‘Last Armenians’ of Diyarbakır tie the knot after 60 years of waiting

[PlanA]

I saw this article and found it interesting. Many people think that people living in Diyarbakir would be just Kurdish.But there is also an Armenian community. Maybe because phenotype-wise there is a large overlap between Kurds & Armenians that's why people Armenian people can blend in Diyarbakir without looking foreign and passing as Kurds. And so people keep stereotype inhabitants of Diyarbakir being of solely Kurdish origin.

Anyway the news article:


Diyarbakır’s recently restored Surp Giragos Armenian Church has been the witness of a very special wedding, the “yes, I do” of two octogenarians, pronounced after long overdue by some 60 years.

With the traditional dress, the bride Beyzar, 84-years-old, reverenced as “the last Armenian” of Diyarbakır for being the dean of what remains of the southeastern city’s once significantly large community. With the tuxedo, his three years younger groom Sarkis, from the province’s district of Silvan, also the hometown of the acting head of the Armenian patriarchate in Turkey, Aram Ateşyan.

The couple could have been celebrating their diamond wedding anniversary, instead they will content themselves to experience the excitement of newly-weds after 60 years of a reluctant concubinage.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/images/news/201406/n_68194_1.jpg
“I did not want to die unmarried,” said Beyzar right before the ceremony, apparently moved. She then explained that most of his Armenian friends chose to leave the country, but now the city is looking after its Armenian cultural heritage – one example is the restoration of the Surp Giragos church, which had been the nexus of the community.

“I wanted this marriage so much and I feel so blessed. May God give such a happy day to everyone in their life,” she added.

Gülten Kışanak, the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) co-chair who was elected Diyarbakır mayor during the March 30 elections was present to conduct the office, also homage the couple, expressed her wish that they can be an example for the youth.

“This is no ordinary marriage. We are witnessing the immortal love of two people who have not consummated their love for each other. They have succeeded in their struggle to remain standing in this land with the power of their love,” Kışanak said.

But the couple had no intention of letting long solemn talks overshadow their wedding and celebrated just like any young newly-weds. Surrendering to cheers, Beyzar stepped onto Sarkis’ foot, a gesture meant to signify who will be the head of the household. She then threw her bouquet to a crowd of unmarried women half a century her junior.

Yervant Bostancı, the famous oud master of Armenian descent who decided to return to Diyarbakır late last year after 20 years of self-imposed exile, played Armenian, Kurdish and Turkish songs, adding more symbolism to a marriage providing Armenians the feeling that Diyarbakır can become their home once again.


http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/last-armenians-of-diyarbakir-tie-the-knot-after-60-years-of-waiting.aspx?pageID=238&nID=65667&NewsCatID=341

[Musso]

Thanks for posting the article :)

[roro4721]

My great-grandmother was from Diyarbakir. Her name was Arshaluys, her parents were killed and she was deported to Aleppo. I'd like to visit someday.

[PlanA]

My great-grandmother was from Diyarbakir. Her name was Arshaluys, her parents were killed and she was deported to Aleppo. I'd like to visit someday.
Sorry to hear that. Now I am curious about your phenotype. Would you say, you would look as local in Diyarbakir phenotype-wise?

[roro4721]

Sorry to hear that. Now I am curious about your phenotype. Would you say, you would look as local in Diyarbakir phenotype-wise?

Well, I'm only 1/8th Diyarbakiri(?) and I have no clue what the average person from Diyarbakir looks like. Here is my great-grandmother from Diyarbakir:
http://i59.tinypic.com/10400ar.png

Her kids:

http://i60.tinypic.com/23ksqw8.png
Great-uncle

http://i59.tinypic.com/21n2uco.png
My grandmother

http://i57.tinypic.com/esnldv.png
All these girls were her daughters except the blonde one.
They all knew Turkish too and so does my mom, but I'm the first of my kind not to know a word.

