It is an indisputable fact that Whitney was always the Second Carpetdog. Mo, who died in January, visited a dog neurologist. Whit was lucky if she got wormed. Mo was a interactive, manipulative personality who overreacted to every real or imagined slight. Whitney was content to lie quietly under a table and have her ears scratched. Mo never met anyone who could throw a ball more times than he could bring it back. Whitney only put a ball in her mouth when she thought the novelty would draw someone's attention away from Mo for a few minutes. Mo sucked the air out of a room. Whit was referred to as the supermodel -- beautiful but a bit dim.

For ten years, every anti-social or irksome dog habit was blamed on her. The carpets were always covered in her hair. She was the one who barked her head off when someone came to the door. She shredded the mail. She woke up every morning at six asking to go out. Her insecurity was the reason we could never take dogs to an outdoor cafe or tie them up outside the supermarket while we shopped.

In early December, Mo began to spectacularly disintegrate. Within six weeks, he was gone. Simultaneously, in what at the we interpreted to be one of her most ineffective attention-getting gambits, Whitney's nose would, upon occasion, expel gallons of blood. Preoccupied as we were with the decline and fall of The Most Precious Dog, we did not pay as much attention to this as it might have merited. We feel bad about this.

After Dr. Elif exhausted all diagnostic options (make no mistake, there is a wing named after us at the Anipoli Veterinary Clinic in Cihangir), she recommended we take Whitney to the Istanbul University Veterinary Hospital, under the suspicion that the bleeding and breathing problems were caused by a tumor in her snout. If you don't comprehend the depth of dread this recommendation inspired, you don't read this blog very often. Revisit some of our Azeri vet experiences.

We really should have posted at the time about the experience of hiring a dog taxi to take us halfway to Bulgaria for the surgery (it might not have been far, but anywhere we can't walk to is halfway to Bulgaria) on a gray, wet March day.  As always, Dr. Elif went far, far beyond the call of duty, setting up all the logistics ahead of time, ensuring that a slightly mental, barely literate yabancı could deliver a sick dog to the correct surgeon. (We know this is a digression, but it's a good story and it's not been told yet).

The vet hospital was neither new, nor shiny nor very technologically advanced, but it was clean and staffed by compassionate young students with whom Whitty trotted off to the surgery while we hyperventilated. Since the waiting facilities were sparse, we explored the stables (racehorses are treated there) and petted the giant Kangals (dun colored, black-pointed Turkish shepherds) that made up most of the clinic's incoming patients. Occasionally, a vet assistant came out to ask us to purchase more gauze or a different gauge needle from the on-site pharmacy (patients are responsible for providing all the necessary equipment for the surgery). 

After several hours, Dr. Murat emerged from surgery proudly holding a gelatinous grey mass in his palm. It was just a small portion of the tumor he removed from her sinus cavity. It was so big he was unable to get all of it, he said, and he suspected it was Transitional Cell Carcinoma, one of the most common -- and untreatable -- cancers in dogs. He wrapped it in a paper towel, handed it over to a vet student and instructed us both to carry it over to the human part of the hospital to have it biopsied. 

Dr. Murat's diagnosis was correct. He prescribed an anti-inflammatory that would mitigate, but not cure. He gave her a few months to live.

For five months Whit lived, despite everyone's predictions, quite comfortably with a giant tumor in her head. During this time, something funny happened. She emerged from her role as the quiet dog that no one ever paid any attention to become the dog about whom everyone said, "what a nice dog this is! Why didn't you tell us she was so sweet?"

We could take her to a cafe and she'd lie quietly beneath the table. There was hardly any hair on the carpets. We sometimes didn't notice if someone came to the front door. In fact, in a household that was often maligned by mailmen and meter readers for its decibel output, she was a silent, polite doorway greeter. Sometimes we got to sleep until 8:30 am. She seemed to smirk at us. We feel bad about this, too.

Last night, we came home from dinner with dear friends who, having known Whitty for almost half her life, offered toasts to her memory and made delicious food. But we opened the front door to silence. It was the worst silence we have ever heard.

Sayın Zafer Bey!

