Going to the Movies

It was a rainy Sunday here in Gaziantep. My neighbor Judy and I had spent most of yesterday and this morning doing desk work. We definitely needed an outing. We'd heard that Valentine's Day was playing in a couple of the multiplexes here in town and that it was in English with Turkish subtitles. We checked the times and thought we'd better go the M1 (across town) because the only time it was playing in Sanko Park (the nearest cinema) was at 9:30 PM. This was the first time either of had been to the movies here in Turkey. Our weekend adventure.

The first challenge was buying the tickets. The title Valentine's Day was not listed on the board, but something called Romantik Komedi was. We figured that must be it. Avatar was also showing, and it seemed that was the favorite. When we finally got to the head of the line and asked for two tickets for that movie, we were told something in Turkish. The only word we recognized was "yok" -- no or none. We didn't understand why; maybe they were sold out. However, there were five or six showings that day so we thought that maybe we were in the wrong line. We decided to try at another counter and were also turned away. Finally, we saw a poster for the movie Romantik Komedi, and it was clearly a Turkish movie and not Valentine's Day. That gave us some hope. Then Judy found a flyer with little blurbs on each of the movies that were showing. This time they did have Valentine's Day along with its Turkish title. So back we went and asked for two tickets for that movie. Again she answered with a long explanation in Turkish, but at least we didn't hear the word "yok." Then we were shown a seating chart on a computer screen. Most of the seats were in red with about 6-7 or seven in gray with the letter "S" on them. We thought those were the only ones we could choose from and kept trying to select those seats; we were clearly having communication problems. Finally, someone who spoke some English came up and told us to pick from the red seats -- now we know you buy an assigned seat in a Turkish movie theater. We got our tickets and off we went.

After finding our seats, we went back and bought -- POPCORN! And sour cherry juice. Sort of American. So here we were, munching our popcorn and watching an all-star cast frolic in LA. Half way though the movie, it just stopped -- in fact, kind of ground to a halt. The lights went on. There were only about eight of us in the theater. Slowly the others filed out. Judy joked that maybe it was an intermission. I needed to use the restroom, so I thought I might as well take advantage of the break. Turned out that's where the others were heading, too. Sure enough, not long after I returned, the movie started up again. Later I learned from a Turkish friend that there are always intermissions at Turkish movie theaters. I told her they were missing an opportunity in not telling the audience to visit the snack bar during intermission. Room for a little entrepreneurial activity here in Gaziantep.

After the movie we both felt a little jolt as we exited the theater and realized we were in Turkey. Somehow we'd forgotten. The mall was packed; in fact, the parking lot was packed with people cruising around, looking for a parking spot. It'd been there twice before, once on a weekend. Both times it seemed almost empty. I guess the weekend plus rain sent everyone to the mall.