Hot town! Summer in the city
Back of my neck getting dirty and gritty
Been down, isn’t it a pity
Doesn’t seem to be a shadow in the city …

Saturday morning. My flatmate Omer reminded me that the night before I had promised to go swimming. He was right. I had promised, somewhere between beers (that would be me; Omer isn’t drinking during Ramazan). So – swimming it is.

Omer loaned me a pair of swimming trunks. We packed towels, bottled water (and a couple of bottles of Efes on my end) and set off in his car to Caddebostan. It felt good to be out cruising on a Saturday morning with the Doors “Break on Through” and “Light My Fire” propelling us like a sailboat through the streets to the seaside.

It was quiet at the beach. During Ramazan (Turks say “Ramazan”), at least when like this year it is during the hot summer months, many of those who are fasting choose to stay at home and rest. Nothing is supposed to pass the lips, not even water. “And swimming makes you thirsty,” as Omer reminded me. So we had the beach nearly all to ourselves. Caddebostan is a fairly posh neighborhood, with lots of Med style; those who were out were mainly middle-aged. They lived in the neighborhood and greeted each other pleasantly.

Stripped down, I felt good, relieved. It always felt good to be at the sea again. Normally most years in Turkey I’d already been out several times and this year hadn’t and was beginning to worry. Here we were in July and it was my first swim of the year.

The sea was always a shock when you hit it the first time, but then immediately there was a feeling of returning.

The sea has been one of the few constants in my life. When you get in you feel exalted; everything washes away: the burning hours, the busrides, the traffic, the grind, the heat, the sweat and the bars and all the regret, everything washes away. You give yourself over to the sea like a child, and you feel like an ice cube floating in a glass of lemonade somewhere in the Deep South and it just doesn’t get any better, with the sea all around you and, above, only the sun and sky.

The sea was calm that morning, gently rolling, with the current leading steadily toward the shore, and there were a few yachts and fishing boats about 200 yards out. The sea birds seized upon a fish and flocked in dozens fighting over it.

It being my first swim of the year, I took it easy, rolling over onto my back and pretending to be some kind of sea creature, letting the current do most of the work. Even a sea as easygoing and accommodating as the Marmara needs a certain amount of attention and respect. Don’t push yourself unnecessarily and obey the sea’s signals. Omer had already been out many times so he was in good condition. He vigorously swam out a good 100 yards, and further until he was a tiny figure on the horizon before he stopped, turned over on his back to rest and with a thumbs up, started back to shore.

Meanwhile, back ashore I stretched out on the sea wall, broke open a bottle of Efes and read from Bukowski’s “Tales of Ordinary Madness.” Perhaps you’re wondering why I am not reflecting on the Taksim Square protests. At that moment, I couldn’t give two shits about Taksim Square or any protests. If the world has a problem, then it’s its problem and not mine. I’m at the beach having a beer. The beer was cold, and nobody said anything to me about drinking beer in public during Ramazan.

Omer came up from the beach and sat down. His phone rang. It was a client calling from Bahrain. The client needed some price information.

“Yes, no problem,” Omer said. “But you know, here in Turkey Saturday is a holiday so I am not at work. Could I give you the information on Monday?”

No, the client needed the information today. In Saudi Arabia, Saturday is Monday and the client was working and Omer, as a fellow Muslim, didn’t feel entirely comfortable telling his client that he was sunbathing at the beach during Ramazan and not strictly fasting. So, after ringing off, Omer called his boss, apologized for interrupting his weekend, and got the information for the client.

After awhile, we went back for another swim. Some Kurdish boys, street beggars, stripped and their skinny brown bodies plunged into the sea, all of them cursing with joy and relief. I watched them as they splashed around; their movements seemed clumsy, they foolishly expended their energies, but then I reflected that they had youth in spades to throw away.

Nearby, two young women in bikinis sunned themselves on the rocks. They were not very good-looking. There were only a few women out and most of them were middle-aged, or else children. A brown boxer appeared out of nowhere, and he chased a tennis ball thrown by his owner into the sea. The ball went in a high arc and splashed into the sea not far from me. The dog paddled out furiously, seized the ball in his powerful jaws, and set off again for shore, spitting out sea water in grunts and snorts.

All in all, it was a fine morning. With the swimming, you felt good, clear and fit, even productive in a listless way. It was a significant victory over work, the traffic, and all the prodigious demands of the megacity.

“So many people,” agreed Omer, “they are living in Istanbul, and they are waiting for their holiday – one week – to go to Bodrum or Fehtiye, and they can swim right here in Istanbul. They say the water is dirty, so they don’t want to swim here.”

I knew what he meant. I’ve been swimming in and around Istanbul for three years and the sea had never been anything but kind to me. Sometimes I even packed a pair of trunks in my bag and had a swim between classes at a public beach near the school that was popular with poor, working Kurdish families. In the big city, there are places where you can find relief; you just have to know them and utilize them. Like those kids in pictures of summertime in sweltering New York, when the kids break open a fire hydrant and splash around in the cool spray on the hot streets. On a hot summer day in the city, pride has no place, it only adds to the heat.

****

That evening Omer went to visit his parents, so I went over to Bahane Kultur, a fine outdoor café in Kadikoy. One of the waiters, Mert, is trying to improve his English. His girlfriend, Eylul, which means “September,” wants me to recommend a school in New York that Mert can attend. She speaks really good English and she wants Mert to speak really good English too. I write the name of a school down on a business card and hand it to her.

“Thank you,” Eylul says. “Do you know we are having stand-up comedy upstairs tonight?”

“How much is it?”

“Twenty-five lira. But for you, you can go as my guest.”

So I went upstairs to catch the comedy. The room was already packed, but Eylul found me a seat up at the bar. We waited, and presently a big, tall bearded Turk came onstage and went into his act. I can speak passable Turkish in a limited set of familiar situations, but there was no chance of understanding the comedian. He blazed around the stage, assaulting the audience with a rapid fire of slang, interposition and suggestion. I couldn’t understand a word. The audience seemed to love him though, and they responded with big bursts of laughter, and responded to his verbal challenges with a few digs of their own.

After awhile, I gave up trying to follow the gist of the conversation and just listened to the sound of the laughter, and even joined in. It felt good to just laugh.

This is the funniest joke I never understood, I remember thinking at some point. But then, it’s not always necessary to understand everything. Sometimes it’s good to have the joke on you. I thought of a guy I’d seen on the bus a few days before. This guy had a look in his eyes I’ll never forget. He wore an expression that suggested he was wondering if he had forgotten the name of the man he intended to murder, and was at a loss. Perhaps it was you he meant to murder, or me. And I thought about the swimming at Caddebostan, and the coolness of the sea, and how Eylul had invited me as her guest to the comedy, and how once at the café someone had picked up my check for no reason at all, and how once on another night some guys had jumped me in a dark street on the way home from the bars and stolen my wallet, and I thought of a number of other things that had happened, both good and bad.

So, on balance, it was a good evening, listening to a comedian I could not understand, and yet laughing anyway, laughing because it felt good to laugh, and hoping the joke was on me. Or was it?

James Tressler was a reporter for The Times-Standard. His books, including “Conversations in Prague” and “The Trumpet Fisherman and Other Istanbul Sketches,” are available at Amazon.com and Lulu.com. He lives in Istanbul.