It is difficult to be away from home when disaster strikes it.  It is no different this time, after the earthquake in Van.

I was in Istanbul on vacation when the 7.4 1999 earthquake hit.  Although my parents’ building or the surrounding area were not damaged, I felt the 3am horror and the anxiety afterwards with my family.  The fear we felt as we spent the night outside, the helplessness we felt as we watched the devastation after being able to go inside the homes and turning on the TV are still in me, can’t be forgotten.  In retrospect, I do feel lucky that it happened before I returned back to the US, because it is very difficult to watch the crisis from afar.  Another summer in 2001, 3 days before my flight back to the US, I was sitting in my parents’ kitchen watching live coverage of the WTC attacks, I saw real time as the second plane hit the towers. I found myself going online and scouring American news sources for any bit of information, in shock.  I’ve been feeling the same way the last few days.

A 7.2 earthquake hit the eastern city of Van.  The end of the first 72 hours is speedily approaching and the number of casualties is approaching 500, with more than 10 thousand injured.  This time around, one thing is quite different though.  I’m sitting in our apartment in New Jersey and watching streaming CNNTurk (which is doing a very good job in coverage) on my iphone while I follow the news on news websites and the social media on my computer.  In 1999, we had the Internet in Turkey; however the Internet was not what it is today.  People in Turkey are very much online and communicating and expressing themselves through different sites: facebook, twitter, friendfeed, Eksi sozluk and other sozluks.  Some quite helpful websites/blogs for coordination have been set up, e.g. http://yalnizdegilsinvan.wordpress.com/.  I’m still feeling quite helpless, but I can at least virtually be a part of the post-quake sentiment.  I could send some help through globalgiving’s Van earthquake fund, which I found out about on “yalnizdegilsinvan” blog.

As I tried to connect with my “original” home after this disaster, I was thankful for the technological advances that enabled the virtual bridge.  Social media was great for getting news, being connected, and even contributing to the relief efforts a little bit.  I have been following how people in Turkey have been coordinating relief efforts through social media as well. News of the urgently needed items, how to help, where to collect the aid items, how to coordinate the transfer were all shared.  They have also shared news of people under the debris with AKUT, a rescue organization, which resulted in the rescue of a few individuals and saved their lives.  All this is THE GOOD about social media.  It has definitely made a difference in communication and coordination compared to 1999, for me individually and more importantly for those struggling to help (and get help) in Turkey.

I was filled with hope and appreciated the efforts as I witnessed “the good” on social media.  However, I could not avoid THE BAD.  The bad was seeing people diverting the online communication and discussion off topic, to useless polemics and terrible jokes.  People are losing lives every minute, those who survived are trying to live through the bitter cold and the rain, leave aside the horror they experienced and loved ones, homes, and possessions they lost.  There is urgent need for help, at least understanding and empathy.  However, some in the social media is almost immune to the sensitivity of the situation.

I took a look at the reader comments on a HuffPost news on the earthquake.  I couldn’t believe that some people were cracking stupid jokes around “turkey”/Turkey/thanksgiving.  How shallow does one need to be to make these jokes, which are not even funny?

Then, there are those who discussed Israel and middle eastern politics with limited and misleading information.  Yes, Turkish government initially did not accept the offers from 50some countries offering to help except for Azerbaijan, Iran and Bulgaria.  Teams and help from these three, according to what I read, showed up without asking; and the first two happen to be across the border from Van, they are closer to the disaster area than Istanbul.  Turkish government’s decision not to accept help can be discussed, I don’t know whether it was pride or thinking that they could cope with this with their own resources or an attempt to keep things under control and prevent chaos (there seems to be terrible coordination problems on the ground even without any incoming foreign help).  However, it is misleading and bad intentioned to portray this as if Turkey just refused Israel, tying this to regional politics and diplomacy.  I don’t think it is too much to ask to focus on the survivors in Van rather than Israel’s hurt feelings due to “rejection of help offer.”

