Armenia

James R. Thomas glanced up from his notes to the wizened Armenian peasant, who simply sat
and watched him, his face closed and empty. His face was riven with laugh lines and crinkles,
and he looked like a man who might normally be full of cheer and spirit, telling stories and
giving gifts to grandchildren, carving objects in front of the fire, talking and chattering, a man
who had lived a full life and now was content to rest. There was none of that happiness in his
eyes, which were flat and still, neither hard with anger and intent, nor soft with kindness and
companionship. There was something terrible in that face.

James wondered again how he had ended up in Armenia. Oh, he knew well the obvious causes. He
spoke Armenian, courtesy of growing up near a little Armenia in the United States, although
sometimes his Armenian and the Armenian that the peasants of Armenia spoke seemed like
languages more different than the difference between English and Armenian itself. When he had
become a reporter for the New York Times, it had just been an interesting fact, something
nobody cared about. Nobody cared about Armenia after all, nobody except the Armenians.
Nobody cared until the Turks had started massacring them, and the Allies of the last war had
done their best to get every newspaper in the world to carry the stories about it. Now, the war
was over, but Armenia was in the eye of the world, and the New York Times wanted to get every
scrap of information they could. They had plenty of native-Armenian reporters out here, but they
had wanted to avoid an impression that they were biased with just Armenians, so he was here.
But how, how had the world gone so mad, so crazy, so foul and wicked and terrible and full of
pain and suffering that evil could exist to such level to call the attention of the world to this land?

The pay was good, by the standards of a journalist, the country was beautiful, it was exciting
work, there was enough danger to make it interesting but not enough to make it frightening, and
he had come to love these simple rural peasant folk, who despite their poverty would let one into
their homes and share everything they had with you, who spoke plainly and simply, willing to
share their stories to someone, anyone, who might tell what happened to them.

It was times like this, as the feeling of helplessness and sorrow confronted him, that he regretted
it. "So Mr. Yeranos Nerguizian, how old are you?" James cursed the dreadful meaninglessness of
the question, it was like asking a mountain what its age was. Only Americans like him would
need that sort of information.

"I have 67 years of age, as of this spring." The voice of the Armenian was flat and lifeless, as devoid of life as one of the zones rouges in France, shattered by guns and left barren and dead.

"Where you were born, and where is it that you have lived during your life?"

"I was born in a village named Norashen, near Lake Van. I did not leave until three years ago."

"You were a small farmer, a peasant, then? Was life good there?" He wanted to curse himself
again, at these insane questions.

"We farmed the land, as peasants do." A flicker of something more like happiness flickered across
the Armenians face, although it was so small that James wasn't quite certain if it was really there. "You are American, from your land where buildings are said to be higher than the sky, so I am sure that you would think that it was poor. But for us, it was all we knew. We were happy, most of the time."

"Who was your family?"

"I had my grandmothers, grandfathers, my mother, father, two sisters, three brothers and... I
think three or four cousins, some nieces, my uncles, my aunt, There were probably around 15 of us." Yeranos looked like he might continue, then stopped. James was unsurprised. Armenian
families could be large compared to the little circles he was used to back home.

"What about yourself, when you grew up and started your own family?"

"You never truly leave your own family behind, American. But when I became a man, I married
Maritsa Mesropian. I remember when I first set eyes on her." A note of warmth definitely had to
be in his voice now, like a rose petal falling upon the frigid snow. "She was not beautiful, she was homely and plain. But she had a good face, one that smiled easily. She was a bit old, 16, I was 19. The matchmaker did his work well, we married a year later. I was happy at the wedding, the entire village there. At first we didn't know each other, but as the years passed we did, especially after my first child had been born. Njteh was so handsome, his face so red as he squealed the cries of an infant. Those were the happiest years of my life, I had three sons and two daughters who lived past childhood, Varak, Yeranos,
Noubar, and Goumach and Marmar. Those were the happiest years of all my life."

James had to shake himself out of the silence that followed, Yeranos staring off into the distance,
lost in memories of his past. He waited as the minutes ticked by, until finally the Armenian
looked up."I am sorry for my silence."

