by<\/em> Tugay Bek<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I was born in 1974. I work as a freelance lawyer in Adana. My family is from \u00c7orum Osmanc\u0131k province, more precisely \u00c7amp\u0131nar village, which is a village of Central Black Sea Region of Turkey. <\/p>Tugay Bek<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n \u00c7amp\u0131nar is a forest village. The people who lived in this village once made a living from the forest and smuggling. I got inspired by the memories of smuggling that I used to hear from my father<\/p>Tugay Bek<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n \nWith his blonde curly hair, sparse eyebrows that were not noticed\nuntil we looked near, the new sweaty mustache that stole red, Irfan\nwas like a thin, long, walking sapling. He was sixteen years old, and\nhe could just go to sit in the village coffee shop, looking out for\nmoments when his father wasn\u2019t there. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nHe woke up that night with the voice of a howling dog. He thought it\nwas late for a moment and jumped out of bed. When he drew the curten,\nwhich had sunflowers on it and looked at the moon, which hung like a\nlamp in the sky, the palpitation of his heart rested, relieved, not\nbelated. Trying not to make noise, he poured the water in the copper\npitcher and hit it in the face. Cold water with crispy ice in it,\ntouched the forehead and neck, and he felt that his entire body was\nwaking up. First, he put the old one of the wool socks his mother\nknitted, then put the new one on top and pulled it to his kneecaps. \nAfter dressing up a few layers, he put on the green parka his uncle\nbrought back from the military service and went downstairs. When he\nopened the door, he saw two cows and a pair of oxen lying down the\nwall, unresponsive. Standing right next to the door, R\u00fczgar\nswang its hips and shook its head twice as if saying\n“I’m ready.” R\u00fczgar,\nwho was five years old, was taken from a peddler for seven sacks of\nwheat by Irfan\u2019s father when it was just three months old. The\nelder peddler explained that R\u00fczgar’s\nmother was a champion horse who participated in the races in Urfa.\nThe old man said this horse’s lineage came from Hejaz. Irfan dreamed\nthat perhaps it was a descendant of Hazrat Ali’s horse, D\u00fcld\u00fcl.\nR\u00fczgar\nand Irfan grew up together. No one has ever boarded R\u00fczgar\nexcept Irfan because he did not let others draw near to R\u00fczgar.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nIrfan covered an old black rug onto R\u00fczgar\nand put a saddle on it. He carefully tied his axe, which he sharpened\nmeticulously last evening, to the right side of the saddle, its bit\nfronting the ground. He hung the food bag consisting of onions,\nmolasses and the flat bread wrap with dry cottage cheese, which his\nmother prepared before going to bed, to the hook at the back of the\nsaddle. When the door was closed with noise, he was glad his father\nhadn’t woken up yet. Because his father would never let his only son\ngo to the mountain alone at night for a jacket. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nIt was only three hours before the sun came up. Irfan could curb his\nfears thanks to the moon, which illuminated the surroundings like a\ndaytime. For a while, he watched the hectic state of two bats\ncircling around a mulberry tree in the garden with a few dry leaves\nleft on top. He thought his time was running out, and he got on his\nhorse in a move. R\u00fczgar,\nwhich has carried trees many times before, began to climb into the\nforest road with rapid steps. As they approached the forest, the\nhigher the snow was. Irfan was following in the footsteps of another\nsmuggler who was understood to have crossed the same path the day\nbefore so that his horse would not be stuck in snow. In this time of\nwinter, no one visited the creek bed for days and it snowed without\ninterruption. There he found a storm-torn old pine tree. The trunk of\nthe pine tree, which is almost as long as the minaret of the Ulucami\nmosque in the town, two strokes thick, was completely stuck in the\nsnow, its majestic branches stretching towards the sky as if they\nwere asking for help. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nIrfan tied his horse to the nearby juniper sapling and put around its\nneck a bag of barley straw more abundant than ever before. Waiting\nfor this moment, R\u00fczgar\nburied its head in the bag with pleasure and loud noise. Irfan\nexpertly separated the edge branches of the pine from the body. He\ndecided to divide a pine of this size into three, thinking it would\nbe difficult for him to carry it to the town in such a snowy weather.\nHaving difficulty feeling his cold-freezing hands, Irfan’s long nose\nwas glowing like a tomato. After swinging the axe for about two hours\nin a row, he managed to peel off and divide the pine. He threw the\nsmall hard unopened pine cones falling from the pine tree into the\nbag standing in the horse’s back with the thought of painting them\ncolorfully and giving them to Zeynep when she would arrive at the\nvillage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nBefore sunrise, there was no time to rest as he had to enter town\nbefore the foresters kept the roads. After loading his horse, he\ncovered the rest of the pine with the snow so that no one else would\ntake it and set off. Irfan, who could not use the main road to avoid\ncoming across the foresters, drove his horse to the edge of the\ncreek. Irfan was very careful because he knew that his horse would be\nconfiscated if he was caught. Thanks to this work he had done\nsecretly from his father, before the eid he would be able to buy the\nblack jacket with its fine brown stripes, which he saw in the draper\nAli\u2019s shop and liked very much. So far, irfan had always worn the\nold clothes from the relatives, he had never had his own jacket. He\ndreamed that he was wearing the jacket, that he had met his childhood\nfriend Zeynep, who had been going to study in the city for two years,\nand who came back to the village for every eid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nThe tree-laden horse in the front, Irfan in the back, in his dream\nworld, they were about to get out of the moonlit forest road when\nR\u00fczgar\nsuddenly stopped. Despite hitting it slightly on the\nback with his wand and shouting “Giddy up my lion!”, R\u00fczgar\ndidn’t move. It had its big black eyes open to the end, and R\u00fczgar\nlooked like it saw the devil. When Irfan looked in the direction in\nwhich R\u00fczgar\nfixed its gaze, he noticed a pair of glowing eyes from the darkness.