Quarter of the Infidels
It was a winter’s day. Snow, having completely covered narrow “küçes”[1] of Diyarbakır, continued to reign everywhere. Snow, extending along the path like the beard of St. Sarkis and climbing the stairs in the courtyard of the parish, embraced and kissed the holy cross which was sanctifying the city all the way up from the top of the bell tower.
Uso was the sexton of the parish. He was also called Crazy Uso. In fact, it would be more accurate to call him “half witted.” Before Uso was appointed as the sexton of the parish, he was working by the side of his brother Sabro the Ironsmith who was three years older than him, blowing the bellow. Now and again, Uso with his scarce wisdom would attempt to give advice to Sabro whose habit of needlessly flaming up at everything won him the nickname “bundle of nerves.” Hell would break loose, fraternity would be forgotten and the bickering would turn into a fight between master and apprentice, but things would be settled amicably without any bloodshed thanks to the intervention of the neighbors who always seemed to arrive at the eleventh hour. Uso would furiously take off his leather apron and throw it at his big brother. Making it clear that he is quitting, Uso would scream “May my mother become my wife if I ever set foot in this store again.” Hurling further strings of abuses, he would go four stores down to the store of his twin, Rızgo the Ironsmith, heading straight for the bellow and getting down to work like he usually does after similar fights.
Uso’s shuttling back and forth between his brothers Sabro and Rızgo was actually a commonplace occurence. No one ever found these fights strange. Sabro and Rızgo were both married and lived in separate households. Because their father was dead, their mother Rehan Baco was living in a small room in the courtyard of the parish together with her son Uso. Uso’s appointment to the post, which became vacant with the death of Sexton Zıfkar, was considered the most correct and appropriate among all the decisions taken by the administrative council of the parish up to that very day. The Armenian community greeted this decision of the council with applause, saying that “they killed two birds with one stone.” First of all, Uso’s apprenticeship was ended in his forties and these fraternal fights, which might one day have possibly ended with bloodshed, with a knife, with a sickle or even with a sledge, have been prevented. Secondly and most importantly, this official appointment might perhaps also prevent Uso from tolling the bell whenever he felt like it... But then, because he would be staying at the parish all the time (that is at home) as necessitated by his job; people following him about on the streets, ridiculing him and thus amusing themselves would have to go without his unheard-of profanities.
On that day, that snow-white day, when Uso heard the news about Meryem’s death, he was truly and deeply saddened. He would cry after everyone’s death. After each death, his heart would be branded with a hot iron. In fact, he was usually drowned in tears. After he did his duty for Meryem by way of crying, he started to grumble by himself:
“The beautiful Meryem died while Hıçe is standing safe and sound… bak sen bu işe!”
His lunacy and half-wittedness aside, after he became the sexton, or rather after he was officially appointed to the post, Uso took his job very seriously. After having shed the adequate amount of tears for Meryem, remembering his blessed duty, Uso ran hurriedly and ripped off the bell rope from where it was tied on the wall. Pulling the rope with all his might, he started tolling the bell. While the chimes were spreading like waves through the streets of the city, reverberating through the piles of snow on the roofs, Uso was grumbling:
“The bride died while the mother-in-law is standing.”
“The mother-in-law is alive, while the bride died needlessly!”
“Should this be happening in this severe winter? God must have gone crazy!”
“Repentance, repentance, repentance…”
The muezzin[2] of the nearby Shaikh Matar Mosque endured Uso’s perpetual chimes by asking for patience from God. Eventually, this made him remember his own duty and climbing to the historical four-legged minaret, he too started calling out:
“Allah-u-akbar! Allah-u-akbar!”
“Ding-dong, ding-dong!”
“Allah-u!...”
“Ding!..”
“Akbar!..”
“Dong!..”
When Muezzin Nusret descended from the minaret, with his big nose red from the cold like a tomato; Uso with his short and round figure was still pulling on the rope of the historical bell, rejoicing deep down as the muezzin threw in the towel. The chimes were spreading further and further in waves, hanging like a question mark on the cold-ridden ears of each and every Armenian.
“What’s the matter kirve Bedo, what are these chimes at this time of the day?”
“Güzellerin Meryem is dead.”
“She was saved… She isn’t suffering anymore.”
“But she was very young.”
“Age doesn’t matter when it comes to these things.”
“Indeed.”
“May God forgive all her sins, pardon her and bless her soul.”
