stephan huller

As many of you may know my family has some connection to crypto-Jewry. In any event, I am walking my dog the other night and all by a sudden I see this French Bulldog and honestly - the most beautiful woman I have seen in some time. Turns out she is my new neighbor. She's from Lima Peru. Seriously a spitting image of Penelope Cruz. She says she is having all the neighbors over this weekend and invites my wife and me over for drinks. Everyone here works at Microsoft, so the company of origin is no surprise. Her boyfriend turns out to be Turkish from Izmir (Smyrna).

He's talking about growing up in Smyrna, his experiences. I am getting bored of talking to computer people so I try to change the topic saying that I have always wanted to go to Izmir because they have a lot of Dönmeh there and I am going on and on about my interest in Dönmeh (the 5000 or so surviving followers of Sabbatai Zevi http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C3%B6nmeh.

Now I don't say I am Jewish because that's always bad news. So as I am talking about my interest in Dönmeh he almost chokes on the chicken he is eating.

I am surprised by the reaction. I ask 'are you a Dönmeh'

He gets a flushed look on his face. His eyes start to look me over with this puzzled annoyance.

I am thinking to myself, 'have I broken some social taboo?' Is this still a secret society (contrary to all I have learned - i.e. that it is a fully integrated community).

I start to gesture and say, 'you know the Dönmeh the one's with the strange dress' and by now he is just about beside himself.

He says, 'do you know what a dönmeh is?'

I am nod my head and say that I come from a related tradition.

He stops and stares at me again and looks at everyone at the table and says - in Turkish dönme means 'transvestite'

I assure him he must be confused or maybe I am saying it wrong so I spell it out. He nods his head, this is exactly the spelling.

Turns out that in modern Turkish the name for the followers of Sabbatai Zevi now means 'transvestite' http://home.online.no/~geskogse/BulentTS.html

The word "dönmeh" is from Turkish dön- which means "to turn", i.e., "to convert," but in a pejorative sense. They are also called Selânikli (person from Thessaloniki) or avdetî (in Arabic-Turkish, عودة awda "return"), a Turkish word for a religious convert. Members of the group refer to themselves as ma'aminim, Hebrew for believers.