Snow Bus

If there is one thing that that I have learned during my time in Turkey, it is that Turkish people are intelligent, generous, hardworking, and brilliant in many ways. However, driving in the snow is one area I cannot count among their strengths. Ever since our most recent snow-laden cold snap swept in from Siberia, our street has echoed with an eternal chorus of tires spinning fruitlessly and engines screaming, "I think I can, I think I can!" as they battle the hill in front of my house. This is often followed with petulant drivers leaning on their car horns further down the hill, as if the stuck driver were blocking up the street out of spite.

It's an ongoing battle. Some drivers put chains on their tires for extra traction. Other idiots go joyriding in the middle of the street, building up speed and then hitting the brakes to send the car spinning. Most just hunker down and pray that they reach their destination alive.

I was stir-crazy enough from several days stuck at home in the snow to ignore the horrible driving conditions today and escape to a mall with some friends. Yes, laugh all you want at our teenage-ness; there isn't much else to do in this city on a cold afternoon. But the mall is far enough away that I had to take a bus to get there.

Wrong day to do such a thing! Getting there was fine, but I hit rush hour on the way back. I hopped on a bus in the center of town that was so sardine-packed I barely squeezed in, and spent the ride crushed up against the door, falling off every time it opened. Once I ended up pressed in a position with my left arm twisted behind my back, my rib cage contorted so that I couldn't breathe, and one foot hovering in space as I teetered on a stair. I tried pushing myself up onto the step next to a very large woman who glared at me for violating her personal space, but at that moment the door opened at the woman said, "I'm getting off here!" and pushed me back down the stair, off the bus, and into the snow.

But our poor bus driver was facing an obstacle course of his own, even more intense than Ankara rush hour on a normal day. Not once, but twice, he was forced to find a different route because someone had decided to abandon their car halfway up a hill on a major street. The first time this happened, the bus driver promptly shifted gears and drove backward down the hill for probably 200 feet to the previous intersection. A general rebellion rose up among the passengers when they noticed that we were now off-course, and several people got off the bus and insisted they'd find taxis instead. I thought this a silly idea, seeing as there were no taxis anywhere to be seen, but of course I'm a foreigner so my perception is often misguided.

The rest of the passengers were stoic, holding to the Muslim culture of fatalism and acceptance of the cards that God deals us in life without complaint. There were even smiles and bets of how long it would take us to get back to where we needed to be. It seemed a simple matter of zig-zagging a block around, except that we were impeded again at the next turn, where another car sat parked in the middle of the intersection, hazard lights warning us that no one was inside to move it from our path. The bus driver tried to get around him, but of course buses make wide turns and it was simply impossible. Being smushed in the front corner of the bus, I had the best view of how very few centimeters stood between me and the side of this car. We were not making this turn. At this point a guy hopped off the bus to direct the driver as he maneuvered back and forth and around, finally managing to round the corner. But victory was short again because 100 feet ahead a school bus was stopped in the middle of the street.

No fear! The bus driver, his friend, and about five other guys decided this was the perfect time to attach snow chains to the tires, so they all jumped off and two guys applied the chains while the others smoked cigarettes and watched. They jumped back on shortly, with gleams of NASCAR pit crew pride in their eyes as they congratulated each other on accomplishing this in under two minutes.

By now, we were completely off-course and I gave up all hope of any plans but going home to a hot shower, dry clothes, and a bowl of soup. The bus trekked uphill more steadily with the chains, but since the traffic had us stopping every ten seconds it was mostly irrelevant. Twenty minutes later we were finally back on a road I recognized, and the rest of the passengers began to relax a little more. I decided to bail on the bus and walk forty minutes home, figuring it would be faster and more comfortable than being stuck in traffic crammed into a space significantly smaller than what I normally occupy.

This was the right choice, despite the cold and wet. Streets everywhere were closed off due to accidents, cars were slip-sliding everywhere, and the city was generally a mess. So, the lesson learned today is that snowy days in Ankara are meant to be enjoyed from inside, where I can simply laugh at the poor automobile owners in their futile attempts to scale hills instead of falling victim to their folly.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

Sledding

Traffic and social life tend to come to a halt whenever it snows in Ankara. There is no municipal snowplow system, so it's up to determined citizens to clear paths through the streets and open up the roadways again. But until that time, buses and taxis alike find their paths impeded, and pedestrians like me tire quickly of arriving places soaked to the knee and splattered with blackened slush.



The past two weeks of intermittent snow have left the streets resembling what an optimist might describe as a rich chocolate cake dusted with coconut, and what I might call a disgusting sludge that does no good for my shoes.

Yesterday the snow started again mid-afternoon, and fell steadily all night. Around 11 pm my flatmate suggested we go out for a walk to enjoy the winter wonderland while it was still fresh. So we bundled up and went out to explore the neighborhood. (Photo credits to my flatmate. I was too busy slipping and sliding to take pictures.)

The odd thing is that we were far from the only street prowlers out. The local park was crowded at midnight with camera-wielding families, couples with dogs, and sledders. To be clear, only about five people in Ankara own actual sleds. But as I've mentioned before, there is no flat space in the whole city, which means that a blanket of snowfall creates a sledders' fantasy land of abundant slopes. The temptation is great enough that a mass improvisation occurs, with the population rushing to their kitchens to fetch spare plastic bags, which are surprisingly slick little sleds.

My Cuban flatmate, being from a tropical island, had never gone sledding in her life, and was equal parts curious and terrified of the activity. Her fear was amplified by the sight of Turkish college guys racing their plastic shopping bags down the steepest, longest hill in the park at maximum speed, surrounded by a laughing gang of about twenty friends who were drinking beer and cheering them on. Several of them ended their runs sprawled out in a snowbank after a final bump sent them flying.

Thankfully we had lots of options for a bunny slope, and managed to find a hill that wasn't too steep for her first adventure. She screamed the whole way down, but then immediately ran back up the hill to try it again. I'm sure in time she'll be up on the big hills with the Turkish guys, skidding gleefully into piles of kicked-up snow.

And for the rest of the time, I am making full use of the armchairs which sit in front of the large front window in our living room, reading classic novels, sipping hot tea, and watching the snowfall. Bliss, indeed.