I woke up this morning and headed to the Assyrian Church who promptly let me in at 9am. In a pleasant oriental mix, the church floor was covered in carpets making it necessary to remove one’s shoes. Granted people still sat in pews, it was a comfortable change. Women sat on the left with their hair covered and men on the right. A group of young girls in embroidered scarves sung in Aramaic during the service while the male children served as alter boys while the youngest just wandered around the alter getting in the way. In total, there were about 15 to 20 people representing about 5 or 6 families in the entire city. Unfortunately, there church seems low on money. There was a single heating lamp which people occasionally walked up to during the service but most just wore their jackets and scarves. Any church as unique as this would be open all day in Western Turkey or elsewhere but here, with a lack of tourists, it seems the church is just able to stay above water.

Afterwards, I was treated to a delicious breakfast of triangular Kurdish bread with honey, absolutely mouthwatering local cheese and the usual tea to drink. From there I was invited to play soccer in the church’s courtyard with the congregation. It was the first time I’ve ever played. From there we walked downtown to a cafe and I later met Mehmet, my translator from the previous day. We went to a typical smoke filled teahouse where men played dominoes and cards apparently for money. He complained again of a lack of books.

After two cokes and a lot of talking, we left to meet my Christian friend from earlier, Murat, and his Muslim friend Mahmoud. We ate at a local restaurant where I had the always fabulous yogurt kebab. They took me to their favorite cafe again where people immediately became interested in the only English speaker. Within no time, nearby tables migrated to ours as everyone tried out their few phrases of broken English. I met a number of local students who could just have easily been American or German. All except one were Kurdish. There was a single Turk from near Trabzon who’d come to the university to study chemistry. She said it felt strange being in Diyarbakir as the city is about 95% Kurdish although the university is in Turkish. She was picking up Kurdish quickly.

Given the group, I was hesitant to bring up politics this time yet I was quickly asked what I thought about Turkey and the EU. Everyone seemed very interested. Expressing my support, I did say that I found it unlikely Europe would accept them although I and America both support Turkish entry. Having let them open the topic, I moved on to Iraq. Again, I found overwhelming support for the liberation of Iraq and great excitement about the now free Kurdistan. As expected, everyone was not only in full support of an independent Kurdistan, but wanted to join with them as soon as it happened.

Although I have a Turkish visa and Turkish Airlines ticket stubs, Diyarbakir hardly seems to be a part of Turkey. A one Kurd joked, 95% of the city is Kurdish, the other 5% are Turkish soldiers. Indeed, there is a unusual military presence throughout the city. As I walked through some of the residential areas, every few blocks a random apartment building was marked as military with machine gun wielding soldiers behind sandbags smoking and playing with their cell phones. I also spied a few outright bases as well. Try to imagine, if you can, any nondescript residential area sprinkled with military, hardly a sign of a stable government presence. Walking past an apartment building, military installation and then normal apartment building, I thought back to my time in the West Bank. Here, Turks are an unpopular minority occupier. While Kurds I met in Istanbul were disinterested in any independent Kurdistan, this poor and disconnected region has little to bind them to Turkey proper. One would think the Turkish government would have learned to create stakeholders.

To finish up, I was begged to stay another day by my Christian hosts who’re picking me up at 10 for breakfast and hamam. Then I’ve been invited by someone else for lunch and yet another for dinner. I’ve been practically kidnapped. In addition, I was also invited to a university English class but since everyone else seems to be organizing my day, whether I’m actually going or not is uncertain.

Last year at this time, a funeral for slain PKK fighters turned into a major riot here in Diyarbakir. Barricades were built, tires burnt, protesters shot and the military called in. Walking and talking my way through Diyarbakir today, Turkey’s tenuous grip on its Kurds and the possibility of disintegration is real. While life goes on as normal on the surface, a sudden and unpredictable collapse (as in the USSR) along ethnic lines could very well happen and Iraqi Kurdistan may have already lit the fuse.

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