Sevgi Soysal was a prolific Turkish writer of short stories and novels and masterful critic of social injustice, gender inequality, and militarism. Amy Spangler is founder and co-owner of AnatoliaLit Literary and Copyright Agency, an Istanbul-based literary agency representing some of Turkey’s finest authors. She is the translator of The City in Crimson Cloak and the coeditor and cotranslator of Istanbul Noir.

Noontime in Yenisehir

Milet Publishing

Ahmet the clerk meets with defeat in the department store basement

The poplar swayed as if about to collapse with a thunderous crash. Those who failed to see those things that happened, that changed with each passing moment, failed to sense this. It was noontime. The crowd coursed towards Piknik, the liveliest, noisiest, most frequented haunt in the neighborhood of Kizilay, with the fastest service too. The sales manager of the department store Tezkan, located on the opposite side of the boulevard, was still at his desk on the ground floor. He had just closed the installment sales ledger. The fastidious customers wading through the ironing boards, blankets, and clothes hangers in this particular department had not yet tired of touching the same items over and over, of testing the woolen texture of the blankets, expecting their fingers to display extraordinary talents, or of opening and closing the doors of medicine cabinets they contemplated hanging in their bathrooms, or of scolding their snotty-nosed children who knocked over ironing boards as they sprinted from one end of the store to the next, or of trying to wrest their future curtains or divan covers out of wrinkled paper wrappings. Husbands sick of scowling at their wives when confronted with "necessary" items that absolutely had to be bought for the home, narrow-minded housewives who mistook household amenities for the center of the universe, families who never tired of change and innovation when it came to appliances, certain that each would spice up their bland lives (and indeed, it was perhaps in this regard alone that they made any so-called progress in their lives), fiancees who derived incomprehensible pleasure from decorating the nests they were about to build, imprisoned birds who spent endless amounts of money and labor on their cages, and those who bemoaned the act of shopping all the while they were engaged in the very act ... But amongst these types, the store manager could not distinguish one from the other. For it wasn't his job to do so. Distinguishing different types of customers was the clerk's job. In short, the clerk should know how to distinguish newlyweds from oldyweds, and fiancees from both; that is, he should be able to distinguish those likely to lay out a small fortune from those liable to pull tightly at the purse strings.

The sales manager was responsible for installment payments; he was responsible for making sure that payments were made to the right places at the right times, for the traffic of money coming in and out, and for making sure that there were no disruptions in the flow of that traffic. He had spent all morning identifying those customers who had not made their payments on time and then undertaking the necessary procedure. Meanwhile, he had also registered new installment plans, and made sure the business was, on the whole, securely anchored. That is, as securely anchored as financial figures can possibly be. For example, though for many one or two hundred was nothing to sweat over, like anyone who deals in numbers the sales manager knew the tempests that a figure of one or two hundred was capable of whipping up. Or at least, how misleading the apparent stability of a hundred lira could be, and the villainous hoaxes one might encounter when trying to deal in hundred lira bills. One hundred liras might be good for a blanket one day, and just two clothes hangers the next, to give the simplest of examples. That much the sales manager knew. Therefore, he was responsible not only for making sure there were no disruptions in the incoming and outgoing traffic of figures, but also for being vigilant so as to ensure that, when it came to the insidious volatility of numbers, it was the customers and not the store that got screwed in the end. Looking at it this way, his job was equivalent to the jealous sailor who attempts to sequester the regiment's whore yet himself spends months at sea. It was a tough, calculating task, trying not to get cuckolded by money. Customers turned the goods over in their hands with the incomprehensible idiocy of husbands doomed to be cuckolded, with the logic of husbands who assume that they can protect their honor by objecting to the revealing nature of their wives' attire, no matter how slight it might be. They wearied themselves, as if squeezing the wood of the clothes hanger twice and inquiring after the price thrice would somehow subvert the preassigned roles in this game of shopping with its rules that never changed and never would. The salesmen would take part in the same wearisome game, running themselves ragged and running their mouths nonstop. The purchasers were the righteous who must never know that their rights were being violated. The clerks dashed about, wet with perspiration, repeating the same words over and over, lighting up with smiles for snot-nosed children, submitting to the insane demands of crotchety housewives, convincing husbands that their precious money was not being wasted and thereby striving to cover up the crime that no one would admit to. There were spoilsports out there trying to ruin the game of shopping, but who were they? According to the sales manager, it was the clerks' job to make sure that none of the customers became a spoilsport and to endure all manner of suffering in the process. Suffering was part of their job. And for them to think it was they themselves who cheated the customers, that was part of the game too. Their own salaries a constant from one month to the next, like bewildered eunuchs they kept a meaningless watch over the natural friskiness of numbers. In truth, such thoughts never occurred to them or the sales manager. This was not a place for thinking. And it was not a place for watching and observing either. They were all slaves under the whip of an unjust division of labor, obliged to bear for months and years on end a weight which they did not ponder.

