Apocalypse in Sepia-Tone

'Keep your eyes on the sky'

September 9th , 2007

By Jack Harris
Special to Assist News

We'd been driving for an hour or so after once more enduring the border crossing at the Iraq-Turkey border. The days turn hot as the relentless summer onset approaches. This particular day however, it was mercifully cooler because of a heavy overcast with the look of possible rain showers. The landscape of Eastern Turkey is mountainous and rocky to the north and more plains-like toward the Syrian border. In the late spring the natural grasses turn brown under the oncoming summer sun and the wheat fields are white with harvest.

As we drove along the Syrian-Turkish border, to the South (out of southern Iraq) a strange thick brown cloud was rising below the overcast and began to spread like a coffee stain across the sky. Dust storm, I thought to myself; and perhaps it was, but it was the singular most bizarre phenomenon I have ever encountered here. It continued to rise higher and spread out across the sky, mingling itself with the soft pewter cloud-cast overhead; the sky began to darken.

My driver noted it to me as he glanced toward it with a worried grin; it was obviously something he wasn't used to seeing. We passed some wheat fields where the native Kurdish people labored, gathering by hand, the harvest under the ever darkening sky.

A typically costumed Kurdish woman, with sickle in hand, was reaping her harvest as the whole world around us now turned Sepia-tone brown, similar in look to one of those antique tinted black and white photographs often mimicked today. The odd thing was that the air was not dusty but clear, making the phenomenon all the more surreal. It was only the light and the sky which changed, giving the whole landscape a monochromatic look. Had the theme music from the Twilight Zone begun to sound from the heavens it would have seemed perfectly appropriate. It was one P.M. in the afternoon, yet it looked like late evening, just after the sun sinks below the horizon, that time of day called the gloaming.

On our way, as we passed through several small Kurdish towns, (Eastern Turkey is the Kurdish region) we encounter three different wedding caravans. Each lead car is decked out from hood to trunk with ribbons and artificial flowers with four to six cars following in train. Those following the lead car have their windows rolled down, there are hands extended out of those windows holding multicolored scarves streaming like flags in the wind. The colors are red, green and yellow, the colors of the flag of Kurdistan, expressly forbidden in Turkey. I wonder if this is a form of defiance and pro-Kurdistan sentiment, I suspect that it is. I ask my driver but his English is minimal so he doesn't understand my question. I see only the extended hands waving their colors, the faces within remain strangely anonymous under this darkened sepia light.

The sight is uncomfortable and vaguely disturbing; like watching a Sci-fi film in which people continue to celebrate, deliberately oblivious to the face of impending disaster.

The scripture came to mind which says, "They ate and drank, married and gave in marriage until the Flood came and took them all away ..." It's a strange day.

When I arrive at the Mardin airport, I find that I'm a day early; somehow, it seems, even time itself has become confused and distorted in this Dante-esque world around me.

Inside the air terminal, I speak with the only person conversant in English, a Security Police Officer. He's a tough, heavy-set authoritarian type; he sits down next to me for a few moments and tries to act cordial with some small talk. I know that he is simply fishing for some information concerning me and why I'm in the area. "You're in from Urak," he says. It's not a question, but a statement. Why else would an American be in this part of Turkey? I answer in the affirmative. "What were you doing there?" he then asked. "I'm part of a Humanitarian Aid team," I replied, offering no more information. This part of Turkey is a military zone, on the way we were stopped several times by military road blocks. Everything is suspect in this part of the world; with good reason.

Before he leaves me, the officer glances out the window at the spreading brown gloom. "Something is going on over there in Urak," he says, nodding toward the sky. Again, there it is -- that anxious look of concern; there is a certain sense of helpless resignation in his voice that belies his hard exterior. It's as if though the hell-fire smoke from the forge fires of Mordor itself were spreading across the land, threatening to bring about the end of free men everywhere. There is indeed something of the work of a dark lord rising over here and "Something wicked this way comes."

I think to myself as he walks away, this is exactly how I always envisioned the prelude to the Apocalypse, all that is missing is a cameo appearance of the Four Horsemen.

I couldn't see them, but they're out there alright, somewhere just over the horizon, their hoof prints are everywhere: Political Ambition, War, Famine, Pestilence and Death.

"Urak," that's how they pronounce it here; this, with the understanding that when the Nation of Iraq was created after the First World War, it was named after the ancient city-state of Ur; the same Ur of the Chaldeans from which Abraham was called by God to leave. From here, he begins his journey to Canaan in pursuit of his destiny with God.

Strange ... how it all begins here, in this part of the world, from Eden to Israel; ultimately, it ends here as well, with that final great conflict between Good and Evil.

Many here and at home would scoff at the idea of a Biblical Apocalypse, but today, under a bronze sky, they scoff like men who are about to face death's hard stare straight on ... gallows humor, I believe it is called.

Postscript

My flight arrived safely in Istanbul. I had a good meal and a decent night's sleep. I awoke this morning to a clear sky and the World did not end; I'm glad. In the news however, Hezbollah rockets have killed more Israeli civilians, there is fighting in Lebanon, more of our ships have been deployed to the Middle East, stepped up al Qaeda attacks continue throughout Iraq and Iran has threatened to go to war with Israel if they go into Lebanon. In Africa, tens of thousands are starving with pestilence reigning supreme in many areas. At home, the reality is suspended by endless commercial breaks selling products that subtly suggest that they will outlast and endure eternity itself, the endless sports casts emphasize how much more important the games are than the State of the Union, and the band plays on ... and on. At the risk of becoming known as "The Quintessential Alarmist" or an overly dramatic tragedian, my sage advice to all; "Keep your eyes on the sky!"



Jack Harris is the Director General of Hands of Hope Foundation (Iraq), a humanitarian aid organization working with the Kurds in Kurdistan, Northern Iraq.

He is also a filmmaker-documenting the truth of what has happened to the Kurds, and what will happen again if the U.S. fails to support its Kurdish allies.

Jack is an ordained pastor, missionary/evangelist with over 30 years experience in 46 different countries. His e-mail address is: GKell@aol.com.

Pictured: Jack in Iraq.