The cheik told me he hoped the new generation, largely educated in Europe, might welcome such innovations, but “it would be difficult for the old. My wife, for instance, complained at having to ‘receive’ men visitors in Berlin. She considered it ‘cheap’ and ‘lowering’ to her prestige.”
I can only hope the women of Turkey, when they achieve progress, will advance on the right lines—more determined on tact than pace.
One must, of course, discard conventions at need, as I was doing all the time on this journey, but one can, at the same time, respect the feelings of others.
I could not, for convention, allow my present companions to keep up the full Eastern “separation of the sexes”; and, as the cheik remarked, London ballrooms would be no less offensive to Turkish ladies of the old school than the comparatively “close quarters” which common humanity forbade us to avoid.
There are often, of course, directly opposed conventions in different climates. In the Eastern mosques men keep on hats and take off boots; Europeans reverse the custom. Eastern women object to “low” frocks and “strange” partners “for the dance”; and, as one who had joined in them once told me, it is better to dance alone; for, if the music suddenly stops, a “couple” feel so embarrassed!
We were driven to the station for a train due to leave at 10 in the morning, which actually started about 5 P.M.! We had first attempted to find room in a third-class compartment with a French colonel, a Turkish officer, and two servants. But Europeans, even in Asia Minor, are seldom inclined to be accommodating, and my “ally” (!) diplomatically expressed his desire to be left alone in his glory. “You will be much more comfortable, my dear madam, in a less crowded carriage. I fear you could not even find a seat among all these officers, and, at least, fifty boxes.” We were not slow to take the hint.
However, there is no sign of being able to leave the station for some hours, and the sun is shining for a change. Everyone, naturally, prefers the platform; and having learnt, it appears, that I am not married to either the cheik or the Turkish officer, the colonel approaches me with renewed curiosity. When I explain that I am English, he simply answers: “You mean American?”
“The one Frenchman and the one Englishwoman in Anatolia,” was my retort, “have met by chance at a wayside railway station, and you will not even allow me to enter your carriage. Are you really French?”
“I should be delighted and honoured if you will come and talk to me,” was the would-be gallant reply, “but I have twenty boxes” (he has quickly disposed of thirty). “I thought at first you were a lady of sixty.”