the sight of the sea

The first sight of the sea made me giddy with joy. I had no idea how much seeing those waves would excite me— I grew up with the Black Sea, and only realised at this moment how I had taken it for granted.

connecting

Back in April, as you may remember, I took a journey through northeastern Turkey. Upon returning, life had picked me up and tossed me about, and I neglected to share with you some of the sketches I drew while there. I realised in the snowy green hills, that I had long been trying too hard to fit the mould of a typical "Urban Sketcher," attempting architecture, which I mostly dread, and drawing less and less of what I truly love; what got me sketching in the first place: people. The people in Trabzon, Rize, Ayder and Çarşıbaşı, were so warm— nearly everywhere we went, we were offered çay as we drew.

It went like this: we sat down somewhere, then pulled out our sketchbooks, picking a subject. Eyes would be drawn to our unusual activity, and within minutes, muttering conversations were being held nearby, with inquisitive stares. Next came the spy— one of the onlookers would slip like a shadow away from the group, and pretending to do something important behind us, would end up peering nonchalantly over our shoulders, and suddenly run back to the group and report what was seen. There would be more discussion. It was then, only a matter of time before we were surrounded by smiling faces and offered a çay. My broken Turkish was praised and appreciated, and I felt a warmth that I had missed— I just cannot interact with a building. They don't breathe; they don't hope, they don't grieve, they don't desire. In drawing people, I feel a connection to them; I feel that in that moment, I know something of them.

In Çarşıbaşı, a little town outside Trabzon, we found a little tea house to rest our feet. A very dapper older gentleman caught my eye from across the street, and I began to sketch him. I was only about a minute into the sketch when he spied me, and came walking over to us, a wolf-headed cane in hand. Without a word, he sat down at our table and stared us in the eye, from underneath a heavy brow. I explained we were artists, and showed him the sketch I had began— this interaction grew a little crowd of the tea house staff and some passersby. The gentleman ordered some tea for us, stretched his neck, and struck a very dignified pose. As we drew, we learned his name was Rıza, and he came from the area. Children stopped playing in the street to come hover around us, and eventually an old lady in a flowery headscarf joined them, barking authoritatively at Rıza Bey, ordering him to tell her just what he was doing with these yabancıs, and how he was speaking to them if they don't speak Turkish. Rıza laughed and confided that this concerned old lady was his wife, and assured her that everything was fine, he was coming home soon. She left with a final declarative: Yunus is waiting for you! I wondered who Yunus was.

When we finished our sketches, Pedro ran off with our books in search of a photocopier, so Rıza Bey could take copies of his portraits home with him. We imagined him arriving at his house, his wife demanding another explanation of what he was doing in the company of two yabancıs, and him presenting her with the portraits. We hoped she would like them.  Rıza Bey was pleased with our efforts. Beaming with pride, he thanked us— we thanked him, and went on our way.

in pencil and ink

I'm soon heading off to a part of the country I've never been to— but before I do, I thought I'd share some of the sketches from my recent adventure in Northeastern Turkey.
Stay tuned—there's still more to come!

the colours of trabzon

a threatening sky

another u-turn

After leaving Sivrikaya with a heavy sigh, we rerouted ourselves towards Anzer, hoping to get there before we were immersed in the blackness of unlit rural roads. The pockmarked one we were travelling on became dirt somewhere in the darkness, and we were soon bumping along in rocky muck— giggling about the look on the faces of the car rental agency if they knew where we had taken their poor vehicle.

The road was little more than a scratch in the surface of the Earth, serpentine, with shoulders that plunged into hidden rivers. At some point we doubted the map— there was nothing about our environment which promised a charming village of bees and honey at the end of it. Eventually we came across another human being, casually strolling in the darkness, hands folded behind his back. We asked him with all the naïveté and hope of lost tourists, if we were on the right track to Anzer.

Anzer? He repeated with a chuckle, and dramatically lifted his hand in the direction we were already set on, and let out another soft laugh. The gleam of amusement in his eye concerned me, and as we followed his fingers, we began to worry about that chuckle. Just where was this place?

At some point, thoughts of dealing with popped tires in the middle of nowhere, with no cell reception, hungry, in the cold, began to weigh heavily against the possibility of dining on honey and resuming our search for the Caucasian Black Grouse. After some debate and a few more sighs, I got out of the car to help direct a dangerous U-turn, delighted with morbid fantasies of wolves circling me. We would not see the grouse on this trip, but sometimes the journey and the search are what we remember and carry with the most fondness.

That night, we drove all the way back to Trabzon.

passing through

reaching snow

We hadn't planned a thing. We bought plane tickets, packed only the essentials (which included sketching gear, binoculars and a scope), laced our hiking boots and took off. There was an old Lonely Planet guide which nested back and forth between our bags, providing us with some slightly outdated information on lodging. Upon arriving in Trabzon, the Kaçkar mountains, like phantoms lining the horizon opposite the blue line of the sea, seduced us. We rented a car and drove toward their whiteness, hoping perhaps, to catch a glimpse of a resident black grouse.

There was rumour of a village named Sivrikaya, which stood on the edge of an alpine plain. Each time we asked someone on our journey where this mythical Sivrikaya was, they would reluctantly shake their head and shrug their shoulders. Bilmiyorum, was the constant response. Apparently this unknown village was known outside Turkey for its proximity to the habitat of the famed Caucasian black grouse. There was a man named Mustafa, who could take you to see them.

One night, not knowing where to go but up, we headed to Ayder, which our Lonely Planet promised a bed to sleep in. Little did we know the town was entirely touristic, and being off-season, empty. Lodging under 100 lira was difficult to find, but eventually an old insistent lady in a floral headscarf offered us an unheated room with a low ceiling for 70. Fortunately she gave us a little plug-in electric heater she called a soba, which helped keep the mountain cold at the door.



Mounds of old snow lay about the green hills, and it reminded me a bit of childhood trips to Switzerland, though a lot more ramshackle and disorganised. The air was crisp, and held notes of wagtails, crossbills, and crows. I layered on two pairs of socks, bundled up in a yak wool sweater and coat, readying myself for a hike in the snow. Crunching uphill, we passed three wooden signs with crude illustrations of wolves, bears and lynxes, with instructions in Turkish of what I assume were the proper means of dealing with an encounter of each. I made a mental note of the shape of each carnivore's footprint pattern, just in case.

uphill

angels and lions

deface

belief scratching out belief; gouge the eyes, the face
personal graffiti, centuries deep or decades
scar, mar
leave your trace.

sümela

Clinging improbably to the side of Melá mountain in Trabzon province at a height of 1200 metres, is the stoic face of Sümela Monastery, a Greek Orthodox monastery dating back to the Byzantine era. Founded in 386 CE, Sümela was abandoned during the 1923 population exchange between Turkey and Greece, and converted into a museum. I have long been mystified by images of Sümela— it seemed mythical; this long, stone structure embracing a menacing cliff above a dark, storybook forest, so out of place.

I don't know how long the hike up through the forest was. I remember its steepness, the dampness, the smell of earth and impending rain, and the flashes of blue from a spying jay. We stopped part way up to sketch, sitting cross-legged on the ground, occasionally graced by the curious stares of passersby.

The depth of the valley from the monastery was intoxicating— the rushing river below reduced to a pale trickle— the pines, dark spots in a field of many greens. Ravens slipping in and out of view like shadows, lifting into the graying sky, then plunging into the green. I did not expect that behind the impressiveness of Sümela's straight face stood several humbler structures— little stone kitchens, chapels, as well as rooms for monks and visitors, huddled around a central church, which was carved into a cave in the rock— every surface painted with biblical stories.