I walked back to the hotel and had the misfortune of running into the same scooter guy who offered us wine. Dang it. I hoped that I wouldn’t have to see him again. He was on his scooter and offered to take me back to my hotel. I felt a little weird about that offer, so I declined. He told me that he was going to watch the sunset, somewhere that all the locals go every night because it is such a great view. He invited me, and I accepted. I climbed behind him and we drove up a hill much steeper than any scooter I had ever been on could tackle.
We sat on the white rocks and watched the valley turn orange, red and yellow with the sinking sun. He moved in a little closer, put his arm around me and pointed somewhere. Sorry, guy. I only agreed to this because I thought that having lots of other people around would keep you from pawing me. I stood up and reminded him that he had to get back for Iftar. We drove into town, and he invited me to join him and his family as they broke their Ramadan fast. Seemed safe enough to me, so I went with it.
Eating Iftar is one giant feeding frenzy. Hardly anyone noticed I was there for the first fifteen minutes because they couldn’t chug water and shovel food in their faces fast enough. Then we began some cute chit chat about how I liked Turkey and what I had seen so far. Dinner was over much quicker than I imagined, probably because everyone was dying to smoke. I liked the feel of being with people who had waited 16 hours to eat or drink.
After dinner I announced that I had to go home. He tried to convince me that I should join him for wine, but I could tell from the way his hand found my knee at dinner that he was really aiming to make my last night in Capadoccia end in a grand finale. I was sick of it. I just wanted to go home, call my mom, take a shower and call it a day. He got a little pushy, and I finally told him that I felt like he was trying to sell me a rug that I didn’t want. He got the message and left me alone as I walked back to the motel.
I got back to the motel and sent out a quick email to a couchsurfing friend from the night before who offered to take me to his store before I left. I let him know that I was too wiped out to hang out. He quickly emailed me back saying that he understood, but was disappointed because he had canceled plans so he could be my friend that night. I’m a sucker. I can’t do that to someone because I’ve had too many people do that to me. He was really nice, so I felt bad crapping out on him. I emailed him back and let him know I would be coming after all.
I walked to our meeting spot and saw that he was waiting for me. He drove me to the town next to Goreme and we grabbed a container filled with lots of flavors of ice cream. Right next to his store was a charming café, so we sat down to eat. He invited all his friends within sight over to share the ice cream. The café owner brought out spoons for the five of us and pulled up a chair to join in. It was really cute eating ice cream on a hot summer night with so many Turkish people.
After the last spoonful of ice cream was snarfed down, we went into his store. It was like walking into that cave in Aladdin filled with all the treasures. I didn’t see any piles of gold, but there were plenty of other sparkly things piled up around the shop. I picked up about a million things that I would have bought if I had more suitcase space and more money, but I needed to keep my purchases to a minimum. I still regret not buying an amazing red silk scarf, a cool blue wall hanging with gold thread accenting the design, and some great silver jewelry.
I watched him help customers in Turkish, English, Korean and French. He didn’t use the hard sell tactics that annoy people like me, he just kept himself available and made himself useful when people wanted to try on every pair of boots in the store or take two dozen scarves out from their plastic wrap. I have met a few Muslim men like this, and their gentle patience always leaves a sweet impression on me.
Before we left, I asked him to ring me up for a small stash of items that I could easily fit in my suitcase. I planned on paying exactly what they were marked, because it was a fair price. I guess I’m pretty lucky in a bunch of ways because he said that I was his good luck charm that night. A bunch of people bought stuff right before it closed and that usually doesn’t happen. Conclusion: he was going to keep me feeling lucky and give me everything at a great price. Awesome!!!
We drove to a couple cool rock formations before he took me back to my motel. I laid in my cave bedroom, reviewing all the randomness of the day and decided to take the rapid pace of my adventures down a notch. I’m getting too old and ill humored to keep this pace up for long. Either that, or I’m ready to trade in this crazy acid trip for a taste of boring old normal life.
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