Andrew Kay: Shame

“Pretend we are Dutch,” I said. It was 3pm on a very hot day in Turkey. Lunch had been okay, the beer had been good and it was almost time to return to our sun loungers for the last part of the day.

““Pretend we are Dutch,” I said. It was 3pm on a very hot day in Turkey”

Up until that moment the café had been relatively quiet, just us and a few other couples partaking of a break from the sun, a cold drink and a plate of food.

Then suddenly there was a distant but growing murmur. It started low and grew, grew until four ladies deposited themselves heavily at the table next to ours.

Forgive me if that sounds rude, the word heavily, but my word these were ladies of a very particular size, the one that is preceded by the letter X in a variety of configurations.

This may sound rich coming from an out and out porker like me but I assure you, these were big ladies, very big.
The sounds of them descending into the cane chairs was lost as they continued with what had been a murmur but was by now a roar – a great and scary roar.

It took me a few minutes to switch my brain into dialect identifying mode. But when I did it was veering towards the North East of the UK, a fact confirmed by Mr R.

I have trouble with the accents of the North East. I once worked with a lady called Marilyn who I could not understand because I thought she was speaking German, but it turned out she was a Geordie and I way-eyed off the mark.

The ladies started to chatter in the most animated manner and eavesdropping was not a choice; it was, by the volume, enforced upon us.

It was something of an education too. According to them the following advice needed to be heeded when visiting Turkey:

1. Looking at the beach was okay, but not going onto it. Apparently all Turkish beaches are “effing filthy”.
2. The sea is alright to look at, but not to go in. Apparently the sea in Turkey is “effing filthy”.
3. The food in Turkey is alright if you stick to the burgers and chips, but nothing else. Apparently Turkish food is “effing filthy”.

Of course we were not taken in, as for a whole week we have been enjoying the sand, the sea and the food – and had come to no harm whatsoever.

Funnily enough, the ladies, a band that by this point had expanded to eight (nine if you count the little girl who seemed to have been sent off to the “effing filthy beach” alone), seemed to have no problem engaging in social intercourse with the Turkish men who take such pride in being waiters. No, they were easy game and much merry banter was engaged in as they ordered drinks, and duly complained when they arrive not bedecked with rainbow foil streamers, multiple bendy straws and paper parasols (a bit over the top, I thought, for a lunchtime libation).

There followed much discussion about their accommodation, much of which it turned out was “effing filthy”. Then a debate with a man who it seemed was concerned that the child would burn if she did not have a hat and some sun tan lotion. We could not make out if he was part of the party, which by this time had, with the shifting of quite a lot of furniture, grown to 12. He didn’t look English, having the tanned leather hide of a local, but his accent was not clear.

We also learned that one of the ladies had lost her husband at the hospital after he had had a fall. The hospital too was “effing filthy”, and she could not take it so had left him there to fend for himself, and in turn leave her free to flirt with the waiter.
It was a saddening spectacle as with each breath they shredded any last tatter of national pride we might have had.

We drank up, settled up and scarpered, and shame-facedly told the waiter that we were from Holland. I don’t think he believed us but I think he knew why we had done it. As for the ladies, I suspect they were simply waiting to find out if the waiter matched their expectations and was effing filthy too.