Imagining Syria - interview with a father
A Syrian man in a loose fitting button-up shirt walks in. His sandals slap echos across the floor. His movement is swift. Six men in western business attire sit with their genitals pinched between crossed legs. They smell of cologne and coffee. The man entering the room lacks a specific scent.
Before sitting, the Syrian man takes in a chest full of air. There are several small recording devices at the center of the table. Blank pieces of paper are spread about, seemingly at random. The man pulls the chair out and sits down, not pulling himself closer to the table.
Fifteen seconds melt out of the room. Finally someone speaks. A well-fed man who can’t quite get his suit jacket to stay buttoned. He makes eye contact with the other men in suits, but when he gets to the Syrian man, his eyes drop to the paper in front of him.
“Welcome, Mr. Kurdi.”
The Syrian man’s head tips. His eyes are sunken and desperate. His hands and lips are chapped deeply. There’s a thirst to him. The eye contact he makes is fleeting. His hands lay dead in his lap, palms up, fingertips slightly overlapped. It looks like he’s holding something delicate, something that no one else can see.
One of the other men clears his throat. “It’s a pleasure to have you here with us today. We all feel for your loss. Would you like to make a statement regarding your recent situation, Mr. Kurdi?”
There’s a lump in Mr. Kurdi’s neck like a recently fed snake. It slithers there for a moment and drops into his chest. He shakes his head, “No.”
The well-fed man jumps back in, stamping on the silence. “So, Mr. Kurdi, you’ve experienced an unthinkable loss. It’s no secret. The images are making global headlines. It must be difficult for you to see these images considering your position.”
Mr. Kurdi’s head rises. His eyes trace the table to where the question came from. The well-fed man is leaned in, inquisitive. Kurdi gives two slow wavelike nods.
“Well, is there anything you’d like to say about the way the media is handling this situation?”
Kurdi stares at the table. His eyes are dark. His cheeks are mostly covered with a short graying beard.
One of the suited men begins another question but Kurdi cuts him off. “They’re not different than you, right? And you’re no different than I.”
A stuttering voice comes from one of the chairs, “Ye-ye-yes, Mr. Kurdi. That’s why we brought you here. We-we-we-we’d like to hear your side of the story, firsthand.”
Kurdi comes in again, his voice bellowing more this time, “The media doesn’t handle situations. The media is meant to expose situations to the people. This is your job. Sometimes you brings attention, which can lead to the handling of a situation, but the media alone rarely handles things well. That’s not its nature. This type of media is built for entertainment. It’s built to sell commercial spots.”
The chubby man chimes back in, adjusting his open jacket around his belly. “Well, with this type of imagery, there’s no way the media isn’t going to run with it. It’s too powerful an image, as miserable as it might be. But what we’d all like to know today is – how you feel about the situation, personally.”
A woman enters the room and slides a tray of cheeses and crackers onto the table. Kurdi doesn’t react to her presence. His hands are still holding the invisible form in his lap. The conversation pauses while some of the men in suits pull from the edges of the platter. They nibble politely and pat their mouths with cloth napkins.
“You want to know how I feel?”
“Yes. We understand it’s an awful position for any parent to be in. But we’d like to hear how the situation has affected you personally. All of this must be taking its toll on you.”
“There’s no more toll to take. I’ve paid my toll. I’ve paid my toll with the lives of two of my sons and my wife. There’s no more toll.”
A squeaky voice with a bit of cheese responds, “How does a thing like this happen, Mr. Kurdi?”
“The same way all terrible things happen. The only difference is, you got to see a snap shot of this horror. It happens every day. It happens in my Africa, it happens in Asia, it happens in the west where you live.” Kurdi looks down at his watch. “It’s nine o’clock now. In a few hours, it will happen again. And again tomorrow night and next week. All of you will go back to your hotel rooms. You’ll watch television and eat more cheese and crackers. You’ll sleep and fly back home and unthinkable things will continue to happen.”
Mr. Kurdi takes half a pause, “The only difference in my case is a photo that was shared by the media. Is the publicity a good or bad thing? Yes, I believe so. Will it stop? No, probably not.”
One of the reporters: “So you believe this type of incident to be almost epidemic?”
Mr. Kurdi closes his eyes and fills up with air. “For the last few days, all of you westerners, all of you reporters have hounded me. Everyone wants to know about Aylan. You ask: How does it feel to lose your son? What will you do? You all pretend to be caring, yet you care more about this cheese than you do Syria. I saw the picture of Aylan just like any of you. My youngest son…drowned. Dead. Lying in his favorite shoes with his face in the sand. That’s not an image anyone should have to see. For you it’s a photo, but for me it’s more than a name and a headline. That child used to wake me up every morning before work. He played with blocks and had friends of his own. You don’t see that in the photo. Nor do you see my wife and five year old son who also drowned that day. You don’t see them and you don’t give a damn about them.”
“What needs to change in Syria so that things like this don’t happen again?”
“You don’t give a fuck about Syria. The west doesn’t give a fuck about anyone unless they’ve got resources to exploit. It’s not about Aylan. The troops that come to Syria, the drones that bomb Syrians, those have alternative motives. A drown three year old means nothing at the end of the day. It’s a distraction. A symptom of something much worse.”
“Mr. Kurdi, surely you believe that this needs to change.”
“It is changing. It’s changing with drone strikes and suicide bombs. It’s crumbling. If it continues, there will be nothing left to change. Whether the Islamic State is victorious, or the west, it makes no difference. Destruction and poverty is the result. The Syrian people will suffer regardless.”
“And you believe this is why people are fleeing in mass? Your family was headed for Greece, correct?”
“People are fleeing because they are no other options. A father does not put his wife and young children on an unsafe raft in the middle of the night if there are other options. You are watching desperation. You have a photograph of desperation. Drowned children washed up on the shore like garbage. To you it’s insane. You’re comfortable in your suits, with your cheese. You don’t understand life in this region. We pay for this. We beg, borrow, and steal to pay for these boats. We pray they will land safely, but we know the risks. It’s life or death. Desperation.”
“I’m not the only one. There are many men and families with burned out holes in their hearts. Aylan isn’t the first or the last. People offer sympathy because they saw a snap shot of the end of his life. I have better photos of Aylan.”
Mr. Kurdi reaches into his pocket and pulls out a wallet. He rummages through it and removes a plastic sheath of photos. His hands begin to tremble as he struggles to get them out of the plastic.
“I have them. I have photos. Playing football. Aylan’s mother. Aylan’s brother. All of us together, smiling, happy.” He holds them up, fanned out in his hands. His eyes are an empty room and they’re filling up with water. “These were more than photographs. This was my family.” He flings the photos down onto the table. “But this isn’t what you want. You don’t give a damn about the Syrian people. You’ve already got the photo you want. A drowned child in the sand. And you’ll probably blur the image before you publish it. It’s too real for the west.”
Mr. Kurdi stands up. “It’s not too real for the people of Syria. It’s not too real for me. Tonight I’ll bury Aylan. You’ll go back to your hotels. But, tonight I’ll bury my son.”
