Can Öztaş

Every summer, the apartment buildings of Istanbul, Ankara and other major cities begin to empty. Neighbors who have spent the winter sharing lifts, parking disputes, delivery couriers and the occasional suspicion that someone upstairs is moving furniture after midnight head off in different directions.

This summer, Turkey’s coast mostly held. A fire near Fethiye, a scare in Antalya’s Kepez district, a few homes emptied as a precaution and their residents returned to within a day. After last year, it has the feel of a reprieve, which is the most dangerous weather the region knows. Because we have all seen what the season can do.

António Guterres will arrive in Cyprus at the end of July, carrying another possibility of peace to an island familiar with such visits. Cyprus diplomacy sometimes resembles Buñuel’s The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie. The guests assemble, the table is laid, and dinner is indefinitely postponed.

Some countries remember politics through monuments, trials, flags and anniversaries. Turkey, more emotional and dramatic, rather like its world-famous TV series, also remembers it through songs.

A few weeks before NATO leaders gather in Ankara, Istanbul hosted a more strange kind of summit. It unfolded not in conference halls, but across ferry terminals, concert queues and crowded streets.

At Istanbul Airport, one can sometimes see the new Turkish economy walking past in surgical bands. Men arrive with thinning hair and leave with careful instructions, swollen foreheads and a cautious sense of restoration.