Kindness of Strangers

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Is it possible to get too far off the beaten path?

It’s a question I’ve been pondering for the past four days since landing in Cirali. I heard about this tiny beach town in passing from one of my aerobics teachers back home, who spent time here a few years ago on a trip to Turkey. She gushed about how secluded and lovely it was, which was just what we needed six weeks into our odyssey: a vacation from our trip. Five days of relaxing on a beach – not having to make decisions about dining, bus trips, and all the other details of our traveling life – sounded sublime.

A few days before leaving Goreme, I tried to figure out directions to Cirali. The instructions our Lonely Planet guidebook provided were vague at best, so I searched on the hotel’s website, clicked on the little British flag, and was provided a translation in…Turkish. I tried calling the number listed on their website, but the phone rang ad nauseum. Oh well, I thought, how hard could it be?

We boarded an overnight bus for Antalya, where we would transfer to another bus bound for Cirali. The conductor, a young man clad in a tuxedo shirt, polyester pants, and an orange, felt bow tie, was eager to strike up a conversation with us. While we didn’t get very far, we tried to convey that we were going to Cirali. “Cirali?” he asked. He seemed perplexed, conferring with the two men in the seats ahead of us. I pointed to a map of Turkey, creating a black pinpoint with my pen between Olympos and Kermer. “Cirali!” he cried. He pointed towards the floor. “Kermer,” he said, indicating, it seemed, that this bus would terminate there. Although we had purchased a ticket to Antalya, he seemed to be okay with us staying on the bus, which would bring us closer to our final destination. He didn’t appear to be a by-the-book sort of a guy. He routinely crouched down on the stairs, blowing smoke from his cigarette into the air vents, with flagrant disregard to the “No Smoking” signs overhead.

We were deposited at the bus company’s office in Kermer, but weren’t really sure what to do next. A conversation, cobbled together in English and Turkish, ensued between us, the bus driver, the conductors, and any bus personnel that happened to be standing within a 10 foot radius. We learned that a bus, going somewhere we thought we wanted to go, would be arriving somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 to 60 minutes. “What does it cost?” we asked. The man from the bus company shrugged, tinkering with his cell phone. “It is about the same as the buses that pass on the main highway?” we asked. He shrugged again.

The bus came a few moments later, but not before we shared a philosophical conversation about Islam with the man who passively shrugged, who, for no apparent reason, suddenly took a great interest in us.

We boarded the bus, passing along our written directions to anyone who cared to read them, hoping someone might know where we should get off. Every time we board a bus we have no idea where we’re going or where we should get off; we consider it a miracle every time we reach our final destination. After thirty minutes, the bus halted to a stop, and the conductor cried, “Cirali,” motioning for us to get off. We are always the only ones getting off at a given stop, which only furthers our sense of unknowing.

We crossed the road, where a dolmus, Turkey’s famous minibuses that cart passengers short distances, stood at the ready. A crowd of women slumped in the shade, the late morning heat and humidity already bearing down hard. The dolmus driver cradled a custard- and evergreen-speckled melon in his arm, delivering it to the rustic lean-to to cut it open, then passed wedges of the melon to the wilting passengers.

After the melon had been polished off, we wedged ourselves into the van and trundled down the hill, seven kilometers to the town center. Everyone except us exited. We proceeded to the end of the street, where the dolmus delivered us to our hotel. We were then guided to the farthest patch of bungalows, set in the middle of a grove of lime and pomegranate trees.

We had little cash and learned that there was no ATM machine in town. Later that night, as we ate dinner by the light of a kerosene lantern at the fringes of the beach, we heard the call to prayer drift over the rugged mountains that crashed into the sea and the starry canopy above. It hit us: the town had a mosque but no ATM machine. A few days later, Maikael went in search of cash, returning 3 hours later and 19 lira poorer, having had to take a dolmus, bus, and walk 2 kilometers to find an ATM in the next town over.

Was coming all this way worth it? Had we gone too far off the beaten path?

As difficult as it is to get here, the beaches are still teeming with European visitors, their white, fleshy bodies splayed out on cushioned beach chairs. A few meters down the beach, women wearing long pants, shirts, and headscarves bob jovially in the waves. Depending on which way I turn my head, I am either in the middle of nowhere or somewhere – but where? The tropical plants constantly belie the feeling that I am in Turkey. So do all the Europeans.

It’s hard to know whether I’m really off the beaten path or not, but what does it matter? Despite the fact that it is the height of tourist season, I can still enjoy a quiet day at the beach. I rarely hear a peep from my fellow sunbathers, who are scattered sparsely over the sandy terrain. I can swim in the clear bathwater of the Mediterranean and feel like the last person on the planet. The nights are perfectly silent. I have read two books in four days. It’s hard to complain.