I was in a state of thorough exhaustion. Our flat was full of friendly welcomers and well-wishers, but I snuck away from the crowd in search of a potential sleeping spot.
The big bedroom had a single bed mattress on the floor by the wall and a very large pink washing bowl in the middle of the floor. The smaller room had a large (queen or maybe king-size) dark-wood bed-frame - that is, a head-board, foot-board and side-rails. Sitting well inside this - leaving a large space at each side - was a much smaller (double-bed size) grotty old (stained and torn) mattress with the shape of the springs showing clearly through the fabric.
I stepped over the side-rail, and - avoiding the worst stain - lay tentatively on the mattress, wondering if I was tired enough to sleep even here.
I lifted the edge of the mattress to check on the actual bed. It was a few inches smaller than the mattress, and had metal struts, and four metal legs designed to fold up (I use the word 'design' fairly loosely here) for storage - but with a tendancy to fold at other times too. The 'feet' had long since lost their little rubber floor-protecting shoes, and these had been replaced with tatty-looking plastic bags wrapped and taped on. But the worst part was the edge where the previous occupant had obviously repeatedly sat to tie his shoes, and the metal was bent and cracked.
A thoughtful person had provided us with bright, fresh, brand-new pillows, sheet, pillow-cases, doona, and doona cover - it would have been nice to have had a chance to wash the size out of the linens before sleeping on them, but that couldn't be helped.
The first night Peter slept quite well on the downhill side - it was a little like a hammock. But I fared less well on the uphill slope, and at 2.30am when the jet-lag struck I gave up trying.
The second night we found a big pile of old magazines in a cupboard, and used a stack of these to even up the broken strut. Now with a horizontal bed I had a chance to get over the jet-lag.
Nearly a week later
we were provided with a 'new' mattress, no stains, almost perfect faric, no springs showing through, and much bigger size.
Of course, no bed yet. The new mattress is perched on the old metal bed, magazines and all.
The new mattress arrived late in the day, and of course the sheet would not fit (no tuck in). I just had to lay it across the bed and we tried to lie fairly still so as not to rumple it too much during the night.
The next day we visited the
Sheet Shop.
With barely enough Turkish language to say 'hello', it was back to charades to try to buy a new sheet from one of the tiny manchester shops just around the corner. But the shop-owner was an excitable little fellow who had maybe done this before. Once he realised we understood nothing he started prancing around, waving his arms in demonstration and pulling samples off his floor-to-ceiling shelves.
We had some useful measurement numbers on a scrap of paper, and soon we had just what we wanted, a fitted sheet of exactly the right size and the same design as the previous flat sheet that had been supplied. However, when we discovered a sheet set would cost us only 14 YTL (about AU$12) we decided to buy two. The little man was delighted, and once again became quite excitable, offering us a little blue hand towel as well. It wasn't free, he wanted to give it to us for 2 YTL. I don't know, maybe he just didn't have change. We gave in and bought the towel as well - you can never have too many towels.
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