Re: Turks Are Nice People Provided You Don't Step On Their Tail Reading Baliozian is not easy, because you have to follow the curvatures of his brain to touch his sentiments, huge memory of knowledge and his professional skill, to hit his principles and ideas, even joking himself. For me, his irony and intelligence is exceptional, so I try to read every line as an admirer, and add some comments, if I have the time, knowing that he will welcome and be happy at least with “one good reader” who may not be one of the Armenians he is trying to enlighten. I hardly have any objections for everything that he put down and my comments are intended to be “complimentary “ to his wise observations..
“CONSTANTINOPLE” Philip Mansel, St. Martin’s Press, NY, ISBN 0-312-141574-8
I admire this comprehensive work with many interesting observations. Below I quote some of the excerpts, which I think that they are much more indicative of the treatment of minorities or if they were ever mistreated as slaves or cast citizens
P.52: As old churches were lost, new ones were built. Without towers or visible domes, they had to be discreet; even today those built before 1800 are hidden behind walls and invisible from the street.
P.54: Constantinople is one of the few cities where Muslims as well as Christians have lived together, over several centuries, in nearly equal proportions. It is not surprising that the two religions influenced each other. Balikli for example’ was revered by Muslims as well as Christians. In 1638 Sultan Murad IV is said to have asked the monks to pray for his victory over Persians. The day they prayed, he took Baghdad. The crowd, drawn from rich and poor, Muslim and Christian, Bulgarian, Armenian and Catholic, was sometimes so great that the whole city seemed to be present.
P.335: In 1896 the Sultan appointed Artin Pasha Dadian, president of a council to resolve the conflict between the empire and the Armenian revolutionaries. Having secured and amnesty and liberation of 1.200 political prisoners he sent his son to Geneva to talk to the exiles. He himself claimed to work for reforms in the East ‘at once as an Ottoman civil servant and as an Armenian’. When an Armenian radical smiled at the phrase, he said: ‘I know that you young Armenians, you do not believe in my patriotism and believe me a Turkish zealot. … ‘it is our duty to work faithfully for the state and fear movements of revolt so as not to suffer terrible punishments. He ended with a cry from the heart: ‘Prudent patriotism, is it not also patriotism?’ In a letter of 1898, intended for the Dashnak party, he is lucid and prophetic: Many organizations are fighting different causes, each in their own way, and in the middle of all this stands the pitiful Artin Pasha, who on one hand begs the Sultan for mercy by telling him that this would be the best thing for his empire and on the other hand fights base individuals who in order to attain their selfish aims are even willing to sell their nation.
P.337: While some Armenians and Bulgarians chose violence, most Greeks were too prosperous to fight for ‘the Great Idea’ They felt that while the Ottomans reigned, Greeks, through their banks and commerce, governed. In the words of one Greek businessman: ‘We lend them the vivacity of our intelligence and our business skills; they protect us with their strength, like kindly giants…’
P.348: However, mullahs, Greek and Armenian priests and rabbis were photographed side by side, surrounded by Ottoman soldiers, in commemoration of their successful organization of the elections. Of the deputies elected in 1908, 142 were Turks, 60 Arabs, 25 Albanians, 23 Greeks, 12 Armenians (including four Dasnaks and two Henchaks) five Jews, four Bulgarians, three Serbs, one Vlach. The colloquial term appropriated by followers of the Committee, had about 60 deputies. Others included ulema opposed to secularization, conservatives, and liberals in favour of decentralization.
P.397: While nationalists left Constantinople to join the army, waves of refugees and orphans, Turkish, Kurdish and Armenian, poured into the city. There were so many that they took over military schools, palaces and mosques. A special American-funded charity called Near East Relief, fed over 160,000 people a day in Constantinople.
P.398: The city , which had received so many refugees from different regions, from Spain, Poland and Central Asia, now witnessed the arrival of a procession of 126 boats containing 145,693 Russians (and Russian imperial stud). They came not, as many Russians had once hoped, to hang ‘Russia’s shield for ever on the gates of Tsarigrad’, but as refugees traveling in indescribable squalor. Some were so hungry and thirsty that they lowered their wedding rings on cords, down to boatloads of Greek and Armenian shopkeepers, in return from bread and water. They slept in the stables of Dolmabahce palace, or prostitutes’ vacated rooms in the port hotels of Galata.
P.414: “The Ottoman dynasty is the savior of Turkish Jews. When our ancestors were driven out of Spain, and looked for a country to take them in, it was the Ottomans who agreed to give us shelter and saved us from extinction. Through the generosity of their government, once again they received freedom of religion and language, protection for their women, their possessions and their lives. Therefore, our conscience obliges to serve you as much as we can in your darkest hour
Choosing Sides:” Sure we chose honest men, not nationalist or religionist frauds
Subservience: It means comfort, security of life and being on the strong or rich side! A Turkish poet Orhan Veli, in one of his poems was comparing the pet dog of the house living in comfort with no worries of shelter or food, when the street dog has to go through garbage cans to find food, shiver and run on streets. Nevertheless, he ends his poem with such a statement to the pet dog:: “But your job is not easy; because you have to wiggle your tail to your owner every time”!
Sermon: Excellent, but can someone explain to me what the empty words of “Pan-Turkism” or “Ottomanism” really mean? I do not interpret Mansel negatively. The excerpts I quoted give a rather balanced, homogeneous society. The Patriarchs were responsible towards the Sultan, but they had full authority for their own community, even judicial punishments, exile, prison etc.! This a very “strange style of slavery” or racial-social discrimination? To me it looks like an X-large lifestyle of undeclared autonomy!
Notes and comments: I do not think of any person, race, or nation as an enemy! If some idiots think and treat me in the opposite, it just shows the degree of their prejudice, injustice and ignorance!
Problems: One French young and clever person taught me a simple theorem. He said, “Every problem has a solution!”
“If there is no solution, it means that there is no problem”. Simple and well said!
Armenianism: I do not understand and hate to classify people by their race, nation, religion etc as if we are speaking of football club hoodlums or fanatics! Yes, resurrect brain-dead is impossible, but what if he has no brains at all or a flat one?
Tribalism: I do not see any serious difference in genes or other characters or features among us. We are all the product s of the same region, same traditions, same tribal life and habits. I think that we have almost everything in common, from neighborhood, hospitality, food, habits, living styles etc. But the ARF for centuries has managed to draw lines of separatism and negativity because they need this product to sell and collect money to enrich their own selves.
Questions and Answers: Democratic representatives? None of them is good, but many are much worse than others are and once they grab the power, they never let the chair go!
Your being paid by the Turkish Government ?:
My friend, this is a typical palaver or a “lie with tail” some diaspora communities fabricate so frequently when they have “no say”!
The Turkish Government does not know, “armenians-1915.blogspot.com”, they never heard of Ara Baliozian and even Sukru S. Aya (despite my two books sent to all universities) and weak presentations. I have never been even heard or invited by anyone and I know that only “close friends and special relations” may get some rumored “presentation funds”! You or me? Even if we could ever tried to be subservient, we had no chances because we are not pet dogs! We both do not wiggle our tails. I told my nearest one that when I die, they better cut my tail first with a hand saw, because otherwise the lid of my coffin will not be shut. Do not feel sad that they take you for being pro-Turkish! There are many who think that I am of Armenian race or family and changed my name; otherwise, why should I be writing and trying to pacify this tribalism or antagonism!
They want us to be idiots like themselves so that they applaud us! Who needs the applause of absolute fools? Knowing that many get milked, while some get enriched!
Salute, Regards
Sukru S. Aya Istanbul 10.09.09
0 comments:
Post a Comment