Misadventures in Turkish: “What can you do with a knife?”

Turkish class. Students have just learned the abilitative mood. İnce, the instructor, is holding up pictures of common household objects, and students are practicing their grammar by describing what they can and cannot do with them.

İnce: A ball!

Kathy: You can throw it, but you can’t eat it.

İnce: True. What about a pen?

Henning: I can write a letter, but I can’t write an email.

İnce: Good job! A bowl?

Jennifer: You can eat soup, but you can’t eat a sandwich with it.

İnce: A knife?

Connor: I can rinse it in a sink to wash off the blood, but I can never scrub away the human stain.

İnce and class: …

İnce: What about a  shoe?

Misadventures in Turkish: “peace”

A bus station in Şanlıurfa, thirty miles from the Syrian border. An OLD MAN approaches CONNOR, who is carrying a duffel bag and waiting for a bus, every inch a dumb American.

Old man: Has the bus to Erzurum left yet?

Connor: I don’t know. We’re going to Ankara.

Old man: Where are you from?

Connor: I’m an American.

Old man: Ah…Barack Obama! New Negro American President! Bush is finished!^[1]

Connor: Yes. Soon, new president.

Old man: I think Obama is good. Israel is filthy! Israel is foul!

Connor: Yes, I think Obama wants to make a filthy^[2] Israel.

Old man: Palestine? Good! Israelis? Filthy! I think Israel is foul!

Connor: I agree. Soon, all of Israel will be made filthy, God willing.

Old man: The Jews! The Jews are bad! The Jews are evil!

Connor: Ah…I’m sorry, what?

CONNOR realizes “pis” might not be an English word.

Connor: Is that the bus to Erzurum, over there?

Exit OLD MAN.

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[Back] ¹ Since Nov. 5, I haven’t had a single conversation with a new acquaintance that has not started with this very exchange.

[Back] ² NB: The Turkish word “pis,” meaning “foul,” “filthy,” “shitty,” or “disgusting,” is a homophone for the English word “peace.” The Turkish word for “peace” is “barış,” which I’ve known for a while. But when the English kicks in, man, it kicks in.

‘Büyük beyaz makinesi’

The phone is ringing.

I throw off the comforter and stagger out into the living room. It is cold, I am still sleepy, and the phone is stabbing my ears with sound. I am wearing only my underwear; everything is underwater without my glasses. I run to the closest source of noise: the black base of the cordless phone. Nope. Handset’s gone. I dash back into the foyer, narrowing down the source. There it is! Under the sweater on the big chest.

I pick up the phone on what must be the last ring…and stare at it. Now I’m facing a dilemma. Odds are whoever’s on the other end will not speak English. I might be able to explain that I can’t understand them. But what if it’s something important? What if a grandma died or a test is positive or a library book is overdue, and all gets sucked down the memory hole of my Turkish incompetence? No good.

Or what if it’s something worse? What if it’s the police, calling to let me know they’re deporting me? Oh, God. That’s it. They know I watched a YouTube video the other day. They know I ran my residence permit through the washing machine. They know I wandered onto a commando base on fall break. Holy crap—that’s three strikes. Do Turks even play baseball?

It doesn’t matter. They figured it out. It’s the police on the line, just waiting to tell the stupid foreigner to pack his bags and ship out on the next freighter flight to the states. Better not answer. Better pretend I’m not here. Better play it cool. I put down the phone and take two steps back like it’s threatening to mug me.

All of a sudden, I grab it again. What if it is something important? What if it’s a warning? The tranny hooker who works the corner by the apartment went crazy and started killing the neighbors. There’s a protest in Kızılay and I should stay away if I don’t want to get bludgeoned or tear gassed or killed by a stray rock. It’s the embassy. My family’s been killed by ostriches. Oh, God. That’s it. They’re all dead, their eyes pecked out by the big gangly motherfuckers, probably honking the entire time. Oh, God. I should pick it up. I should just press the button, say “Efendim,” and get it over with.

Misadventures in Turkish: “ground beef”

İnce: “Do you know what this type of meat is called in Turkish?”

Connor: “Yes! This one is called kuşbaşı, and that one is kıyma. In English, ‘ground beef.’”^[1]

İnce: “Kıyma. ‘Ground beef.’”

Connor: “There is joke in English: How to say this thing cow without the legs? ‘Ground beef!’ Because of ‘ground’ English also like ‘floor.’”

İnce: …

Connor: Never mind.

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[Back] ¹ “Kuşbaşı” is one of my favorite Turkish words, because it literally means “bird-head meat.” It’s not actually bird heads, but small chunks of beef or lamb, similar to carne asada.

Misadventures in Turkish: “something fishy”

Connor: “In Turkish language, is there idiom ‘this is fish-thing?’”

Begüm: “I don’t know this expression. I’ve never heard it.”

Connor: “It means like ’something here is false’ or ‘there is an untrue thing’ or ‘it rotted.’ Does Turkish language similar phrase there is?”

Begüm: “No, I don’t think so. I suppose you could say ‘liar.’”

Connor: “No, not like liar. ‘There is a rottenness, a fish-thing in the Danish government.’”^[1]

Begüm: …

Connor: “Never mind.”

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[Back] ¹ According to Sour Times, the Turkish equivalent of Urban Dictionary, the phrase I was looking for was “çürümüş bir şeyler var danimarka krallığı’nda,” or “there is something rotten in the Kingdom of Denmark.” This is not even remotely close to the mangled phrase I actually uttered.