16- Family Reunion

 

In the spacious area stretching from the courtyard gate to the house, two long tables had been set up. Great-uncle Ayhan and great-aunt Ayla were seated at the head of the table. Other family members had also taken their seats. Uncles Turgay and Ertan were by the barbecue grilling the meat, while members of the third generation were distributing it onto plates.

Coloured decorations hanging from the branches of plum and mulberry trees swayed gently in the breeze, along with solar-powered lights that had been charging all day. String lights had been strung across the centre of the tables to be switched on once darkness fell. On this warm July evening, the sun was still scorching the earth as it made its way west.

Outside the large iron gate of the courtyard, family members’ cars were parked in a line. When Çiğdem noticed a pair of headlights approaching, she glanced at the table to see if there were still guests who hadn’t arrived. Everyone was there, including her cousin Nesil, who had just made it after her daughter’s conservatory exam in Ankara. However, considering the sheer size of her mother’s extended family from Filyos to Mengen, it wasn’t impossible for uninvited guests to show up.

As the car drew nearer, Çiğdem saw that it was a sky-blue, convertible Jaguar E-Type from the 1960s — exactly the sort of striking beauty her husband Jacques would admire. Seeing such a rare car in these parts surprised her. Driven by a mix of curiosity and a protective instinct, she walked towards the gate — Jacques joined her, likely just as intrigued by the car as she was. The others at the table turned their eyes in that direction too. The car came to a stop about five or six metres ahead, beside the second row of vehicles.

Çiğdem had been planning this large family gathering for over a year — and finally, the day had come. They were in the garden of the large wooden house where her mother Leman had been born seventy-five years earlier, in the ancient coastal town of Filyos by the Black Sea. Her mother was the third of eight siblings — all of whom were present that day.

Çiğdem had taken inspiration from the family reunions on Jacques’s maternal side, which were held annually in Brussels. Her mother-in-law Jacqueline’s mother was called Marie. Since 15 August, the Assumption of Mary, is a public holiday in Catholic countries and schools are closed for summer, the idea of turning that date into a family party had first come from the eldest sister forty years ago, and the tradition had continued without fail ever since. As Jacques’s wife, Çiğdem was always invited to these gatherings.

Jacques’s family also had seven siblings, and like her mother, his mother was the third child. Each sibling had three to five children. With daughters-in-law, sons-in-law, grandchildren and now their partners too, they had become a family of nearly one hundred and twenty people. Of course, divorces and changing relationships meant the attendees changed a bit each year,  some faces disappeared, new ones joined, but the annual party never dropped below seventy or eighty attendees.

One of Jacques’s great-aunt’s daughters was married to an MP — a true politician who loved being the centre of attention. He would take the microphone and never let go, speaking passionately, getting the family to sing songs together, encouraging dancing, introducing newcomers, cracking jokes. At her first attendance, he had handed the microphone to Çiğdem and asked her to sing. Embarrassed, she had only managed a brief greeting. Over time, though, she had got to know the aunts and cousins, and grown very fond of them.

Her dream of organising a similar event for her own family grew stronger with each passing year. Çiğdem greatly admired large families. As her own siblings lived in different countries, she only saw them at Christmas and in the summer. She longed for shared holidays like Jacques had with his family. But her busy professional life had not allowed time to realise that dream.

In 2023, everything changed. When her husband received a job offer in Canada, Çiğdem decided to take a break from work and follow him. That’s how they ended up in Quebec for a year and a half. That summer, with more time on her hands, she developed the idea of a family gathering in her mind and thought, “Well then, I can organise this myself.” And so she got started.

Her mother Leman had one more sibling than her mother-in-law, but the number of children and grandchildren was far fewer. After listing them all, including their spouses, Çiğdem realised they didn’t even reach fifty. She thought, “At least thirty of us could come together.” Things were easier with Jacques’s family — most of them lived within a hundred-kilometre radius of Brussels. But her own relatives were scattered not only across Turkey but all over Europe. Different countries in Europe, different cities in Turkey.

The family loved and visited one another. A few had even gone on a Balkan tour together the previous year. But gathering all eight siblings at once would be a first. Perhaps it couldn’t become a yearly tradition like Jacques’s family had, but Çiğdem was determined to make it happen — at least once — in July 2024.

