One Bordero, Two Cities, and a Shared Memory
On the border separating Nusaybin in northern Kurdistan and Qamishlo in Rojava, the story of a geography divided politically is manifested, yet it has remained connected in people’s memory and conscience.
AKIN STERK
MARDIN_ Perhaps the reality of fragmentation in Kurdish geography is most clearly manifested at the border separating Nusaybin in Mardin in northern Kurdistan and Qamishlo in Rojava.Maps change, borders are drawn, and city names may change, but the unity of geography remains alive in people's memory.
The border separating Nusaybin district in Mardin and Qamishlo city is not merely a line separating two cities, but is also a tangible reality embodying how the geography in which the Kurdish people live was divided. As for the people on both sides of the border, the opposite bank is not a strange place, as much as it is an extension of a familiar life.
The Kurdish heard in one street blends with the sounds of the opposite street. It is not known whether the elegy chanted by a mother is sung on this side of the border or that. A song does not need a passport to cross with its words.
In people's memory, villages, families, relatives, and the past continue to cross the drawn borders, transcending the lines imposed on geography.
Looking at a Shared Identity
Therefore, looking at Qamishlo does not mean merely looking at the opposite city, but means looking at a divided history, a fragmented geography, and a shared identity that is being sought to be preserved despite everything.
This fragmentation, which is considered one of the fundamental issues in Kurdish political consciousness, is also manifested in the details of daily life. Borders separate people, but they cannot erase the unity of language, culture, and memory. Here specifically, the material power of borders confronts the continuity of collective memory.
Perhaps the most striking thing in the scene extending from Nusaybin to Qamishlo is this truth: there is a line separating the two sides, but life on its edges has not been completely severed from one another. Some borders exist on maps, not in people's memory.
When one looks at Qamishlo, one sees not only what is beyond the border, but also sees a part of one's own history. This scene silently evokes, and for long years, the unity of a geography that was forcibly divided.