Diyarbakir, Turkey – Volunteers at a three-storey workplace block in Diyarbakir sit amid a fog of cigarette smoke, sipping cups of black tea as they plan the logistics of delivering assist to victims of Turkey’s earthquake catastrophe.

Dozens of helpers, working from workplaces borrowed from the town’s Chamber of Commerce, are coordinating cargoes of provides for hundreds of thousands of individuals affected by the disaster final week.

They’re only a small cog in a machine of many assist operations arrange by unusual residents throughout Turkey.

“Our motivation comes from eager to assist our folks, and that’s what we’re working for,” stated Evin Seker, a 30-year-old sociologist who usually works for a regulation agency in Diyarbakir, a southeastern metropolis of two million in a province that bears the identical title, and the biggest Kurdish-majority metropolis in Turkey.

“I beforehand labored as a volunteer for an NGO serving to youngsters, and when the earthquake occurred, all of us got here collectively to assist the individuals who have misplaced every little thing.”

Seker and her fellow volunteers are working across the clock to organise assist starting from meals and shelter to toiletries and clothes. They’ve additionally despatched rescue employees and medics to the catastrophe zone.

Their preliminary focus was on Diyarbakir itself, which is the easternmost of the ten provinces hit by the February 6 quakes, but it surely has now switched to different provinces comparable to Kahramanmaras, Adiyaman and Hatay, the place the demise toll and stage of destruction are far bigger.

“Solely a handful of buildings collapsed in Diyarbakir, however there was nonetheless a fantastic lack of life,” stated Sirac Celik, a commerce union official serving to on the assist centre.

Some 350 folks died in Diyarbakir, in response to the Diyarbakir Metropolis Safety and Solidarity Platform. Search and rescue efforts have been persevering with on Monday at three websites the place 55 persons are regarded as beneath the rubble.

“We’ve got organised a whole bunch of locations for folks to remain throughout the town and we’re taking care of them in addition to arranging vans carrying no matter is required to different provinces,” Celik stated.

Throughout the town, a takeaway kebab restaurant within the Yenisehir neighbourhood has been become an improvised assist distribution centre.

Kebab Cease proprietor Sinan Guneri was shaken from mattress by the primary earthquake. He quickly gathered his employees to start distributing free meals across the metropolis to rescue groups and survivors.

His enterprise has been placed on maintain as Guneri, along with household, pals and different native companies, masses assist convoys on the street exterior.

“We’re not doing this for cash,” he stated. “We’re simply attempting to assist folks. Individuals and different companies deliver what’s mandatory right here and we put together vans to ship them to the earthquake areas. Individuals even deliver issues from their houses to ship.

“We’re going to the villages and different locations which might be troublesome to succeed in. It’s our responsibility to assist folks as finest we will.”

Guneri and his band of volunteers synchronise their efforts with different advert hoc citizen assist teams throughout the nation via Twitter and WhatsApp.

“The largest downside is coordination,” he stated. “In the mean time my accomplice is with the vans and I’m chatting with different teams to seek out the place the locations are that need assistance most urgently.”

Yilmaz Tekin, a 32-year-old volunteer loading an assist truck at one other swiftly established distribution centre in Diyarbakir, stated his mother and father advised him how unusual residents had volunteered to offer assist after the 1999 Marmara earthquake that struck east of Istanbul, killing an estimated 18,000 folks.

“We’re all right here as a result of we really feel an actual have to do one thing to assist folks,” he stated.

“This earthquake is like nothing we now have seen earlier than, however my mother and father knew individuals who died within the Marmara earthquake and so they advised me how the state did nothing within the early days so folks had to assist one another.”

From a small constructing housing the workplaces of a lecturers’ affiliation in Diyarbakir’s Kayapinar district, Tekin and scores of others type a human chain to cross assist provides hand-to-hand to a lorry that’s too large to entry the slim street.

“We have been right here inside three hours of the earthquake hitting,” he stated. “Though Diyarbakir is an enormous metropolis, generally it feels smaller as a result of everybody appears out for one another. We apply that spirit to the work we’re doing now.”

It isn’t simply lorries that carry provides from the white-painted, two-storey constructing, but in addition non-public automobiles, the boot and again seats piled excessive with blankets, clothes, sugar, tea and different requirements.

Kurdish language instructor Fesih Zirek is overseeing the operation from a small workplace behind the constructing. A gentle stream of individuals comes and goes and the hall exterior is congested with volunteers hauling containers of provides.

“In fact, it’s nice to see so many individuals who really feel the necessity to assist,” Zirek stated. “However the tragedy is all the time near the floor for everybody. We hope as of late will cross quickly.”