Eleven months in advance, she created two WhatsApp groups — one for the whole family, and another for four people she thought might help with planning. As soon as the groups were set up, she found herself engaged with the family and was thrilled to see how warmly her idea was received. Her enthusiasm only grew. Her great-aunt Ayla in particular said, “I really admire you, Çiğdem. You’re making something happen for the first time. Thank you so much.” It moved Çiğdem deeply.

She had invited her middle uncle Turgay — who lived near Filyos — to her small planning group, which she called “Organised Affairs.” She also included great-aunt Ayla’s daughters Selin and Pelin, and her great-uncle Ayhan who lived in Zonguldak. Turgay took charge of food and drink. Selin and Pelin helped with decorations and activities. Uncle Ayhan hired a gardener to prepare the garden for visitors.

Of course, there were dissenting voices in the family. One cousin who ran a café in Urla said July was their busiest month. Another, Nesil, said it clashed with her daughter’s conservatory exams. The cousin in Venice, Ulaş, couldn’t even be reached. Perhaps he didn’t want to come due to a strained relationship with his father, Ayhan.

Tensions and even arguments flared up over trivial matters during those days. When Çiğdem told Jacques, “Your lot deserve a medal. Mine have started fighting before we’ve even gathered,” Jacques calmly reassured her with his soft voice: “It happens in every family, love. Don’t worry.” He then told her how his youngest uncle would act up when drunk, how Aunt Miette would take his side, and how that had led to countless rows. That uncle no longer came to the gatherings. Çiğdem had never even met him.

In October — around the time she began trying her hand at writing — and with nine months still to go until the reunion, Çiğdem had another brilliant idea. She would write a family chronicle and distribute it at the event. In Jacques’s family, there was always a huge photo album about a metre tall, smaller albums, and memory books brought to the gatherings. Çiğdem had pored over these with great interest and found joy in seeing the youthful pictures of people now in their seventies and eighties.

In November, she left her husband behind in Canada and travelled to Turkey for six weeks. With her mother Leman, she packed suitcases in Izmir and set off on a family tour. Starting in Izmir, they visited each aunt and uncle one by one in Bursa, Denizli, and Istanbul. Çiğdem scanned and copied the photos everyone had, and gathered stories and information about grandparents and their lives.

Unfortunately, there weren’t enough photographs to create a large, beautiful album like the one Jacques’s family had. The oldest picture she could find dated back to 1935. It was a passport-style photo of her great-grandfather Mehmet Bey, born in 1877, at the age of 58. From the period between 1935 and 1965, there were barely thirty photos. Some of them were so worn and faded that it was impossible to recognise the people in them.

When they reached their final stop in Zonguldak, and from there travelled with her great uncle Ayhan to the abandoned family house in Filyos, she was bitterly disappointed. The house, which she hadn’t seen in years, had turned into a ruin. The large garden was overrun with brambles, ivy and tall grass. This grand wooden house, which the elders in the family once referred to as the “New Mansion,” was far from new—in fact, it was completely dilapidated. The only reason for its name was that her grandfather’s grandfather Osman Bey had built a house in the 1880s, which they called the Old Mansion. When Mehmet Bey, Osman’s son, had a house built a hundred metres further in 1915, it naturally came to be known as the New Mansion. After the Old Mansion was demolished in the 1950s, the name remained, even though the second house had long since lost its former glory. The mulberry tree planted beside it was now 110 years old. It still bore delicious fruit, but the house looked as though it would collapse if thirty or forty people were to enter it.

It was in this house that Mehmet Bey’s seven children had been born. The youngest of them, Rıza Bey, was Çiğdem’s grandfather. Though his older siblings were born during the Ottoman era, he was a child of the Republic.

Years later, Rıza Bey raised his own family in this house, bringing up eight children under its roof. But now, the house Çiğdem saw had long since lost its splendour. Time, along with the Black Sea’s humidity, had devoured its carpets, books and photographs. Some of the items she remembered from her childhood had been thrown away in recent years due to neglect. The huge house had slightly tilted due to soil subsidence, floorboards had broken and holes now connected the upper floor to the one below. The wood had blackened; the white lace curtains in the bay windows had yellowed.

