Dispatches from Turkey: Voir Ani et Mourir
By Khatchig Mouradian on Mar 25th, 2010
turkey-voir-ani-et-mourir/
BY KHATCHIK MOURADIAN
Have you ever felt, after arriving somewhere, as if your entire life
was a gravitation towards that particular destination?
This is not the `all roads lead to Rome’ kind of sensation. It is
rather as if all the roads you thought you consciously took in your
life to get to this or that place, were unconsciously taken to reach
that specific, fateful destination.
Sunday, March 21, my fifth day in Turkey, witnessed that kind of an
arrival for me. I was among the ruins of Ani.
Ani, once the glorious capital of an Armenian kingdom, was luring me
towards her for thirty years, it seemed.
It felt I had learned walking only to one day walk here.
If you’re looking for glorious monuments, look elsewhere. Ani has been
grieving her lost glory for centuries. The stones of many of her
majestic churches have now become building blocks for uninspiring (an
understatement) houses in nearby villages. Her scars are only covered
with newer scars that are covered with even newer ones.
Here, the distortion of history is as striking as the scars of Ani.
There is not a single mention of Armenians on the Ministry of Tourism
signs and placards. People from Krypton could have built those
churches for all we know.
A horse’s feces at the entrance of one of Ani’s churches was a
powerful reminder of her place in this country (see photo). It
reminded me of the fecal matter I saw at one of the 1915 mass graves I
had visited in the Syrian desert of Der Zor last September. Back then,
I told the Economist `Donkeys are now defecating on the bones of my
forefathers. They were not allowed dignity, not even in death’ (Bones
to Pick, The Economist, Oct. 8, 2009).
A horse’s feces at the entrance of one of Ani’s churches was a
powerful reminder of her place in this country. Photo by Khatchig
Mouradian
Nearby, the ruins of a bridge on Akhourian – the river that demarcates
the borders between Turkey and Armenia today – is a chilling reminder of
the state of affairs between the two countries. If you are not sure
exactly why Turks and Armenians are nowhere near `normalization,’ ask
Ani.
During my stay in Turkey, I learned about several initiatives to
renovate Armenian cultural monuments (from Malatya to Diyarbekir to
Ani). TEPAV, the think tank that invited me alongside a group of eight
American experts to Turkey, is planning to renovate the bridge on
Akhourian, and, after that, other structures and monuments.
The Turkish state can’t bring back those who lost their lives during
the massacres and genocide, but if it is genuinely interested in
mending fences with Armenians (as I was told it was by top officials
of the current administration), perhaps it should start by creating a
conducive environment in which the thousands of Armenian architectural
structures across the country can be renovated, and their authenticity
preserved. Reparations for the genocide (a topic many progressive
intellectuals I met here are comfortable discussing these days
publicly, and even more so, during private conversations – something
which was almost impossible only a few years ago), is not only about
returning confiscated land, property, and money.
Ani is a monumental reminder that Turks do not need to go very far to
face their past. She is staring at them with a piercing look every
single day.
`To see Venice and die,’ they say. We, Armenians can easily say the
same about Ani.
I won’t.
Because Ani is worth living for. Ani is worth revisiting. And Ani is
worth every drop of sweat you and I can spend to make it rise from the
ashes and feces.