When I lived in Kadıköy, I would often see the Syrians. Groups of them would camp out near the newly constructed metro station by the nearby shopping mall. In the evenings, after work, you’d get off at the metro stop, come up the escalator, and there they were.

A mother, with several children, for example: The mother would be sitting nursing a baby on a blanket stretched out on the concrete, while her other children would run around nearby, trying to solicit money from the passersby. In the bushes surrounding the mall, freshly washed clothes were draped to dry in the dusk.

In the morning, along the main avenue Rihtim Caddesi, you’d encounter more families. They would sit on the sidewalk, with signs scrawled in their newly acquired Turkish, asking for help. Most of the time, you could always tell the Syrians apart; even if you weren’t sure, the scrawled signs gave them away.

The most astonishing thing, in retrospect, is how quickly you accepted their presence, took them for granted. You got used to living among the Syrians.

The tragic, terrible circumstances that forced them to flee their homeland, whatever had happened to them along the way, were things you could only guess at. They were the flesh and blood incarnates of the news reports, the headlines. Just as you got used to the headlines, immunized, as it were, you also got accustomed to the refugees living right there on your street – as long as they kept out of your way, kept their misfortune at a polite distance.

When I got married, I left Kadıköy to live with my wife in Koşuyolu, a pleasant neighborhood close to a big park. One weekend not too long ago, we noticed a Syrian man and his young boy sitting at a park bench at a busy intersection. Timidly, he approached (or have his little boy do it) the people sitting in their cars at the traffic light, or the ones enjoying their lattes at the Starbucks. Most of the people clicked their tongues in the Turkish manner of refusal. Sometimes, if it was the little boy asking, they might give him something, a 1-lira coin perhaps.

After a day or two, the boy and his father were gone. We haven’t seen them since.

Where did they go? Where do they all go?

Along the Turkish-Syrian border, government-sponsored camps have been set up for years now, to house and contain the more than 1 million refugees who have spilled into Turkey since the start of the Syrian civil war. Most, however, eventually make their way to Istanbul, since it offers the greatest chance to find work of some kind. Also, perhaps, they see Istanbul as a transit station, where they hope to make their way to Europe, America, Anywhere.

They do have some help. On Facebook, I found a woman from England who has a page dedicated to helping the Syrians. The page has nearly 3,500 “likes.” The woman collects food, blankets, clothing, diapers and other necessities and distributes them to the families. Many Turks help as well. For instance, one Turkish couple who recently married spent their wedding day feeding thousands of refugees, instead of having the usual reception.

But it’s a touchy issue. Technically, if you have an organization that is offering some kind of assistance, you are supposed to notify the appropriate authorities, who then will want to ensure you are complying with the regulations. In other words, to make sure you are not harboring illegal aliens, who may or may not be agents, or provocateurs.

Aside from the tents along the border, the government has offered other forms of assistance. During last month’s Ramadan, the government hosted free iftar meals in big tents near the Blue Mosque. On our wedding day, my wife and I were still in our formal clothes, waiting for the yacht we’d reserved to pick us up for the Bosporus reception we’d planned for our guests, and we saw many of the Syrians waiting in a long queue for the ferry boats to take them over to the free iftar tents.

Most of the refugees, one presumes, eventually have to find their own way. They apply for Turkish residency, obtain work permits, and try to find jobs. You read reports, from time to time, of police raiding an abandoned house where refugees have been squatting. The police inevitably get called in because of a dispute, or fight, that erupts between the refugees and the locals. A refugee has reportedly pulled a knife, threatened somebody, and the fed-up locals want them all thrown out of the neighborhood.

A couple of weekends ago, my wife and I were having a picnic at a park near Caddebostan, home to well-off retirees. While we were sitting, having lunch and relaxing by the sea, we noticed some poor families in the park as well. They sat on towels or blankets, the children running around the park and down to the sea. One of them, scarcely more than a toddler, approached us and asked for money, while another one asked if he could have my shoes.

Actually, to be fair, we weren’t sure if these children were Syrian, or if they were gypsies.

“They could be Syrian,” my wife said, acknowledging my uncertainty. She is Turkish, and even she wasn’t sure. “Many of the Syrians are learning to speak Turkish very quickly.”

What struck me that particular afternoon was that the Syrians, having fled the atrocities in their country, now have to share the streets with those who have long been disadvantaged in the city, such as the gypsies, as well as the working poor Kurdish minorities. They have to compete in their misery. One is reminded of the Okies in “The Grapes of Wrath,” who are forced to leave the Dust Bowl, only to find greater hardships in the promised land of California. Like the Okies, the Syrians left their lands in search of escape, and have had to deal with a lot of the same displacement issues –lack of work, poverty, inadequate support, marginalization, crime, intolerance, and a dim, uncertain future.

The civil war in Syria, meanwhile, shows no signs of ending. No doubt, the refugees will keep coming, trailing all around them weariness, desperation and misery. Adding fuel to the fire is the stepping up of Turkish involvement in the fight against Islamic State south and east of the border, and the bombing of PKK sites in Syria and Iraq. The government has recently issued warnings to citizens of potential terrorist attacks in the major cities.

The dark winds of misfortune that followed the Syrians in their flight are now blowing over our heads too.

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James Tressler is a writer and former North Coast journalist and resident. He lives in Istanbul.