Çiğdem looked at the house with sadness. Hosting guests inside was clearly impossible. However, a gathering in the garden could still be arranged. The garden was neglected, but could be cleaned up. Given that the Black Sea summer was notoriously unpredictable and sudden downpours could happen at any moment, they would need to procure tarpaulins.

But perhaps due to climate change, the summer of 2024 began with scorching heat. Not a drop of rain fell throughout June. When the organising committee arrived in Filyos a week before the gathering, the grass was as yellow as if they were in the Aegean, and they had to water it themselves.

And so, on that sweltering July evening, the family had gathered in the garden of the New Mansion, cheerfully chatting away. Laughter echoed all around, a curated playlist of Turkish jazz and classical songs played softly on Spotify in the background, accompanying the flow of memories.

As Çiğdem approached the gate, a stylish man in his seventies stepped out of the pale blue vintage car, wearing a white linen shirt over beige trousers and leaning on a cane. He retrieved a fedora from the back seat of the open-top car, placed it on his head and began walking towards them. A few people at the tables stood up. The lively crowd in front of the massive, darkened wooden house fell silent, and in the background, Ajda Pekkan’s voice—“But alas, the street was empty…”—was left all alone.

Back in November, when Çiğdem had come here, she had met many people and even consulted two regional authors to learn about the family’s more distant history. She searched her memory—was this man one of them? No, he wasn’t.

One of the authors was Ali Nuri Bey, a 90-year-old graduate of the Village Institutes. He had served as a school principal in the area and written books about the region’s history. The other was a retired teacher descended from her grandmother’s line, who had written a genealogical study tracing the Rumbeyoğlu family’s 550-year history. Since two grand viziers had come from that family, Çiğdem had found further information both online and in academic sources. She had brought both authors’ books back to Montreal, signed. Upon returning, she had compiled photos, memories, historical documents, and findings from academic theses and DNA research into a booklet over the course of four or five months.

In the booklet, she had also described the changes in the region: the collapse of bridges over the wild Filyos River, boatmen pulling ferries with ropes, the region’s old churches and mosques, family members who had commissioned these buildings, and how education evolved from concubines to primary schools with the advent of the Republic.

This man wasn’t one of those writers; he looked like an Istanbul gentleman. It would be quite something if he turned out to be a descendant of one of the ancestors she had found in Ottoman archives. But surely those people had no way of knowing a gathering was happening here.

During the Ottoman era, her mother’s family had been monarchists. Her grandmother’s lineage traced back to two grand viziers—one from the reign of Mehmed the Conqueror and the other from that of Abdul Hamid I. Their sons continued to work at the palace and married into the dynasty. The second vizier, Rumbeyoğlu İsmet Pasha, was known for being pleasure-seeking and even rather lazy. But he was apparently very funny. He had commissioned the largest waterfront mansion along the Bosphorus. Of course, it now belonged to the Komili family. For a moment, Çiğdem imagined this man stepping forward and handing her the keys to that mansion. Then she smiled, shaking herself out of her daydream. With the Tanzimat reforms, those who didn’t know French and couldn’t adapt to change were pushed away from the palace. Her ancestors had returned to Filyos in the 1840s, where they acted as regional beys. But some of their younger brothers had clung to the monarchy until the last possible moment, raising their sons to be diplomats. One such son had taken part in the Treaty of Sèvres and ended up on Atatürk’s list of 150 undesirable persons, sent into exile. She couldn’t help but wonder—was this man his grandson?

There had also been curious cases of adopted children in the family. She had learned that adopted children couldn’t inherit and that in some cases, they might have been born out of wedlock. Perhaps he was one of them—who knows?

Though she had gathered information about the men in the family, she had learned little about the women. Ah, she thought, if only the Surname Law had been introduced a century earlier, during the Tanzimat period, how much more information we would have had about the women. Perhaps this man descended from one of those female branches—who knows?

As the garden gradually surrendered its stifling heat to the relief of the evening breeze, Çiğdem, still wondering who this stranger was, pushed the iron bolt and opened the courtyard gate, bracing herself to stop the heavy gate from swinging shut on the guest. The mysterious gentleman who had descended so nimbly from the beautiful car had sparked everyone’s curiosity—not just hers.

To be continued in Part 2. Next week...

 

Reuniting at the Roots, Living in the Memories.

