Gaziantep, Türkiye – A few hours after the first major earthquake that hit southern Turkey and northern Syria last year, Ahmad Nached decided to marry his partner, Anna Rudnichenko.
Ahmad, 30, and Anna, 23, were sleeping in their old eighth-floor apartment when the first tremors woke them from a deep sleep.
The two massive earthquakes, which occurred within hours of each other, killed more than 50,000 people in both countries.
The couple, originally from Syria and Ukraine respectively, assumed the noise and destruction was due to an airstrike, something with which they were familiar.
It took them a few minutes to realize that it was an earthquake, something neither of them had ever experienced in their lives.
From their cozy home in Gaziantep, as they talk about the final details of their first Valentine's Day as husband and wife, they explain that they had never talked about marriage before the tragedy.
Rudnichenko decided to move to Turkey from his native Zaporizhia in 2021, seeking independence after graduating from university. “I always had this affinity for Turkey because, when I was little, I lived here for a few years,” she told Al Jazeera.
He chose Gaziantep, a city famous for its gastronomy, where he found part-time jobs in hotel management and teaching English.
What for her was a choice, Ahmad was forced to make by the conflict ravaging his country. In 2012, after participating in protests in his native Aleppo that eventually led to clashes with the government and a war, his parents sent him and his sister to safety in Gaziantep, just across border.
Since then, Nached has been working with Syrian humanitarian organizations in Turkey while cultivating his passion for electronic music in Room41, a collective of Syrian and Turkish DJs trying to brighten the nights of Gaziantep.
Initially disappointed by the lack of nightclubs in Gaziantep, Rudnichenko ended up attending one of Room41's parties.
“The only thing I remember about that night is that the music suddenly turned off when, according to me, it was quite early, around 1 in the morning,” Rudnichenko recalls. “So I walked up to the console, quite angry, complaining to the DJ and asking him why he had already ended the party,” he laughs from the couch, sipping a cup of hot Turkish tea.
Nached remembers being confused by the way she approached him, but he had had the feeling all day that he would meet someone that night.
It took time, but eventually their friendship turned into something more. Nached says dating someone from different backgrounds enriches the relationship.
Rudnichenko had never met a Syrian refugee and was fascinated by Nached's story. He didn't know that in less than a year she would also become a refugee.
When the war in Ukraine began, Nached knew the exact words to comfort his partner because he had already been through it.
“Now we had something more in common that brought us closer,” he says. “We were both very upset about our countries, but as a Syrian with a decade of experience dealing with war trauma, I knew how to convey the skill of staying calm while your loved ones are trapped in a war zone.”
While the unusual couple shared a tragic backstory, it also highlighted significant differences in their displacement.
As a Syrian in Türkiye, Nached says he experiences a lot of racism. “I always felt like I had to hide my identity, trying not to speak Arabic on the streets or portray the best version of myself so as not to be labeled 'the bad guy,'” he explains.
Turkey hosts more than three million Syrian refugees and there have been tensions between them and the local population since 2012, highlighted by the aftermath of the earthquake and national elections characterized by a fierce anti-Syrian campaign.
On the other hand, since the beginning of 2022, Turkey has also welcomed thousands of Ukrainian refugees, who feel much more welcome and integrated. In Gaziantep, both refugee communities live together but are treated differently. “When I say I'm Ukrainian, I feel a lot of compassion and sympathy,” Rudnichenko says. “But it's not the same for Ahmad.”
In February 2023, Nached and Rudnichenko spent a couple of days in a shelter in the city before being evacuated to a hotel in Ankara via Nached's workplace. They were so shocked that they decided to leave Gaziantep.
They looked at Canada's resettlement programs but ultimately opted for Germany, a common destination for Syrian and Ukrainian refugees. Rudnichenko left first, hoping to find help upon his arrival.
“But since I didn't come directly from Ukraine, I couldn't qualify as a refugee, although I couldn't return to my country, which is the description of a refugee,” she explains. The same happened with Nached, as the Syrian crisis is no longer considered an emergency in Europe that entitles Syrian asylum seekers to be accepted for resettlement.
In Germany, Rudnichenko finally experienced the same type of racism that Syrians experience daily in Gaziantep. “Only then could I really empathize with what Ahmad had been through for more than 10 years,” he says.
After five months, they decided to give up and stay in Türkiye. Meanwhile, life had returned to normal in the earthquake zone and they felt safe enough to return to Gaziantep together.
Last September, during a trip to the Prince Islands from Istanbul, Nached proposed to Rudnichenko and the two were married in Gaziantep on Christmas Day.
After last year, they never imagined that they would spend Valentine's Day in Gaziantep. But they say that the city – despite the tragedy they witnessed – remains their perfect refuge.
“Whatever the future holds, spending it with the right person just makes the world and this life a little less traumatic,” Nached says.
