The San Francisco call., 1910-12-27
TRAVELERSANNOYED
BY time in TURKEY
Paper and Pencil Needed to Cal
culate the Hour According
to Sunset

It is o'clock In the afternoon. let us
say, in Constantinople. You live in a
cunning. tile rooted village along the
Bosphorus, but you wish to make a call
in town. You are a newcomer, and you
have been told that among other things
which have survived some two years Of
new regime" is Turkish time, or the
hour "a la Turque.'
Turkish time means the reckoning
according to sunset, with sunset as "12
o'clock" If one is not a foreigner.
therefore, he sets his watch anew about
every Gay twelve hours from II
o'cloclI-that is, some time in the morn
ing-the hours begin over again.
With so much preliminary explana-
tion let US begin to find out when you
can get boat TO town. Some day, per-
haps, you may take an electric car,
but. that is not yet.
The time table is an orange covered
booklet Cat penny. from which the
pages stretch out in triple folds. The
white sheets are for week days. the
yellow ones for Sunday. says the West
minister Review. The schedule for Fri
day, the Mohammedan Sabbath, differs
merely by the suppression of a few
boats, as indicated on the week day
sheets.
TIME TABLE TROUBLES
The time tables used to contain also
set of pretty red and green flags. to
explain the meaning of the colored ban
ners which fly from the mastheads of
the boats-red for the Asian shore.
green for Europe, red and green for
those interminabIy long zigzags which
run from one continent to the other
and take two hours for half hour
journey.
Well. then, it is o'clock in the after
noon. The first thing is to look ND the
hour Of sunset; there is a table for this
IN the front of the time table. It is.
let US suppose in the beautiful month
OF May, the 10th Of the month. The sun
sets approximately at 1927, according
70 the table, so reckoning from 1927 in
the morning a boat after .'7 o'clock
Iurkish" would do for 7:27+7-I4:g7-
1Z-2;27. There is boat at 1888. Pen
ell and paperi 7:27+7:3S=14:65-12-
2:65=S:o5 in the afternoon. Just the
thing
AND so you get ready for the visit in
town, start leisurely down the hill and
gaze over the expanse of bluest 1va+er
Then suddenly you notice a hoet Ieov-
IN the scala (wharf) in the direction
OF town. What can that mean? Some
times the boats run a few minutes
ahead OF schedule, but surely that can
not be your boat? It is still q Quarter
OF an hour before the time of departure
AT the wharf you find that it was vour
poat' and that the next one will come
a4ohg In an hour and half. The ticket
seller does not understand vo1Ir -noo5
and you are not exactly able to e1,Ia"r -,,Tou'
IL 10 him, being still limited in T11rki<b
70 the numbers and a dozen other vaIu-
aOle words, none Of which are available
LOT Che present occasion, however Tho
ucKet man only smiles syrnpatheticaIi,,
sures you that everything is All riyb+
LA siiaC the ooat came on time: and he
ppluS you welcome to make yourself at
next steamer. 1'ie
ORIENTAL CALENDAR USED
II you were an easy going Turk
- ~ouio accept. Instead. you turn
toward home, and there exnlair r,-;,I,
some rancor to an older residan+ ho,,i o,.l
the boat has failed you. He on1,,
Iaqghs and says: You forgot what
especially warned you abou+ Tho
sunsets are given according to the orr
entail calendar" u i
True enough! And that is - davs
pehlno 1t is necessary to go back
those IL days, especially in tbe seoSoa
Of lengthening daylight. when the Sif
ference In calendars easily amounts tn
quarter of an hour. And If is eli
because the Greek church. in 1880 did
not accept the correction of Julius CO
sar calendar by Pope Gregory the
thirteenth, or because they have not
been wise enough to do so since. Rus
sla, Turkey, Bulgaria, Roumania. SER
Via and Greece still continue this in
convenient divergence.
But here is the new spirit of Turkey
which, with a thousand faults inherited
from the Hamidian regime (and much
farther back than that, too) is. never
theless, progressive. In future the
Bosphorus steamers will run on ''FNranl X
time" and not "a la Turquev any more.
One Stamboul newspaper deplores the
change. Other Turkish newspapers
commend the new move, and recall to
the conservatives that it was the Arabs.
indeed, who by their astronomical re-
searches, were the real authors of
European" time. But if you have not
lived in Constantinople you can scarcely
fancy what revolutionary reform
this change to Frank time is. The
whole life Of the city will be Obliged
to fall in and march regularly. Mash
allahi
S0CKEYE SALMON ARE