In the garden of her mother’s childhood home on the Black Sea coast, Çiğdem organises a large family gathering. Inspired by her Belgian husband’s family reunions, she works for months to bring relatives together and prepares a booklet documenting their history. The overgrown garden of the crumbling mansion is cleared, tables are set. Just as everything seems to be going perfectly, the arrival of a mysterious man in a classic convertible hints at long-buried family secrets. Family Reunion is a warm tale woven with heritage, memory, and the bonds that tie generations together.

 

02- Aunt Lili

02 - Aunt Lili

Aunt Lili was 79 years old. She had been born into a wealthy family in Belgium, but life had drawn a difficult path for her. Her husband, Viktor, whom she married for love, was a kind, gentle, and humane man. He was also well-educated. However, when it came to work, he was a complete adventurer and very irresponsible. He constantly came up with new business ideas, but none of them ever brought in income that could contribute to the family. Because of this, they endured years of unnecessary poverty.

The couple had two sons. When they reached school age, she gave birth to two more sons, hoping for a daughter. But her life became a cycle of raising four boys and dealing with Viktor’s failures. For years, she bore all the burden on her shoulders—trying to support the household on a teacher’s salary, managing the housework and the children’s education. They always lived on the edge of poverty. Apart from a road trip to Italy in the 1970s when they had only two children, there were few opportunities for long travels.

The years passed like this; the sons grew up and set off into life. Only after retiring was Lili finally able to part ways with Viktor. Despite all those years, they had never managed to buy a home and had always lived in rented flats. It upset her that half of her small pension went on rent. However, for the first time in her life, being able to save a little and go on holiday every other year had become one of her greatest pleasures.

She read a great deal, and seeing the places she read about with her own eyes was one of her biggest dreams. That’s how she found herself travelling to places like Uzbekistan and Egypt—places most women her age wouldn’t dare to visit. She disliked luxury, preferred to get to know the locals and the culture, and would rather brush her teeth in the waters of the Nile than stay in a fancy hotel.

Despite her advancing age, she never considered retreating from life. She took great joy in helping her grandchildren with their homework and gathering her sons around her to cook delicious meals. She preferred to be called Aunt Lili instead of Mrs Lili. Though she never had a daughter, she had formed bonds with both the former and current wives of her sons. She even liked the second wife of her eldest son, Eda. She would share memories with her, gossip about her sons, and talk about her travels. With a few glasses of wine, her tongue would loosen, and they would have long, laughter-filled conversations.

Not long ago, while reading a novel by Marie-Bernadette Dupuy alongside her sister Ella, she added a new place to her list of dreams. The book spoke of a small town and a young girl who grew up there. This town had been built in 1901 around a paper mill. At the time, it was considered a model modern settlement and developed rapidly. But only twenty-five years later, the factory shut down, and the town was completely abandoned.

Interestingly, this wasn’t a fictional place. It was a ghost town in the deep forests of Canada, beneath a waterfall—Val-Jalbert. Back when it was built, many homes around the world didn’t have running water or toilets, but the workers’ houses here were equipped with both, and villagers from surrounding areas would come out of curiosity just to see them. While it had once been a dreamlike town, after the factory shut, it was left to disappear into nature’s arms for forty years. In the 1960s, it was overrun by hippies and vandalised. But for the last forty years, it had been protected, restored, and turned into an open-air museum.

What affected Aunt Lili so deeply was the fact that the young girl in the book had the same surname as her own mother. That’s why she read the novel as if conducting a genealogy study, paying close attention to every detail. As she read, the tragic fate of this town captivated her. How could a place so far ahead of its time have been completely abandoned? And so, the ghost town became a place she longed to see with all her heart.

As soon as she learnt that her eldest son and daughter-in-law Eda would be moving to Quebec for a while, her first move was to pull out a map and examine the distance between Quebec City and Val-Jalbert. She was overjoyed. Though she wasn’t particularly close to the gods, she chuckled and told her old friend Marianne: “Oh darling, I dream, and the gods roll up their sleeves to lay the stepping stones to carry me to my dreams.” A month after they had moved into their home, they invited her to spend a few weeks with them.

