KAHRAMANMARAS, Turkey, Feb 3, 2024 (BSS/AFP) - Cansu Gol lost her baby in the
rubble of Turkey's massive earthquake a year ago. Now she spends her time
trying to heal the mental scars of her two surviving children.

One suffers from trauma-related attention deficit disorder and the other from
speech problems which emerged after last year's February 6 disaster in which
50,000 died across Turkey's southeast.

For the 33-year-old mother, the improvised schools in a container city near
the quake's epicentre in the province of Kahramanmaras offer a glimmer of
hope.

"My seven-year-old daughter was pulled out alive from the rubble hours after
the earthquake. Now she is suffering from attention deficit disorder," Gol
told AFP.

"She didn't cry or scream at all, instead storing all the stress inside," she
said.
 
Her four-and-a-half-year-old son began to speak after joining a nursery set
up in one of the containers housing hundreds of thousands of survivors of
Turkey's deadliest disaster of modern times.

"He keeps asking about his brother (who died). He says he flew away like a
bird," the mother said.

- Bouts of violence -

Teachers try to create an atmosphere of normality for the kids, each one of
whom has lost homes, family and friends. All have varied levels of
understanding what actually occurred.

A bust of post-Ottoman Turkey's founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, stands in the
courtyard, just as it would at any other school.

The 20-student classrooms are decorated with balloons, adding colour to a
camp comprised of hundreds of identical white metal containers arranged in
even rows.

Just a 10-minute walk away, empty spaces recall the apartment towers that
stood in this Mediterranean city, once most famous for its ice cream.

"It is just as painful for the students as it is for the teachers," said the
school's principal, who spoke to AFP on condition of anonymity because civil
servants are barred from speaking to the media without authorisation.

"Many things evoke the quake: aftershocks, the month of February or simply
the snowfall," which was heavy that fatal night, he said.

His school takes care of 850 children from diverse backgrounds.

They live in a container city housing 10,000 survivors, creating a tense
atmosphere that breeds occasional bouts of violence.

"Cursing, offensive gestures, kicking -- things won't go well until these
families are settled in apartments," he said.

- 'Ghost city' -

The principal said the state was doing its best, even housing teachers in the
container cities so they can be near the kids.

"In which disaster is everything perfect?" he asked. "Life goes on."

But that life, said Sara Resitoglu, 24, is a constant struggle.

"There's no space. All our lives are in one room," the young mother sighed.

Elif Yavuz and her husband tried to rebuild their lives in the nearby city of
Mersin, following the path taken by more than three million people who left
immediately after the quake.

But like many others, the couple eventually moved back because their seven-
year-old, who has heart problems, struggled to adapt.

"I resigned myself to returning and living in a container just so that she
would not be upset," the mother said.

Her daughter was now doing well in school. Yavuz plans to buy her a new pair
of shoes as a reward for another excellent report card.

Away from the container camp, Fatih Yilanci joined the multitudes who spend
days scouring city ruins for scrap metal they can sell to feed their
families.

His apartment was only lightly damaged, meaning that his family did not
automatically qualify for a container home.

But his neighbourhood is gone, as are most of his friends, who died in the
ruins.

"Kahramanmaras has turned into a ghost city," Yilanci said.