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Travel: Behind the facades of Kurdish Turkey

News that 44 people were slaughtered at a wedding in southeastern Turkey in May - an instructive if extreme case, said Reuters , "of the depth and bitterness of blood feuds, clan rivalries and vendettas" among Turkish Kurds - shocked the world.
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News that 44 people were slaughtered at a wedding in southeastern Turkey in May - an instructive if extreme case, said Reuters , "of the depth and bitterness of blood feuds, clan rivalries and vendettas" among Turkish Kurds - shocked the world.

The feud apparently involved a single extended family, and while triggered by a jilted groom had roots in a lengthy land dispute in the village of Bilge.

The article went on to say that southeastern Turkey, west of Iran and north of Iraq and Syria - where the Turkish army, backed by often unaccountable village guards, is trying to contain the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) - is awash with guns and a tendency to solve differences "blood for blood."

Bilge sits just outside Mardin, a gorgeous city that climbs (or flows down) a funnel-like mountain topped with a citadel (occupied by the Turkish army) and overlooking the flat and seemingly endless Mesopotamian plain.

Almost all the buildings in this ancient crossroads, just north of Syria, are of a golden-hued stone, leading to a comparison with historic Jerusalem. In the last decade, Mardin has gained popularity with Turkish travellers and outsiders, inspiring Lonely Planet to write: "Get there before the crowds do."

Which all goes to show that you don't necessarily see behind the facades and the smiling faces. Such was the case with my recent trip through Eastern Turkey: I didn't see the Kurdish anger, yet there were signs.

In the north, our group of 16 in a van, organized by the company Explore, kept coming across massive patriotic signs embedded in the hillsides. They were pleas to the Kurdish population to behave themselves - and at least to try to be patriotic. They said things like (in Turkish, or perhaps Kurdish): "We do everything for our homeland."

All along the two-lane highways that cross from the Anatolian Plateau through the Kackar Mountains into eastern Turkey and then wend southward along the borders with Armenia and Iran, we were stopped at roadblocks manned by Turkish soldiers.

Also through this region, along the roads and hills, you see Kurdish shepherds - often a twenty-something male wearing a seemingly unsuitable suit jacket, with a flock of goats or sheep numbering no more than 400.

In summer, Kurdish families graze their livestock in the high pastures - carrying with them horsehair tents and portable kilims. In the autumn they return to the lower elevations to spend the winter in sprawling compounds of rough-looking stone huts.

Near Mount Ararat, close to the Iranian border, the town of Dogubayazit has a frontier ambiance. I was told the grocery store sells drivers' licenses. A restaurant we dined at had walls lined with half-timbers, like a log cabin in a Western movie, and served lentil soup, kebabs and salad (the usual in the region) costing two or three dollars.

Dogubayazit is a Kurdish heartland, and some women still wear colourful tribal dress. That said, in a restaurant in more southerly Van, also deemed a conservative city, we saw young women in jeans, T-shirts and lots of bling. And from my room at the Buyuk Asur Oteli, typically comfortable and inexpensive, I could see a United Colours of Benetton. Kurdish-stan is changing.

Breakfast is one of the glories of Turkey: invariably garden-fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, olives and boiled eggs, feta and soft cheeses, seasonal fruits and heaps of warm bread (which I drizzled with the local honey).

After motor boating on Lake Van to Akdamar Island, with its abandoned Armenian cathedral covered in detailed frescoes, we continued south on the highway, through working towns like Tatvan and Bitlis.

Finally, we pulled into Mardin, said to remain a PKK stronghold.

The main street, Cumhuriyet Caddesi, cuts across the hillside like a deep incision. While laden donkeys lumber along the caddesi, motor scooters and BMWs are just as prevalent. Street vendors are mostly friendly, and when we slipped down a few steps into a sprawling off-street market, with several hundred hole-in-the-wall stores selling inexpensive goods and services, we met smiling faces.

Mardin boasts the Zafaran Syrian Orthodox monastery, a truly golden site of incomparable beauty, and Forty Martyrs Church, one of a number of churches still run by the albeit dwindling Syrian Christian community, and proof that some tolerance remains in what is otherwise a Kurdish-Muslim domain.

Mardin is also rightly proud of its spectacular post office - ensconced in a 17 th century caravanserai with intricate wood and stonework, and the remains of a 13 th -century Islamic madrassa with inner courtyard and symbolic fountain.

But it was an eatery called Cercis Murat that blew me away. Nestled into a collection of stone buildings on the Cumhuriyet Caddesi, this now famous restaurant - Prince Charles has dined here - was founded by a young feminist named Ebru Baydemir. (She has since opened another in Istanbul.)

The food runs to platters and plates inspired by, but not confined to, traditional Middle-Eastern cuisine. It's licensed, with a good wine list. A headwaiter, at least on our visit, was demonstrably gay - even camp. The setting - a walled balcony, open to the sky and looking out at distant, night-lit towns in Syria, even Iraq - is unsurpassable.

And right down the road sits the unfortunate village of Bilge.