HOPE SPRINGS
Our homes were turned to rubble by deadly earthquake but now we’re rebuilding thanks to generous Sun readers
HER once-neat home reduced to rubble by Turkey’s deadly earth- quake, mum-of-three Selver Erpirti had lost everything.
Yet rather than dwell on her misfortune, Selver instead joined rescue teams and dug through mounds of debris with her bare hands in a desperate search for survivors.
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The former shop assistant, 34, remembered: “People trapped under buildings were screaming and there were bodies everywhere. My children were so traumatised.”
Now — six months on from the giant quake — Selver’s family are slowly rebuilding their lives with help from the Red Cross and more than £1.8million donated by you, caring Sun readers.
Home for Selver and children Talha, three, and Hazal, 15, is now a three-roomed shipping container not far from her old property in Kahramanmaras, close to the quake’s epicentre. Her other youngster, Baran, 13, lives with her grandparents.
The family has received food, clothes, bedding and blankets with the help of local Red Cross volunteers — and the container has recently been provided with creature comforts including a washing machine and TV.
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Single mum Selver told me: “It feels like a home now, not a container. The children are happy.
“We’re grateful to all the Sun readers who donated money. It was very kind to support us.”
Urgent help is still needed by thousands
The latest welcome addition to their home provided by the Red Cross is an air-conditioning unit — vital as temperatures nudge 40C.
Conditions in central Turkey are markedly different from the freezing early hours of February 6, when a 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck the country and neigh- bouring Syria at 4.17am.
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Tower blocks buckled and pancaked down on themselves.
Family homes were turned to matchwood and smashed masonry, trapping families “like being alive in a coffin”.
Mum Selver vividly recalls: “We felt our house shaking and then there was darkness.
“We couldn’t get out because furniture and rubble blocked the doorway, so we lay beside the sofa as the aftershocks continued.
“After an hour and a half we were rescued.”
Thousands of others weren’t so lucky. In Turkey alone more than 50,000 people perished and another 100,000 were injured. Around 345,000 homes were destroyed and four million buildings damaged.
I witnessed the devastation first-hand in Selver’s home town of Pazarcik and nearby provincial capital Kahramanmaras in the days after the quake.
A region famous for its ice cream and clothes factories, much of the urban area was flattened.
White sheets were held up to give the deceased some dignity as weeping family members helped hoist their loved ones from the rubble.
Mortuary teams and cemeteries were overwhelmed.
And shell-shocked survivors slept in their cars or by the roadside in makeshift shelters as temperatures dipped towards -10C. As powerful after-shocks continued to ripple through the region, survivors prayed the outside world hadn’t forgotten them.
Red Cross teams were soon on the ground preparing emergency food drops and hygiene kits.
Moved by their plight, you, our big-hearted Sun readers, began donating to our earthquake appeal in aid of the Red Cross.
Our fund — today totalling a magnificent £1,854,174 — was soon helping the charity support the needy on the ground.
The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement gave 416million hot meals as well as blankets, hygiene kits and baby clothes.
And 2,800 containers — like the one Selver’s family now live in — were provided as temporary new homes.
The charity’s specialist psychologists have also given solace to those left bereaved, homeless and without possessions. Mike Adamson, chief exec of the British Red Cross, said: “Our teams were on the ground immediately and have helped 6.5million people with shelter, food, clean water and psychological support.
“We are so grateful to Sun readers for their kindness and donations, especially when times are so hard.
“Your generosity means we can continue to support the families who lost everything.”
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Yet urgent help is still needed by thousands trying to rebuild their fractured lives.
Speaking at her container home, Selver added: “My children’s school was destroyed in the earthquake. They still haven’t gone back to classes six months on.
“I lost my job at a dress shop so we rely on charity. We’re very thankful for all we have received but we still need help.”
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The Red Cross’s head of delegation in Turkey, Ruben Cano, said many “are still struggling with their day-to-day needs, including paying for food, rent and other necessities. A normal life is still far from reach.”
Another person living in the Pazarcik container city and receiving Red Cross aid is Mehmet Ali.
The self-employed handyman, in his 20s, revealed: “While the container city doesn’t exactly feel like home, it’s still accommodating us during these hard times. Things are so much better now than earlier in the year.”
He wants to get married to his fiancee next year, but says: “You can’t get married in a container but our hearts are strong.” At her container home in Hatay Province, survivor Zahide Celikyurek tells how Red Cross handouts have “brought her great joy”.
Weeping, the mum in her 40s described her family as “fortunate” to receive the cash donation for food and household goods.
The fortitude of Zahide and others is inspiring in a land where survivors were still being pulled alive from the rubble 12 days after the earthquake.
Babies became split up from their families — their identities unknown — while others were left orphaned.
One such story, however, had a brighter ending.
A dirty-faced tot pulled from a collapsed building in Hatay Province after five days — and featured on the front page of The Sun — was believed to have been orphaned. Given the name Gizem, meaning “mystery” in Turkish, it was believed the three-month-old’s family had all perished in the quake.
But DNA tests proved her mother Yasemin Begdas was alive and recuperating in hospital.
After 54 days the pair were reunited in tearful scenes.
The baby — real name Vetin — lost her father and two brothers and yet now she will embark on life at her mother’s side.
Survivor Emrah Konac told me by telephone how the Red Cross has given his young family a lifeline.
The construction worker, 33, from Gaziantep, southern Turkey, is still haunted by the wave of destruction unleashed by the mammoth quake.
The dad of five told The Sun: “We were all sound asleep at home when the walls started shaking. My children were screaming as we ran outside. The house was destroyed with all our belongings inside. We just felt lucky to be alive.”
In a bitter wind and with temperatures well below freezing, Emrah huddled in a tent on waste ground with wife Peyam, 31, and children Nurhan, 12, Suna, 11, Orhan, ten, seven-year-old Sahin and Zeynep, three.
Hungry and thirsty, they received food and water handouts from charities including the Red Cross.
After a week in the leaky tent, they were offered a ramshackle building to use as a temporary home by a family member 440 miles north in Turkish capital Ankara.
His voice wracked with emotion, Emrah said: “We drove my old car over the mountains and when we arrived in Ankara we had nothing.
“The Red Crescent gave us wheat, sugar, rice, cooking oil and vouchers to buy clothes and blankets. It was a lifeline.
“We are living in a shack, but it’s better than a tent.
“It’s allowed us to get back on our feet again.”
He had this message to Sun readers who donated money to our appeal: “Thank you very much to everyone who donated. It has been such a help.”
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Now the dad has a job in a recycling factory and, although life is often a struggle, is able to put food on the table for his family.
An incredible story of hope and resilience in a land that has seen so much suffering.
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