THE BROWNS

Once upon a time, I was the sole U.S. consular officer in Nicosia, Cyprus.

Background:  Cyprus is an island in the Eastern Mediterranean just south of Turkey.  The Turks invaded and occupied the northern third of the island ten years before this story begins.  When the fighting stopped, someone drew a line on a map in green pencil showing where the two armies stopped fighting which became the de facto border.  Because diplomats are very clever people, this became known as the “Green Line”.  The date was 1974.

This was an ordinary day at my office.  I interviewed some applicants for visas to visit the U.S. and some to study there.  I issued passports and some reports of birth to new American citizens.  Luckily, there were no deaths of American citizens.

Then the phone rang.  Because of the hostilities between the two sides, there were only seven phone lines across the Green Line and the American Embassy had one of them.

My secretary came to my office door and said, “Dogan is on the phone for you.”

Dogan Bey, as he was called more formally, was the Embassy’s senior Turkish Cypriot employee in Northern Cyprus.  He seldom called me.  When he did, it was important.

“Hello, Dogan,” I said.

“Sorry to bother you, Mr. McNamara. But there are two Americans here who I think you should see,” he said.

As I crossed the Green Line every two or three days, Dogan’s note of urgency was unusual and called for my immediate attention.

“What seems to be the matter?” I asked.

Dogan replied. “I really think you should see them for yourself today.”

If Dogan felt that way, I should really go.

“I’ll be over as soon as I can get away from here, Ok?” I told him.

“Fine.  See you then,” he said and hung up.

I told Paul, my senior Greek Cypriot employee and the one who really ran the office, that I was going to see Dogan and for him to look after everything.

I got my car from the Embassy parking lot and left through the gate waving at the Cypriot guard.

Not only was Cyprus divided but so was the city.  The only people who could drive across the Green Line were diplomats and UN peacekeeping forces.  In the two years I spent on the island, there was only one shot fired across the Green Line caused by a Cypriot guard who dropped his weapon.

The Green Line consisted of tall, battered rusted metal panels riveted together.  A dirt road ran to the left and right.  A wall still littered with bullet holes faced the Line.

I drove up to the first barrier manned by a Greek Cypriot guard who recognized me and lifted the barrier.  Driving a short distance, I came to the Turkish Cypriot barrier.  On the left between the two barriers was a covered area where blue bereted UN peacekeepers lounged. The Turkish guard also recognized me.  He pulled his rope which lifted the barrier.

I proceed through.  There is little difference between the two sides.  The Turks aren’t strict Muslims.  Everyone wore Western clothes, no turbans or veils.

I turned left and went down a couple of streets until I came to Dogan Bey’s house, nice by Cypriot standards.  There was no plaque identifying it as an Embassy office.  In fact, no one called it an American embassy annex, only Dogan’s office.  The only sign was a small plastic red, white and blue one on the corner of the house.  Everyone just called it “Dogan’s office” but knew it was the U.S. embassy’s office in Northern Cyprus.

There was a car with German plates in the driveway.  Unusual for Dogan’s office.  I parked on the street and went to the door on the side of the building. I walked into the office.

Dogan’s desk was straight ahead.  The consular clerk’s desk was to the right and in a room off the main office/waiting room proper was the Information Service’s office and library.  It was manned by one middle-aged woman clerk.  These three constituted the entire Embassy staff in Northern Cyprus.

Dogan was slightly shorter than me with jet black hair and a voice a little higher than mine.  He tended to a formal but friendly attitude.

“Ah, good afternoon, Mr. McNamara,” he said. “There are two gentlemen waiting in your office.”

The office belonged to any officer visiting from the Embassy; but I probably used it most to conduct visa interviews.

Dogan got up from his desk and went with me into the office.

“Mr. McNamara, I liked to introduce Mr. Nathanial Brown and Mr. Jacob Brown.”

The two sat on the only two chairs in the office for visitors. The men wore black suit jackets with high old fashioned stiff collars even though it was a warm day.  But that wasn’t what caught my eye.  They had long beards grown down to their waists. They had on wide Amish-like round hats. 

The younger man sat behind the older one and held out his hand and I shook it.

“Jacob Brown, sir.”

His father gave him a disapproving stare.

“Then you’re Nathanial Brown,” I stated.

He nodded his head without smiling.

“What can I do for you?” I asked.

“Get us to Israel,” said Mr. Jacob Brown.

“Well, there’s a sea and the Turkish Army between here and there,” I said hoping to break the ice.

