A colourful beach ball is flying away from a kid. It’s summer. The sand burns my feet, so I run to the sea. Sweet relief!
What’s that smell? Mmmm..
- “Süt dari, süüüüt dari”
I reach a 5'er to the vendor and enjoy the next 10 minutes munching on my corncob.
The beautiful Aegean Sea in front of me is shimmering. It’s calling me for a swim, but I stay, choosing to enjoy the roasting heat of the sun.
I turn on my pocket radio. Yes, it’s Dario Moreno — singing about the mountains and the vineyards of İzmir, my beautiful İzmir:
Dünyayı dolaştım, birçok kıta aştım
Güzelim İzmir
Eşini aradım, her yeri taradım
Bir tanem İzmir
He says he has traveled all around the world, but nothing could replace this dear town.
Like him, I took my time in other parts of the world as well.
As you see, I am even writing in tongues that are not one of my Izmir’s many native ones. But I came back here, like all eventually do.
Because there is something magical about this place.
Izmir knows this. That it’s like no place else, and that they will all eventually come running back to its arms.
It lets us go, because it wants us to grow. It wants us to see the world for ourselves. It doesn't want us to resent.
That’s what people who genuinely love you do. They don’t stand in your way, no matter how painful it’s for them.
The radio switches to another channel. It sounds like a tango. A woman is singing in Greek:
Poú na ‘sai alíthia to vrádi aftó
pou me khtipái t’ ágrio t’ ayéri
na ‘rthis kai m’ éna philí kaftó
na me yemísis me kalokaíriAs erkhósoun yia lígo
monakhá yia éna vrádi
na yemísis me phos
to phrikhtó mou skotádi
kai sta dio sou ta khéria
na me sphíxis zestá
as erkhósoun yia lígo
ki as khanósoun metá
She says:
Where could you be this night?
That wild wind blows on me.
Come to me and with a hot kiss
fill me up with summer.
I wish you would come for a while
just for a single night
to fill up with light
my terrible darkness.
And into your arms
to hold me warmly
I wish you would come for a while
even if you disappear afterwards.*
Filled up with pain in my chest I wake up. I’m not in Izmir.
Gründerzeit buildings covered with red curtains are staring at me. It’s a rainy autumn day in Frankfurt.
I think about all those people who came here. For work, for living a better life, for love, for being a learner of philosophy, leaving the salty waters of their homes.
Maybe they think of me too.
My pain lessens.
The sun shows itself a little.
There is a colourful rainbow. It has the same colours of the half deflated beach ball that got away from the kid.
Check out the sequel to this post, Gurbet and Fernweh,:
