me as
the worst kind of cultural homogenisation because it is so pervasive.
You can boycott McDonald’s or Starbucks but the Chris Tarrant
lookalikes have invaded your living room, and once they’re on screen
it’s impossible to be rid of them. The shows are frighteningly,
annoyingly addictive.
At Ephesus, I planned to visit the ancient theatre, where it is
thought that crowds of up to 25,000 people once gathered to watch the
gladiatorial games – games that to us today seem bloodthirsty and
barbaric. I wondered if in some post-apocalyptic future new
civilisations would dig up the ruins of gameshow studios and
speculate about our societies in the same way.