soundscapes
wordless narratives


He stood hands in pockets, eyes to the ground, in front of the facade of a Tokyo Starbucks knockoff, Cafe Excelsior. The cafe's sign was written in the same thick green font as its more popular sister, it's flourescent lit interior held simple tables and massively produced plush seating, no doubt from some gray place in China. Hair disheveled, carrying the same heavy posture that spoke to a gland disorder or an unnatural involvement with heavy cream that his son carried, he waited for me, a never-before seen friend of his son's for a cup of coffee.

"Hello."
"Ah, Cem, Nas?ls?n?z.."
"Actually, "
I loaded, fired one of the most common conversations of my life.
"Actually, I dont speak Turkish."
He blinked.
"I am the only Cem Ozturk that you will meet in your life that doesn't speak a word of Turkish."
He smiled widely.
"I see. Tokyo is full of first things."

He had come to Tokyo following the sudden death of his wife, to get away from the things that reminded him of her, and to be with the boy that they had together. Their son, Yale educated yet fiercely intelligent, was cooped up in a $5000 US a month efficiency in the East Azabu business tenement that housed most of the core of the Ivy wreathed Tokyo business elite - a place of serviced apartments and special services. Unsurprisingly, it was the best place to get obscure and obscenely expensive French cheese in Tokyo too.

"Cem, let us get coffee now, how 'bout et."

As we approached the counter, I prepared suitable Japanese sentences in my head, only to be reminded of how unnecessary local language is when you are with a middle aged Mediterranean man.

"Young lady" he began in a thickly accented English to the counter girl "I vill have the second from top one, big one, and he vill have-"
He pointed at me with a thick, oddly shaped finger, which he then turned over into a questioning upturned hand.

"Medium coffee, black."
She looked at me as if I had just barked. So, I used basic Japanese.
"Ano, cohee ippai, M sizu, blacku de kudasai."
She looked at him, as if to ask him why I was barking.
"He vill have same." he said in his strongly accented English.
She smiled and got our drinks.

--

Certain Turkish men of previous aqqaintance had demonstrated that odd talent for communication to me, but none quite as clearly. I have been told that the skill is especially well developed among Black Sea traders, a job considered generally to require well honed wit and shrewdness what with all the various swarthy types inhabiting its shores... and the man across me was a veritable Black Sea shipping magnate, a ship owner with vessels running circles from the Ukraine to Istanbul, even to the filthy Suez. Another characteristic of the Turkish breed generally is the "sit and talk", or often the "sit and smoke and drink and talk", where adult Turks sit in loose circles, drink something that will loosen their tongues, or perhaps inflame their irritation with one thing or another to the point where it boils over into conversation - possibly coffee, possibly wine, probably Raku - - and then they talk. But not about things that Americans are more inclined to talk about - we seem to talk about sports and quotes from the Simpsons or the Chappelle show. With Turks its always love, or love-politics, politics, or life, or life-politics or life stories or just -

"Interesting story. Now I have story to tell you" he said petting his hanging jowls in a slightly effeminate way, as much as petting jowls can be.
He pointed the same oddly triangular fat finger at my neck as I tucked away the Persian amulet that had been the center of a previous conversation about Iran.
"These items, these things, these religions: it never fails to amazine me the power of these things and these simple ideas to connect people - and the real power that this has in the world, the real influence it can that these things have over everyday life. Religion... it is crazy, there are all of these Muslims in far away countries, like Indonesia and China and Malaysia, and America, and everywhere.. and they read the same words from the Quran every week and they wear the headcoverings like this the same, and bend down to pray the same and, and... and it is a good thing when you meet these people - they say to you 'Aha, you are muslim too, then we must be friends, we are the same people' but - but - what is this nonsense? We don't have anything in common with these people! Some man came to their little village or island 400 years ago with a Quran that only he could read, and since there wasn't anything else to do but throw coconuts and have babies, they decided to start believeing the man with the strange book that they couldnt understand. We read from the same Quran, but of course noone can understand the Quran because it is in Arabic, and even the Arabs can't understand the Quran because how many of the damned Arabs can read and write anyways... But everyone is reading this book, and many ymemorize the words and can read the script but they don't know what it is saying, it is just these sounds... "

I look up, recalling the many Indonesians, Thai, Burmans who I had met who could read Arabic script, even write their name in it, but had no idea what the words meant. They were trained in Arabic as a holy language. I step in- "And of course we cannot translate the Quran, because it is the fucking word of God, which is supposed to be perfect. And so everyone must memorize the Arabic words, and rely on others to translate the meaning for them -"

The man's eyebrows, massive and irregular silver square patches like loose strands of iron wool, bounced up and down to signal his agreement and empathy -

"Yes,YES -- you cannot imagine the power of these men either, the ones who translate - moreover the ones for whom Arabic - particularly classical Arabic is their native tongue. I have seen it in Turkey, I have seen it many places. The translators, the knowers of the language of God, these people can have such an effect when they enter a community. They are seen as part God, like the Pope. They are the ones in whose language God revealed the truth, they speak the language of the holy book that the men brought...



WORKING!! ill be done again soon