Tarabya is a busy dining district on the Bosphorus that becomes a recurring setting for outings by Füsun, Kemal Basmacı, and the Keskin family. Beginning in the summer of 1977, these excursions offered more than a change of scenery: away from the careful roles maintained at home, Füsun and Kemal could sit beside one another and exchange quiet words. The same setting later holds an uneasy evening in which an encounter with a man connected to Feridun gives way to confrontation, then to a shared song on the journey home.

Setting and Atmosphere

In the period recalled by Kemal, Tarabya was among the most popular places along the Bosphorus. Its crowded restaurants spilled across the sidewalks, where tombala ticket sellers, mussel and fresh-almond vendors, photographers, ice-cream sellers, and musicians moved among the diners. Traditional singers performed in many of the restaurants, and the district had not yet become a tourist destination. The waiters, carrying heavy trays across the narrow road between the restaurants and their outdoor tables, impressed Nesibe the seamstress with their speed and daring.

This busy public setting gave the Keskin family a shared ritual. After persuading Tarık Bey to join them in the summer of 1977, the group began making excursions at least once a month, in both winter and summer, in a car driven by Çetin. They went to restaurants and large gazinos to hear the old melodies and singers Tarık Bey enjoyed. The outings could lapse during periods of tension or uncertainty about the film work, but the pleasure of being together would return unexpectedly during a drive or meal.

Huzur Restaurant and Family Ritual

The first outing was to Huzur Restaurant, a relatively modest establishment with an available table. Tarık Bey took to it because the neighboring Mücevher Gazino allowed the diners to hear its Turkish songs without paying for a seat inside. When Kemal suggested that the group would hear the performers better in the gazino itself, Tarık Bey rejected the expense and criticized the band and singer; nevertheless, he followed the music closely, correcting the performers and completing their lines. After his third glass of rakı, he closed his eyes and swayed with the song.

Music made the meal into a family performance as well as a night out. At times Tarık Bey sang along, and on the drive home the others joined in. The shared listening and singing helped the group put aside the awkwardness that could build around them. Tarabya’s restaurants thus extended the Keskin household’s familiar company into public space while giving its members new ways to enjoy one another.

A Space for Füsun and Kemal

At home, Füsun did not ordinarily sit beside Kemal. In the car and at the restaurant in Tarabya, she did. With her parents absorbed by the music or the view of the Bosphorus, the two could whisper across the noise about the food, the evening, or Tarık Bey. Their conversation was tentative, like the tentative flirtation of two young people learning how a couple might form a relationship in Europe. The shift in seating and circumstance mattered: Tarabya let them occupy a more intimate position without openly challenging the household’s arrangements.

The outings could therefore feel like a temporary release from the roles they played indoors. They did not erase the limits on their relationship, but offered a public setting in which a closeness otherwise concealed at the dinner table could be quietly enacted. The district’s noise, music, and surrounding diners made their proximity less conspicuous, while the family’s shared pleasure gave the excursions a respectable social frame.

A Later Tense Evening

Tarabya also became the setting for a later outing marked by jealousy and strain. After leaving the Pelür, Kemal told a friend of Feridun’s that there was no room in the car because they would be collecting Füsun’s parents for dinner. He then persuaded Nesibe the seamstress and Tarık Bey to join them, and the group went to Huzur Restaurant. There, Kemal noticed the man with dark green eyes seated two tables away, watching them with a companion; Feridun realized that Kemal had seen him. The narrator’s account describes a confrontation and its de-escalation, but emphasizes the disturbance that remained at the table.

As a ship’s searchlight swept the choppy water, Füsun continued smoking and held Kemal’s gaze without looking away. He understood her changed manner as evidence that, over the preceding two years, her expectations had become more consequential than the immediate trouble with the drunken actor. Tarık Bey began singing Selahattin Pınar’s “Why Did I Ever Love That Cruel Woman”; the family joined in, and later sang together in the car on the way home. The song did not undo the tension, but the shared journey made it seem, for a while, as if the unpleasant incident had been left behind.

Narrative Significance

Tarabya gathers several strands of the Keskin family’s life into one recurring place: television-bound domestic routines give way to drives, meals, music, and the Bosphorus; family companionship creates cover for Kemal and Füsun’s private intimacy; and moments of ease coexist with jealousy and changing expectations. The district’s significance lies in this contrast. Its outings are genuinely pleasurable, yet the later confrontation reveals that the closeness they shelter is neither simple nor secure.