Стамбульские хроники. В истории Стамбула свой след оставили...

Istanbul chronicles. In the history of Istanbul, Russian emigrants left their mark. At the end of 1920, our ships — military, commercial, and passenger — came to the Golden Horn Bay. There was an evacuation of the white army of Baron Wrangel from the Crimea. Together with the White Guard, the former Russian Empire was also abandoned by civilians, not only from the Crimea, but also from Odessa, Novorossiysk, and southern Russia. In the early 20s of the last century in Istanbul there were about 150 thousand Russian refugees of various classes. Someone managed to seize means of living, someone came with almost nothing ... On the way, waiting for a French visa, in 1920 Ivan Bunin was here with his family ...
Those who had the funds opened pharmacies, pastry shops, cabarets, restaurants. Russian doctors, lawyers, artisans appeared, the school started working, shops and libraries opened ... Former officers became drivers and mechanics, former countesses and princesses sold flowers in ичеicek passage (by the way, they first sold on the street, but their courtship of the male population was painfully taken out and the owner of the passage allowed the trade to be moved inside, hence the name “chichek”, which means “flower” in Turkish, the operetta artist Vladimir Smirnov opened the Parisian cabaret theater, Lydia Krassa-Arzumanova (aka Leyla Arzuman) founded the first in Turkey, a ballet school, Alexander Vertinsky sang in the Black Rose cabaret, Thomas, the head of the St. Petersburg jazz band, shocked the city as the first jazz variety show in Asia (Thomas was black-skinned, and blacks in Istanbul were traditionally called Arabs, and so, jazz in they called it “Arab music” for a long time), at the Rejans restaurant they cooked borsch, served Russian pies with vodka (for the recently restored Regans interiors were created by our fashion historian A Lexander Vasiliev), Baroness Taskin performed Russian romances and gathered the color of Russian emigration ...
"... Istanbul, Istanbul! The Last Dead Mill
The last great nomad! ... "(I. Bunin)
For several years, a rich cultural Russian life raged on Istiklal. And then, in 1922, a law on refugees appeared in international law, and Russian exiles received special status, rights and documents - the famous “Nansen passport”. Most left Istanbul, at first there were 10-15 thousand, then one and a half thousand, then Russian Istanbul was empty ....
But now, passing through the Beyoglu district, no, no, and you will see references to those times, and somewhere in the crowd General Charnoth flashed with Lyusya, Vertinsky’s light burr would be heard, looking around, Trotsky would slip in (he also lived here on Buyukada island) , the once-famous fashionista-baroness walks thoughtfully with a flower basket ...
"See Istanbul and not forget!" - exclaimed back in 1907 in his story “Shadow of a Bird” Ivan Bunin ... So the Russian emigrants who left Constantinople dreamed for a long time on the banks of the Bosphorus and the Golden Horn, the gentle light green waves of the Sea of ​​Marmara, the crosses of churches and the domes of minarets were dreaming and heard everywhere is Turkish speech ....