Earthquake Victim Fikri Töre from Turabdin in Adiyaman: Türkiye’s First Aramean Tour Guide
- Post 11 February 2023
On 6 February 2023, a 7.8-magnitude earthquake hit Türkiye and Syria, causing tens of thousands of dead victims. After a long and desperate search, Fikri Töre (27) from Midin, a beloved WCA Representative in the Turabdin region in Southeast Türkiye, was finally found lifeless on Wednesday night under the debris of the Isias hotel in Adiyaman.
On Sunday, Fikri and a group of tour guides from all over Türkiye had just left their tour in Midyat, Turabdin, to arrive at the Isias hotel in Adiyaman. When the earthquake hit this region a couple of times, starting on Monday around 4 a.m., huge swaths of Türkiye and Syria were struck. While Fikri and his group were asleep, the hotel collapsed and turned to rubble.
Fikri could not be reached, nor had anyone seen him. Hopeful, yet full of worries, his mother, brother and cousin immediately drove to Adiyaman in the morning. In the next days, they witnessed a horrific apocalypse in this city, where countless buildings had fallen to dust and the survivors were heard wailing in desperation to find their loved ones with their bear hands from under the debris, while the smell of dead bodies hang all around this ghost city.
Nobody was able to provide reliable information about Fikri and his wellbeing, and his loved ones kept desperately searching for him one hospital after another in Türkiye – from Adiyaman to Mersin, and from Istanbul to Ankara. The WCA reached out to Ankara for help, but he could not be found in the records of any hospital throughout the country.
On the first day, rumors and documents began to spread on social media which falsely claimed that Fikri was found, rescued and brought to a hospital. Due to the great chaos in the whole earthquake affected region, it was a race against time to find Fikri alive. It took three days until the remains of the hotel he stayed in was searched through completely by an expert team of Turkish Cypriots who were looking for their nationals, members of a volleyball team.
On Wednesday night, the shocking news was broken live on air to the Arameans worldwide. The WCA President Johny Messo, who was in close contact with the family to help trace Fikri, took part in a live fundraising program for the earthquake victims. As soon as Fikri’s body was found, he received a horrifying call from Fikri’s cousin Daniel who was at the site, paralyzing Johny who realized that he lost a dear friend and colleague. When the viewers witnessed this scene live, it immediately sent a chilling shockwave through the entire community worldwide.
Fikri’s body was found under the debris, a little after that of his roommate. After Yuhanon identified his brother, the family brought Fikri to a local hospital for his records. The next morning, they drove him home to his birthplace Midin, where the heartbroken village embraced the corpse of their departed son.
The WCA not just lost a coworker, but an ambitious young man who was fired up to contribute much to the tourism industry in the Turabdin region. Fikri was a fresh tour guide. He will always be remembered as the first Aramean Aramaic-speaking tour guide of Türkiye! We wish his family angelic patience, divine strength and hope for a reunion in heaven!
The funeral will take place tomorrow, Sunday 12 February, at 1:30 pm local time (11:30 am CET) in the St. Jacob Church in Midin. It will be broadcast LIVE by Suryoyo Sat.
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FIKRI & WCA
In 2020, 2021 and 2022, we granted Fikri scholarships for his university study of Culture and Tourism in Çanakkale; last year, he was one of 25 Aramean students from Turabdin whom we supported. As we believed in Fikri and he believed in the WCA, we began working successfully together. Sadly, we cannot continue and fulfill our joint mission together.
To illustrate our fruitful cooperation, let us mention just these 7 noteworthy examples:
- In March 2022, Fikri recommended the WCA President to ask Türkiye’s Minister of Culture and Tourism to add Aramaic as a language for certified tour guides in Türkiye. Later, letters were sent to the Ministry and we have come close to maybe realize this.
- In June 2022, we invited Fikri to be part of the WCA’s delegation on a historic mission with government officials and experts from Ankara and Midyat to inspect the sites in Turabdin which Türkiye requests UNESCO to recognize and promote (photos: pp. 4-5).
- In July 2022, WCA helped save the Harvest of Midin after Fikri requested this on behalf of his village: 42 Aramean farmer families were delighted with our assistance and Fikri coordinated this project locally on WCA’s behalf (photos: p. 7)!
- In November 2022, we invited Fikri again, this time to join us on our amazing Turabdin Youth Trip so that he could gain practical experience because he was about to become Türkiye’s first Aramean Aramaic-speaking tour guide! See these photos and video.
- On 27 November 2022, the WCA Youth Academy, of which Fikri was a proud member, organized an event where he spoke as a native of Midin about the life in Turabdin.
- In December 2022, we requested Fikri to coordinate on our behalf the annual WCA Christmas Gifts that were sent to 708 Aramean children in Turabdin!
- Shortly before, he had completed his study and we began to organize our 5th Turabdin Trip, now to enjoy a traditional Easter Celebration in Turabdin from 11-18 April 2023 (a few other trips and projects for 2023 are still in the pipeline!), and Fikri very much looked forward to this trip and be our official Aramean Aramaic-speaking tour guide!
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Download the Press Release here in PDF.
