It is exactly one year after the earthquake disaster in Turkey and Syria. Families were affected, houses destroyed and streets unrecognizable. More than 45,000 people died. And now that the dust has settled, the literal and proverbial aftershocks have passed, it is the mourning that remains. “Everything is coming back to the surface today, it’s still alive.”
Mehmet Keles from Tilburg has just turned off his television at home. All day long the Turkish channels talk about nothing other than the earthquake and he has had his share by now. The news is quite one-sided: that many people are without homes, reconstruction is going slowly, many people are still living in containers and loved ones have been lost. “Those images wake you up again.”
“I’ll never be able to see that city again.”
The reports show Antakya, the city that Mehmet loved so much. He describes it as a home to many cultures and faiths, where his family lives or lived. “It was a model city,” he says firmly. “People could live side by side there in peace. But it will never be the same again. Never again the way it was. And because it is your thing, it affects you directly. I will never be able to see that city again.”
Esther van Neerbos, who went to the disaster area with her sniffer dog team Signi to look for people, also remembers that rubble. “A year with many disasters,” she calls 2023, referring to all the misery in Turkey, Gaza and Afghanistan. “They are the same kind of collapses, but in Turkey the aftermath is enormous. You remain very aware of how intense it was and remains.”
Esther is still in contact with the guide who helped her look for bodies in the area. “He deals with victims, with orphaned children. There are many.” That is why she emphasizes once again how great the impact is. “And when it freezes again, you think about that. About all those people who were left without a home and are still living in containers. You keep working on it.”
She sees the biggest difference with other disasters in the scale of the earthquake. “That will take 15 to 20 years in Turkey,” she says. “That is why the first phase of help is so important. The more help victims receive, the more resilience you give them to recover.”
“Time doesn’t soften it.”
“Time doesn’t soften it,” Mehmet continues in an affected voice. He lost a lot of family in the disaster, but also has many relatives still in the middle of the misery. “I’m trying to raise money to help them, but that’s only what you can do financially.” It alleviates some of the suffering that his neighbors, uncles, aunts, cousins and cousins experience there. “Furthermore, all I can do is listen to their grief on the phone.”
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