The Keyif is Killing Me

photo credit: timur tusiray

Yet with all this, I’ve never seen such a relaxed culture. Though, as I'll explain, this relaxation can be fatal too.

My family roots were initially what brought me to Istanbul. But it was the culture and the aesthetic of enjoyment I found here that made me a junkie. There is a word for this in Turkish – keyif. Merriment, joy, pleasure, joviality, good cheer, humor – these are close. I guess the best word we have for this in English would just be ‘enjoyment’, but this doesn’t fully capture it either. Keyif is more like an ethos of enjoyment, an attitude which with people take their pleasure. There’s a certain idleness to it, but a rigorous and almost principled idleness. 

There are many varieties of keyif.  The most common is çay keyfi, the enjoyment of tea.

People like to sit for hours at a time with black tea, some cigarettes, a little company, and preferably a good view, though a simple table and chairs on a balcony or sidewalk will do. The tea in Turkey is strong and served in little hourglass waist cups, perfect for a little tea break and conducive to drinking mutiple cups. Everybody drinks it. Old men sit in special tea houses for the retired whittling away the day playing card games. Women sit together on balconies gossiping over tea. Young people sit in hookah bars playing backgammon and drinking tea. Shopkeepers offer tea to their customers as a token of friendship as they bargain over prices, just as business men do for their clients. Tea is considered almost a human right in Turkey. The working day is punctuated with numerous tea breaks. Tea is served on ferries and long-distance buses. Everybody from truck drivers to judges drinks tea on the job. Even prisoners in jails have their tea.

photo credit: timur tusirary

Another form of keyif is kahve keyfi. Coffee in Turkey has a deeper meaning than it does back in the States. We enjoy it, we meet with friends in cafes for it, but more often than not we guzzle it, throw it back on the way out the door or in the car. In Turkey the drinking of coffee has a deeper resonance. It is drunk not in haste but with care. There is a saying in Turkish about coffee: bir fincan kahvenin kırk yıl hatırası var. A single cup of coffee has a memory of forty years. The coffee is a prop, a delicious pretense for conversation. And the connection that can be built, the sharing of hearts that occurs, over a fifteen minute cup of coffee are remembered for a lifetime.

There are many types of keyif, all based around the presence of some sort of food or drink and good company, but my favorite would have to be the ritual of enjoyment that surrounds rakı, the Turkish national drink. Rakı is an anise-flavored alcohol, similar in theory to the Greek ouzo or the French pastis. It is quite strong and served with water in tall, thin glasses. The alcohol itself is transparent but once water is added it turns to a cloudy, milky color. Rakı is never served alone, but has a whole family of meze, or aperatiffs, that accompany it. At the very least it should be paired with a little melon and some feta cheese.

My uncle Fatih in Izmir

An evening of rakı with friends or family can easily last four or five hours. The night begins with melon and cheese, and some light salads. Then you might have stuffed grape leaves, puff pastry, and a variety of eggplant dishes. There’s a whole category of dishes meant to be served with rakı, all chosen with the express aim of bringing out the flavor of the liquor. Small portions of many dishes are tasted as you drink and converse. The idea is to keep the evening going as long as possible without becoming either too full or too drunk, taking many little breaks for people to talk and smoke, and, if you’re out drinking at a restaurant, to sing and dance. As a final course there might be fish, followed at last by Turkish coffee or tea and platters of fruit. By the time you finally leave the table you are completely stuffed, pleasantly tipsy, totally exhausted, and absolutely amazed that enjoyment can be such hard work.

photo credit: timur tusirary

photo credit: timur tusirary

photo credit: timur tusirary

photo credit: timur tusiray

photo credit: timur tusiray

photo credit: timur tusirary

This is what I mean about keyif being rigorous. And for me, the first time I came here, being basically a foreigner, surrounded by family conversing in a language I could barely understand, these dinners were both a delight and a test of patience. However, as time passed I began to better understand the mentality of these evenings, even hosting many of my own for friends back home. But this culture of enjoyment began to be challenging in a different way after I finally moved to Istanbul.

My health began to suffer. Not just from the rakı nights, which at most happen two or three times a month, but from the general lifestyle of both heavy work and heavy enjoyment. The leading cause of death in Turkey is heart disease, which when you think about it is not particularly surprising. There’s the fattening foods, the oil, the butter, the salt. There’s constant intake of caffeine and cubes of white sugar with every glass of tea. There’s cigarette smoke and, for the non-smokers, second-hand smoke. These are conditions ripe for clogged arteries and heart attacks. It’s different than in the US, where processed foods and the obesity it causes are more rampant. But these were never a problem for me in the States because I was surrounded by a culture of health food and exercise. It was when I came to Turkey and begin to enjoy keyif this and keyif that that I started to notice the effects of constant indulgence. Remember the freshman 15? There’s also the Istanbul 15. What else did I expect to happen, what with the sedentary lifestyle with the lack of exercise, all the alcohol, and the incredible but calorific cuisine?

photo credit: timur tusirary

photo credit: courtney pinar

photo credit: timur tusirary

photo credit: timur tusirary

photo credit: timur tusirary

The culture of keyif, like the city itself, is addicting. And if overly indulged in it can be pleasurable and harmful in equal proportions. I’ll never forget a story a friend told me about something he saw in the museum where he worked. A woman who worked in the office was feeling overcome by sickness and stress and her friend was trying her best to calm her down. The woman can’t seem to calm down and finally her friend says, “Hadi, bir sigara yak bir kahve iç ve kendine gelirsin.” Come on, let’s get you a cup of coffee and a cigarette and you’ll feel better in no time.

photo credit: timur tusiray

photo credit: courtney alemdar