On this day too the sales manager was tired. He picked up the ledger and locked it in the safe. He placed the calculator in front of him. He began crunching the numbers, punching them into the machine and then pulling down on the handle again and again. There weren't many customers left in the shop. Now the salesmen were busy trying to return the goods which had been strewn all over the counters to their rightful places. Customers who plunged into the store in a sweaty rush, filled with the sense of panic that strikes once the closing time announcement is made, attacked the salesmen, as if the store were closing for good, never to open again. The clerks, weary from having exhibited good intentions all day long, were trying to palm off to the customers whatever goods happened to be in front of them.

A couple intending to purchase a trash can and wallpaper for a newly furnished home grew angry at the clerks' hastiness:

"Look, darling, that wallpaper with the violets is by far the prettiest!"

The woman really loved violets. And to have her nails done too. When they first started dating, Hayati had always brought her violets.

"That way you won't forget to bring me violets every now and then ..."

The exasperated salesmen reached for the scissors.

"How much do you want?"

"Wait, no need to rush, dear. Look, that there with the birds is awfully pretty. Take that one down too, would you?"

The salesman was just about to hang the violets back up and take down the birds when he was interrupted:

"Wait, don't hang it back up. Take down the birds too. Not that one, that one. Do you have it in pink? Not in the storeroom either? Okay, so do you have the bird wallpaper with violets?"

The salesman put down the scissors. Even the most infatuated of men would lose patience pandering to such whims.

In a dimly lit corner of the store, an old woman was analyzing a suitcase.

"How much can this hold?"

"It can hold all kindsa things."

"Give me a proper answer son, will you? What do you mean exactly, 'all kindsa things'?"

"It'll hold all of your stuff, ma'am."

"I'm not buying it for myself, I'm buying it for my son. He's going to America. How much of his stuff can it hold?"

"It can hold a lot of stuff, ma'am. Look, you can put yer dress shirts here."

"Who puts dress shirts in a suitcase, son? They'd get all wrinkled. I'm going to put those in his hand luggage."

"Look at how soft the leather is, ma'am. Luggage with soft leather like this can hold all sortsa stuff."

"But then the clothes will all get wrinkled. How many suits and how much underwear will this hold?"

"It holds a lot, ma'am. Enough that you can go anywhere with just one suitcase."

"Who goes all the way to America with just one suitcase, son?"

The salesman leaned against the suitcase for a moment. He stared at the old woman with vacant eyes. With full eyes the old woman was calculating how many suits her little boy could fit into the suitcase.

In front of a counter where the latest patterned bed sheets were displayed, a middle-aged woman with hair dyed golden blonde and wound in a neat bun, wearing plain but clearly expensive clothes, ran into a heavy-set young woman with glasses who, as was apparent from her attire, had spent a long time in America, and who, as she would soon make apparent, had studied at a fancy private high school.

"Ohhh, Mine, my dear, how are you?"

"Just fan-tas-tic! I'm about to lose my wits."

"Well, I'm in a wretched mood myself. What's up with you? I swear, if you ask me, you're just fine. You're always just like this, always so active."

"Don't say that. It's enough already."

"Don't be cross. Tell me what's wrong."

"Well, you see, I've been without help for months, my dear. Cooking, cleaning, getting two kids to do their lessons, the whole burden is on me. And just when the ladies' auxiliary is starting to have their teas."

"Do you know who's going to be the next Madame President?"

"Not yet. We're going to hold the next tea at the Ankara Hotel again. The entrance fee is a hundred liras."

"Oh, how wonderful!"

"There are cheaper solutions but then the next thing you know it'll be a disaster and at the end everyone will be talking behind our backs. Last year was better, I tell you. I mean, nothing's new, you know, haha!"

"Oh, I almost forgot. A woman called yesterday. She wants to join."

"Who?"

"I'm not sure, actually. Her husband works for the air force, I think."

"Does she know English?"

"If you want my opinion, I don't think we should dwell on that anymore. I'm sick of people just showing up and giving speeches left and right. We need some members who are actually useful. Look, last year we got everything we needed for the dinner for cheap from the Army Solidarity Cooperative thanks to Muazzez Hanim's husband. By the way, she'll improve her English as she comes and goes."

"True. You've put on a little weight, dear."

"All because of those anti-baby pills. They said it wouldn't do me the least bit of harm, but then I started bleeding. We tried all kinds of doctors. Hüseyin Bey told me to lie still in bed. Faruk Bey tried to give me an abortion. Meanwhile of course it was just sleep and eat, sleep and eat. Anyway, I'm better now. With a little help from the sauna and regular massages, hopefully I'll be able to shed the pounds."