From the moment she stepped off the plane, Lili fell in love with Canada. Well, once someone sets their mind on loving a place, they’ll find a way to love it. Armed with her smartphone, which she had become well acquainted with in recent years, she was constantly gathering information and even adored the Canadian French, which was so different from the one she spoke. She spent her first days in Canada looking up towns around Lake Saint-Jean on her phone and map, jotting down ideas in her notebook in her loopy handwriting. Eda and her son researched hotels and restaurants.

Finally, the big day arrived. They laughed at the funny stories Eda made up about Canadian lumberjacks and breathed in the fresh air through the car’s open roof. As they neared Lake Saint-Jean, Lili turned into an excited young girl again. She started pointing left and right, guiding them as if she were showing places she had known all her life.

When they arrived at the hotel—an old monastery turned into a guesthouse—they found their room numbers handwritten on a sign on the wall, and the doors were unlocked. The enormous kitchen downstairs was available for guests to cook their own meals. A fire burned in the large lounge’s fireplace, guests sat in the dining hall, and a few young children were running around. The atmosphere warmed all three of their hearts.

The next morning, Lili woke up early, got dressed with excitement, and waited for the others in the breakfast room. As the three of them entered Val-Jalbert, “Here we are,” said Eda, linking arms with her mother-in-law. For a moment, they paused time and shared their mutual happiness.

They spent the day there. They visited the rooms where nuns had once stayed in the old school building and sat at students’ desks. The town was just as described: the only place in the region at the time with electricity and running water in homes, admired by villagers who visited in awe. They rode the cable car up to the waterfall and gazed at the view, then looked down at the lake, the dam, and the ruins of the factory. They toured the mill and relived the history of the town step by step.

Val-Jalbert, with its restored houses, old factory buildings, and silent streets, felt frozen in time. With each step, Lili recalled scenes from the novel. “This could be the house where Marie-Claire lived,” she murmured, stopping in front of a small wooden cottage.

On the way back to the hotel, she said, “I want to write a book.” Charles was surprised. “What about, Mum?” he asked. Lili gazed at her fingers for a long time before answering. “About Val-Jalbert. But not just a book that tells its history… The story of a woman visiting this town. Maybe I’ll include other places I’ve been too. Maybe… it’ll be my story. Who knows, maybe I’ll include you as well,” she said, bursting into laughter. All three of them laughed. They exaggerated the roles they wanted to be given in the novel. That evening, as they sipped wine at the monastery-turned-hotel, the stories deepened. It was then that Eda shared for the first time that she had also tried to write. But hers were just little tales of four or five pages. She knew her mother-in-law’s way with words was far stronger. She said she was looking forward to the book.

When the book was published a year later under the title Aunt Lili on the Road, it created a small literary sensation in Belgium. The travelogue, written by an 80-year-old woman, not only recounted her experiences in Egypt, Romania, Uzbekistan, and Canada, but also told a life story full of dreams, hopes, and disappointments.

When she returned to Quebec for the book’s promotion, she visited Val-Jalbert once more. This time, her name was also written on the plaque at the entrance to the town:

“Aunt Lili, the Woman Who Carried the Spirit of Val-Jalbert, was here.”

 

15- The Phantom of the Golden Coast

 

It was March 1993. After the end of the Cold War, Europe's major cities were honoring former Soviet musicians, and Russian composers were performing at various festivals.

In their apartment in Küsnacht, Mathilde and her husband Bruno were preparing to attend the Bolshoi Ballet's performance at the Zurich Opera House for the first time that year. Their production of "Swan Lake," which brought a modern interpretation after the rigid aesthetics of the Soviet era, had made a huge impact in artistic circles. "Look, Bruno," Mathilde said excitedly, showing him the newspaper, "Critics are praising Natalya Dudinskaya's student, the new prima ballerina. They're calling her the 'perfect blend of Soviet discipline and European romanticism.'" Bruno, as he was putting on his cufflinks, shared in Mathilde's joy: "I know, my love, your childhood dream is coming true. We're going to see a Russian swan live... You become so beautiful when you're happy," he said, pulling her close and kissing her.

Mathilde was forty-nine, Bruno fifty-one, and perhaps those years were the most beautiful and radiant period of their lives. Bruno had yet to be diagnosed with Alzheimer's, which would come twelve years later, and his death was still twenty years away. They had lived in this apartment, located in the most beautiful corner of Lake Zurich's "Golden Coast," for twenty-two years.

