A barber working in Istanbul longs to be 'both here and far, far away'. And one day, without warning, he takes himself off and disappears abruptly into the great far away. The barber settles in a far-flung village, and as chance would have it the one-time local barber, Jingle Nuri, vanished from the place years ago.
Every one of our lives is stuffed with secrets, of lies, of hidden desires and fears we can reveal to no one... Believing in lies or hearsay, deferring to other peoples reality; these are things that come surprisingly easily to most of us. But what happens if you start believing in your own lies?
A barber working in Istanbul longs to be both here and far, far away. And one day, without warning, he takes himself off and disappears abruptly into the great far away. But is it really possible to begin a completely new life far, far away as a nobody?
There is a village there far away... But where exactly is a mystery. And when, which year, which age, that too is a mystery. It is as if time has stood still, locked in eternal spring.
There is a village there far away... All well and good, but whose village is it?
The village is in the hands of the mukhtar, the elected local chief. The barber from Istanbul settles in this far-flung village, and as chance would have it the one-time local barber, Jingle Nuri, vanished from the place years ago. So the new barber rents his shop and opens the doors for business.
The village is not, however, the innocent village of your imagination. The mukhtar, the leader of the village, its everything, finds himself dealing with one mysterious disappearance after the other. Güvercin, the prettiest girl in the village, is now missing without trace. The mukhtar and his only armed man, the village guard, set about questioning everyone in the village. The mukhtar suspects Cennets son more than anyone else. And he beats the gentle dreamer with the soul of a poet to a pulp as he cross-examines him - which causes the boy to lose his mind. The mukhtar and the guard spread terror through the village, but still they fail to find Güvercin. And Cennets son starts drifting through the streets of the village asking, Why does snow fall, snow? - even though not a flake of snow has even been known to fall.
In despair, the mukhtar seeks the advice of the village sage, Musa Dede, but only to be reminded that the history of the village is full of such secrets, misdemeanours and disappearances...
Even more peculiar things start happening. Jingle Nuri suddenly turns up out of the blue, for instance. He arrives but now its the turn of his wife, who has been waiting patiently for him all these years, to disappear. Then a bogus love spell is cast in order to convince Güvercins stubborn and sceptical father of the power of incantations: this is, after all, their last resort to finding the girl. The trouble is, the spell backfires and an innocent lad is killed in the process.
The mukhtar, the guard and the villagers are appalled by the succession of disappearances and deaths they seem to encounter every step of the way. The complexities of life and their bewildering destiny as a village are simply dizzying.
In the end, the mukhtar decides to turn to the state to resolve his unspeakable troubles. So he sets off for the district town never to return again.
Güvercin is eventually found, but this solves none of the villages problems. On the contrary, it leads to her being swallowed up by a gigantic lie fabricated by the villagers themselves.
The barber seems content to watch this all from the distance like a dispassionate spectator. And one day, when the poplar pollen is wafting through the air like the snowflakes that never fall, he just walks away, looking down on the village for the very last time from a nearby hill.
But what the barber doesnt know is that he too is being watched by someone far, far away...
written by Ümit Ünal