I'd rather remain anon on this website, but here I am as a tot. Can you tell if I can pass in Diyarbakir through this?
http://i58.tinypic.com/2isgv2w.jpg
http://i60.tinypic.com/dheaud.jpg

[PlanA]

Oh that's a cute baby girl picture. Mhmm it's hard to say anything about a baby picture, but I think the people in the pictures don't look stereotype Southeasterner look. To me they look more Caucasus but also Eastern part of Turkey. Are they all pure Armenians or mixed with Assyrians or other Christians?

[roro4721]

Oh that's a cute baby girl picture. Mhmm it's hard to say anything about a baby picture, but I think the people in the pictures don't look stereotype Southeasterner look. To me they look more Caucasus but also Eastern part of Turkey. Are they all pure Armenians or mixed with Assyrians or other Christians?

They're pure, my grandmothers father was from Kilis (which is as South as you can get).

[Azalea]

Your great-grandmother does resemble some Kurdish woman from Eastern Turkey that I know, the others not so much.

[roro4721]

Your great-grandmother does resemble some Kurdish woman from Eastern Turkey that I know, the others not so much.

What area would you say they'd look the most common in?

[roro4721]

Some Armenian recollections of Diyarbakir

“The crowd lined the square, some people were sitting in chairs, some Arabs selling quinces, people burning incense, the Turkish women in burugs were sitting on hassocks eating simits. The sun was terribly hot, and on the black walls some cranes were perched. In the middle of the crowd there were fifteen or twenty Armenian women, some a little older than me, some my mother’s age. They were dressed in their daily clothes, some in long, fine dresses; others, who were peasants, in simple black. They were holding hands and walking in a circle slowly, tentatively, as if they were afraid to move. About six Turkish soldiers stood behind them. They had whips and each had a gun. They were shouting, “Dance. Giaur. Slut.” The soldiers cracked the whips on the women’s backs and faces, and across their breasts. “Dance. Giaur. Slut.”
Many of the women were praying while they moved in this slow circle. Der Voghormya, Der Voghormya. (Lord have mercy.) Krisdos bada raqyal bashki i mezi meroom. (Christ is sacrificed and shared among us.) Occasionally they would drop the hand next to them and quickly make the sign of the cross. Their hair had come undone and their faces were wrapped up in the blood-stuck tangles of hair, so they looked like corpses of Medusa. Their clothes were now turning red. Some of them were half naked, others tried to hold their clothes together. They began to fall down and when they did they were whipped until they stood and continued their dance. Each crack of whip and more of their clothing came off.

Around them stood their children and other Armenian children who had been rounded up from the nearby Armenian school. They were forced into a circle, and several Turkish soldiers stood behind them with whips and shouted “Clap, clap!” And the children clapped. And when the soldiers said “Clap, clap, clap,” the children were supposed to clap faster, and if they didn’t, the whip was used on them. Some of the children were two and three years old, barely able to stand up. They were all crying uncontrollably. Crying in a terrible, pitiful, hopeless way. I stood next to women in burugs and men in red fezzes and business suits, and they too were clapping like cockroaches.

Then two soldiers pushed through the crowd swinging wooden buckets and began to douse the women with the fluid in the buckets, and, in a second, I could smell it was kerosene. And the women screamed because the kerosene was burning their lacerations and cuts. Another soldier came forward with a torch and lit each woman by the hair. At first all I could see was the smoke, and the smell grew sickening, and then I could see the fire growing off the women’s bodies, and their screaming became unbearable. The children were being whipped now furiously, as if the sight of the burning mothers had excited the soldiers, and they admonished the children to clap “faster, faster, faster,” telling them that if they stopped they too would be lit on fire. As the women began to collapse in burning heaps, oozing and black, the smell of burnt flesh made me sick. I fainted and your mother’s Haroutiun found me and took me home.”
— the recollections of “Dovey,” or Aghavni, an Armenian Genocide survivor from Diarbekir, retold in “Black Dog of Fate,” by Peter Balakian.

[StonyArabia]

The city was founded by the Banu Baker Arabian tribe.

[turkojew]

I thought every Armenian in western Turkey was butchered by those fascists in 1914-15.