No go with these two, not a smile.

“Why do you want to go to Israel?” I asked.

“My father had a vision,” the younger Brown began.

His father turned on him and said angrily, “I told you not to talk about that with strangers.”

“Sorry, Papa,” the younger man apologized.  “But Mr. McNamara is here to help us and, unless he knows why, he wouldn’t.”

The old man thought this over and decided, “Ok, tell him but not the location.”

“Of course not, Papa.”

Jacob Brown began his story.  “My father is a prophet and a visionary.”

Looking at Nathanial Brown I could believe he believed it.

Jacob continued his story, “We established a small but elite church in our small town. My father spent many hours in prayer and meditation to perceive what the Almighty wanted of us.  One day he was surrounded by a heavenly cloud and an angel of the Lord appeared before him.  The angel said the Lord God Almighty wanted us to reestablish the temple of the Lord, destroyed by the Romans.”

“Where?” he interrupted the father in a transfixed voice, one that you would use talking to an angel. “The angel said first you must find the Ark of the Covenant.”

Of course, why not? I thought.

“Then the angel and the cloud disappeared.  My father collapsed.”  The younger Brown continued.

“When my father recovered, he said we must go to Israel.  We preached to our congregation who were amazed at the Vison; but were too poor to help us much.  We went out on the streets and preached and begged for money for the trip.  We even interested one of those televangelists who put us on his show. After many months we got enough money for the trip.  Couch class.”

While keeping a diplomatically serious face during this narrative, I could see the staff listening at the door and trying valiantly to keep from laughing.  They had seen “Indiana Jones”, too.

Jacob continued his tale: “When we got to Germany, we bought a second-hand car and drove to Turkey.  We looked at a map and saw that Cyprus offered a quick way to Israel.  But nobody told us about the Green Line.”

“No, the Greek Cypriots won’t let you cross because they consider you illegal aliens.”  I explained.

“But” said Jacob plaintively, “we have visas!”

I asked for their passports and saw as I suspected; they had Turkish Cypriot visas.

“The Greek Cypriots consider that anyone who enters Cyprus on the Turkish side to have entered illegally as they were not admitted by Greek Cypriot immigration of which there are none on the Turkish side.  This is what you call a Catch 22.”

“What can we do Mr. McNamara?” asked the younger Brown.  His father hadn’t said anything.  Jacob apparently was the family spokesman.

I had an idea; but I wanted to check I with Dogan.  I went out to the main office and saw that everyone had gone back to their desk and was looking busy. 

I asked Dogan, “Does the ferry still run to Syria?”

“Yes, sir,” he said, “I believe it does.”

“Do you have a schedule?”

“Let me look,” he replied as he searched in the file next to his desk.  “Here it is.”

“Could you call and see when the next boat leaves?”

I went back to my office and the Browns.

“Gentlemen, here is my thought,” I said pulling out a map of the area.  “There is a ferry that goes from Famagusta on the eastern side of Cyprus but still in the Turkish area.  It goes to Syria.  From Syria you can drive to Israel.”  As I said this, I used my finger to show them on the map on my office wall.

Dogan came into my office with the schedule.  He told us, “However, the boat doesn’t leave until tomorrow morning.”

“Can you guys stay overnight?”, falling out of my diplospeak. “Do you have money?”

Jacob looked at his father who nodded his head.

“Dogan, could you arrange a hotel room for the Browns for the night, preferably near the ferry dock?” I asked.

He assured me he could and left to do it.

“While we wait, would you gentlemen like some coffee or tea or something else?” I said playing the host, like a good diplomat. “I’d advise against the Turkish coffee unless you like it very strong.”

“No, tea would be fine,” Mr. Nathaniel Brown said, almost his first words.

My clerk brought it while we waited for Dogan.

Dogan gave them directions to the hotel and said the ferry would leave at 8 am.

Handshakes and good luck were offered all around and the Browns left the office.

When I heard them pull away, I turned back to the office, shaking my head at what I had just heard.

Having no other business the Turkish side, I returned to the Embassy., Thee I sent cables to the State Department detailing my encounter with the Browns, copying embassies Damascus and Tel Aviv so they could be on the lookout for the bearded “Indiana Joneses”.  I never heard anything more of the Browns, a good sign they hadn’t gotten arrested in Syria nor found the Ark of the Covenant in Israel.

It would turn out that my conversation with the Browns would be the strangest in my Foreign Service career.