turkish-greek civic dialogue - AEGEE Europe

152
So, Crete file has taken its place on the pages of history and we remember
these days with sadness.
With the protocol on compulsory exchange of Turkish and Greek people signed
on 30 January 1923, the exchanged population from Crete Island, Yanya,
Thessaloniki, Serez, Kavala came to Moudania (Mudanya). Two thousand Muslim
Turkish populations who had different occupations in those days.
They set up a band with the help of their own musical instruments that they
had brought from Crete island and the other musical instruments inherited
from Greeks. This band is now called ‘’Moudania Band’’. Moudania Band was
set up in those complicated days and it is the oldest band of Turkey.
Watchman Kazım Bozdağ (Hüseyin Akbaş’s father-in-law) came to Turkey from
Greece during the population exchange in 1924. While he was coming to Turkey
by Kırzade boat he brought uniform, gaiter, shorts, trainers, goal nets and
other sports equipments that were red and green.
We are still protecting them. We can see all of these sports equipments’ colours
as red and green in the history. These colours are the symbol of poppy that
grows among olive trees.
Our friend, the conductor of Moudania Band tells the first days of the band:
During the population exchange in 1924, the first band was set up with the help
of their previous experiences, musical instruments left in the church by Greeks
from Moudania. Thanks to these exchanges town’s musical history began to
start since many people came to Turkey through the exchange volunteered to
participate in this band.
Moudania Band has performed art in all ceremonies during the Republic. A
hundred-year old Çakmaklı Clarinet is the most valuable instrument that we
can’t find a similar one. It can put three different compositions together.
Çakmaklı Clarinet was registered to the Moudania Orthodox church inventory
eighty years ago.
THE COMPULSORY EXCHANGE OF
POPULATIONS BETWEEN
GREECE AND TURKEY
.................................................................................................. Ayhan Somer Moran
January 3, 2005
”80 th Anniversary Symposium” was a sudden and harsh revelation of the
reality and the horror behind the story of the people whom I have known
all my life as “The Cretans - Turkish people who emigrated to the Aegean
Region of Turkey as a result of population exchange in 1923”. Though
my father and all his family were true Cretans, I had never seriously
thought what it meant historically, politically and socially. It was a romantic and
an interesting story, and it gave my father sort of an exotic background and
image. I don’t recall ever any serious discussion, complaint, and not even a mention
of hardships, mistakes, and wrongdoings about the Exchange and its aftermath.
Though they spoke Cretan dialect among themselves, his family’s “Cretan”
roots manifested itself mostly in their life style and values, and not in the
shared stories of “the old country”, and memories and memorabilia of their
life in Heraklion.
Recently when the third generation of the Cretan emigrants began to
research into their families’ past, serious studies started on the subject.
Since my father was one of the few emigrants who was still alive and
mentally agile at that age (he was born in 1917 in Heraklion), we and
some of the researchers urged him to talk about his past and what
he remembered.
Surprisingly, he was extremely reluctant to do so – we never really understood
why. He always found a way to get out of such meetings and discussions. Once
he said, “It is too late to do anything about the mistakes made at the time.”
Maybe that was the real reason behind his reticence, or he did not remember
anything he considered “significant”.
Population Exchange Association des Etats Généraux des Etudiants de L’Europe