May 2017.
When I walked into the Turkish coffee shop today, I felt as though I was attending a romantic and gluttonous party.
The menu featured coffee mochas with towering whipped cream, a delectable selection of 12 different flavors of ice cream, and extravagantly ornate chocolate tiramisu cakes advertised as “Turkish desert” that towered behind the glass.
Uzbek music blasted a little too loud on the speakers, and people spoke loudly to be heard over the music, creating a buzz of laughter and chatter all around me.
I saw a couple feeding each other bites of cake. Teenagers sat together, not talking, but viewing their phones with intense concentration and typing vigorously. Two girls in gray turbans tied in the front of their foreheads sat in a corner sharing a pot of tea and giggling softly. A group of middle-aged men wearing square skullcaps (doppa) sat in a circle the middle of the room, multiple tables pushed together, talking loudly and laughing boisterously with each other.
Another woman sat alone with a red headscarf and an iPhone 6S adorned with shiny rhinestones, face plastered with white foundation, and a thick, dark penciled-in unibrow. She sent voice messages into her phone as she ate a piece of strawberry cake.
The din of people’s laughter and stories mixed with the music like a melodious harmony—a song of love, friendship, and pleasure, a short burst of time in the midst of busy lives. When I listened in on the conversations, I noticed that they never broached the religious or the political, and the kids were speaking in Chinese to each other.
The friend I was with took a selfie of us with our two bowls of ice cream. She airbrushed my pimples and the bags under my eyes, made our skin instantly whiter, put it together in a collage that said ‘best friends’ in English, and posted it on social media.
Our curated image of ourselves and our night out, a night of pleasure and escape through ice cream and cozy coffee shops surrounded by foreign music and huge pictures of cake, was suddenly disrupted by a raspy voice.
“Please, acha [older sister], won’t you buy some? 3 for 10 som [Uyghur word for unit of currency]…”
I turned and a boy no older than five looked up at me. His face was dirty, his eyes were tired. He was wiggling and squirming as he stood next to our table, presenting packages of wet wipes for sale, and staring at our food. We shook our heads no, and went back to burying our heads in our phones, trying to escape this uncomfortable moment of sitting in his need and shameless begging. He pushed, asking us again, and we told him qeghez ba! (we have tissues!) a little too harshly.
The waitresses with black baseball caps and orange sweatshirts bustled around the crowds, clearing trash and returning dishes to the kitchen.
Outside, a military post was monitored by young men in camouflage holding large guns behind a black cage that says in large yellow characters: 请勿靠近 (please don’t get too close).
Across the street, a father stood at the entrance to the mosque, as he did every night, holding two young children in his arms while he rocked back and forth chanting praises to Allah and begging for help and mercy.
A black van reading 公安 (public safety) with bars on its windows rumbled past, its blue and red lights flashing.
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