Full Moon over Noah's Ark

by Rick Antonson

  Journalist Joe Klein noted in Time magazine: “There is not a politician, policymaker, or journalist who hasn’t been wrong about Iraq at some point,” a comment arguably applicable to the entire Middle East.

  9 A decade after Parrot’s visit, in 1840, a devastating earthquake along with volcanic activity and a resulting landslide destroyed the village of Ahora and the Monastery of Saint Jacob on the north side, and killed 10,000 people (also obliterating Parrot’s original route).

  10 In the eyes of some (and the author treads on shifting ground here), the Sunni and Shia doctrinal and practical differences get a nodding comparison to the at times severe relationship between Catholics and Protestants; much spilled blood, yet as they’ve lived in the same neighborhoods, intermarried, and lived peacefully.

  FIVE

  WOMEN OF ARARAT

  “Is it a terrorist that speaks your language?”

  —Documentary, The Women of Mount Ararat

  Murat and I, like all the passengers on the Van Gölü Express, found ourselves disembarking at Elazig early the next morning. We left our couchette feeling goodbyes could be saved for later, when we were on the platform. But the train-to-bus arrangements were not as smooth as I anticipated. Once we were on the platform, in the midst of the chaos, Murat merged into the crowd, and I found myself stranded with the other passengers.

  “Where is the bus?” an Asian traveler asked me.

  I couldn’t help. A Turkish man, dressed in a suit as though headed to work, noticed our dilemma and motioned across the parking lot. “You will find there a station. It is down the road a walk. That is where you want.”

  Two dozen travelers and their gear headed out toward the destination. Once inside the cavernous depot, everyone dispersed in search of a connection.

  With great expectations I approached three waiting buses, motors running in the open-air, high-roofed parking lot. None of the signs said what I hoped to see: “Tatvan.” Standing alone, propped up by my orange pack, I was a beacon in search of a ride. A bus pulled in. It did not display a sign indicating any destination but already had twenty people on board. The door swung open, and a female bus driver looked down at me.

  I could have asked myself why many Western politicians so often think of hijab-wearing women as hiding something. I might have asked why Westerners on the religious right so often think “Muslim = extremism.” I could even have asked myself why a woman here had what is traditionally considered a man’s job. I’d heard it condescendingly phrased as: “You have your fingers in dough. Why do you poke your nose in a man’s job?”

  But I actually thought of none of those things. What I wondered about in the seconds after she opened the door to me was if this woman seeking personal independence was also among those striving for Kurdish independence from Turkish rule. It was not an inappropriate question to ponder, so why was I surprised when she spoke to me in my own language?

  “Tatvan?” I asked.

  “Tatvan,” she confirmed. Down she came, unlocking the luggage compartment leading to the bus’s chassis holding bin and helping me slip the backpack in. “You are from where?” she asked, then answered herself: “Not from here.” There was no judgment in either her timbre or her words. Why had I expected such a thing?

  Eastern Turkey is an area where females are encouraged to not leave the household behind to pursue a career. Illiteracy among women is much higher than it is among men. The need for educated words is still seen as less important to women for whom men wish to speak.

  I boarded. No money changed hands.

  The bus was surprisingly comfortable—I had half-assumed that I would be enduring a rickety, bone-clatteringly bumpy ride. In lands that are so old, Westerners’ views and expectations can quickly be proven outdated, or just flat-out wrong.

  860 to 590 BCE, the Kingdom of Urartu (approximating the geographical region of Urartu). Scholars debate translations of ancient, vowelless texts showing that “the ark came to rest on the mountains of rrt,” where “rrt” could be “uRaRTu” or, later, “aRaRaT.” A similar geographical area referenced as “the historical Armenian kingdom” was a continuation of the Kingdom of Urartu, also known as the “Kingdom of Van.”

  To approach Tatvan is to traverse overlain land claims, revisionist history, and the flow of kingdoms into and out of history, all on the same footprint of ground. I found it puzzling—and like most puzzles, it can be explained only when finished, and I had just gotten on the bus. Still, I spent a good part of the trip thinking about what I already knew.