The sign on the door had already read "closed" for some time. Customers, bearing their packages, left the store reluctantly. Under his breath, the clerk Ahmet, who had plans to meet his girlfriend in front of the record store at exactly half past noon, cursed the customers before him who never tired of choosing cloth. Finally the door to the store was locked from the inside so that no one else could get in. Ahmet rolled up the bolts of cloth that had been strewn across the counter and returned each ream to its rightful place, with a swiftness and dexterity calculated to please the ever watchful storeowner who was sitting at the cash register. He took his comb out of his back pocket and carefully ran it through his hair, which had grown curly at his neck. He patted the cuffs of his bellbottoms, ridding them of dust. After tightening his belt one more hole, he made a swift exit out of the store and onto the boulevard. A young mustached man, his unbuttoned shirt revealing a hairy chest, stood next to an open suitcase containing a pile of Orlon sweaters, yelling:

"Wrap 'em up 'n' take 'em home! They're fifty liras in the Kizilay shops, but we got 'em for thirty! On the cheap from a merchant that went bottom up! There's no obligation to buy. But I'm talkin' genuine Orlon brother, genuine American Orlon! Buy it! Wear it! Wash it! If it shrinks, bring it back! May we be cursed with cockroaches if we don't take it back, brother!"

A crowd of people eager to get something on the cheap, cheaper than everyone else, for the cheapest price before anyone else, had amassed around the suitcase. At that moment, a "shill" who practiced the art of facilitating sales by taking advantage of customers' idiocy and greed, was busy doing his job. He pushed aside those gathered around the suitcase and started grabbing the sweaters out of the hands of everyone left and right, as if he'd struck gold. He paid immediately. And then a few seconds later of course he furtively returned the goods, getting his money, and then some, returned in the process. It was a highly effective tactic. Just as it was in the stores. Of course, in the stores there wasn't any professional involved, just a slew of greedy, aggressive customers who never failed to sway the undecided, leading to the outbreak of a property struggle over goods not yet purchased. Ahmet couldn't count the number of customers who'd fought over the last bit of a certain ream of cloth, even while there were reams and reams of better quality cloth. Just as he was thinking this, one of the birds perched on a tree crapped on him. His new shirt was ruined. For a moment, he just stood there, stunned. Then he grabbed his shirt and shook it, a meaningless motion, as if that would make it clean again. He glanced around. He felt as if all the pedestrians on the boulevard were gawking at the bird crap on his shirt. His right shoulder began to twitch, like it always did when he was upset. If he'd had a gun he would've shot all the birds he could, that's just how particular he was about his appearance. "Damn birds! If I could get my hands on you ... Ah!" Grumbling, hopeless, he started walking. But who wouldn't be angry, downright furious in the same situation? It wasn't for nothing that he spent the better part of his salary from Tezkan on clothes from Amado. Of course it wasn't. You had to invest if you wanted to be at the height of spiffy all the time. Were the shop windows of Amado not designed for the sole purpose of realizing Ahmet's dreams of being the handsomest of the handsome? They sold stylish, unique, original things there. The clothes they sold were the same ones worn by the young people Ahmet strove to emulate. Patterned shirts, pants with thick belts. But these weren't enough to make Ahmet stand out to the degree that he desired. Even in Samanpazari there had sprouted up young men with a predilection for such novel attire, even if it wasn't of the best quality. But their garb was hardly on par with Ahmet's, of course. As soon as Ahmet walked out onto the street, young men went green with envy, neighboring housewives shook their heads in disapproval, and blood went rushing to the heads of old geezers. And that's what mattered. Anyone who was a real man stood out in Samanpazari. Anyone who didn't stand out was a slovenly, ragtag twit, a member of that inconspicuous hoard known as "the people"— the people! If you asked Ahmet, any self-respecting man should be dressed so as to turn at least half a dozen heads as soon as he walked out onto the street. He stopped in front of the record store. Sükran hadn't arrived yet. While studying the cover of a "Love Story" record displayed in the window, he was startled by the sound of a shrill voice:

"Brothers and sisters and fellow citizens ... Come closer, closer still ... Look! I've been to sixty-six counties, three hundred and ninety townships and one thousand five hundred villages in Turkey, but a crown befitting my head have I yet to find. May Allah deliver us from destitution of every kind. My Muslim brothers, we just performed our Friday prayers together at that mosque right over there. So do not, I bid thee, seek to detect in my words falsehoods, hypocrisy, or untruths. Now you wake up in the morning and you feel an ache in your head, a pain in your back, but try as you may, you can find no antidote. Well, our factory, esteemed customers, will supply the cure that you have sought in vain in stores and apothecaries, and for the mere recompense of one hundred and fifty lira. Now dear respectable brothers and sisters, when I shake this jar I am holding right now, not once, not twice, but three times, this snake, beknownst to you as an asp, which thirty-six hunters chased for fourteen days in the African jungle, will poke its head out to greet my dear respected brothers and sisters ... But first, I beg you to turn your attention this way and I shall take these boxes you see me holding in my hand ..."