(Hürriyet Newspaper, 29 July 2020)
Eritrian nightmare click here for previous TNT
reporting on this adventure.
Accidental Turk sailors with Djibouti Turkish
Ambassador (he's the one who didn't lose 14
kilos).
Turkish amateur sailors Selim Ekmekçioğlu, İbrahim Iğnak and Lütfi
Erman Atamer were taken prisoner in Eritrea in the southern Red Sea
as they returned from a world tour in Ekmekçioğlu's 'Murat Reis'
catamaran. Now back in Turkey, Iğnak has told his story to Hürriyet:
When they took us to the island, it was like nothing any of us had
ever seen or known about in our lives. The mentality of the soldiers
in Eritrea is nothing like that of the Turkish soldiers we know. They
wore no uniforms and there was no hierarchy. Neither were there any
clocks or calendars on the island, which they claimed was a military
base! For food, we had only watery lentils, rice, cabbage stew and
macaroni. I lost 14 kilograms!
Our ambassador to Eritrea and other Turkish officials put enough
pressure on the Eritreans to get three cows slaughtered for us,
which pleased the soldiers guarding us to no end because they'd
never eaten such meat in their lives and they thanked us for it.
There is no bathing culture or anything like hot and cold water.
All the water is hot there. For them, a bath is just pouring water
over your head wherever you happen to be. Nevertheless, they
gave us lots of soap and detergent powder.
Iğnak, left and right (!), with Hürriyet's Umut Veis
Drinking water is one's most important personal possession. As
for relieving ourselves, we just put a can under our arm and
walked to somewhere private. There are two big water tanks -
one holds 500 kilograms and the other 700 kilograms. One holds
drinking water and the other water for general needs. But there's
really no difference between them. At night the camels would
come, lift off the covers and drink from the tanks.
For 56 nights at this 'military base' we slept out in the open on
chaise longue-type cots without any blankets, sheets or pillows.
There was no medicine at all or anything approaching a health
clinic. I got a really bad case of diarrhea, the worst of my life.
They gave me 'oralet' (like Tang), salt and oranges for it. If it
wasn't for WHO and UNESCO aid, there would be no medical
items at all.
There is a dilapidated command building that the Chinese are
repairing and it has a generator. Electricity is available for
specific times but none at night, when it's pitch black. They
(soldiers) have a few mobile generators they use for own work.
We fell into this situation because of a number of mistakes that
Selim (Ekmekçioğlu) made. He claimed that the satellite
telephone on the 'Murat Reis' was too expensive to use and he
wouldn't let us call anyone. Yet he called his son in China to
get weather reports. Some of the catamaran's machines were
faulty and there was no radio. But he didn't tell us anything
about these deficiencies beforehand. Since I trusted him I
didn't check them out first when we joined him in Sri Lanka.
The Turkish Ambassador in Djibouti, Levent Bey, was very
helpful, as were all of our Turkish officials. I was going to
get back on my own from Djibouti but I would have had to
sit out a 14-day COVID-19 quarantine there so I decided to
come back on the 'Murat Reis' after it was repaired and
provisions loaded.
Selim (Ekmekçioğlu) was pretty depressed during captivity
and he said to me 'leave me to these guys or kill me, or I'll
kill myself.' But I supported him and got him to forget about
suicide."
//END//
Hiç yorum yok:
Yorum Gönder