an ode to ' home '

Saying goodbye at the airport gets me every time. I try to hold back my tears because I have a wonderful mom who’ll cry ten times as much as me if she sees me do it first.

But one thing I realized today as I walked towards the plane and away from the airport is that it’s not only the exchange of byes and hugs (we try to keep this part as casual as possible as per a long-standing request I made from my parents) that creates a knot in my throat and an ache inside the bridge of my nose as I prepare to leave. It’s something much bigger than that.

Allow me to explain.

Earlier today, when I walked into the lounge at the domestic departures segment of the airport, the first thing I saw was six TV screens placed next to each other, all showing different people from the government (not a single channel that’s known for its opposition was on). The second thing I saw were a group of magazines, stacked upright and next to each other so as to display the cover page. Right there on the cover were the faces of Obama and Erdogan, with the title “The Best of 2015” written in all caps Turkish.  I could feel my face changing as my anger levels increased quite tremendously and in a very recognizable fashion.

When I’m in New York, I don’t actively think about the unfortunate absurdities going on back home. I know that they’re there, but it’s much easier for me to avoid being stressed, annoyed, and angry, as there aren’t constant reminders of such things in my day-to-day life. Moreover, even though New York is not known for being home to the politest people in the world, it’s still an epitome of civilization, and you can expect basic manners such as respect towards people’s personal spaces, not cutting others in line, and so on and so forth to be present majority of the time.

It is mostly when I land in Istanbul and get off the plane that things start bothering me about my own country and that I express the highest level of disappointment that I don’t feel like I belong here. It is when I get in line at passport control and someone decides to drag their entire family in front of me, when cars don’t give priority to pedestrians in traffic, and when drivers have absolutely no patience and start honking the second the light turns yellow that I feel isolated and alienated from my own country and my own people.

It’s when I read in the news that the President of my country dreams of having the powers that Hitler once had, when a man’s mother gets killed in the Southeast because the government doesn’t care for the civilian Kurds living in that region and her sons have to take turns watching from 150 meters away to make sure vultures or dogs don’t pick at her body (since they can’t pick her body up because the first person who tried to do that also got shot and killed), when the Ministry of Religion releases an official statement on its website stating that it’s a sin for Muslims to marry people from other religions (and somewhat more acceptable to marry people of other denominations of Islam), when the President openly threatens a journalist who revealed news that he’d been sending weaponry to rebels in Syria and that journalist later gets thrown in jail with a life sentence without even a trial, that I feel a terrible frustration build up inside my chest.

That frustration becomes even stronger when I talk to people who support this President and his government because he’s so strong and powerful and brave for shooting down a Russian jet (little do they know the million ways in which he conflicted with his own words after the incident saying that he wouldn’t shoot down the plane if he knew it belonged to Russia, and then going out to the public and making a statement that he would do the same thing if the situation re-presented itself), that he made the healthcare system much better (untrue, as even though people can see a generalist more easily, if they have a more serious problem that requires them to see a specialist and perhaps get surgery, they cannot see some of the best doctors who work in government hospitals anymore as their insurance no longer covers it (and much, much more problems that I’ve heard from patients and doctors both), that he made the education system much better (completely false as the introduction of the 4+4+4 system made things much more difficult for families of lower income as they can now enroll their kids in middle schools only within their own neighborhood, which creates a cycle (or rather, trap) of poverty or, alternatively, encourages bribery). It makes me so sad and mad that half of our country’s population lack the urge or need or skill to think and question things, but that a large portion of that half uses empty reasons lacking any sort of reasonable basis to defend this President and his government.

It is when I get in arguments with such people or watch them talk their heads off on TV that I feel more and more removed from them, and less and less like I belong here.

But then again, there are moments that make me feel the exact opposite emotions.

Every time my parents and Baskan (my dog brother) drive me to the airport and we say goodbye at the domestic departures security checkpoint, every time I take a last sip from my black tea in a traditional Turkish tea glass or a final spoonful of lentil soup at the airport in Istanbul before heading to my gate; every time I go to our favorite seafood restaurant with my parents and the waiter knows exactly what we want and when we want it; when me and my mom go to the hairdresser who’s been cutting her hair since 1985 and mine since I was old enough to get haircuts and talk to him about his kids; when we go to get my dad’s shoes repaired or my mom’s necklace adjusted and know each of those people by name and their families by name and if their wife has healed after her chemotherapy; every time I come home and wash Baskan and hear my mother tongue being spoken in the background on TV; every time we watch daytime programming with my grandma when we visit her for a cup of Turkish coffee; every time we see an old apartment building that was left untouched as we drive around town with my mom, I feel a swerve of delightfully positive emotions that make my heart feel full of warmth, love, happiness, and a sense of belonging.

I feel happy to know that there are people who still care about this country, about each other; who remember what its like to be neighbors and friends and to be there for another who may benefit from solely the other’s presence, even if we can’t do anything else to help them. And every time I take a final look outside the window of the airplane and make a wish to return here on happy days, for happy reasons, and not too late at that, I feel that I’m leaving pieces of my heart here with the people and places I love; the ones who have made and continue to make me who I am; and that I’m taking pieces of their hearts with me in return.

A few hours ago, I was listening to Fazil Say’s “Nazim, Op. 12/1”, a piece he composed for Nazim Hikmet, one of the most amazing poets in the world in my opinion, who led a long part of his life in exile as he was accused of being a communist. Say is without doubt, one of the most gifted musicians of our time, and it makes me proud beyond words that he’s ours to take credit for. Not because we’ve made him who he is (in fact, most of his concerts are getting canceled in Turkey today because the Ministry of Culture doesn’t support him as he is known for speaking very openly against the government and Erdogan), but because despite his universal fame and the difficulties he faces in trying to perform here at home, he composes pieces dedicated to people and places and to other works of art from his own country. His wonderful pieces smell like home and somehow only the good parts of what I think of, when I think of Turkey as home.

I was listening to Fazil and watching the traffic in Istanbul as I walked towards my gate. It was then that I realized what it feels like to miss someone, to miss a place, before even having left them yet.

And it was then that I realized that there is no other country like this and no other country that I’d rather be from. The people ruling it today sometimes make it hard to see all of its beauty, but no dictator in the history of the world who has caused this much pain for others has had a happy ending. This one (and his clan) is no exception.

Ultimately, I know that I’ll come home and see faces on TV that are good for the world to see and hear voices on the radio that are good for the world to hear, and I’ll take a deep, calming breath knowing that we live in a place that we feel like we belong in; a place that we identify with.

Despite all, this is where my heart feels whole. Despite all, this is home. And I know that good things happen to good people. And finally, I know that my people are good.