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

his grandparents survived, migrating from Bitlis to Istanbul, where they continued to speak Kurdish. Aramsays the past was not talked about during his childhood: “These subjects were taboo in our childhood.They were not spoken of at home. They said we were wealthy. They had hidden cans filled withgold which remained there, and went through difficult times.” He points out that speaking about thepast has only become possible in recent years: “We never investigated our Armenian side. Doing thesekinds of things was considered nationalist when we were growing up. Circumstances were more dangerousand difficult. In those days, whether the Armenian question was this or that was not discussedas we are doing now.”As a result of his father’s position, and being so well integrated into Turkish society compared to otherArmenians, Aram’s family had a wide and diverse social network. At the same time, Aram speaks of thecost of achieving public recognition as an Armenian in Turkey: “He was a careful man. If you are sportingfor Turkey and you are Armenian, you have to watch your back. For instance, he never went to Armenia.He probably didn’t experience open discrimination. But I think it had a price.”Aram remembers several of his father’s anecdotes which illustrate the difficulty of being an Armeniannational sportsman: “When he won a match the newspapers would write, ‘Our sportsman won thematch’, but if he lost they wrote, ‘Our sportsman of Armenian origin lost the match.’ During the Cyprusevents he is going to compete against a Greek. The military attaché says, ‘Don’t shame us, you have towin.’ My father gets a punch in the match, his eyebrow splits. He gets another one, his other eyebrowbursts as well. When the two eyebrows split, doctors usually stop the match. He said ‘I’ll play’ and wonthe match with his two eyebrows bleeding.”Where are you from? Your name is so different!Aram speaks about his experience of living in Turkey as a third generation Armenian after 1915: “Whenyou establish a one-to-one relationship you don’t feel discrimination. You may feel pressure from theoutside. Somewhere, you always run into walls. For instance, you are traveling to another city, somebodywill ask your name and you’ll have to give an account. ‘Where are you from?’ ‘Your name is so different!’I am a citizen of the Turkish Republic, what will happen if I say ‘I am Armenian’?”Unlike most Armenians in Turkey, Aram, who trained as a doctor, succeeded in becoming a civil servantand received a green passport issued only to high level civil servants: “They prefer that you not bean official. Having a green passport was very important to me. I was saying, ‘They are obliged to give meone too.’”28