To the shoeshine boys it doesn’t matter what kind of shoes people are wearing. They could be wearing running shoes, suede moccasins, or even plastic flip-flops. The shoeshine boys will come running up alongside them chanting, “Shoeshine, shoeshine, shoeshine.” I never took any of the shoeshine boys up on their offer. I wonder what they would do if I stopped and said, “Well, yes, come to think of it, I would like a shoeshine.”
The presence of these kids was rarely more than a minor nuisance. I quickly learned to ignore them in the same way I learned to ignore 95% of humanity in an urban environment, the same way I learned to ignore the shady characters in Taksim asking me where I was from or if I knew what time it was.
It would be too much, though, if any of these people broke the invisible barrier and touched me. And one day, one of the shoeshine boys made that mistake.
I don’t know why I react so emotionally when a street person or a beggar touches me. Maybe it goes back to when I was a college kid in Chicago. I was coming home one night, entering the vestibule of my apartment building. I heard someone ask, “Excuse me sir, what time is it?” and I turned around just in time to see two street thugs leaping through the air at me. They got me down on the ground, beat the crap out of me, kicked my head repeatedly into the vestibule’s stone wall, and then ran off. If they had taken my wallet, at least they would have picked up a few bucks for their troubles. But they just wanted to beat up on someone.
Maybe it’s because of that experience, or maybe it’s because of something else. I just prefer that strangers on the street keep their distance, especially when they are beggars.
Anyway, late one morning in Istanbul I was walking back to my apartment in Harbiye from a teahouse in Taksim. The normal phalanx of shoeshine boys started running after me, chanting, “Shoeshine, shoeshine, shoeshine.” After a block or two of me ignoring them they gave up and fell by the wayside, all but one who pursued me with unheard-of tenacity. This kid would not take no for an answer.
He walked alongside me for an extra block or two and then, from the corner of my eye, I saw him dip two of his fingers into one of his dusty tins of shoe polish. He scooped up a good-sized chunk of the black gunk and held it up in the air. He waited until I glanced over at him, and then he smiled at me mischievously and glanced down at my shoe.
…
[This is an excerpt from the chapter “Threatening the kids” in A Tight Wide-open Space.]