Morgan Stone - The Russian Factor

The castle of Marmaris morphs out of ancient Greek dwellings that grow in size as one climbs the hill the town is built on. The higher up the hill and the closer to the castle, the more affluent you would have been in antiquity. It is so indistinct at the plebeian street level that I didn’t know we had reached it until the castle wall itself became an obstacle. A dead end. Anna plunked herself on a step to brood in the pizza-oven like heat.

Sea-glimpses between buildings revealed the bay that had once been home and refuge to Alexander the Great’s fabled fleet. I pulled the camera from my pack and snapped a few shots.

“I cannot believe we will sail this sea?” Anna waved at the scene I was shooting.

“You bet, just look at how beautiful it is. What an adventure we’ll have.” I tried for a shot with some foreground perspective. “Why do you ask? Are you afraid?”

“What do you think? Of course, I’m afraid. You have at least some experience, I have none. I’ve never been at sea. I’ve never even swum in it.”

“You have nothing to worry about. We’re doing everything right. Getting the right kind of boat. Making sure everything is safe. Like by getting a survey with Harvey, for instance. And what choice do we have? We have to leave Turkey, we have to do it on our own, and our only option is to do it by sea.”

“I know we have no choice and I know you will do everything you can but I don’t know what I am capable of. We are facing oceans and seas, such an immense undertaking and I cannot help but be afraid of it. It scares me just to talk about it here on land. At sea I will be useless. I am not just afraid, I am terrified. We are talking about death here. That time when we sailed with Erdem and that Frenchman, I could do nothing. I was frozen with fear. I couldn’t even move, Jess, and that was only a sunny day in that pretty bay you take pictures of now.” Anna clawed at her spiky, wrecked hair. “Even if I wasn’t afraid, I still don’t know how to sail!”

A red-faced troupe of profusely sweating Brits huffed past with cheerful greetings before I continued. “Of course you don’t know how to sail yet, but that’s not a problem. If you can ride a bike, you can learn to sail. We’ve got time before the deal on the boat closes. I’ll sign you up for sailing lessons.”

“You can not teach me?”

I snapped off a couple more shots. “I’d rather not. A professional will do a better job and cover stuff I might miss.” It sounded plausible.

Anna hugged her knees. Went silent. I wondered how long she had before someone wanted to use their front step.

With something like a third degree sunburn ravaging my nose, I reached down, took her hand. “It’s time to go.”

We started downhill on a narrow cart-passage of polished heat-shimmering cobblestones. Anna clomped beside me in her Doc Martens. Her hand was cold, even in the searing heat, and she held on like she was afraid of letting go. I was starting to worry about this adventure.

One after another, staff in marine stores responded with blank stares when I asked about sailing lessons. “Does anyone actually learn how to sail around here, or does one simply rent a yacht and head on out into the wild blue yonder?”

“Oh, no, test must be passed to sail a yacht.” Finally, we’d come across someone in the know. A large, older woman sitting behind the counter, cradling an old, blind toy-poodle, told me, “You must get a card, it is like a license, to take out a yacht.”

“Funny, nobody asked to see my qualifications before telling me to take a yacht for a test drive.” I glanced at Anna.

She didn’t look good. Maybe heatstroke or the sudden onset of a nervous breakdown.

“The marina mall, it has schools for sailing.” The woman put down the poodle and traced a route for us. The dog stood, crooked, paralyzed, shaking — a picture of fear and pain. Poor creature didn’t have long.

I didn’t know the marina even had a mall. It was brand new, barely occupied, and built in the classic Taco Bell fake-adobe style. Almost everywhere outside closed storefronts, signs announced Yacht Clubs and Sailing School s. One of the deserted sailing schools had at least gone to the effort of taping pictures of sailboats and smiling fit crews to its windows. It also provided an after hours phone number. Anna punched the number into her cell phone, checked to see that it was ringing, then shoved it at me. She prefers to let me deal with strangers.

“Hello,” Then a string of something in Turkish.

“Do you speak English?” I asked.

“Of course, who is this?” A woman’s voice demanded.

“I’m at your sailing school at the mall, there is a number here. Is this the right number?”

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

“Nothing’s wrong, I want to speak to someone about sailing lessons.”

“Uh-huh, your charter operator will set that up before you arrive. Who are you chartering with?” The woman asked.

“No one. I’m not chartering. I am in Marmaris in front of your office.” I said.

“Oh, right, you said that and your number is local.” The woman broke into a fit of coughing.

“Do you give sailing lessons? Is this the…” I looked for a name on the storefront.

Anna elbowed me and pointed at the sign.

“…C.Y.A. Lykia Sailing School, number?” I sounded like a quiz show contestant.

“Yes, it is. You want sailing lessons for how many, what rating, when?” More coughing.

“One person.” I looked at Anna. “I need someone to teach my friend to sail a fourteen meter Beneteau as soon as possible.” Once arranged, I intended to follow along like I had done during the sea-trial. “I would teach her myself.” I explained to the woman on the phone. “But I have no patience and I believe she — my ah, um… sailing partner — will benefit from professional instruction.”

“Okay sure, only one person? What outfit are you with?”

“I’m not with an outfit. I’m buying a sailboat. My friend and I need to sail to Canada. She needs sailing lessons before we leave. Can someone from your school teach her on my boat?”

“I suppose so, as long as it’s seaworthy and insured.” The woman paused. “It’s fifty Euros an hour and I teach C.Y.A. if that’s okay.”

“C-Y-A?” I asked.

“C-Y-A, that’s the Canadian Yachting Association. It’s standard here. R.Y.A. is the British version. If you need the A-S-A, American Sailing Association certification, I think you have to go to Bodrum.”

“No, the C.Y.A. sounds just right. I’m Canadian and we’re on our way there.”

“Yeah, you said, but not on a yacht, right?”

“Actually, yes… on the yacht. I’m buying it now, here in Marmaris.”

“And you need sailing lessons?” She half laughed, coughed. “Look, I’m close. Can you wait for me at the office?”

Three minutes later a short, tomboyish woman skidded her mountain bike to a stop in front of the office. “It’s you that phoned, right?”

“Yeah, it’s us.”

“I had to see if this is for real.” She held up her hands. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but it sounds crazy. She needs sailing lessons to cross the Atlantic ?”

Inside the Lykia Sailing School’s Spartan office, the woman introduced herself as Sinem. She sat behind a desk, poked a prehistoric IBM PC to life and waved us toward a couple of folding chairs. “I work with another instructor who owns the school.” She saw me staring at boxes of personal belongings stacked on the bare cement floor. “Oh, that stuff. We don’t teach here. The space is free and I needed a place to stow my things. We teach on yachts, out there, on the water. My partner is okay letting me freelance if you don’t care about certification or a rating.”