They had purchased this ground-floor apartment in 1971 when they were newlyweds, even before the basic concrete was poured, and had carefully chosen the wallpaper themselves. The complex had been designed by a famous architect reflecting the modern lines of the time. It consisted of seven blocks, with only two apartments in each block. Between the blocks, a large garden stretched out, which, over the years, the gardener would shape with scissors every morning, filling it with shrubs and flowers.

Mathilde had fallen in love with this vast green space, while Bruno was in love with the sunlight that filled the house. Through the apartment's four-directional windows, the sun traveled silently inside from morning until evening. In this spacious apartment, which was quite large for a couple, they had once dreamed of having children, imagining them running and growing up in the garden, with each child having their own room.

They had tried hard to have children, but by the mid-1980s, they had accepted that they would remain childless. They filled the gap with their professions, the roses in their garden, winter trips to their little mountain cabin, and Mathilde’s favorite thing: dressing up and going to the opera.

Mathilde’s childhood and youth had been spent in a large mansion near the city of Kortrijk in Belgium. Servants worked in the house, cars full of wine and meat were delivered directly from producers, and the barns and cellars were always full.

In 1966, as was customary for every bourgeois family, her parents had sent her to London to learn English. There, she had formed an international circle of friends and soon met a Swiss engineer named Bruno within this group. Bruno had completed his civil engineering degree in Zurich and was doing his master’s in London. Tall, slender, and with piercing blue eyes, he could not take his eyes off Mathilde. They fell in love. However, Mathilde's wealthy landowner family—especially her mother—strongly opposed their marriage, as Bruno came from modest beginnings. Mathilde ignored their objections, gave up all her inheritance, married Bruno, and moved to Switzerland.

That night, Mathilde had carefully prepared herself, tying her brown hair into an elegant bun, and accentuating the outline of her blue eyes with a thin eyeliner. She picked up the family heirloom diamond earrings and hesitated for a moment in front of the mirror about whether to wear them. Even though her mother had not spoken to her in twenty years because of her marriage, she had bequeathed these precious earrings to her only daughter upon her death. Bruno understood her indecision. "Go ahead, wear them, they suit you so well," he encouraged her.

Although their financial situation was much better than in the early years of their marriage, Mathilde still avoided excessive luxury, mindful of her husband's modest background. With Bruno’s words and the approval in his smiling eyes, she wore the large diamond earrings. She put on low-heeled shoes under her light blue coat with a fur collar and, with a graceful movement, linked her arm through her husband’s.

Despite the cold of March, the city was alive; trams passed by with a soft hum, and people walked slowly on the streets, chatting, entering and exiting shops or restaurants in Seefeld. The lights of the shop windows had not yet dimmed, and the golden light of the setting sun gave everything a romantic atmosphere. The night was beautiful.

The opera house was packed that night. In the lobby, crystal chandeliers sparkled as champagne glasses clinked. While Mathilde was scanning the guests in the lobby, she looked for familiar faces.

When the curtain rose, the legendary Bolshoi Orchestra was interpreting Tchaikovsky's notes, and Mathilde secretly clung to Bruno’s arm. The "Four Little Swans" in the second act, with the dancers’ perfect synchronization, mesmerized everyone in the hall. Even the typically reserved Swiss audience stood and applauded.

By midnight, when they left the opera house, the March wind was blowing Mathilde's coat’s fur collar. Even when they got home, their excitement hadn’t died down. Bruno poured two glasses of white wine from the fridge they had opened earlier that evening. He handed one to Mathilde, who was sitting on the maroon velvet couch in the living room. They drank, and talked again and again about the performance.

Mathilde went to the bedroom to remove her makeup. At that moment, as she opened the jewelry box in front of the mirror, the magic of the Bolshoi was replaced by fear. She let out a small scream. The box was empty. There was only a small piece of paper inside. It read: “Don’t be afraid, the Phantom has come to visit you.” Below was a red wax seal and an elegant signature.

Mathilde's hands were trembling. Bruno immediately grabbed the phone and began dialing the police. Mathilde, afraid to even move a meter away from him, stayed close. Together, they went through the rooms and turned on all the lights in the house. There was no one there.

