Syrians in Turkey Decide Whether to Return Home

0:00Today on State of the World, Syrians in Turkey decide whether to return home. You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening. I'm Greg Dixon. After more than a decade of living in exile, many Syrians are finally considering what was once unthinkable, going home. Millions of Syrians fled the civil war and the rule of dictator Bashar al-Assad. In December, Assad was deposed, and now expat Syrians in neighboring countries like Turkey are wondering if now is the time to go back. But it's not that easy when you've made a life somewhere else, and when the life you left in your home country might be gone forever.

0:47Rebecca Rossman brings us the story of two families in southern Turkey who are standing at that crossroads. So this is our land and the village. Adham Aljamus keeps a plastic bag full of old photos, the only thing his family managed to carry out of Syria. They reveal a world that feels like a lifetime ago. Golden afternoons, family meals, a home untouched by war. Even the bad memories are good memories, he says. Especially after you leave forcefully, even the things you hate, you would start to love and miss. Al-Jamous is 32 years old. He grew up in Daraa in southwest Syria, the cradle of the 2011 uprising.

1:33When he and his family fled Syria, they thought they just had to lay low for a few weeks. That was 11 years ago. For years, Syrians like Al-Jamous have lived with the same question. Will I ever be able to go home again? But since the fall of Bashar al-Assad seven months ago, that question has started to change. Now it's not if, but when, how, and at what cost. When the circumstances are suitable, there will be a return to homeland, inshallah, for sure. But a lot needs to happen before those circumstances can be called suitable. Sanctions are being lifted to reconnect Syria with the international economy.

2:13But roads, railways, and homes still need rebuilding. Years of conflict have devastated basic services. Electricity and water remain unreliable in many areas, making daily life a struggle. And there's uncertainty over Syria's interim leader, Ahmad al-Shara, who was once linked to al-Qaeda. None of this worries al-Jamous. When the regime was in control, I said I would follow the devil if he overthrew this regime. Because for me, this is worse than the devil. The real problem isn't just the logistics of returning. is that the Syria waiting for Al-Jamous isn't the Syria he left behind. The war didn't just destroy cities.

2:56It shattered what home could ever mean. Sometimes I just sit and try to think who's left there. Literally no one from my friends. I don't know anyone there. So if I go back, I think it's going to be a big problem for me. Like, your hopes or your dreams are just dreams. And he's not alone. In another corner of Gaziantep, Turkey, I meet with Bushra Ajaj and Hassan Ajam, a married couple who met through the revolution and survived it together. Some Syrian sweets and here it's Syrian sweets, please. Over generous cups of cardamom coffee and pistachio-filled sweets, they tell me what returning feels like now.

3:40The new Syrian flag hangs in their living room. It's a symbol of pride and grief. Both were arrested for their activism. Both lost friends and family. Hassan Ajam has returned to Syria twice since Assad's fall in December. But even now, he says. Everybody has memories and have friends and everything in lost life there in Syria. But till now, I visited Syria twice time, but I didn't go inside my home. Bushra Ajaj went back once, in April, for the first time in 10 years. In some moments, I felt myself like a stranger. It's very different from the Syria that we lived. Her family home was damaged.

4:25No windows, no doors. But it wasn't the house that broke her. It was seeing her old university. So I remembered my friend that passed away because of Assad regime there in university. I remembered a lot of stories we lived there in the university. So I cried a lot when I saw it after 10 years. The memories came back. Yes. It's not just that Syria has changed. It's that going back means facing everything and everyone that's missing. For this married couple, even imagining a return comes with questions. They have two young kids to think about, both born in Turkey. They speak Turkish better than Arabic.

5:06Sometimes I feel it's good because they live here not to feel themselves strange. But now we are thinking about going back to Syria. We are not sure. We don't have any clear picture about our situation. I fear that they feel they're a stranger in Syria. If they do ever go back permanently, Bushra Ajaj wants it to be somewhere new. Not her tiny village. Maybe somewhere in nearby Aleppo. Somewhere she can create new memories, even if it never quite feels like the home she left. Rebecca Rossman, NPR News, Gaziantep, Turkey. Rebecca Rossman's reporting was sponsored by the Pulitzer Center.

5:54That's the State of the World from NPR. Thanks for listening.