The music door

A whisper of a Latin groove carried up the street as I made my way down the steep and narrow cobblestone alleyway, growing louder as I passed a crumbling red building. It's not uncommon for structures in Istanbul that at first glance look abandoned to actually be inhabited, so the summery sounds could easily have been coming from someone's radio inside. But the notices affixed to the imposing metal door drew my eye.

On four sheets of letterhead from the Ecuadorian Consulate General, each sheathed in plastic and tapped to the door in a careful line, someone had written the same message in English, French, Spanish, and Turkish, using a blue marker and a loose, lively hand:

Guys,
This Music is YOUR Music, it makes the "Lovers' alley" more secure and your kisses sweeter...
Please protect it the way it protects you

The windows of the building, I then saw, were boarded up or missing, as was at least part of the roof. There were no signs of life within. Above the doorway, though, hung a small black speaker, the vehicle through which the offering of music was being made to passers-by. I continued down the street with just a little bit more spring in my step than before.