Finally, there are those who try to prioritize the ethnic problems and the PKK over the devastation.  The region where disaster hit is predominantly Kurdish, and the quake happened at a very tense time, days after 24 members of the military died in attacks by the PKK.  Yes, there is a political problem in Turkey over ethnic differences; however a disaster calls for transcending the differences and uniting over the common ground, humanity.  I was maddened when I saw a hashtag that calls for boycotting “Sarmasik” become trending topic in twitter Turkey.  This is a social aid organization, a legitimate and legal one, based in Diyarbakir, another province in the region.  Just because the chair happens to be the BDP (Pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party) mayor of Diyarbakir, some people argued any donations to this organization would go to the PKK.  How stupid is this?  This is an organization in the region, they can probably be quite effective in getting aid to the disaster area and distributing it compared to centralized organizations based in Ankara (like Kizilay).  Turkey has had its share of nonprofits that siphoned off funds collected for aid and it is normal for people to be suspicious.  But branding a legitimate organization “a terrorist organizatin”  based on its location and the people affiliated with it is wrong.

It gets worse.  There is THE UGLY side of social media.  It depresses me so much, I don’t even want to write about it.  I want to ignore it and think it doesn’t exist.  However, there are so many people who subscribe to this ugliness that I can’t avoid it.  They creep into the hole I stick my head into and find me.  They are all over social media.  They are those whose thoughts and feelings are stained by the ugly side of nationalism and they feed on the ethnic dimension of the disaster.  There are so many comments that go beyond schadenfreude, that are just nasty, it makes me lose faith in humanity (for those who know Turkish, see this).  The Turkish comments relayed that they were glad the disaster happened, they thought it was God’s work, God was punishing the Kurds for the dead soldiers.  “You support the PKK, you vote for the BDP, this is what you get” is the general sentiment.  A TV show host made some terrible comments on TV, something like “You stone the police, kill the soldiers in the mountains, and now you ask for help from the police, from the military.  You should know your place.”  When I watched the video of this tirade, I felt a twinge, I was enraged, I was also in disbelief at how she could say these.  These feelings just multiplied when I saw that many people were just endorsing her.  As others protested her for these comments, they defended this as free speech.  There is nothing defensible about what she said, it may be free speech but that doesn’t change the fact that it is utterly racist.  Racism at a time of disaster is even uglier than racism itself.

There is the other side of THE UGLY.  I saw some comments by Kurdish counterparts of the ugly Turks I was trying to ignore/avoid but couldn’t.  They ignored all those Turks who were really putting themselves out there to organize, collect, and get aid to the region and claimed that only Kurds will help Kurds and Turks just don’t care.  They criticized the government for taking it slow in getting aid (and not accepting international aid), because they wanted to punish the Kurds.  I saw in the news reports on CNNTurk and in the social media news from the region that there are serious issues with getting the aid (especially tents and blankets) to the region, to the villages in particular.  The aid that does make it to the region is not distributed efficiently and effectively -I saw images of people stopping the trucks and raiding the goods in the back.  Both the central government and the local government are failing in this regard, and I heard that the office of the governor and the BDP led mayor’s office have been having trouble in working together (due to political differences).  However, I believe that claiming that the ethnicity of the survivors has something to do with these problems is a very malintentioned reading of what’s been going on.  If anything, the AKP government would go all out in helping the region to gain the people’s sympathy in hopes to win some of the BDP votes in the future.  Beyond any humanitarianism, the AKP government is opportunistic enough to try to turn this crisis into gains in the next elections and they will do whatever they can to show the people that the government cares for them.  They are very bad at logistics, that’s another story.

Following the disaster from afar has given me conflicting feelings.  Beyond the obvious sadness, I felt hopeful, appreciative and thankful, angry, furious and disgusted at the same time.  The 1999 earthquake was a milestone in Turkish-Greek relationship, it was the beginning of improved the relationships.  I wonder what the 2011 earthquake will mean for Turkish-Kurdish relationships.  It is too early to tell and I don’t want to delve on it now -it must be obvious that I think we should be focusing on the suffering people in Van rather than politics.  I just hope that the good conquers the bad and the ugly, now.