When they had entered the house, they had noticed nothing unusual. Aside from the empty jewelry box, there was no trace of a burglary. They had opened the door with their own key. There was no sign of tampering or forced entry at the lock. The house was just as orderly as they had left it that evening.

Mathilde thought about what other valuables they had. The Omega watch she had bought for Bruno on their twentieth wedding anniversary was on his wrist that night. In the living room, next to the dining table, she looked for the silver cutlery set her mother had bought for her but which she only received after her mother's death. Those boxes were empty too, and the same note was inside: “Don’t be afraid, the Phantom has paid you a visit.”

In the hallway, Bruno noticed a glimmer on the carpet. It was an old Belgian silver franc. Mathilde had an old coin collection—it was in the bedroom. When they opened that box, the third note appeared.

Apart from these, nothing else in the house had been touched. The curtains were drawn neatly, the books under the lamps were arranged exactly as they should be. Several valuable paintings, their brand-new TV weighing at least twenty kilograms, their record player and vinyls—all were untouched. Nothing large had been taken. Everything stolen could have fit into a backpack. The thief seemed to have found every light yet valuable item in the house with uncanny precision. Even though everything appeared to be in its place, an invisible hand had touched their home, spreading an air of unease.

About fifteen minutes later, two police officers knocked on their door. As soon as they heard the story, they immediately knew this was the work of the “Golden Coast Phantom,” who had been active in the area for two and a half years but still had not been caught.

One of the officers went to the door leading to the veranda. It was closed, but there was a small hole in the bottom corner filled with toothpaste. He immediately called the other officer to show him. “Well, looks like he’s done it again,” he said, pointing to the still-wet paste, and they chuckled between themselves. When they saw the fearful expressions of the homeowners, they became serious and took down Bruno’s statement in detail. Mathilde, still in shock, couldn’t say a word.

The police explained that all the previous incidents had occurred using the same method, and despite more than 15 cases, the culprit had yet to be identified. The thief or thieves would drill a three-millimeter hole into the window or door frames of villas or ground-floor apartments, insert a special tool through the hole to lower the door handle from the inside, and enter the premises without leaving a trace. Since no one had ever seen the thief during any of the burglaries, people had started calling the intruder the “Golden Coast Phantom.”

There had been some subtle changes in the Phantom’s style. In the early years, they had taken only gold and cash, never bothering with silver. The note back then simply read: “Don’t be afraid, just a visitor.” After the media began referring to them as the Golden Coast Phantom, the message changed to: “Don’t be afraid, the Phantom has paid you a visit.”

The thief was extremely meticulous. Likely wearing jeweler’s gloves, as not a single fingerprint was ever found. In the houses the Phantom had entered—just like in this one—no drawers were left open, no chairs overturned. The garden gate was always carefully closed in the same manner it was opened, and the hole drilled for entry was precisely filled with white toothpaste. The Phantom was certainly not in a hurry; drilling the hole, entering the house, and locating valuable items in different parts of the home must have taken time.

The police believed that the burglar had watched the houses and only entered once sure no one was home. Mathilde explained that every other Saturday evening they attended the Zurich Opera, where they had a subscription, grabbed a bite at the opera café, and were gone for four to five hours. On weekends when they didn’t go to the opera, they often went to their mountain cabin and stayed the entire weekend. On Thursday evenings, they attended dance classes. Lately, they had also been frequently visiting Bruno’s mother, who had recently moved into a care home but disliked it so much that she kept calling her son and daughter-in-law to have dinner with her.

Although they were not home often, Mathilde said they had known all their neighbors for years. If someone had been watching the complex, surely someone would have noticed.

The officers said they would come by the next day to ask the neighbors a few questions and bid them good night. As they left, in a half-joking tone, they added: “Don’t worry, the Phantom never visits a place twice. He won’t come here again. Sleep well.”

Still, Mathilde and Bruno barely slept that night.

The next day, Mathilde accompanied the police while they questioned the neighbors. No one had seen anything. Of the two neighbors whose apartments overlooked the veranda, one wasn’t home that evening, and the other had been engrossed in a movie on television. The others didn’t have a view of the veranda at all. However, one neighbor with a view of the bedroom window had said they saw a light turned on. It was clear the thief had boldly turned on the lights.

The police left, saying they had no solid evidence for now, but would continue the investigation.

