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ANTIPOVA saw Istanbul for the first time in the fall of 1920 from the deck of a freight ship, she did so with one small swelling in her womb and a larger one on her back. With the help of her husband, she ploughed her way through the crowd of passengers, who had all stood up for the entire three days since they left the Crimea. She clung to the rails to see what the city that awaited them looked like. Ever since she was a little girl, she relished playing games with colours more than anything else. Wherever she went, she needed to discover the colour of the place first in order to feel at home there. The mansion in Grosny where she was born and had spent her childhood, for instance, was rhubarb, and the church they attended every Sunday parchment yellow. In her mind’s eye, the villa they lodged in during religious festivals was a sparkly emerald awash in dew; the house she lived in with her husband after their wedding was the orange of a winter sun. Not only places but also people, animals, even moments had colours each of which, she had no doubt she could see if focused fully. She did so once again. At first with curiosity, then with frustration, she stared and stared without a blink at the silhouette of the city in front of her until her eyes watered and the image became blurred.
    Istanbul was under a heavy fog that morning, and as all Istanbulites knew too well, during foggy days even the city herself could not tell what her colour was. However, Agripina Fyodorovna Antipova had always been pampered with greatcare since birth and had been subsequently led to presume that others were to blame whenever she could not obtain anything she desired. Hence she interpreted the persistence of Istanbul in withdrawing herself behind the veil of fog as a sign of intentional hostility and personal insult. She still, however, wanted to give the city a chance, as she firmly believed in the virtue of forgiveness. Lifting her small silver Virgin Mary icon toward the city she smiled benevolently: ‘What you just did to me was not right, but I can still show tolerance and forgive you. For that would be the right thing to do.’
    ‘And I will give you water and bread in return,’ replied a voice.
    When she bent down the rails, Agripina Fyodorovna Antipova saw there in a boat at the side of the ship a wiry man gesturing at her with bread in one hand and water in the other. Before she could even fathom what was going on, a chubby, rosy-cheeked, blond woman with shorn hair pushed her aside, tied the gold ring she took off her finger onto the belt she released from her daughter’s waist and lowered it from the ship. The swarthy man in the boat grabbed the ring, lifted it in the air giving it a quick inspection with disgruntlement and relayed the belt back with a round, black loaf of bread tied in its stead. As the blonde, who had sheared her hair when a lice epidemic broke on the deck, and the scrawny daughter standing by her started devouring the bread, Agripina Fyodorovna Antipova looked at the sea with her eyes wide open in bewilderment and noticed that not only the ship they were in, but all the ships anchored in the harbour were surrounded with such boats. Cunning Turks, Greeks and Armenians waved foodstuff from these boats haggling with the White Russians who had been without food or water for days. Figuring out what was going on, Agripina Fyodorovna Antipova fretfully withdrew her silver Virgin Mary as if it too would be snatched away from her. Over the boats and sellers and waves she stared fretfully at the city in the background to grasp what sort of a place she had arrived at.
    Istanbul was in dire straits at that time and also underoccupation. She therefore paid little attention to the half-baffled, half-haughty gaze of this nineteen year old woman on the deck of yet another newly anchored ship. Her tolerance for putting up with such selfish children having long run out, Istanbul returned to her own hubbub with a shrug of her