Back in January, we posted about our experience obtaining our residence permit at the Yabancı Şubesi (Foreigner Office) in the İstanbul Emniyet (Police Headquarters), an experience we compare unfavorably to visiting a Central Asian gynecologist. We commended your operation for gradually imposing order by requiring folks to take a number and reducing the number of windows one has to visit and the number of stamps necessary to just one. We took this as a sign that, over the three years we have been obtaining residence permits, Turkey is, yavaş yavaş, becoming more civilized.

Well! After that post, you kindly left a comment, which we ignored at the time, because, just like the gynecologist, we avoid thinking about the Yabancı Şubesi except the one day a year when we have to go there, asking us to provide some constructive criticism*. Little did we know that you already had some improvements in mind for the operation that closely track the kind we might have suggested.  You should have run them past us! We would like credit for them (Your original comment along with a hasty translation are below).

Recent reports from the Correspondent Formerly of Kathmandu and Beirut and Now of Istanbul indicate that the changes made since January, are in a word, awesome. If you follow her work, you know she specializes in reporting on Epic Failures for Carpetblog. Based on her experience at the Yabancı Şubesi, one might conclude its management has been turned over to a pack of wild dogs. But we think that's unfair.

Gone was that experiment with internet-based appointments (did anyone really think that would work?). On her first visit, she was told that in order to get a number to turn in the documents for her permit, she would have to get in line across the street from the Emniyet, starting at 2 am. She did this and was relieved to see an orderly and friendly group already formed. She took the 18th place in line and made friends.

When 8:30am rolled around and numbers were handed out, she was discouraged to receive number 74. How did this happen? Comrades-in-line deduced that the first 50 numbers had been sold by an "entrepreneur" who, after "picking a fight" with other line-standers, was "detained" by the police with a show of force so convincing observers concluded the entrepreneur could only be another police officer. The ability to pretend you're not doing what you're doing is what separates Turkish police and waiters from all those yahoos in FSU. We admire that. Those people are savages.

After navigating the YS's signless maze (you might consider posting directional signs in Turkish, though definitely not in any other language), CFKBNI finally coughed up more than 770 YTL for a document that confers few meaningful benefits. We paid less than 600 YTL three years ago. Inflation! You have it! Play that card if it's your hand. Carpetblog approves, as long as you don't use the extra fees to improve the Yabancı Şubesi customer service.

We here at Carpetblog were becoming worried that Turkey was losing that developing world "edge" that foreigners always appreciate, especially when it comes to dealing with police and bureaucracies. We are relieved our fears were misplaced! If CFKBNI's experience this week was any indication, the Istanbul Emniyet has become concerned, too, and opted to rely on its old skool habits for dealing with "visitors."

*Just FYI, our contract with the "Constructive" Division of the Criticism Department expired long ago.

Original Post:
26 Ocak 2009'daki Yabancılar Şube ziyaretiniz ve yaşadıklarınıza ait
deneyimlerinize yer verdiğiniz yazınızı okudum.

Önerilerinizin yapıcı olacağı ve daha faydalı olacağına inandığınız
düşünceşerinizi, bizimle paylaşmanız.. saat 03.37 olmasına rağmen iyi niyetli yaklaşımlara her zaman açık olan emniyet teşkilatını memnun edici motivasyona taşıyacaktır. Yazınızdaki tutum ötesinde, gözlemlerinizin sizde olması gereken çözüm
önerisi nedir? konusundaki fikirlerinizide oraya taşımış olmanız bizleri mutlu ederdi.

Yanıtınızı bekler, iyi niyetli ve yapıcı olacak önerileriniz için şimdiden teşekür ederim.

Zafer Işık
İst. Em. Md.lüğü Yabancılar Şube Çözüm Ortağı
Yönetici

Translation:
I read your writing regarding your visit to the Yabancilar Subesi on 26 January 2009 and your experience.

With the belief that you intend your proposals to be constructive and more beneficial share with us ... Despite the fact that the hour is 3:37 a.m., the police staff, which is always open to good-intentioned approaches, that carry a motivation that will please the police staff.

Besides/beyond the manner of your writing, had you included in that writing your ideas on proposals for solutions, which your observations surely must have given you, that would have made us happy.

I am awaiting your response, I thank you in advance for your suggestions that will be good intentioned and constructive.

Zafer Isik, Istanbul Police Department's Yabancilar Sube's manager of
resolution partner

Then maybe you might like these photos from our June trip to Gazıantep, Glorious Urfa (not to be confused with other, less glorious imitations), Diyarbakır and Nemrut Dağ.