Turkish-Montrealer coping with relative's death after Istanbul attack

Candice Sag was sitting at a restaurant in Iskenderun, Turkey, when her mother received a call from a family friend asking if she was okay.

It was only then Sag realized that if herflight leaving Istanbul had been delayed any longer, she might not have made it to the restaurant at all.

Sag, a23 year-oldConcordiastudent, was in Istanbul's Ataturk airport one hour before this week's gruesome attack.

It took another few hours for her to learnthat her relative had not been so lucky. He was among the44 people who were killed.

"I was just shocked,"Sagsaid."We couldn't sleep. We were all just together, sitting downas a family."

Grief in Iskenderun

Umut Sakarolu, a member of her extended family, had tried to stop one of the bombers,Sag toldCBC'sDaybreak.

A customs officer who had just earned his degree a year ago,Sakarolushot one of the bombers, causinghim to fall to the ground.

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"He jumped on the bomber," Sagsaid. "And after he jumped on the bomber, the bomb exploded."

Sag said a sergeant called Sakarolu's immediate family to give them the news.

Family members, police officials and others in the community gathered for a funeral in Iskenderun on Thursday to mourn his death.

"It was very sad. There were pictures of him everywhere," said Sag.

There has been an outpouring of support for the airport employee, some calling him "a martyr." A Facebook pagecreated in his honour this weekis filled with condolence messages.

Travelling on

Sag travels to Turkey often to visit her family. She said this was the first time an attack hit so close to home.

"I know it's weird but it's like I feel safer [here inIskenderun] than Istanbul," she said in a phone interview. Iskenderun is a coastal city near the Syrian border.

"All the attacks, right now, are there."

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Still, she said, she hasconfidence in the country's security forces and says she will continue her planned travels.

"I'll still keep my plans. I don't think it will be an issue," she said, after mentioning she intended to travel around the Black Sea.

Sag plans on returning back to her home in Montreal'sPlateau Mont-Royal neighbourhoodin the fall to continue her studies in psychology at Concordia.

"We shouldn't look at t as 'there was an attack inTurkey,'" she said. "Rather,there was an attack done to other humans.'"