The reporter cleared his throat. "Don't be. It speaks in its own way, without words. I had to write
down what you said too," He added.

"Did you", he said continuing, "have any problems with the Turks or the Ottomans during those
years?"

"The Turks hated us. One of my neighbors, Mangasar was his name, had two of his daughters
kidnapped by Turks and stolen away. We never heard of what happened to them. There was
another, Haygag, whose son they tried to convert to Islam. In villages where the Russians and the
Turks did their worst. There was a group that fled, and the women violated, but they survived at least. We thought that we were safe, safe with each other."

There was once again the flat sound in his voice, without either pain or hate, but something
worse, an absence of anything at all.

"Is it too painful for you to go on?"

The Armenian shook his head. "No. I want to tell my story. I only wish that I did not have to."
He looked around. "Do you have a pot of tea?"

"Yes. What type do you want? I have herbal, apple, cinnamon, green, pomegranate, earl grey,
ceylonese, Nepalese, and a few Japanese."

"You have so many types of tea?" A note of whimsy entered Yeranos' voice. "We had a few in
my village at most, not most of a dozen from around the world. I thought that you Americans
liked your coffee?"

"We do", admitted James. "But I grew up in New York, near little Armenia. I learned to like the
taste, and I brought it with me when I came hear."

"You did not tell me that you grew up alongside Armenians", remarked Yeranos.

"In New York, you can find any people you could imagine existing in the world, and a thousand
more you never had heard of."

"Were there many Armenians there?" The Armenian man sounded interested. James liked the
sound. Yeranos had been willing to share his story, but otherwise he was painfully uninterested
in the world. It was only occasionally that flashes of the man who he had once been - or at least
who James thought he had been - showed through. Probably reserved, stern, but once he knew
and cared for you as one of his own capable of loyalty and friendship that would put any
American to shame, who would laugh and cry and feel joy and happiness as with any man. It was
something he had noticed, for many people who weren't his own countrymen; they were not as

prone to pleasantries and informality, and they could seem cold and uninterested to Americans
used to people who always smiled, but when one came to know them they would never abandon
you, never let you down, and always be there in your time of need.

"Yes, there were thousands of them. Did you know any Armenians who went abroad?"

"Many of us left after the Sultan started to attack us. Meghri Yeterian went to America, but we
did not hear from him again. More went to Paris. They sent back money and encouraged us to
leave to come live with them, but we did not want to leave our village. I wish we had."

Another lingering silence filled the air, until Yeranos looked up from his hands. "If you don't
mind, I would look some of your herbal tea. It is traditional Armenian tea?"

"Yes, it is, I purchased it here." James rose, and set a pot of kettle on the little fireplace he had,
waiting for the water to boil. The fire flickered and twisted, heat radiating from it, until the kettle
started to shriek and cry, the high pitched sound of the steam escaping. James poured the tea into
a cup, and put in the herbal tea mixture. Yeranos watched. Despite the silence, it was a
companionable atmosphere, the sound of the fire crackling and the occasional sigh of the wind
outside. They could hear little of the sound of life in the city beyond, although occasionally there

were the cries of neighbors and children who played in the courtyard where James had the home
where he was staying.

Yeranos took the cup of tea with his old hands, veined and marked by the passage of years, but
still steady and strong, drinking the tea with delicate sips. "Not quite like that in my childhood,
but close enough", he said with a sigh. "I have never found tea that matches it, it is always
somehow off."

"My apologies."

"You Americans are always apologizing for something. It is good that we try find new things.
None can return fully to his youth." Yeranos took another sip of tea, then put down the cup. "I
suppose you want to continue the interview now."

"If you do not mind, yes. What happened to you in the 1890s, in the Hamidian massacres?"

