Muse reflects that in the end people can adapt to all bodies, even when it is hard, because they can be quickly removed and then kept working.
Others, mutilated bodies, detached, amputees: these are the realities that Moses, the volunteer helper, could not become numb to. “When we pull out a mutilated corpse, it feels hot at noon and the smell is sharp. We are human, even if we try to harden. It affects me deeply. It is not easy,” Musa says in staccato bursts, trying to push from his mind everything he sees and handles because the memory burns and wears him down. He has to speak about it.
embraced
They have been in this building for three days, yet they managed to reach the place where the bodies lie today. There are roughly 70 in there, and this morning they recovered a man aged around sixty five with his daughter. They were holding each other, and he was missing guts while his arm dangled. It took a long time to extract him. Musa recalls this moment from a week ago, a life before the city changed, a construction worker in Istanbul.
Yet his life, and especially the life of all Turks in the southeast, was altered by the earthquake that struck the south of the country and the northwest of Syria early last Monday. The numbers climb quickly and alarmingly: thirty three thousand lives lost across both nations.
“Hopefully someone can be found alive from the inside, God willing, but in this era there is little time to wait,” the worker notes as he puts on a mask. The odor grows stronger when leaving the site. After a week under rubble, the air clings with decay and death. A shouted command cuts through the noise as the excavator claws at the rubble, pressing it down and pulling it away. The heap of rocks and dust keeps sliding, a mountain slowly collapsing.
“We have no hope of anyone surviving any longer.”
“This is how we operate now. We work with bulldozers since hope is slipping away. It is a disaster, a true disaster. Words fail me now. They are never enough,” he complains.
Almost a week after the quake, a large portion of the ten Turkish provinces affected have finished or nearly finished their rescue efforts. Diyarbakir, Sanliurfa, Kilis and Adana have largely completed their search and rescue operations.
Antioch
Two distinct regions stand out in this catastrophe: Adıyaman and Antakya. On the latter, this Sunday, the sun finally breaks through for the first time this winter. The city center, once one of Turkey’s most recognizable hubs, feels haunted. Men move slowly through streets blanketed in rubble, their faces etched with sorrow.
From the once bustling streets lined with synagogues, mosques, and churches now only stones, dust, and toppled facades remain. Antioch was the site with the highest death toll; the city no longer exists as it once did.
“When people arrive, we meet countless families in need,” says Abdullah, a volunteer who now delivers food in what used to be the city center, his own belongings buried under debris.
“We lost everything at once. Antakya died.”
families running away
Mehmet, in his sixties, sinks into despair as the situation unfolds. He shouts for his family to move, to hurry, to gather what remains. The family of four drives back and forth, the city’s bus station in ruins and it is nearly impossible to tell where a bus might go or who is moving where. Mehmet pushes his family to leave, saying their home collapsed and they have nothing left. He wonders if loved ones survived, while the few belongings they carry include a black plastic bag, four small bottles of water, and a handful of lemon cookies.
“We woke up on Monday with nothing. We will try to reach another city now. We have no place to stay and no home to return to. Our life is all that remains,” Mehmet explains.
After some time of pleading and pushing, the family secures four seats on a moving bus. Mehmet asks about the seats, counting them aloud: 11, 12, 14, and 15. Numbers have never carried more weight or pain for him.