A Turkish adventure

Lolita Harper

Just to the right of the intricate woven rug that sits in the foyer is

what Viviane Wayne calls the Turkish room.

On the far west wall of the small but quaint reading room in her

Newport Beach home are five sentimental objects that remind Wayne of her

rich ancestry.

At the top of her shrine hangs a picture of her father, Ralph R.

Fresco, and below that, a picture of his father, Moise Fresco. Just

beneath the two patriarchs is the medal given to Wayne’s grandfather by a

sultan. The last hanging picture shows six of her uncles on her father’s

side. Adding a touch of femininity to the otherwise masculine display are

her mother’s inlaid silver bath slippers.

Each item in the room evokes its own memory in Wayne’s mind, reminding

her of an ancestry so dripping in history and the unknown, it inspired

two trips to Turkey and a corresponding recently published nonfiction

novel, titled “Inshallah: In Pursuit of My Father’s Youth.�

“They give me pleasure, these objects. They provide me with a strong

sense of continuity, a connection to history that had previously eluded

me,� Wayne writes in the final pages of her book. “And they represent,

finally, a completion to the search for my father’s history.�

Wayne, 75, is the daughter of Sephardic Jews who both came from

Turkey, where their families had lived for 500 years after fleeing the

Spanish inquisition. Her parents -- especially her mother -- told tales

of their native land, but Wayne said she remained a skeptic.

Although evidence of the family’s culture was prevalent in aspects of

everyday life -- like exotic foods at mealtimes and ornate floral rugs

that covered the floors of their California house -- Wayne, a travel

writer and poet, wanted to discover more.

The most pressing reason Wayne traveled to Turkey -- and the reason

denoted in the book’s title -- was to find the lost history of her

father, who had died when she was only 15.

“It was important to verify the kind of person that he was,� she said.

“I always adored him. He was very kind and had a wonderful sense of

humor. But when someone dies when you are that young, they remain frozen.

I needed to add to the little bit of knowledge that I had about him.�

Her parents were introduced during an arranged meeting in Turkey,

which was intended to produce a lifelong partnership. Either of the two

could have gotten out of the arrangement but both were content with their

future spouse. Within a month, they were married.

Because of such a short courtship and no previous knowledge of her

husband, Wayne’s mother could not answer many of her daughter’s questions

about her father once he had passed away.

“She didn’t have a huge background about him or his youth and I wanted

to know more,� Wayne said.

Her desire for knowledge was shelved for years, as Wayne was trapped

in a common Turkish mind frame revolving around the motto, “Inshallah,�

or “God Willing� in English.

The Turkish word encompasses more than a mere phrase, it is a

philosophical attitude that controls how Turkish people live their lives

and view their fate, Wayne said.

“Man’s attempt to control his destiny, already determined by God, was

a foolish and puny struggle,� Wayne explains in her book. “Better to meet

one’s fate with a shrug and gracious surrender.�

It was this philosophy that stalled her trip to Turkey. Wayne always

assumed if she were meant to go, she would go.

Then an optimistic, pragmatic man walked into her life and showed her

that people can make things happen. This man became her husband -- Ellis

Wayne. He inspired her to finally visit the land where her roots were

buried, Wayne said.

Her book describes two different trips to Turkey, one in 1977 and the

other in 1991. During both trips she traveled with her husband, who

helped her uncover missing pieces of her heritage.

While in her parent’s homeland, she found an exciting bustling city,

rich in history and beauty. She found larger-than-life examples of pieces

of culture she had grown up with in the United States. She found

relatives who would lead her through the country, point her in the right

direction and add what detail they could to the ancestral tapestry she

was weaving in her mind.

Most importantly she found the house where her father grew up. Her

book describes the humble building -- rotting and ransacked after being

abandoned for three years -- tucked away on a small island -- one of the

nine Princes Islands. The poetic prose of the book explains the isolated,

quaint feeling of the island, where cars are forbidden and the only modes

of transportation are by horse drawn carriage, or walking.

“It’s a wonderful feeling because you can’t really hurry,� she said.

In the house, on one of the last days of her second trip, she found an

article for her shrine. The picture of her father, which now hangs in a

neat, modern Southern California home, was found in the attic of the

two-story Turkish gray stone home, sprawled among dozens of letters and

photos.

“We carefully picked through letters from family and friends

announcing weddings, births, and deaths, the urgency of their news now

reduced to faded ink,� Wayne describes in her book.

“The House� is the last chapter in Wayne’s book and one of her

favorites, she said. It gave her a glimpse into her father’s childhood,

where he played, where he lived, where his fiercely independent mother

lived until she was 92.

All of her discoveries were logged in a journal -- a habit Wayne keeps

daily. Her trips to Turkey had not been intended to produce a novel. But

certain episodes would be written about and submitted to various

newspapers for publication, as were Wayne’s trips to Europe and other

parts of the world.

After advice from an accomplished writing agent and a realization that

it was an interest in family that inspired not only her travel but her

prose, Wayne started “Inshallah.�

The book was born on thousands of yellow pages of line notebook paper.

A self-proclaimed technophobe, Wayne refuses to compose her work

electronically. She only sits down at the computer after she has written

everything by hand, edited it with a red pen, typed it on a typewriter

and, again, marked her revisions with a red pen. The entire process took

almost two years.

“I love the process I go through. It’s like sculpting,� Wayne said. “I

carve out the essential form and then I start to refine it. For me, the

refining part is the most exciting.�

Creating the book was the easy part, in retrospect, Wayne said.

Inspired by years of lineage, the words seemed to fall into place. It was

getting it published that proved nearly impossible.

“I have enough rejection slips to wallpaper my bathroom,� Wayne said.

“You become very discouraged by rejection slips and if you are not

careful, you start to think the piece is not worth it.�

But after two years of shopping it around, Wayne found Fithian Press

and her book is now printed and bound and available for purchase.

On the first pages of the book, she gives thanks to those who

supported her through the long process. To her husband -- who tragically

passed away after a sudden heart attack before he could see the finished

product -- she wrote “with loving gratitude to Ellis whole eagle’s wings

never faltered.�

Another dedication was to Joe Bell, “who taught me.�

Wayne took an editing class from Bell in the late 1970s at UC Irvine

and walked away with better writing skills and a dear friendship, she

said.

Bell described Wayne as “a hell of a writer� and doubts how much

influence his teaching really had on her writing.

“She was one of my earliest students and it was clear from the start

that she was very good,� Bell said. “When you get someone as good as she

is, you question your contribution.�

Her travels to Turkey combined with writing her journals, notes, rough

drafts and -- ultimately -- the final copy of each chapter revealed a

revelation on the spirit of “Inshallah.�

“I never realized how much it dominated our whole lives. When I was

younger it never occurred to me that I could pro actively change things.

I was obedient and did not rebel against it,� Wayne said.

She is not so obedient anymore, she said.

Had she really held on to that attitude she would have given up on

getting the book published, Wayne said.

“But I wanted desperately to see it in ink,� she said.

-- Lolita Harper covers Costa Mesa. She may be reached at (949)

574-4275 or by e-mail at o7 [email protected] .