Yeranos looked off into the distance again, then started to speak. "We were lucky. It was hard to
see that at the time, hard to see that when the Kurds came and stole away our fields and our
animals. It was hard to see that when my youngest daughter, Marmar, saw her household

attacked and her husband killed and herself violated, then she was taken from us never to be seen
again. It was hard to see it when our house was burned down and we had to start anew. It was
hard to see it when taxes crushed us, and when grew hungry and frail, living in terror and horror
that we would be the ones to die next. It was hard to see that we were the fortunate ones, for we
survived, batter and bruised, but alive. My son Yeranos almost died, he was left for dead by a
Ottoman gendarme, but he survived, even if he could never use his right arm again."

The silence came again, and James let him wait to collect his thoughts.

"I was a man in my 40s. I was the patriarch of my family by then, my own father had passed
away. For me, the worst was the powerlessness, that I could do nothing, nothing but hope and
pray. Perhaps my prayers were answered, for we lived, but it was hard to see. There were many
in our village who suffered far more than us, far more than just a daughter lost and a son crippled
and a house burned down and fields stolen."

"Did you hate the Turks for it?"

"How could I not? I hated them, them and the Kurds who attacked us, I prayed that they would
die, that they would go to hell. Now, I am still sure they will go to hell, but I can no longer feel
hatred. Too much is gone to feel that."

"What did you do when the massacres ended?"

"What everybody else did." Yeranos had a bitter voice now. "We tried to rebuild. We rebuilt our
house, we raised our flocks anew, we lived life, we tried to patch up the pain of the past. It
seemed like perhaps we would be allowed to live our lives. It is funny how humans can be such
optimists with time."

"Did you know about the Committee of Union and Progress' coup?"

"Yes, but we didn't care. Who governed the Empire didn't matter to us. There were some who
were young who were convinced that it would mean an end to our oppression, but most of us
didn't know or care."

"But surely you knew about the pogroms during the counter-coup?"

"We heard about those", admitted Yeranos. "But there had been so many pogroms, so much
death, it was hard to know who or from why it came. The refugees from the Balkans were more

important to us, so many people in a land without enough space. All we wanted was to be left
alone."

"But you weren't, of course?" The answers from Yeranos were flowing more freely now.
Somehow despite it James didn't feel any elation.

The Armenian shrugged. "We were for a few years. Life went back to normal, as normal as it
could be. I'm told that the war happened because a man died in a place called Bosnia. How could
the world be so mad as to fight over the death of a single man?"

James shrugged. "The world is a mad place. I would not be talking to you if it was not."

Yeranos nodded in response. 'I suppose you want to know what happened in the slaughter." It
was not a question.

James simply nodded.

The same flat eyes and dead voice came over Yeranos. "We knew little about the war. When it
began, we hoped it would be short and brief. There were a few who hoped the Russians would
win, and that we would be freed from the Turks. Most of us just wanted to tend our fields."

"First they came for our sons, for work in so-called labor battalions. My sons were in their 40s
by then, their sons in their 20s. They were all drafted. We thought perhaps we if we complied we
would be left alone, but once the men were gone, we were without protection.

"I was lucky again." When the Turks had come, much of the family had gone on a picnic, and
changed our destination in route. We were far enough away that it the Turks and the Kurds didn't
come after us, they only burned down the village. Two of my sons, and my daughter, many of
my grandchildren, died. But me, my wife, my song Yeranos, a few others, survived. It was a
pitiful remainder, but we were alive." His voice cracked.

"When was this?" asked James, hating that he had to ask the question.

"Four years ago I think. Probably 1916."

"They came for you late." observed James.

"Our village was large enough to be difficult to take, small enough not to be important, and far
enough away from the cities and isolated enough enough not to be a target. And, we were lucky."

"What did you do next?"

Yeranos shrugged. "There was nothing keeping us at Norashen now. Everything was gone, and
we were sure that the Turks would come back and kill us all. So we left. Apparently the Turks
stole Armenians and forced them to march across the desert to die. We marched too, but we tried
to make it to the Russians."

"You must have made it, or else you wouldn't be here" said James.

"It was not an easy march. Goumach died first. She had always been a delicate thing, sweet and
pretty. The children started to follow, then the babes, and Yeranos died too, the poor cripple. We
were so thin, so tired, and yet still we marched. We could not bury the dead along our route, and
every day, every night, we lived in terror that we would be found. The vultures and the hawks
circled over head, waiting for us to die. And yet, I made it, and so did Maritsa. I don't know how
she did it, but she was always strong. A few of my grandchildren too. I don't know how. I don't
know how." He shook his head in amazement.

