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December 3, 2004/Kislev 20 5765, Vol. 57, No. 14
A miracle comes to a Turkish town
YIGAL SCHLEIFER
Jewish Telegraphic Agency
The main synagogue in Canakkale, Turkey, a rectangular building made of brick and fieldstone, stands forlorn behind a high wall, only its terra cotta tiled roof peeking out.
A decade ago the synagogue was almost forgotten, its roof in danger of collapsing.
But since then, the 150-year-old temple has experienced something of a miraculous rededication.
For the last 10 years, at the end of every October - led by two committed brothers born in Canakkale and now living in Istanbul who have made preserving the synagogue their mission - busloads of former Jewish residents have come back to spend a weekend praying in the synagogue and sprucing it up.
Although it is not used full time, the shul comes back to life once a year in a burst of nostalgia-tinged joy and devotion.
"This is where we grew up, this is our past," says Albert Penso, 69, the older of the two brothers who organize the annual pilgrimage.
Hearing about the synagogue's derelict state made him and some other former Canakkale Jews realize that action was needed, says Penso, who owns an Istanbul yarn supply business with his brother.
This year, 94 people on two buses came to visit their old home. "In this way we can show that this synagogue is active," Penso adds. "We are showing that the congregation exists, even if it comes from outside."
Close to both the World War I battlefields of Gallipoli and the ruins of ancient Troy, Canakkale was once home to a vibrant Jewish community of some 4,000 people.
Today, it doesn't even have enough Jews for a minyan; most of the city's Jewish residents having left years before for Istanbul or Israel.
The synagogue rescue, though, had more than just sentimental value. Up until this year, Turkish law stipulated that unused buildings belonging to religious groups could become state property.
This has been the case throughout Turkey, where the Jewish community has lost ownership of synagogues and other properties in several cities that once had active Jewish populations.
During Ottoman times, the area that is now Turkey was home to some 100,000 Jews, mostly Sephardim who trace their roots to Spain.
But today, the country's Jewish population is closer to 20,000, with many Jews having left for Israel and other countries over the decades following periods of political and economic instability. And while today's Jewish community lives mostly in Istanbul, there used to be pockets of rich Jewish life in cities and town stretching across Turkey, from its border with Greece to its frontier with Syria and Iraq.
The financial burden of maintaining the properties of this once-large community is heavy, Jewish officials in Turkey say, and mostly beyond its means. And, with security concerns at the top of the agenda following last November's suicide bombings of two Istanbul synagogues, fixing up old, unused synagogues is even less of a priority.
In that sense, the work of the Canakkale Jews in rebuilding and maintaining their synagogue with their yearly visit is significant, says Lina Filiba, executive vice president of the Turkish Jewish community.
"It's important that we keep our synagogue foundations in working status so that we don't lose our properties," Filiba says. "Having lost whatever we have lost up until the present, we don't want to lose any other properties that belong to Jewish synagogue foundations."
But for most of the Jews of Canakkale heading down by bus to visit their old home, the annual trip has little to do with questions of Turkish property law. Instead, it's about the need to reconnect with their birthplace, about honoring their departed parents and about holding on to a nostalgic image of a lost time.
As the white chartered bus leaves Istanbul, Oved Hazan, a 67-year-old who owns a women's clothing shop, seems already transported back to his birthplace.
"Canakkale was a small Paris," Hazan, who left the city when he was 7, says dreamily. "There were lots of people, lots of shops, the seashore. It was very beautiful and the people were good."
After nearly six hours on the road, the bus reached the Dardanelles, where a ferry takes it across on a choppy, half-hour ride.
Leaving the ferry, the group's bus heads toward Canakkale's old Jewish neighborhood, a district of small, two-story homes and quiet streets where the synagogue is located. Getting off the bus, the group could easily be mistaken for a bunch of tourists, but its clear they know exactly where they are going.
"This is the neighborhood where we grew up," Gunes Penso, Albert's wife, cries out. As they walk through the streets, she points out a small house painted mauve. Today a veterinary clinic, it is the home where she and Albert were married, she says.
Soon the group reaches the synagogue and Albert Penso pulls out an old key from his pocket, unlocks a big padlock and then opens the iron gates leading into a courtyard.
The building, its peeling, wood-paneled interior painted robin's-egg blue, has been swept and dusted ahead of the group's arrival. Even an old, stately grandfather clock at the entrance has been wound up for the occasion, quietly ticking away in a corner.
As the group enters the sanctuary, many immediately head for the ark, kissing its wooden doors. Several stand there for minutes at a time, their eyes closed, saying prayers for deceased relatives.
"When I was young, on Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, there wasn't any room to sit in this synagogue," says Moiz Penso, 60, Albert's younger brother, as he looks through a closet filled with dusty and crumbling prayer books.
The next day the group returns for Shabbat prayers. The air of celebration is palpable, as if the synagogue needs to be filled with enough prayer and joy to keep it standing until next year's visit. As the Torah is returned to the ark after being read, the women gather around it, showering the scroll with bright red petals collected from a rosebush in the synagogue's courtyard.
The next day the pilgrims return for one last prayer service before heading to the local Jewish cemetery to visit the graves of relatives and then back to Istanbul. Among them is Yasar Yuhay, a 65-year-old with a bushy white mustache who is one of the last few Jews left in Canakkale, where he owns a sneaker shop. "I'm very happy when they come," he says about the Istanbul group. "The synagogue wouldn't be open at all without them."
After morning prayers, the group's members slowly make their way out into the courtyard. On the floor, the petals that were thrown the day before have already started to turn brown and wilt. Even the grandfather clock in the corner has stopped ticking, already going into its annual slumber.
At the gate, Albert Penso turns back to take a long look at the synagogue, standing there for a moment. He then locks the gate, putting the key in his pocket, not to be used again for another year.
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