The light is pale. The swallows have gone. A walnut tree has just begun to turn yellow. I see this when I walk to the corner shop, notice the steep Pirin Mountains, the second-highest range in Bulgaria. Walnut—its etymology: foreign nut. It was introduced to England from Gaul and Italy. I cross a bridge over the Glazne River. It is now a trickle; I can hear the stones. The river begins in a group of glacial lakes high above the town of Bansko. At the foothills last week, I saw a wild red fox. At first it stared at me, then scurried off.

Scurry: to move quickly, a situation of hurried and confused movement. I’m reading a book on the Turkish pogrom of 1955 or, more specifically, the Istanbul riots. The pogrom was a government-sponsored riot primarily against the Greek community of Istanbul, as well as Jews and Armenians. It occurred one long night in September. By morning, tables, chairs, glassware, paintings, mattresses, fridges, food, and curtains—all broken, torn, or smashed—strewn in the streets. Churches burnt down, desecrated.

I have visited a lot of Turkey: all the way east to Rize (not far from Georgia), over the Kaçkar Mountains to Kars (near the ancient site of Ani, which overlooks a ravine on the border with Armenia) and south to Van (a small city with a Kurdish majority). At first, I didn’t tell anyone I was Greek. As the weeks went on, I gained courage; their response was to call me brother. I didn’t need to tell them my story: that I was born in Australia, that I spoke only Greek till I went to kindergarten, that my parents were born in Egypt.

There are no lines on maps for birds. The swallows in Bansko fly south in the winter, to Africa, the Middle East, and India. They do not reproduce there. Most will come back again the next spring to carefully restore their nests; together, a male and female pair use mud and grass to create pellets for their roost. At the hotel across from my apartment, the swallows have chosen a secure location above a light fitting on the wall of a balcony. The nest is quiet now, though: no squeaks.

My father never got to see me travel long term as I have during the past five years. He didn’t quite understand why I had a desire to go elsewhere. Now that the swallows have gone, other birds have come to use the untaken space. Two blackbirds, a coal tit, a great tit. I love how the blackbirds reap the earth, potter beneath shrubs and overhanging branches. How they turn away, shyly, quietly. It is a different quiet to the silence of the international community after the Istanbul riots or of the ministers of numerous nations turning away boats in the Mediterranean today.

Intimate, the blackbirds pick at grass, pluck worms I could never see. I sit on my balcony. The space in front of me is split: a hotel here, apartments there. In between, a small garden. October, it grows in shadow; in winter, sometimes in snow. There are insects flying, spiders throwing webs across trees. A spruce stands firm. Two socks hang on a rack. A honeybee flies through an open window. The railing on my balcony is made of wood. My dad never saw my hair turn grey.

The victims of the Turkish pogrom lived without doors, and windows, and compensation, for years. During this time, the head of the Orthodox Church stated that if the Greeks of Istanbul should try to immigrate to Greece, the Greeks there “should turn all of [them] away without even offering [them] the customary glass of water.” He didn’t want them to leave the city. Greeks have lived continuously in Istanbul for more than 3,000 years. Now there are few left. The nest of a swallow is simple.

My father died more than twelve years ago now. I cannot tell him anything. That I am foreign everywhere I go. A cat toys a dead sparrow by a stream. Two women talk on a bench as white beans dry in thin sun. I sit under the shade of a silver birch. At least I can travel, and borders are lines I can cross. The town of Bansko is 925 metres above sea level. Along with the red fox, brown bears, grey wolves, wildcats, pine martens, and red deer live in the Pirin Mountains. Shallow water rolls over smooth stones.

On the way back to my temporary home, a man I greet whenever I pass gives me a bowl of plums. I cross over the bridge. I look up at a now familiar tree; the walnuts are not yet ready to pick.