  Mesopotamia (3500 to 1000 BCE) is a name many Westerners know, a region that long ago had established borders in the land I was now traveling through. Centuries later came the Kingdom of Urartu, where Lake Van and Mount Ararat were politically housed. I’d recently learned a new word: toponyms. “The toponyms Armenia and Urartu are synonyms for the same country.” Yet neither ancient Urartu of 860 to circa 590 BCE or the ancient Armenian kingdom, circa 600 BCE, which evolved into Greater Armenia, 190 BCE to 428 CE, jibe closely with modern Armenia’s borders. Both historic regions do, however, shelter parts of Armenia’s assertion of grander borders.

  As the bus arrived near Tatvan hours later, I clung to a fading hope of catching the ferry, which was scheduled to leave mid-afternoon. When I mentioned this to the bus driver, she chuckled. “Ferry leaves when ferry leaves.”

  Coming into the town, we had a view of the lake and I saw, a quarter mile from the dock, the ferry. It looked to be arriving according to schedule. As I watched it, however, I realized that the ferry was getting smaller as it moved into Lake Van. Outbound.

  I pointed this out to the driver, who noticed my disappointment. “Next ferry,” she replied.

  “Today?” I asked.

  “Today, yes.”

  Tatvan is a good-sized town, a mile of highway doubling as its main street with business and residential buildings along the way, some several stories high and others one-business tall and wide. We slowed with all the cars in our way, ones that had been absent on the open road. The bus driver pulled over beside a line of parked cars. “There is shop. Ticket. For ferry. Or for bus to Van.”

  Disembarking, I nodded to her wave and walked into a near-empty store with a service counter. “A ticket please, for tonight’s ferry,” I said, dropping my small pack to rest on the larger bag. The clerk looked at me from where he sat at a knee-high round table with two small coffee cups on it. The top buttons of his shirt were undone, and he looked uncomfortably warm. He picked up his coffee, slurped what was left of it, and averted his eyes.

  “There is no more ferry,” said a short woman who’d been sitting with him when I arrived. Her eyes held the hope of a cash transaction.

  “Yes, I saw it leaving,” I agreed. “But for tonight’s—the next one. I’d like a ticket, please.”

  “No more ferry,” she said. “Maybe tomorrow. No train now. No freight. No ferry.”

  “I need to get to Van,” I protested.

  “Yes, you can get to Van,” she assured me.

  “Bus?”

  “Bus for day has left. You got off it. Next is late. Tonight. Maybe tomorrow.”

  “How …?”

  “Taxi. There is a taxi. You can find around the corner. Go there.”

  I departed pulling my duffle bag on wheels, bumping along the uncertain sidewalk to the street corner where I turned left. There, as promised, waited a taxi with a young man leaning on the hood.

  “Taxi to Van?” I asked.

  “You should take the ferry,” he replied.

  I sighed. “How much for your taxi to Van?”

  “There is a bus tomorrow.”

  “Do you drive a taxi?”

  “It is long way for taxi. So …” He did not finish.

  “Let’s go,” I said. We swung my gear into the trunk of his taxi and were off.

  The drive through the rolling countryside along the southern shores of Lake Van gave me a relaxing sense of openness. If he had wanted to, Naim, my
driver, could have beat the ferry’s crossing time, but that was clearly not his game. Naim’s afternoon had just become a day out of Tatvan’s snarl of traffic, and with greater revenue. He rambled. “You are good to take time. We will stop for lunch.”

  We were in the Muslim calendar’s ninth month, and fasting for Ramadan (in Turkey referred to as Ramazan) had begun. One hour along our route, Naim, a Muslim, suggested that it was the time of day when I should be hungry. His friends had a roadside food stand ahead. “You eat,” he urged. “I will be waiting. Is Ramazan.”

  He spoke about the food like a hungry waiter rattling on about a menu off-limits to staff. I imagined a Western take-out kebab and wrapped shawarma as I knew it. Naim talked as though he had just taken a bite of it. “The rice is what people notice. The taste is mint, usually. Other spices too, like cinnamon.” His words were moist with saliva.

