A Window Scene from Istanbul

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I just looked out my window this morning through the gleaming sunlight into the neighbor’s window where a cat was busy sunning itself with the last rays of light to make it through the concrete alleyways which make up this sprawling city of 20 million people. The December breeze flooded into my flat in the heart of this phenomenal city chilling my skin despite the heat of the sun. As I checked the street life below, I saw a man placing a fresh loaf of bread in a wicker basket as a woman readied herself to pull the loaf up for her breakfast. Further down the street the taxies line themselves up on the right hand side of the street waiting for passengers to make them useful once again. Meanwhile the currently unemployed taxi drivers play with the street doges, and keep bad intentioned boys from torturing them. The bakal guy from Diyarbakır leans out of his corner ship chatting with a guy on the street. Cars grunt their way up the nearly vertical hill as scooters dodge pedestrians and cars alike; weaving in and out of traffic like they were born with a death wish. The manav across the street is busy with all the Turkish women buying vegetables for the evening meal. Soaking in the atmosphere I force myself to remember that although I only see fifty people out of my window there are over 10000 times that number of people in this dynamic, vibrant city and that the scene I see is replayed millions of times per day. It makes me feel extremely insignificant, slightly overwhelmed, but entirely alive. Through all the streets of the city there are people living, working, laughing, crying and dying - all trying to make their way in this global city. Turkey itself may have very nationalizing policies which are carried into reality hourly on the streets but it has no hope of winning against the force of 20 million people. Try telling the Africans and Eastern Europeans to stop setting up import business in town’ try convincing the Europeans to stop coming to teach English, German, French and Spanish here’ try persuading the Kurdish people to stop moving to the city in search of work. Maybe you could make some headway if there were a quarter of the people, but no one can stop a force so large from having their own impact on this city: it is inspiring and terrifying at the same time. These thoughts flooded my head as I smelled the coal from the chimneys, felt the warmth of the winter sun on my cheeks, and watched the brightly dressed people going about their business on the street below.

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