I
remember vividly a scene from my childhood at my grandmother’s house in a middle-class Muslim neighbourhood in Ankara in the 1980s. It is New Year’s Eve. Grandma has prepared yoghurt soup, roasted turkey, Uzbek rice — and, for dessert, there are baklava and tangerines, which we will consume while watching a belly dancer on state TV. We wear paper hats and blow party horns. Then at midnight, Grandma goes to her room to read the Koran and pray to Allah for a good, prosperous year.
It was a hybrid world back then. In Turkey, more than any other place in the Middle East, a collage of different traditions and customs coexisted; secularism and faith were constantly mixed, dancing a waltz. In some houses alcohol — Iraqi, mostly — would be served on New Year’s Eve. In others, there would be Coca-Cola and tea. Even conservative Turks would find a cause for celebration in the beginning of a new year. While Christmas trees in homes were rare, we loved the baubles and decorations in the shops and the streets. Religion was relatively liquid, flowing, ever changing.