«'I have never received flowers in my life', says Macide Açkıra, a thirty-one year old gypsy selling flowers. 'But every morning at nine thirty, my husband returns from the flowers auctions and brings me these... to sell!' she adds laughing with a throaty voice that suggests decades of heavy smoking.
Early each morning, while Macide is still stirring in her sleep, her husband leaves with fellow gypsy men from his neighbourhood, heading out to a different part of Istanbul to participate in the daily flower auctions. Female gypsies do not appear at the site of the auction; it is the duty of the men to do so. As the men bargain and purchase the day's bouquets, their wives meet and begin their half hour walk through the center of the city, to their designated spots on the side-walks of Nişantaşı, one of the poshest neighbourhoods of Istanbul. The men arrive in a shared pickup truck and unload the flowers in plastic vases and rusting tin cans that have been rescued from piles of trash. There is a short commotion as both men and women line up the vases, arranging the bouquets according to stem height and colour. It seems they are all secret experts on colour therapy as the neat rows of vases are shifted into perfect angles to catch the eyes of the hundreds of passerbys throughout the day. The order and angles of their flowers' display seem to take into account the dances of the sunlight and shadows throughout the day, for as the hours change, the flowers seem to as well in both presence and appeal.
'My favourite flowers are not among these here today', she comments, barely looking over the thirty vases that hold over six hundred flowers on that particular day. 'Fresias and hyacinths ares seasonal and can only be found in January to February'.
Macide has been selling flowers in the streets of Istanbul for the past eighteen years. It was her mother who began teaching her the trade and the one who eventually passed the business down to her. Not having children of their own, her husband and she focus their daily lives around the purchase and selling of flowers.
'I work from 9:30 in the morning until about 9:30 in the evening. The day ends when my husband appears to pick me up at night. Then together, we throw out the flowers that haven't been sold that day', she says. The average number of flowers her husband brings her every morning are the same, yet the amount remaining unsold at the end of the day depends on weather and luck... Those and of course unrivaled bargaining skills accompanied by a slick understanding of human psychology.
'I usually don't target particular types of people to call out to. I wait until I notice someone glance over at my flowers at the corner of their eye. (...)
'People buy flowers when they are sad. Women especially - when a women is upset - notice, she will buy flowers. So I also call out to one who look sad or as though they are having a bad day. Sometimes I smile first, to give them a non-intruding sense of kindness. Then I offer them some flowers. I never have to suggest a particular kind, at time slike this, people instinctively seem to know what they want. (...)
The last confession comes as a whisper and is interrupted by the arrival of a woman, a customer dressed in white and black, wearing stiletto heeled sandals and carrying a Gucci purse.
'Give me two bunches of gerberas and three daisies.'
Macide shuts up and begins to wrap up the flowers in shiny wrapping paper.
'Hello, welcome... Okay, okay...' she keeps saying, but there are no compliments. The customer ignores her greetings and almost rudely orders for other flowers to be taken out and wrapped. Once she has her armload if flowers, she strides away without thanks. Macide sits back down, apologizing to me for the woman's rudeness. (...)
I wonder aloud what she would do if her husband were to bring these roses home for her tonight. She thinks for a moment, stands up straighter under the rain and extending out her neck to the darkening afternoon sky, lets out a last throaty laugh.
'I would probably hit him on the head with it! Giving ME flowers is not romantic! That's like your man giving you a newspaper for Valentine's Day!'.»
in TimeOut Istanbul, nº 33, October 2003
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