“Amen…”
One ear at the bell chimes and the other at his Kurdish customer, Dikran the Ironsmith was trying to makes sense of the chimes while he was screaming at his bellowing apprentice and beating a red-hot piece of iron he just pulled out of the oven, all at the same time.
As soon as he heard the untimely chimes, Tumas the Shoemaker called out to his apprentice:
“Gırbo! Hurry, run to the parish! Let’s see why this crazy fellow is tolling the bells yet again…”
Would Apprentice Gırbo, who was already planning to slip away from the store as soon as possible to play knucklebones with his friends, miss such an opportunity? He immediately untied the leather apron on his waist and bolted straight to the street. When, calculating the amount of whipping he will get, Gırbo got back to the store drenched in perspiration, after having played knucklebones with his friends and having beaten all of them; he got an earful from his master:
“Where the hell were you for the last two hours, you son of a bitch?!!”
“Master, Güzeller’s Meryem is dead.”
Yet his master had already learned the reason for the chimes from Sago the Tinsmith and from Samo the Scarfmaker and from Sıko the Mason and from cross-eyed Dono and from stingy Nono the Pilgrim.
With the descent of Muezzin Nusret from the minaret; Uso, considering himself victorious, rushed to the street after winding the bell rope to the hook on the wall. He was going to the far districts, to the farthest ones, to the deaf ones living there, to the ones who have not yet heard the chimes. Along the way, he gave the news to every single Armenian he encountered, each time in a different wording:
“Güzeller’s Meryem died.”
“Uncle Dikro! Güzeller’s Meyro, Hıçe’s bride is dead.”
“Uncle Sako, did you hear? Meyro the most beautiful, too, has died.”
Soaked with sweat on this cold winter day, Uso, reached the Quarter of the Infidels, rolling inside the snow with his short figure, cursing time and again at this shoe which came out of his foot sinking into the snow.
When Uso, with the comfort of doing his duty in full, made his way back to the parish dog tired, Meryem’s name was being mentioned in all the homes and stores:
“The most beautiful!”
“Poor thing!”
“May God forgive her sins!”
“God forgive me, but really it wasn’t her turn…”
“Why would you take away the young instead of the old!”
“What a shame!”
“How beautiful were her eyes!..”
“What height! What figure!”
“What eyebrows! What eyes!..”
“And her way of walking?”
“What about her playful dancing at the weddings and other feasts?”
“Behind her, two orphans…”
“Hıçe will look after them…”
“Hıçe can’t even look after herself!”
All this talking and commenting continued until Meryem’s funeral. The parish was packed. Uso thought this was because of him and because of the bells which he enjoyed to toll so much. Nearly everyone was in the parish. The only person who did not come was Vanes who had a screw loose and therefore had his nickname confirmed by everyone as “Vanes the Nutcrack.” Except for the Sundays, he would not close down his store or hand it to his apprentice to come to church, not even to a funeral. At any rate, nothing more was expected of someone like him. What else can you expect from the man who, when asked about his trade, answers with a smirk, boasting:
“I am tailor for donkeys!”
They took Meryem and buried her right next to her daughter. The daughter she gave birth to just six months ago... With some tears, a little incense and quite a lot of prayer from Father Arsen…
The good deeds of the first day were completed with the distribution of tahini helva and bread to the destitute Kurdish kids who were watching Father Arsen’s beard, his black robe and his silver cross with astonishment and curiosity.
When Eğuş the Shoemaker went back to sewing shoes, Mero the Ironsmith back to making a snare for wolves, lame Nışo the Carpenter back to making flutes out of a plum tree, Henuş back to nailing horseshoes; in short, when everyone went back to their business, the Most Beautiful was left alone to her soil. Attar Yusuf who was of Chaldean stock and Barber Yakup who was of Assyrian stock continued to play checkers exactly from where they left off.
There were two who lost sleep that night: Meryem’s husband Sıko the Mason, and old Hıçe who was feeling strangely guilty for not having died before her bride. When Sıke laid himself down that night, his little son Seto and his eight-year old daughter Teko were already fast asleep. In the dim light of a small oil lamp; Sıke, together with his mother Hıçe, was looking at the picture of a smiling, youthful Meryem hanging on the wall.
While St. Sarkis, stroking his white beard, was wandering outside in the narrow streets of Diyarbakır that winter night, so was Meryem looking for her own warm bed: her husband Sıke’s hairy bosom.
*Columbia University, Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures
[1] Küçe is street in Kurdish
[2] Muezzin is one who calls Muslims to prayer.
