It was only a year ago, but it will be a Christmas I will never forget.

When I worked as a teacher in Istanbul, December 25 was a working day at our school. Turkey is a predominantly Muslim country, so this is quite logical.  All of the English, American and Canadian teachers told our boss that we would be calling in sick if we didn't get the day off to convince him that this was serious, indeed. He reluctantly relented and gave us the day off without pay.

The hotels and restaurants in Istanbul don't celebrate the holidays to the same degree we do in Canada. There were Christmas decorations in some streets, but no special banquets prepared in restaurants that I knew of. If there were, I knew I couldn't afford the meal. The only solution was to try to create a Canadian Christmas in Turkey.

I polled my friends and colleagues to see who would be interested in chipping in and coming to my apartment for Christmas dinner. Many were, so the game was on. All I had to do was plan the event.

To put everyone in the Christmas mood, I went searching for a tree. The best I could do was find an artificial one that looked like it was on life support. It reminded me of that classic program, A Charlie Brown Christmas. It took seconds to put up and I left it in the hands of a friend to decorate. I guess if you put the right clothes on a skinny runway model with positive results, the right person could make my tree look good – and she did.

I wanted to make sure that everyone had a gift, so I scurried around getting little trinkets that I thought my guests could use.

People were coming to dinner, though. I had to pay attention to the main part of the menu, the turkey.

Just in case you wondered, a turkey isn’t called a turkey in Turkey. It’s a hindi. In Canada, it’s no problem to buy one. In Turkey, it was a bit of a challenge.

I trundled off to the local supermarket to get my bird. It should be noted that I don’t speak Turkish and the butcher didn’t speak English, but I do know that a turkey is a hindi.

I boldly walked up to meat counter and let out a groan, “Hindi.” Like somebody getting his photo for a driver’s licence or passport, this blank, expressionless stare was the response.

Perhaps if I said it louder. “HINDI!” I bellowed with the same result. I paused.

What was the next strategy? As he turned to walk away from this foreigner that seemed to be suffering from gas, I decided to say the word over and over, varying the pitch, expression and pronunciation of the word. “Hindi, hindi, hindi, hindi,” I rattled off in succession. Actually they all sounded the same to me, but one must have clicked. Like a motor starting on a cold morning, his eyes sparked and he nodded, “Ah, hindi!”

To this day I will swear that he said it the same way I said it, but at that moment, I didn’t care. I was marched towards the appropriate aisle in the store where my meal with destiny waited. Like a passenger in a cab, I was dropped off at my desolate destination and left to fend for myself.

There were three birds. Which one was I to choose? Many who go looking for cars lift the hood and look at the motor when they really don’t have a clue what they are doing. That’s me! Well, I’m the same when it comes to hindi. I hefted all three birds, listened for a voice from heaven, as if there might be some sign like the star in the east, and finally decided on one that was slightly over 10 kilograms.

Buying the turkey was only the start of the difficult process. When you rent an apartment in Turkey, unless it is furnished, it is totally empty. I had managed to buy some burners and a fridge, but I didn’t have an oven. A friend of mine, Izzy, told me that a bakery near him had cooked his Thanksgiving turkey for free. I could do the same.

I wandered into the bakery where I usually bought my bread. My only conversation with the owner in the past had been, “Bir ekmek, lutfen,” which means “one bread please.” How was I to explain to him what I needed? When you visit another culture, shyness doesn’t work. I dug deep into my charades background and did my best to convey my message. I don’t know if he thought I was doing the Chicken Dance or what, but I got the drivers’ licence look again. Other customers moved away from me.

I headed over to another bakery where I had bought my birthday cake a month earlier. When I started my dance routine again, the owner held up one finger, rushed out in the street and dragged a surprised young man into the store to see my Vaudeville act. More important, he spoke English. I explained my situation and the owner smiled and took me back to the first bakery. This owner smiled, too, and nodded his head and said, “Hindi.” My problem was solved. I could smell the succulent meat already.

Christmas Day came. To celebrate and look my best for my guests, I decided to get my hair cut. I went to a hair stylist, put my thumb and finger a little apart, and told him to take a little off the top. The clippers swooped down on my head like a combine cutting hay and left a little stubble. I then remembered that he probably didn’t understand English and I had actually told him to cut my hair very short. “Oh well,” I said, “it will grow back.

The next step was to lug the turkey up to the bakery. In case you don’t know, the hills in Istanbul are steep, many of them are like a ski jump. However, the bakery wasn’t far, only about 100 metres, and taking it home would be all downhill.

When I entered the bakery, the owner smiled as I slid the tray onto the counter. Then he frowned. I soon found out why. His oven was for making bread. My hindi wouldn’t fit in the opening.

He started twirling knives, suggesting I could cut the bird so it would fit. To me, that was out of the question.

Both us stood there frozen, but for different reasons.He was trying to figure out what I was trying to say. I had ten guests or so coming in a few hours for a turkey dinner and I didn’t know what to do.

His finger when up. I gasped! He had an idea. Soon he and one of the other employees started punching their cell phones and slamming them into their ear. Actually, the owner had two going at once. Within minutes, he had one of those eureka moments, grabbed me by the arm and we charged outside. He had found another bakery that could perform the deed of cooking my bird.

There was one slight problem. The other place was half a kilometre farther from my apartment. It was all downhill to get there, but getting home would be all uphill. However, there wasn’t any other option. Anyway, I could take a cab home.

We entered into this bakery. The owner took one look at my turkey, laughed and held up four fingers. I was to return later that afternoon. Perfect! Or was it?

At four, I had my rendez-vous with my fowl. It looked and smelled delicious. There was also a lot of grease in the pan. I drained most of it in the street for the chorus of feral cats, then tried hailing a taxi.

I must have looked like a drunk stumbling around with a ten kilogram bird. They whizzed by me as if I didn’t exist. My guests were going to arrive soon, so I had no option but to walk my meal home.

I took one look at the first hill and gulped. It reminded me of a black diamond ski run, but I had to go up it. I pressed on. Half-way up I screamed with a voice that would make a karate instructor proud. My arms were falling off. The local residents were coming to their windows wondering who this strange man was bellowing and walking uphill with a turkey.

I did it! I finally arrived home. My shirt was soaked. Quickly, I put on a dry one, and started preparing for the arrival of my guests. Like the wise men who had arrived at the manger with gifts, I had lugged my turkey from a distant land. Few knew of the sacrifice I had made that Christmas. All that mattered was that the apartment was filled with joy that day.

And so it was. All of the guests pitched in to help where they could. We ate and drank well. We opened the presents and played the silly games one plays at Christmas.

When everyone left, I had a home still warm from the love that had been there and enough leftover turkey to last me for a month.

Each holiday is unique. I know this year will be special, too, but last year will go down in the books as one of the most memorable. I hope yours will be, too. Merry Christmas and may you enjoy your hindi.