Speaking to One Another - The International Raoul Wallenberg ...

that this wasn’t a dream... and... perhaps indeed (pauses for 3 seconds)... I was suppressed... I couldn’tthink... Perhaps I calmed down a little bit, since I thought how to find this Mhair. But I had his phone.Where I stood, I saw that someone was working in a room, I saw there was a phone there, and I askedhim “would you please let me make a phone call?” That person spoke only Turkish, but he understoodand he let me call. Mhair said, “give the phone to that person where you are calling from, I will tell himeverything”. Then I remember that this person went out, hired a cab, I took it and we went. When I metMhair he said, he didn’t want them to see him with Armenians in the city. He... feared that they couldsee him with Armenians, when we were getting out he even said that ... we shouldn’t speak Armenian.He spoke Armenian a little bit, and he spoke English a little, so we were managing... somehow... to understandeach other. Then we went to their house. His wife was a woman with blue eyes. I don’t knowher nationality, she didn’t speak Armenian... she was very attractive... yes, they were Muslims... Muslims.His wife... she was very obliging, she was trying to render her service as much as possible... So wespent the night at that house and left in the morning... He was going to get a cab so we could go. In themorning he said that there was no cab but he managed to find some car, so we could go. He was drivingit. From Moush valley we went to Bitlis. I verified it there that... there... there was one Kurdish personin Mush, that person told that he knows how we shall go to Arpi. He called it “Harpi”. I said to him“no, this is not Harpi, this is Arpi. Because they think... that from Mush we need to go directly south, tothe Sasoun mountains... But I knew it wasn’t that way. We went to Bitlis first. We went to Bitlis, now...on the way, like all real Muslims, like Muslim believers, this Mhair was doing namaz on the way, all thetime. He wasn’t pretending to... He did this several times, at different hours. Several times... He did thisfive times. He stopped the car several times, told me “you wait, until I come back”. He went to do namaz.So, we reached Bitlis. We were already quite late. We went there, reached Bitlis and suddenly (pausesfor 3 seconds) ... It seems, entry and exit from Bitlis were closed, there were check points. They let us in,we drove in. Now... Bitlis... The fortress was there, on the top of the gorge, we drove through the gorge,drove out of Bitlis. So we were now driving to Motki. At that time Motki was considered to be in-betweena town or a village, it resembled a large village... By this time I was already wishing to take pictures, butthis Mhair... he was afraid, he asked me not to take pictures... he said they were following everyonethere, they keep their eyes on everybody hear . If you take pictures, the soldier is there. They are terriblyafraid of soldiers. Now, we went west from Bitlis. On the way, there are cannons placed, one everythree to four kilometers... These were large cannons. As far as I understood, these areas were inhabitedby Kurds, so these were probably to suppress Kurds. Finally we went... and then we entered a very beautifulgorge. Asphalt road ended, we entered dirt road. We went by it, we entered another gorge. It wasvery beautiful, terribly beautiful. I tried to take a couple of photos, but he said “no, no”, so I had to comply...There was a river alongside... We went there, reached one village; Mhair said it was called Meydan.He said, Meydan... We went, stopped there, there was another river, and it was coming from the otherside. That was the Arpi river; it was coming from the Arpi Village already. I stood there for some time...It is interesting to note, they seem to recognize the name Arpi as the Arpi Village, although it seems thatthe name of the village has changed. But when you say Arpi, everyone knows what you mean, they knowArpi. Now... At some place I was waiting in that car, Mhair left me again (pauses for four seconds), so I157