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Pretty Amazing
Garen Yegparian
BY GAREN YEGPARIAN
Yup, pretty amazing, and that's putting it mildly. You saw the news
item. But it was presented so matter-of-factly, so blandly, it might
as well have been just another news release from just another
organization about just another run-of-the-mill dinner dance. But to
me this was epic.
The ARF, the Turkish government's bogey-man, its bête-noire, its
version of evil incarnate held a meeting in broad daylight in
Constantinople for the first time in 80 years. The much mythologized
and maligned `terrorist Tashnags' of successive Turkish governments'
fevered imaginations and propaganda machines are back in town.
Wow!
The meeting was no clandestine affair with some shadowy group, rather
a legitimate political party operating in Turkey with elected members
in the country's parliament. Making things even more impressive is
the nature of that political party, the BDP'it is primarily Kurdish.
Yes, those same Kurds, some of whom massacred our ancestors. The same
Kurds who were used, duped or knowingly, by the Ottoman government to
keep Armenians in fear. Those Kurds are the ones who are slowly
coming around to full acceptance of their misdeeds, starting to accept
responsibility, and even atoning for them in some cases (think the
Soorp Geeragos Church recently renovated at municipal expense by a
Kurdish mayor's design). And, they're approaching the right `place'
far faster than Turkey's government.
Nor was this an isolated incident. It was the second meeting between
the two parties in as many weeks. This further falls in the context
of years of contacts and excruciatingly slow refamiliarization with
one another after three-quarters of a century of Genocide-imposed
separation. But all along, some contact existed. Whether that
contact was because we were neighbors in the Arab countries and Iran,
or having Å?ivan Perwer, perhaps the most noted Kurdish singer of our
times, on one of the earliest episodes of Horizon TV (in the Los
Angeles area) back in 1989.
So we have evolving reconnection between two neighboring nations, one
of which is composed in significant part of forcefully Islamicized
members of the other. But that's not all. This reconnection has now
made the jump into the country whose government has persecuted and
massacred both nations for over half a millennium! So, we must also
give due credit to the Turkish government for not preventing this
(yes, we're still at a point in this process where it's reasonable to
be pleased with the absence of a negative, rather than expecting the
presence of a positive).
We should be thrilled and extremely cautious all at once. We should
be looking for our Kurdish neighbors in dispersion and seeking
rational ways of cooperating based on a necessary and slow
re-acquaintance with our old neighbors and relatives. This will not
be easy, especially for those of us whose families suffered at the
hands of Kurds as opposed to directly by Turks. But, it is a
necessary prologue to our return home to Turkish-occupied Western
Armenia.
No doubt many will snicker at the prospect of good relations with the
Kurds or recreating an Armenian presence in Western Armenia. But a
lot of people snickered when the prospect of Soviet Armenia's
independence was discussed back in the 1960s and 1970s. And, think
about it, if anyone had said, even a measly 5 years ago, that the ARF
would be back in Bolis openly, we all would have snickered.
The beginnings of a sea-change seem to be at hand.
Get busy. Find a Kurd. Start talking. S/he may even be from your
ancestral town or village.
http://asbarez.com/116258/pretty-amazing/
Garen Yegparian
BY GAREN YEGPARIAN
Yup, pretty amazing, and that's putting it mildly. You saw the news
item. But it was presented so matter-of-factly, so blandly, it might
as well have been just another news release from just another
organization about just another run-of-the-mill dinner dance. But to
me this was epic.
The ARF, the Turkish government's bogey-man, its bête-noire, its
version of evil incarnate held a meeting in broad daylight in
Constantinople for the first time in 80 years. The much mythologized
and maligned `terrorist Tashnags' of successive Turkish governments'
fevered imaginations and propaganda machines are back in town.
Wow!
The meeting was no clandestine affair with some shadowy group, rather
a legitimate political party operating in Turkey with elected members
in the country's parliament. Making things even more impressive is
the nature of that political party, the BDP'it is primarily Kurdish.
Yes, those same Kurds, some of whom massacred our ancestors. The same
Kurds who were used, duped or knowingly, by the Ottoman government to
keep Armenians in fear. Those Kurds are the ones who are slowly
coming around to full acceptance of their misdeeds, starting to accept
responsibility, and even atoning for them in some cases (think the
Soorp Geeragos Church recently renovated at municipal expense by a
Kurdish mayor's design). And, they're approaching the right `place'
far faster than Turkey's government.
Nor was this an isolated incident. It was the second meeting between
the two parties in as many weeks. This further falls in the context
of years of contacts and excruciatingly slow refamiliarization with
one another after three-quarters of a century of Genocide-imposed
separation. But all along, some contact existed. Whether that
contact was because we were neighbors in the Arab countries and Iran,
or having Å?ivan Perwer, perhaps the most noted Kurdish singer of our
times, on one of the earliest episodes of Horizon TV (in the Los
Angeles area) back in 1989.
So we have evolving reconnection between two neighboring nations, one
of which is composed in significant part of forcefully Islamicized
members of the other. But that's not all. This reconnection has now
made the jump into the country whose government has persecuted and
massacred both nations for over half a millennium! So, we must also
give due credit to the Turkish government for not preventing this
(yes, we're still at a point in this process where it's reasonable to
be pleased with the absence of a negative, rather than expecting the
presence of a positive).
We should be thrilled and extremely cautious all at once. We should
be looking for our Kurdish neighbors in dispersion and seeking
rational ways of cooperating based on a necessary and slow
re-acquaintance with our old neighbors and relatives. This will not
be easy, especially for those of us whose families suffered at the
hands of Kurds as opposed to directly by Turks. But, it is a
necessary prologue to our return home to Turkish-occupied Western
Armenia.
No doubt many will snicker at the prospect of good relations with the
Kurds or recreating an Armenian presence in Western Armenia. But a
lot of people snickered when the prospect of Soviet Armenia's
independence was discussed back in the 1960s and 1970s. And, think
about it, if anyone had said, even a measly 5 years ago, that the ARF
would be back in Bolis openly, we all would have snickered.
The beginnings of a sea-change seem to be at hand.
Get busy. Find a Kurd. Start talking. S/he may even be from your
ancestral town or village.
http://asbarez.com/116258/pretty-amazing/