"I still remember running into the Russian patrol. We were terrified they would be Turks, that
they would kill us all. Starving and weak as we were, all they would have to do is tap us. Yet
they shared with us their coarse black bread, and they spoke to us in their stumbling Armenian.
We made it to their camp somehow, and there were other Armenians there, soldiers and others
who had fled. We thanked god that we were safe."

The words were pouring out of Yeranos now, faster and faster. James scribbled them onto his
paper, unable to stop, trying to keep up. The pause was a welcome relief.

Yeranos started to speak again, slowly and with a slight shake to his voice. "We were terrified
when the Russians collapsed, and we were convinced that god had put his hand over us when the
battalions held in 1918, when the Turks came again. We had a little farm by then, that we settled
with others who had escaped. We had hope for the future, and once again the salve of time
settled over us."

The voice broke at last, and tears came. Through the choking sobs, he continued speaking.

"It started again at the spring. We had planted our crops, let our flocks out into the country after
the winter. And yet then we heard that the Turks were coming again. We prayed that the troops

would hold them back like before, or that there would come help from abroad but we were
wrong. They broke them, and nobody came to help. Maritsa wanted to flee to Yerevan, and
maybe she was right. By the time we were to leave, the Turks had overrun us again.

I was, for the last time, lucky." He spit out the word like a curse. "I was in the cellar, that we had
built carefully so that the entrance was hard to find, when the Turkish cavalry rode in. Nobody
had heard or seen them, and they caught us all by surprise. I could hear outside the shots and the
screams from men and women, the cries of the daughters and wives as they were violated, the
wailing of infants and babes. And I could do nothing, nothing at all." The voice dripped with
despair blacker than coal, hope and happiness eviscerated from it.

"They burned the house, but I was safe. When I emerged, after the flames had died down, it was
night. I searched among the bodies without light, the blood staining my hands, but the Turks had
done their job all too well. At last I found Maritsa, among them. She was dead, and I couldn't see
her in the light, but I could feel the shape of her face. I cried then, I sobbed, I know not how
long, that the world would do this to me, to leave me the last alive of a kin of blood that was
once score, the last few of a people who had once stretched in their millions across a land."

The tears flowed freely now as he remembered it. It was almost sacrilegious to James to write it,
and yet the swift and terrible pen moved across the page, recording the words as fast as he could.
It was the least that he owed to the man. He felt an urge to try to take his hand and hold it, and

yet he could not summon up the power to reach out. He was transfixed, transfixed except as his
hand continued to scrawl across he page, as the story continued to flow.

"I don't know when I arose from the field of death and blood. The sun was up, and it was high in
the sky. I must have slept there, slept among the corpses as the crows and the ravens descended
among them, slept among the dead of my family and people. And then I walked, walked again,
to Yerevan. I don't know why I walked. I died in that field, and there is nothing that life holds for
me any more. But walk I did, among the other streams of a shattered people as we fled the
Turkish Army that they sent East."

"I arrived here a few weeks ago. There were all too many like me. They've spoken about
numbers that were killed by the Turks, numbers I cannot know, millions during the war, and
more than a hundred thousand in the last few months. My family is part of those numbers, but I
cannot imagine how those cold, those hard, alien terms, those figures, somehow apply to Maritsa
with her laugh, to my young Yeranos who had been so clever, to Goumach who was so delicate
and pure, to my grandson Aghasi who was so kind and innocent. I'm told now that the Turks are
marching now to Pontus, and I'm sure there will be more there who are like me, except they'll
speak Greek instead of Armenian. I find it hard to care any more, hard to feel anything. The
Turks could kill me now, and I think I would utter not a word against them."

At last, exhausted, he lay back in his chair, his eyes closing. He was so perfectly still that James
felt afraid that he was dead. Then, his eyes still closed, he spoke. "Thank you. Thank you for
hearing my story."