turkish-greek civic dialogue - AEGEE Europe

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MOVIE
REBETICA
You fed me with your lies
Almost since I was born
But now that the snakes have risen
And never shed a tear mother Hellas
Ah Thomas joint
We’ll get high together
But so you can get with it
Babis will lay it out for you
Georgadakis fiddling will blow your mind
And Maria with her tambourine will smile and
Lead you on
CRICKETS IN THE BACKGROUND,
PEACE IN THE AIR…
WHAT DO CRICKETS THINK ABOUT THE FESTIVAL?
Karpathios, Karpathios! As Nikos Loizos was playing the songs performed by
Yeni Türkü in Turkey, a giant and improvised circle of people was spreading
the charm in Turkish and Greek. The circle was singing “we are all human
beings irrespective of our nationalities”, just as the prominent author Antonis
Samarakis who passed away just few days after the festival said many years
ago.
One of the most meaningful encounters of the Festival took place when the
psychology workshop participants met “Lütfiye Nine” (Lütfiye Kaya), who is one
of the last witnesses of the Lausanne Exchange in Kayaköy. The participants,
who were welcomed at the garden of Nine’s house, were told about all the
memories by Lütfiye Nine from the bottom of her heart as if the participants
were her own grandchildren. Every word Lütfiye Nine was uttering, reminded
us vividly the reason why we were all there in a very natural way: “My dearest,
you are all the sons of this land”.
The Nea Makri dancers performing dances from different regions of Anatolia
was one of the most remarkable moments of the festival accompanied by a
strong applause.
The day after the one-week festival Kayaköy was reminding the ghost town
again; it generated the same kind of feeling as 80 years ago, when it was
abandoned by Greeks all of a sudden. Everything became silent, the village
got immediately calm. This atmosphere made us automatically remember
the sincere words of the Aegean author Dido Sotiriou: “Send my greetings to
Anatolia…Hope she will not resent us since we watered down its land with
blood. God Damn you all the evils who made one to kill his brother”.
FROM FESTIVAL PARTICIPANTS
Serdar Değirmencioğlu- workshop leader: In a village, which was living in peace
80 years ago without the need to have big forces, big ideologies, big treaties;
this time young people discovered a very important reality. They found out the
reason why modern ethnicity categorisations and widely used adjectives to
identify ethnicities such as “Turk and Greek”, would never be able to destroy
the rich culture that still prevails in that region. All the people left the village
again in tears, as it was the case 80 years ago; however this time all these tears
were the messenger of better days.
Yannis Palavos – participant: I think Kayaköy served as a time machine.
After seeing Kayaköy and the festival, I am confident to say that our
generation will prove that people can live in peace again. Please
remember Jonh Lehnon, who was singing “You may say I’m a dreamer,
but I’m not the only one” as well as Lütfiye Nine who told us “You are ALL the
sons of this land”. The time machines do not lie; however, the ones who profits
from tension between our communities do so. I think Kayaköy was a unique
experience to find out this reality.
Eirini Evangelou - participant: I am a psychologist; I am expert on group
dynamics, conflicts, and similar issues. However, in Kayaköy, we went much
beyond only discussing these topics, we established a very sincere and
meaningful communication, we all wanted this to happen and it was a very
precious experience for us.
KayaFest Youth and Culture Festival Association des Etats Généraux des Etudiants de L’Europe