Tag #124386 - Interview #97985 (Samuel Coyas)

Men would spend their time either at the coffee houses or by going around with their friends, when they didn’t work. Everybody could go to these coffee houses. They played either cards or backgammon and chatted while drinking tea and coffee. These places were favored especially after work and during holidays. Women would usually stay at home. Families would sometimes go to Baglarbasi [a neighborhood, where mostly Armenians lived], to watch the theatrical company. The most famous actor of the company was an Armenian named Karakas. He used to play all the leading roles. Someone from the company would come on a horse carriage, and announce the program with a megaphone: ‘Othello or The Wife of an Arab [this was a slogan of the announcer of the play Othello, refering to Desdemona, the wife of Othello, the Moor or in other words Arab] is going to be staged in our theater this Sunday’. They would go through all the remote streets making this announcement.

Later on, when the era of cinema began, we started watching silent films on a raised deck. When the film started, a man would go to the piano next to the curtain and start playing it. In this way, the silence was broken. I watched the first sound movie at the Beylerbeyi Cinema, which our school had taken us to. It was Tarzan. I remember watching the film and being totally amazed. I liked it very much. From that moment on, we kept shouting ‘Aaaaaaa’, like Tarzan did in the movie.