Something that has always baffled me as a Turkish person is how long it takes to say goodbye to someone at the front door when they are leaving.
You have the moment when someone decides to leave and they say “hade kalkalim?”
In your mind you are thinking ‘thank god’ now I can put my feet up and relax – If Only!
After you have kissed each other 15 times, told each other not to leave it so long next time, as well as have your mum run to the kitchen to put the leftover datli into a plastic container., you then have the dreaded obstacle of…. The hallway!
You then have to go over around 15 topics of conversation that you forgot to talk about while you was sitting down.
You are then stuck for at least 20 minutes while your Teyze tells you all about her bad knee and how there is a new helim dealer and that can get it £1 cheaper than your usual helim dealer (no joke, they do exist – I’ve met one).
What is it about us Turks that we can’t finish our conversation in the living room like normal people that the hallway makes us want to talk about our life story?
Maybe it’s worth turning the hallway into an actual living room and sitting by the door, that way at least you are comfortable.
What makes it worse is you finally got to sit in the infamous ‘misafir odasi’ that no one is allowed to sit in, and now you have to spend time crammed in the hallway to see the misafir off while they stand their with a bag full of leftover lokum and a spare bottle of coke.
However, what really takes the Topkek? It’s the half an hour call your mum has with the misafir when they call to tell you they got home OK!
Next time you are stuck in a hallway, set your stopwatch and let me know how long you was there for using the hashtag #MisafirProblems
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