Months passed. That year, the Phantom visited a few more homes along the Golden Coast of Lake Zurich. Then, in the fall, the incidents suddenly stopped. The police continued their investigations for a while, but witness statements, fingerprint searches, tool analysis, and even the deployment of undercover officers yielded no results.

The burglary wave known as the “Golden Coast Phantom,” which had lasted for three years between 1990 and 1993, came to an end, and the investigation files were shelved and left to gather dust. According to police estimates, the total value of stolen items during this period approached six million Swiss francs.

Years later, a man was arrested at Zurich’s main train station. His name was R.A., and he had been apprehended while wanted for another crime. He had 23 prior convictions ranging from professional theft to unlawful entry and aiding and abetting. The police strongly suspected he was the “Golden Coast Phantom.” However, his connection to the infamous burglaries along Lake Zurich was never legally confirmed. This 55-year-old German national even sued the Blick newspaper for calling him the Golden Coast Phantom, claiming that it dishonored him by convicting him in the court of public opinion without sufficient evidence.

These burglaries, committed in one of Zurich’s calmest and most beautiful neighborhoods, remain a mystery to this day. The Phantom never resurfaced. But Mathilde kept those notes the Phantom had left—in the jewelry box and the other two locations.

Years passed. The neighbors’ children ran around the gardens, grew up, even got married. Old neighbors moved out, new ones moved in. Bruno passed away from Alzheimer’s. Mathilde now lived alone in her garden-level apartment. She was nearing eighty, her walks had slowed, but her mind was still sharp. Especially some memories… some nights… they never faded from her mind.

. . .

Eight years ago, on a September day, I moved into the apartment above Mathilde’s. She didn’t exactly welcome me with open arms, but I made a point of showing kindness and respect to this woman, five years older than my mother. She was a selective and exhausting person. But I slowly built rapport by bringing her small gifts from my travels. Still, she never abandoned her distant and slightly suspicious attitude.

Two years later, I met a Belgian man—and that became one of the main reasons she warmed up to me. Though she rarely visited her homeland, she was instantly charmed by my boyfriend. The moment she saw him on the stairs, her eyes lit up and she exclaimed, “What a handsome man!” She told me she believed this relationship would be good for me, especially after the previous one, which had deeply hurt me.

And so, our friendship grew stronger. Whenever I visited Belgium, I would bring back the tiny shrimp she loved. When her health wasn’t great and she didn’t feel confident enough to go walking alone, I accompanied her on her strolls. During those walks, she told me stories from the past. She was very knowledgeable. We talked about many things—from the first female architect of Switzerland and her protected work in our neighborhood, to the road projects her late husband had worked on, to rose care, her favorite sopranos, and politics. I came to love this cold woman, not despite her aloofness, but because she poured out information like an encyclopedia.

One day, someone had uprooted a newly planted rose bush in her garden. There was a large, deep hole left behind. Mathilde knocked on my door. She was frightened. She told me about the rose and asked me to come down. Because she was so suspicious by nature, I initially thought she suspected me. But she was genuinely scared. Then she sank into the chair on her veranda and turned her face toward the setting sun.

“Thirty years ago…” she began. And then she told me about the Golden Coast Phantom. I listened wide-eyed. She must’ve thought I didn’t believe her because she added:

“I still have the notes. I remember how my hands trembled when I found the jewelry box—as if it were yesterday.” She turned her gaze to the rose branches where large pink blooms had opened.

“Sometimes, even when a shadow passes by, I can hear my heartbeat in my ears.”

I’ve always believed places carry memory. I placed my hand over Mathilde’s trembling one. “Maybe I could write your story,” I said. Seeing her unease after all these years, I added, “Don’t worry, we’ll change your name.”

One day I’ll take notes and turn it into a story.

Some stories are forgotten, some are told. And then there are those that, like that hole in the door, leave marks on time and space.

 Some visitors leave without a trace—others leave a shadow.

In a quiet Zurich neighborhood, a string of unsolved burglaries by the elusive “Golden Coast Phantom” leaves behind nothing but eerie notes and unanswered questions. Decades later, elderly Mathilde shares her haunting memories with a younger neighbor, revealing how one silent intruder forever altered her sense of safety. A tale of mystery, memory, and the invisible marks left on places—and hearts.