Only their second visit to Turkey from America, the long plane ride was still something they were unaccustomed to. After we exchanged excited greetings, my dad’s expression soured as he recounted what had happened on their flight from New York to İstanbul. My dad, coming from the cooler climate of Michigan, sweats and feels hot in weather that would have someone from Florida running for their winter coat. Like most Michiganders we keep our house on the cool side, even during chilly winters. In the summer, each room has ceiling fans that are turned on high throughout the day and night. It was only natural for my dad, in the stuffy airplane, to have his air vent turned up to full blast. The Turkish man behind him, without asking my dad first, would reach up and turn off his vent. Angrily, my dad would twist it back on. This passive-aggressive vent war lasted until my dad turned around and threatened him. The Turkish man pretended to be asleep, but left the vent alone after that. My dad was too angry to sleep. What had happened? Was this guy a freak, or was there some kind of cultural misunderstanding?Luckily for my dad, he wasn’t sitting in front of a lunatic. This unfortunate situation could be chalked up to just another example of the Turkish fear of drafts. I am sure that almost every expat has at one time been in a stuffy, overcrowded bus or dolmuş and reached over to open the window only to have it slammed shut by someone else. I wish I could say that it were only the old ladies and old men that flee from air circulation, but this phobia afflicts young and old alike. My first few years in Turkey I drove the citizens of İstanbul crazy by sitting near the window in the dolmuş, holding the window open for dear life. I pretended not to understand Turkish when asked to close the window and kept my fingers on the latch in case anyone should try and close it anyways.
Add sweat to the mix and the two worst fears of most Turks become apparent. While sitting in a drafty space alone is bad in their book, sitting in a drafty place while sweating is the ultimate way to get sick. In the kindergarten I first worked for we would have to change the shirts on all of the children after each recess break, because the kids had sweated. I naively thought this was so the school wouldn’t smell, but I later learned how wrong I was. Added to this, almost all of my Turkish friends -- young and old, male and female -- wear undershirts, or “atlet.” These are to catch or prevent sweat, I am still unsure of which. My husband, who surprisingly doesn’t wear an atlet, still changes his pajama shirt once or twice during the night if he sweats. To my Michigan character, this is strange and laughable. I ask my husband, friends and coworkers why we don’t use fans, air conditioning or fresh air to prevent ourselves from sweating instead of changing clothes so frequently. No one will even try this as a solution.
The problem got worse for me while pregnant. Hormone fluctuations and weight gain made me feel hotter and sweatier than ever, even in the dead of winter. Even when it snowed, I felt comfortable only when walking outside in a light sweater. In our new house I rarely turned the heat on, only realizing how cold it must be when guests would drop by and not take off their jackets. When my husband was home after his training in Antalya was completed, I reluctantly allowed the heat to be turned on and suffered until the onset of spring.
With warmer weather our household fan wars began. I would turn on the fan only to have my husband turn it off after I fell asleep. I would turn it back on, he would turn it off, no matter how hot and stuffy our bedroom was. This had been going on for the past three years, since we moved in together. How did your ancestors conquer half of Europe and Asia if they were scared of drafts and sweating?, I asked in exasperation. Images of Süleyman the Magnificent on the Hungarian campaign wearing an undershirt flashed through my mind. Was Genghis Khan afraid of drafts as he marched across the steppes? Where did this fear come from? İstanbul is not that cold of a place. Damp, yes, but as cold as Michigan, no. I come from German and Irish stock, so maybe my nonchalance regarding cold and drafty places is in my blood.
Turks probably think that we Americans are crazy for drinking ice-cold drinks in the dead of winter, and a lot of research has proven them right on this issue. There are lots of other things that they probably laugh at as well when living as expats in America. It’s funny these little things that amuse or irritate us expats. For my dad, having his vent turned off by the man sitting behind him really irked him, even when I explained the man probably did it thinking he was preventing my dad from getting sick. Even our cats, both born here in Turkey, dislike drafty places in our house. My parents, used to sleeping with their own cats, left the guest bedroom door ajar for our cats to enter. The first night both slept in between my parents. My dad, hot as usual, reached over to turn on the oscillating fan and both cats ran out of the room like their lives depended on it. Each night the same scenario repeated itself, with both cats only staying in the room as long as the fan was off. My dad was shocked, as his cats back in Michigan sleep contentedly under the ceiling fans. Our Turkish cats carried Turkish traits!
Tourists and expats alike quickly realize the Turkish fear of drafts and sweat. While some of us view it as ridiculous, many of us also become accustomed to and even accept some of this rationale. I for one confess to wearing an undershirt on occasion, to both collect the sweat on a hot day or keep me warmer on a cold one. It’s amazing that the longer I live in Turkey, the more customs I adopt. I used to love walking barefoot but now wear house slippers like it’s second nature. I have gotten used to stuffy, overheated rooms and am now quite cold when I go back to the US and our drafty, over-air conditioned places. The last summer I was in the US, I brought a jacket to wear inside the shopping mall. I wonder if the reverse is true and if Turks who lived in the US return to Turkey and drink ice in their water in winter, walk barefoot in the house or sleep under fans. I am sure that the same things we find strange about them, they find weird about us as well.