  After some thought he added, “Always, almost, shla is there—like stew, and if chicken is available, that and rice make a very fine soup. Soup. Always on. For Kurdish meal, always there is bread. Everywhere here you will find bread, naan, or thicker bread that is also flat, not risen. Even during Ramazan it is fresh-smelling in mornings … that is tough.”

  “You observe Ramazan?”

  “Oh yes.” A breeze carried away his whispered, “Usually.”

  We pulled onto gravel siding where a shelter offered protection from the sun. Flimsy posts held up a tarp, under which several tables waited. Behind the tarp was a dining place out of the view of anyone driving by. Naim took me inside to the owner-cook, a stocky woman with a confident smile, who took my order and asked if I’d like to sit inside. I missed her cue.

  “Outside is best. Fresh air,” I replied.

  Diced and grilled beef was served on a plate for one, placed in front of me and slightly out of reach for Naim. The longer it sizzled, the more it made its own delicious gravy. Beside this were stuffed leaves.

  “Ekmek it is.” Naim looked at it hungrily. “And dolmetes.”

  There was plenty of food on my plate. At first bite I sensed it had been cooked to tenderness, perhaps after marinating a long time in an herb concoction. Without thinking, I instinctively moved the plate over to share.

  “Is problem,” Nain said.

  “My apologies.” How could I forget so quickly? I wondered.

  “Should we go inside?” he asked.

  “I’m fine here,” I said, clueless to my second cue.

  A car passed, leaving the roadway clear of onlookers. Naim reached across and took a piece of meat and ate it. As the savory taste settled in his mouth he grinned and suggested, “We should go inside.”

  Inside (and out of sight of anyone who might have given Naim a disapproving look), our meal was shared openly between the two of us, with the blessing of our host. She promptly put a place setting in front of Naim. “It is not uncommon to break with Ramazan if you think of a different world,” my taxi driver said as he reached for my plate with a fork.

  The woman added, “But … one needs to show respect.”

  Later, as we continued our drive alongside teal-blue Lake Van, a large island came into view. Naim said, “It is Armenian.”

  “Here?” I was a bit confused.

  “Not from now, but from palace built by bishop. We are where Armenia was over one thousand years ago. Then Armenia included here. Now it does not. This is island with Palace of Aght’amar. Now, in ruins. Ruins but restored. Parts. It is called Akdamar Island.”

  He sounded proud of this fact, rather than defensive of his own country’s hold on the land.

  “In Armenian eyes, Greater Armenia includes Akdamar Island.”

  “Do you have Armenian friends?” I asked.

  “I am Kurdish. We too think this land should be ours. Some Armenians are also Kurdish. Most are not. Some are Muslim, most are Christian. My friends are both.”

  I assumed he meant “either,” not “both,” but my knowing seven Turkish words was no ground for correcting his competent English.

  Having heard that statement before, I asked, “What do you mean? Are you not Turkish first? Then Kurdish?”

  “Both,” he said. “There are maybe thirty million Kurdish people. But we have no country.” He paused a bit, as though I should ask for more information before it was polite for him to provide it. “This, where we travel, it will one day maybe be part of Greater Kurdistan.”

  “You must all have much in common, these Kurdish ties,” I said, thinking of song and language bringing the Kurdish people together.

  “They are not ‘ties,’” he said. “They are us. It is who we are. But in Turkey, Kurdish people cannot sing certain songs, or write names with certain letters from our own alphabet. Is prohibited. Because Turkish make rules. And Turkish are afraid of Kurdish.”

  My thoughts swirled. Turkey, where I knew I was, held these lands tenuously against the remembrances of a Greater Armenia that once existed, and against the vision of a Greater Kurdistan that never has.

  Upon reaching the outskirts of Van, Naim overshot the entrance to the Merit Şahmaran and had to retrace the last mile more slowly. The hotel’s name was on a sign tucked back a little. Naim pulled through an entranceway under a portico.

  We patted one another on the shoulder in a nervous goodbye, one of acquaintances but not friends. I reached in my pocket where I’d earlier put about as much cash as he’d told me to expect for the fare. I had a bit more than the final price and, the trip having been enjoyable for both of us, I passed it all to him in a handshake. It was equivalent to the cost of a cross-town taxi in a major western city.

