A few kilometers into the walk today some cops stopped me by the side of the road to chat me up and make sure everything was okay. Before they left they suggested I stop by the police station in the next town, have some tea, rest a bit, and meet their colleagues.
When I got to the station I walked right past it. The people around here are very social, and I wanted to get a lot of kilometers under my belt. I knew if I stopped that’d kill the rest of the day for me. So I kept on.
One of the cops ran out to the highway and called me back though. He said it was important to check in at the police stations, to give them my information, stuff like that. I had heard that was true, and I think it sounds like a very good practice, but I’ve been walking for two months and not once have I done that (and today no one took my information down anyway).
I’m finding that’s a pretty common practice around these parts, to want to hang out and chat endlessly. For example, the desk clerk at the hostel I’m staying in tonight apparently thinks it’s perfectly okay to knock on my door briefly and then enter, without waiting for a response, take a seat, and begin chatting with me, paying no attention to the fact that I am busy writing at my computer. I don’t often get to whip out my laptop and type away with the luxury of a keyboard and a big screen. When I stay at a hotel I like to partake of that luxury, not sit around making small talk.
Anyway, about the cops…
So I walked back to the station with the cop. He introduced me to one of the other cops, and then cops started flooding the room. Pretty soon there were a dozen cops, all wanting to meet me. One of them mentioned he had seen me on TV. I told him I had heard about my TV appearance, but hadn’t seen it. I asked him what was said, but my inquiry was lost in the excitement.
We sat around chatting and drinking tea for about half an hour. They asked me if I had eaten. I told them I had already eaten (that was a lie — I was just being polite). They said that was breakfast, they were talking about lunch. I told them that no, I had not eaten lunch. They ordered me a couple servings of etli ekmek (flat bread with ground meat and cheese) and a couple ayrans (the yogurt drink). Cops after my own heart!
After lunch we sat around watching the TV news for a bit. They asked me some small talk questions. They commented that President Obama and Tayyip Erdogan (Turkey’s Prime Minister) were awfully close. I didn’t want to wade into this cesspool of alligators of a conversation, so I just smiled and kept my mouth shut.
By the way, it’s pretty common here for people to basically say that Erdogan is Obama’s bit**. In fact, a month ago one of the national newspapers ran a headline that said as much, “Obama’s bit**”, with an accompanying photo, above the fold, of Erdogan driving a military vehicle while Obama controlled him with a remote control. So anyway, I didn’t want to get into that conversation, especially with a bunch of cops.
We watched the news a bit more, and they warned me of the dangers ahead (now that I’ve reached Konya, the dangers have moved to east of Adana — they used to be east of Konya).
Conversation got around to what were my plans for the rest of the afternoon. I was tired, the day’s prime walking hours had passed, I had walked a lot the day before, and I knew I was never going to cover the Konya-to-Karaman leg in four days instead of five. So I just said I wanted to stay in a hotel for the night, and I asked them to recommend something. They said there’s one in Cumra, a town nearby. A couple of them were heading out for patrol, including the station chief, and they said ride with us, we’ll take you there.
We walked out of the station, piled into the patrol car, and drove off towards the hotel. On the way one of the cops called ahead and made sure they had room for me. When we got to the hotel, the cops made sure I would be well-taken care of before they took off.
In the past 24 hours, I have slept in an unused Koran classroom in a small village of 1,200 people, and I have been escorted by cops through another village that almost never sees foreigners. I love traveling like this.