Turkey, a Land for All Seasons

The parade of storms that recently rolled into town was a reminder (if one was needed) that Turkey is a land that enjoys proper, melodramatic seasons. Here on the Aegean coast we spend six months too hot or too cold and six months just about right. My partner, Liam, and I first arrived in Turkey to find our new foster home bathed in a glorious Indian summer and we were lulled us into a false sense of meteorological security. Within a month, the pitiless winter was upon us and we were woefully unprepared. Liam and I were mugged by a posse of violent electric storms that rolled across the horizon, a savage spectacle that crashed ashore and trapped us inside for days at a time.

Turkish winters mean business. Prodigious pulses of horizontal rain cluster-bomb every crack and cranny. Water sneaks through every window frame and beneath every threshold. Towels are requisitioned and old cushions commandeered to ebb the relentless biblical flow. Staying warm is a challenge. Think pre-central heating childhood days when the bed was too cold to get into at night and too warm to get out of in the morning. We sprint to the loo for a morning pee, wear sexless layers and revert to copulating under cover. They don’t mention that in the guide books.

We survive the onslaught and the short sharp winter gradually gives way to a wonderful warm renaissance. Spring in Turkey is a magical time of the year, nature-wise. The hills seem to blossom overnight with a riot of flamboyant and exotic flora blanketing the usually arid scrub. We awake from our enforced hibernation, dust down our flip flops and freshen our speedos. Smiles get broader as trousers get shorter. It’s a brief respite before the unforgiving sun burns the landscape back to its usual two-tone hue of dull green and ochre. As the mercury marches inevitably upwards, summer slaps us about the face like a merciless sweaty flannel. By August, varnish peels off the window sills, the upper floor of our house becomes a fan assisted oven and sofas radiate heat like embers from a dying grate. We move slowly, a pair of camp vampires only venturing out between the hours of sunset and dawn. This too passes and falling temperatures herald our favourite time of the year. At last, the wilting wilts and we retake possession of our town to watch the hordes of tourists jump aboard the last flight home. In autumn, Bodrum is in an easy, relaxed mood. Hassle from the press gangs reduces to bearable levels and itinerant workers join the long caravans travelling to their winter pastures back east. Beware, though. Nothing lasts. Winter waits menacingly just out to sea and the cycle begins again.

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Deliver Us From Delirium

I really don't know how the empire builders did it. Those buttoned up Victorians in heavy drapes must have been made of sterner stuff. It's 103 in old money and we've like a pair of camp vampires only venturing out between the hours of sunset and dawn. Our sofa radiates heat like embers from a dying grate, the home entertainment system has gone on strike and the top floor of the house has become an oven which our useless ceiling fan only assists. It’s been completely abandoned save for our clothes which radiate heat as if just removed from a tumble dryer. We take regular cold showers and Liam’s only bound copy of his treasured composition for string quartet is employed as a fan stand in an attempt to dry our clammy old hides. We move slowly. This is not the climate in which to do anything quickly. We've never been keen on air conditioning. In our old Yalıkavak house on the hill we were able to leave our windows ajar to be cooled by the constant sea breeze. The mozzie net protected us from assaults by the squadrons of bloodthirsty bugs. Bodrum is a different kettle of fish. Twenty four hour traffic and a constant throng demands that windows are kept firmly shut at night. We can bear no longer our glowing bed and the nightly rite of sleepless sweats so we've relaxed our aversion to air-con. We procured a unit from a local store. The following day a child arrived to install it. The pre-pubescent boy stared at our 18 inch thick uneven stone and concrete walls in absolute horror, shaking his head and fumbling despondently with his woefully inadequate tools.

Liam rang our landlady for assistance. Canny Hanife arrived with plums in hand, quickly followed by husband and son. For good measure our neighbours also joined the jolly fray. A Typically Turkish passionate and gesticulated debate ensued around our marital bed. We left them to it and put the kettle on. Eventually, the Turkish Jury awarded nil point to the child and his woefully inadequate tools and cast him out into the street. Off we went on another flight of fancy. The wall mounted unit was exchanged for a mobile machine which is vented out of a window. Another bloody catastrophe. The contraption did reduce the ambient temperature to almost sleep-able levels but it was like berthing next to the engine room of a cross channel ferry.

After weeks of sleep deprivation, we finally solved our debilitating predicament with the installation of a wall mounted air conditioning unit in the ground floor spare room where the walls are of standard girth. We’ve abandoned our marital bed with its superior sprung mattress for the rest of the summer. No matter, the gentle cooling hum has delivered us from delirium.

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