\nWhen he looked with a little more attention, he realized there was a\nherd of six wolves lying under the pine tree above the passageway. It\nwas like irfan’s heart was going to pop out, thinking the wolves\nwould tear himself and his horse apart. He thought he had to untie\nthe ropes tethering the tree so his horse could escape in the event\nof an attack. But in this snowy weather, his horse didn’t have much\nchance in front of six wolves. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nYet sixteen-year-old he didn’t want to believe he was going to die\nwith his horse for a jacket. He took the axe hanging on the horse and\ntook a few steps towards the side where the wolves were lying. He\nmade meaningless noises and started shouting so that the wolves might\ndrum up their interest. And even though the wolves cocked an ear,\nthey didn’t move from where they were. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nIrfan leaned the axe on his shoulder like a rifle, turned it towards\nthe wolves and made sounds similar to the gun explosion. He, himself,\nwas spooked by the echo of the sound, and the wolves were not leaving\nthe passageway. R\u00fczgar\ngot more uneasy, lifting the front feet up to the air and trying to\nget rid of the load on his back. This unresponsiveness and\ndetermination in the wolves has further amplified the fear. He’s\nnever felt so helpless, Irfan. He desperately let\nhis hands<\/em> drop to his\nsides, thinking the wolves could attack at any moment. \nMeanwhile, a bulge from the parka’s right pocket was touching his\nhand. When he dipped his hand in his pocket, he found the slingshot\nhis father made from the branch of a mulberry tree two years ago.\nIrfan was more of a master than his peers in using slingshots. Every\ntime they shot at an old pot cover with children gathered in front of\nthe school in the summer evenings, Irfan would win. When everywhere’s\ncovered in snow, he couldn’t see a stone to throw with the slingshot.\nAfter looking around further for a while, he remembered the pine\ncones in the bag. He took one of the cones and took aim at the head\nof the big wolf with long grey feathers, which had a big head and\nlooked like the leader of the herd. But he didn’t feel his fingers\nfrom the cold, and adding the effect of fear, he stretched the\nslingshot with a shaking hand. The cone that buzzed in the air went\nright under the nose of the big wolf and got stuck in the snow. The\nbig wolf pricked up its ears, opened its nostrils wide and smelled\nthe place. He shoved his nose where the cone got stuck and opened a\ncrater-like hollow on the snow, and sprayed the snow into the air\nwith its breath. Irfan, with the other cone in his hand, took aim at\nthe top point of the tall pine tree, with its branches widened like a\nhand fan and covered with snow, under which the wolf pack was lying.\nHe stretched the slingshot with all his strength, and left it all at\nonce and calmly. The pine cone again made a buzzing sound in the air\nand hit the grand pine with a big noise. The pine was shaken like a\ngiant awakened from his sleep. Snow from the upper branches caused\nsnow in all branches to fall with noise, like a domino effect. The\nbodies of wolves lying under the pine were largely covered in snow.\nThe wolves who were lying until then, all of them, rushed into the\nair in a panic. Meanwhile, a pair of shepherd dogs barking were heard\nfrom the village side of the passageway. The big wolf, the leader of\nthe herd, shook off the snow that had accumulated on it and ran\nrapidly into the forest, followed by other wolves. Irfan took a deep\nbreath, waited for a while, pulled the rope of his horse and left the\npassageway. Irfan, who did not feel his ears and fingertips from the\ncold, looked at the lights leaking in the remote hills and heaved a\nsigh imagining that it would be nice to be there in these houses next\nto a hot stove. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nIrfan and R\u00fczgar,\nat the end of two hours, when they arrived in the town, the street\nlights were still on. He reached the sawmill on the edge of the river\nand unloaded his horse. R\u00fczgar,\nfoaming at the mouth, which got rid of the weight on its back, licked\nthe sweat for a long time and nipped itself hard. While Irfan was\ncollecting the rope that he had used to wrap the tree, the owner of\nthe sawmill came to the workshop. The sawyer measured the length and\ndiameter of the tree with the scale in his hand. He made a quick\ncalculation and said that he would pay 80 Turkish Liras for the tree.\nIrfan felt that all his fatigue was gone, when he thought that with\nthis money he could buy the jacket, which was 70 Turkish Liras. He\nripped off half of his flat-bread wrap in his food bag and devoured\nit. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n \nHe tied his horse to the sawmill and went to the draper Ali’s shop.\nHe asked for the black jacket with brown stripes in the window. As he\nwatched the close-fitting jacket in the mirror for a while, he got\nimpatient, thinking of returning to the village and telling his\nfriends about the dangerous journey he had and showing off his\njacket. With the remaining money, he bought her mother a black\nshalwar fabric with red poppies on it. He returned to the sawmill,\nmounted R\u00fczgar,\nwhich was finally rested and recovered,\nand made his way to the village, galloping from the\nmain road. Just outside the town, where he stopped by the spring to\nwater his horse, he encountered three foresters who were wearing\ngreen parka and bright starred hats and walking in overweight pants\nas if to tear at any moment. He had already seen them at the village\ncoffee before and he didn\u2019t neglect to salute them this time<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Smuggler by Tugay Bek I was born in 1974. I work as a freelance lawyer in Adana. My family … The Smuggler<\/h2>\n\n\n\n