Istanbul and the story of Çetin, my new best friend

Cetin's restaurant.  The picture with him is on Kristen's camera.

Hello Friends! I write from Istanbul again! Well, Kristen and I have officially had our first serious adventure with the locals. It all happened just this afternoon, and boy was it awesome. Before I launch into the story that we co-authored, let me just say a few words about the Turkish bath that Kristen and I went to on Tuesday night.

I had no idea what to expect when we arrived, but we were ushered into a locker room, told to take off our clothes and wrap a towel around ourselves, and sent down to the bath. I had been wearing my glasses since we had been on the plane, but since they were going to fog up, I had to take them off. So I was pretty much blind as Kristen lead me across the perilously slippery floor to the marble slab in the middle. This is how a Turkish bath works: you lie naked on the slab and sweat. Then, eventually, a bunch of naked Turkish women with saggy boobs come in and you lie along the edge of the slab while they scrub your skin raw. And they scrub everywhere. There is no shame here in Turkey. I actually kind of don't get that since the women have to walk around outside with their heads covered. Seems like a strange contradiction to me- naked in the baths and completely covered in the world. Anyway, the baths were a rough and tumble introduction to Turkey, and a great activity after having been on a plane all night.

Lots has happened in Turkey over the last four days, and Kristen and I have made some great friends, two of which are traveling with us to the Greek Islands next. But without further ado, I give you, the story of Çetin, told from Kristen's point of view:

We may have accidentally adopted a Turkish child...

*Thıs story was a joint endeavor by Kristen and Elissa
Elissa and I have a new best friend. He is Turkish, he's about 60 years old, and his name is Çetin.
Let's start at the very beginning. After visiting the Topkapi Palace this morning, Elissa and I hit the streets in search of food. Since it's Ramadan, food can be a little difficult to find since not all of the restaurants are open. We looked around for a little while and wound up in front of a restaurant called The Grand Vezir. While we were deciding whether or not to go in, our soon to be best friend, Çetin, introduced himself and asked where we were from. When we told him we were from California his eyes just lit up. He was even more excited to find out that Elissa lives near La Brea, the same area that he had lived in for seven years. Çetin hugged us and invited us into his rug shop for tea, an activity we had been told to avoid, and had so far succeeded at doing.
Once inside, Çetin served us apple tea and we started to chat. As it turns out, not only is Çetin a very friendly Turkish rug store proprieter, he is also a legendary Turkish director in the making. In fact, he has just submitted his first film to Sundance. The title has escaped us (probably because it is very long and complete engrish) but, the hook is something to the effect of: "Be very carefull with your children on vacation. It can be very dangerous."

When Çetin found out that Elissa is a theatre director he was eager to show us his masterpiece, confident that he had just found his ticket to Hollywood. While we waited, Çetin ran to get his laptop and Elissa and I turned to each other, slightly terrified.

Let us describe this movie. First off, it is in English. Very broken English. First shot: the words Hollywood, California flash in bright yellow across the screen. (It was obviously NOT Hollywood. In fact, it is Anatolia, Turkey, which is pretty clear from the Turkish flag awning later in the film.) It begins at the front desk of a five star hotel. A mother and her daughter are checking in. Dun dun dun. Both of these girls have clearly been given some A1 acting instruction. Such as: say "Mommy!" louder, and "look sad". The mother grabs her one laptop bag and makes her way across the lobby, where she is greeted by a suspiciously familiar security guard. Could it be? Çetin? Is that you? The writer, director, AND the star??? AMAZING! For some reason, Çetın the security guard gives the women an entire tour of the hotel and their room, even going so far as to tell them where their towels are in the bathroom.

Note: The sound is terrible in this film. As is the picture. They clearly used the sound on whatever crappy camera they had. So from now on, imagine this as a silent film, with the soundtrack from Jaws, gone wrong.

Anyway, as the story goes, the girls go out to the pool, and the woman leaves her daughter while she goes to get food. When she returns, AAAHHHH!, her daughter, who is suddenly named Judy, is gone!! "No! JUDDDDYYYYY!!!" A huge chase ensues, with the help of Çetin, action hero/security guard. While the mother races through the hallways, stopping at every rug shop in sight to search for Judy, Çetin is in hot pursuit outdoors. This whole suspenseful search goes on for far too long, as far as movies are concerned. Then, in a flash of genius, Çetin knows what has happened to poor little Judy! She is drowning in the sea! Obviously, this calls for a jetski action scene, in which Cetin rides onto the scene, dramatically belly flops into the water, and does the most clumsy free style to get to Judy. In the end, all is well, Judy is saved, and we've learned our lesson.

That was the movie. It was amazing. Such character development.

Çetın had been in and out while we were watching, and every once in a while we would turn to each other with looks of absolute bewilderment on our faces. When Çetin joined us again at the end of the film, we really didn't know what to do. "You like?" he said. "It was beautiful", Elissa said with great sincerity. She didn't know what else to say. Çetın told us that he had shot the movie in only two days in Anatolia. And there had been no screenplay. It has all come from his head. But he wondered, could this film win Sundance? He informed us it had already been accepted, but there were a hundred films, and he knew the competition would be stiff.
Since the film was such a treat, we were delighted when Çetin offered to introduce us to a very famous Turkish actress who had starred in many films. He ran outside and returned with his nine-year-old niece who then performed a scene in the middle of the carpet shop. "Get ready for school", Çetin yelled at her. "Noooo", she said sleepily from the floor, rolling over dramatically onto her other side and curling up into a little ball. The rest of the scene continued in mix of English and Turkish, but one thing was for certian, she did not want to go to school.

"Bravo!" we cried when they were done.

"Come! Eat", Çetin offered, leading over to the restaurant next door.

Over soup, bread, dolma and dessert, Çetin told us that, believe it or not, he had never attended film school and was entirely self-taught. In fact, he was also a self-taught actor who had honed his craft by watching "A Streetcar Named Desire" 650 times. He's counted. (Clearly, the "Juddyyyyy" was a tribute to "Stellllaaa").

After we had assured Çetin that his film would have a solid chance at Sundance he invited us to live with his sister for three months in her mansion on the Bosphorous. But wait, there's just one catch. You see, since Çetin had decided that Elissa was a world renowned acting coach with deep connections to the Hollywood scene, she would be the perfect teacher for his little niece. In fact, he would send his niece to live with Elissa in New York or Los Angeles, or wherever she may be. Elissa would of course feed her and raise her as her own. And one day, she would be a star.
As we left, Çetin kissed us on both cheeks and made us swear that we would help to bring he and his family great fortune and fame in America. He promised to visit and we are now both anticipating the arrival of a small Turkish child on our doorsteps...