  200 BCE marked the emergence of Greater Armenia (also written of as Major Armenia and the Kingdom of Armenia in various contexts), which existed in one form or another as late as the sixteenth century CE.

  As he drove away I walked into the hotel’s high-ceilinged, brightly-lit lobby with a balustrade swinging upward off to my right. Tall windows ahead looked onto a pool in an outdoor dining area. Beyond the tables was the shore of the mile-deep, alkaline Lake Van. The dining area was empty as staff smoothed tablecloths and placed food-warming units on a buffet table.

  The cleanliness of the hotel was a stark and sudden reminder that I hadn’t showered in the last two days.

  In the lobby, from behind the check-in counter, a smartly dressed young woman in a pressed shirt smiled and greeted me: “Buyurun.”

  “Hello, Emre,” I said, prompted by her nametag. “I understand you’ve one nice room left, with a view of the lake and away from the road noise. Not too close to the kitchen air vents,” I continued, hoping that perhaps she could provide an upgrade from my modest booking.

  “We have only a Mr. Antonson left to check in this evening. You are him, no?”

  “Yes to your no,” I said, immediately feeling silly that I’d made fun of Emre’s English when my Turkish fell between fumbling and nonexistent.

  “Yes then, we have a room for you.” In an afterthought she said, “You seem tired.”

  I realized that Emre was practicing her English on me. Seizing the opportunity I said, “I want to ask a favor, Emre, since you speak good English.”

  She smiled again, her head making a shy nod. “Depends,” she said. “Depends on how I can help with favor.”

  “I have a map to show you. I need advice to get overland to Iraq, from here to the border.”

  “You cannot go there,” she said, adding rather confusingly, “but I don’t know how to not go there.”

  A young man had entered the check-in area. He also wore a pressed white shirt and carried an easy demeanor. Emre called him over. “Aysenur, he can help you. He will know what you don’t know.”

  Aysenur adjusted his nametag, knowing I would need to see his name spelled out if there was any hope of recalling it later.

  “I heard your situation,” he offered. “And people from the West, it would be not good to take bus that southward in the eastern mountains. Anyway,” he said as if practicing slang, “th
at shorter route is blocked by military. It is not actually short. There is fighting. Some die. You take long route instead. Two bus days.”

  I pulled my map out of the daypack and spread it across the counter before either of them could leave. The absence of other patrons meant I had their attention. My shower could wait. I pointed to my intended route.

  “That road is dangerous one,” confirmed Aysenur.

  “Yes, that road is dangerous, Richard,” added Emre, who had picked up my full name from the passport I’d placed on the counter for check-in. “Fighters, they are fierce. Fierce men. Women too.”

  Aysenur drew his finger along the road that ran south from Van and east into the mountains, heading south to Hakkari, then west to Sirnak, ending at the Turkish border town of Cizre. Across the boundary sat Zakho—in Iraq. Drawing his finger along the road to Hakkari, he said, “It is here that the PKK fight with the Turkish government forces. Days at a time, right now weeks, that road is not one you can passable.” I liked his newly coined phrases, and tried to store them away in a mind place where I could remember them later.

  The danger sparked a thought about the letter in my packet. “Do either of you read Farsi?”

  They shook their heads in unison. Aysenur continued tracing the longer route, suggesting that I could leave from Van back toward Tatvan, then Bitlis to Siirt, using that route to get to the Cizre border town in a more circuitous manner. “It is this way you must go, if you go. But you cannot go. It is not to be workable. It would not come to be. You would not be let into Iraq.”

  Disappointment must have shown on my face, as Aysenur was quick to offer solace. “Turkey is beautiful country. I can show you elsewhere to go.”

  “But I don’t want to go elsewhere,” I said. “I want to go to Iraq.”

  Aysenur replied with what every stranger stuck in a strange land wishes to hear: “I think I have an idea.” He hesitated. “I am not here tomorrow. My cousin is away for two days. Then I am back. You can fly. That is it, Richard! You can fly from here.”