I motion for the bartender, a scruffy headed young Turk, and order a beer; an Efes, a tall one. He pours the beer and returns to the animated conversation taking place at the other end of the bar. I don’t mean to eavesdrop, but due to their alcohol influenced volume level it is impossible not to. They ask the waitress if she would mind changing the “touristy” American music playing over the sound system to something she might normally listen to. Slightly presumptuous I think. Maybe she really likes the techno version of Boom Boom Pow. She leans over the shoulder of a quiet Turk sitting in front of his laptop at the corner of the bar. She points to the screen and soon Bob Marley’s, Three Little Birds, fills the small space. Good choice. The group is elated, they love Bob too. She asks them where they’re from. They’re from the States, college students here studying Ottoman architecture. The waitress translates for the scruffy headed bartender and the quiet Turk. She excitedly tells the group the bartender is an urban planning major.
They are all amazed by this fortuitous coincidence.