Hasankeyf and The English

Hasankeyf is an ancient town of considerable Kurdish significance, just a few KM from the remarkably named town of 'Batman'. Set on the banks of the Tigris, its most striking feature is a sheer vertical cliff, on the top of which are a scattering of ruins. Beneath these, on the Tigris riverside itself, the most noteworthy feature of Hasankef life are to be found - a string of restaurants. What is striking about them is that the mats and cushions you sit on are on wooden platforms erected on stilts above the river flowing beneath. Unless you're happy to get your shoes wet (as I was), you must take them off to even get to your seat. If you like you may take your drinks seated at a table in the midst of the waters, as waiters, in some real life sketch from Monty Python, splash towards you with your order.

These restaurants presumably exist to serve the regular Turkish people coming here on holiday. Being in the less appealing Eastern-Turkish zone, thankfully it's not a place heavily promoted by processed tourism. That said, in Hasankeyf's case, such a promotion might be justified, were it to save it from the damwaters it's shortly to be under, courtesy of the need for electricity. It's surreal and daunting to accept that soon enough (seven years so it's said) the whole town will be submerged by water up to 6 metres from the top of the highest minaret. Only the anciet ruins will remain, no longer a mountainous promontory but an island.

I was staying in the same hostel as Carlos. We'd spoken of meeting up yesterday and travelling together but hadn't managed it. Two other Swiss girls, Olivia and Justine, had also arrived but managed to get round staying at the only hostel in town by striking a crafty deal with one of the river restaurants. Free accomodation beneath the stars, on the banks of the Tigris for the price of their evening meal. After a longish chat with Carlos about life and work and travel and London (where he'd lived in Hackney in 1999 near me in Islington) we walked down river and met the Swiss girls at their lucky abode. Alfonso, the manager, spoke excellent English, offered us drinks and suggested we also stay. Alas it was too late but we had drinks and at my suggestion all went for a swim. The Tigris looks very dirty and its flow can be very fierce. Even in the safer stretch Alfonso took us to, it was sometimes an effort to keep my balance. Swimming against the current was close to futile while swimming with it dramatic. I'd taken my shoes off, Justine was pleased to note, but then had to tackle the walking-on-hot coals phenonemon which, for me and my sensitive feet at least, walking on river stones reproduces, even in shallow water.

Carlos and I decided to stay for dinner, during which we were joined by a throng of happy Turks. I enjoyed a sublime chat and considerable laughter with the charming Justine. She also did something you rarely find - she complimented the English. She said they were funny, that that was good and that she really liked them. I told her she should read "Watching The English" by Katie Fox. In this book, this anthropologist notes correctly how the English, especially men, never fail to turn any conversation into an opportunity for humour. That for the English, not to have a sense of humour, is the cardinal sin. I suppose this is good in a way, though personally I've sometimes found it frustrating, given the implied injunction against depth repose that underlies so much of this laughter. Not for us the continental languishings in gentle observations over red wine and brie. Still, it was great to be from a race applauded for a change. Usually, we're just trashed for being loud, noisy drunken thugs, or sighed at for our obsession with foreign property. Actually, though, I find more often than not the trashers of the English are other English people - people like me. Our vigilant cpacacity for self-deprecation can sometimes get out of hand.