You’ve got mail

NOTE: It took only a few minutes of the process described at the end for me to feel compelled to create a written record of it as I progressed through, so the sequence below is all accurate and unexaggerated.

In mid November I had someone ship me a small package from the U.S. It was sent by express mail, with a 3-5 day estimated delivery. Four days after it was mailed the Turkish online tracking system showed that it had arrived in-country. Six days later (the 10th day from mailing) the tracking system indicated that the package was being held in customs. Another ten days after that (the 20th day from mailing) I finally received a slip in the mail informing me to go to the package center in order to pick it up from customs.

The customs office is housed in a nondescript drab building off of the main highway in Istanbul, about 20 minutes from the city center. Inside is a long, dilapidated hallway lined with numbered counters on both sides. As I stepped inside a man at an unnumbered counter on the left asked me something in Turkish. I mumbled a reply in English and handed him my package slip.

“Number 1,” he said in Turkish. I walked up to the first counter and gave the man my slip and passport. He pulled out a very large crate full of slips of paper and began rummaging through it somewhat at random. At length he sighed, handed me back my slip, and told me to go to counter number 9.

At counter 9 I waited a few minutes in line and then handed the man my slip. He looked at it for a minute and then told me to go to counter 1. “I was just at counter 1,” I told him in English, “and they said to come here.” He stared at me blankly and responded in Turkish. I tried, unsuccessfully, to use motions to convey my meaning. Suddenly a slick-haired young Turkish man in a yellow leather jacket and pointy suede shoes stepped up and began speaking with the man behind the counter. After a minute he turned to me and said, in English, that I was to go to counter 5.

At counter 5 the man looked at my slip and immediately instructed me to go to counter 1. The yellow-jacket-sporting man standing nearby assured me that this was, in fact, what I ought to do, and he kindly led me back down the hall, muttered something to the man at the desk, and then left me. The man at counter 1 pulled out the box of slips again and this time somehow magically came up with a piece of paper for me. He told me to go to counter 5. At counter 5 the man took my new piece of paper, rummaged through shelves of packages, and without finding anything pointed me to counter 6. At counter 6 the man took my two slips of paper, disappeared for a few moments, and came back with my package. He gave me yet another slip of paper and indicated that I was to go to a nearby desk. At the desk another man pulled out a sheet of paper, filled out some figures, and then sent me to counter 1 to pay duty. At counter 1 I presented the man with the new sheet of paper, and he in turn pulled out another sheet of paper, stamped it, and instructed me to proceed to counter 2. At counter 2 I paid my taxes and returned to counter 5, where I was mysteriously charged again (this time a trivial fee of slightly over $1). Too exhausted to protest or question, I paid it. I then returned to counter 6, presented my stack of slips, and was, finally, given my package.