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--- en:magazines:hade:no_0:tochni [2024/12/21 09:16] – no_name12
+++ en:magazines:hade:no_0:tochni [2025/04/20 19:33] (current) – external edit 127.0.0.1
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 I remember that a few days later, after the visit of a much larger number of Greek Cypriot journalists finally took place, a well known and bold journalist who supports rapprochement "finally discovered" that the Turkish Cypriots are well dressed and stay in houses and one can see cars on the roads! All this is obvious to anyone who lives near the buffer zone.
-So we went to Kyrenia, my heart cried at the small port and my shoulders felt heavy as I walked under the Turkish flag while entering the venetian castle. I remembered the school excursions there during my childhood days. I also remembered the images of Greek Cypriot soldiers surrendering when confronted with the tanks. We had lunch at the Dome hotel… the hotel of the unforgettable memory. We left early for Famagusta in the same way that came to have enough time to implement the plan we had made. We first went to Ayios Epiktitos in my uncle’s house where I often went during my holidays in the old times. We were badly received by a “mavrotsakalos” {word used by T/C referring in a pejorative way to the Anatolian Turks) who grudgingly led us to the croft. The Turkish Cypriots from Avdemou who were there cultivating it were picking lemons and offered us some to take to my uncle. Then we went to the village itself but I passed through it quickly, not because I am not interested but because I want to focus my attention somewhere else.
+So we went to Kyrenia, my heart cried at the small port and my shoulders felt heavy as I walked under the Turkish flag while entering the venetian castle. I remembered the school excursions there during my childhood days. I also remembered the images of Greek Cypriot soldiers surrendering when confronted with the tanks. We had lunch at the Dome hotel… the hotel of the unforgettable memory. We left early for Famagusta in the same way that came to have enough time to implement the plan we had made. We first went to Ayios Epiktitos in my uncle’s house where I often went during my holidays in the old times. We were badly received by a “mavrotsakalos” (word used by T/C referring in a pejorative way to the Anatolian Turks) who grudgingly led us to the croft. The Turkish Cypriots from Avdemou who were there cultivating it were picking lemons and offered us some to take to my uncle. Then we went to the village itself but I passed through it quickly, not because I am not interested but because I want to focus my attention somewhere else.
 ...In the other side there is a village which is called, or at least it used to be called till that time “the village of the orphans” or “the village of the women” or, better still as my friends told me in Greek “το χωρκόν των ορφανών ή το χωρκόν των γεναικών”. I was told that only women and children live there. They are those who remained from the Turkish Cypriot population of Tochni of 1974... On the road sign it says “Tuskent koy” which means Tochni in Turkish. It is the village of Vouno, next to Syghari to the south of Pentadactylos, almost opposite of Nicosia.
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 The young people who were sitting round the old man were generally speaking, wearing casual modern clothes, had long hair and had the image of dissenters. Some nationalists, I would think, whom I had met earlier were looking at me with expressions that implied that I was representing a barbaric tribe, that I was a murderer. I felt I was ready to face that.
-The old man sitting opposite me had an empty expression on his face, maybe due to many long years of deep pain. He was looking at me with a deep and penetrating look. The man was without hatred, he had passed through the land of pain and had reached the other side, the side of wisdom. “My s0n” he said, and he told me the story of how and who rounded up the men of Tochni and led them to the place from which they would never return. His voice was weak, expressionless but steady. Every family had lost loved ones. He told me that he would not like to return back to their village and that it would be good if Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots could live side by side -not together- in peace. This is the official policy as well. But his reference to peace in his soft voice had nothing official in it. And I did not believe him when he said that he would not want the Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots to live together again. On the contrary, I was under the impression that this man could bring the two communities together single handedly. He said, “Bring to me your own people who have suffered as much as I have so we can talk together”.
+The old man sitting opposite me had an empty expression on his face, maybe due to many long years of deep pain. He was looking at me with a deep and penetrating look. The man was without hatred, he had passed through the land of pain and had reached the other side, the side of wisdom. “My son” he said, and he told me the story of how and who rounded up the men of Tochni and led them to the place from which they would never return. His voice was weak, expressionless but steady. Every family had lost loved ones. He told me that he would not like to return back to their village and that it would be good if Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots could live side by side -not together- in peace. This is the official policy as well. But his reference to peace in his soft voice had nothing official in it. And I did not believe him when he said that he would not want the Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots to live together again. On the contrary, I was under the impression that this man could bring the two communities together single handedly. He said, “Bring to me your own people who have suffered as much as I have so we can talk together”.
 From the rest of the young people who were there I only maintain the general memory of a group of people who, I think, are pioneers in relation to the rest of the Cypriots. It seemed to me that these people in their twenties and thirties had already worked through in their inner being the basic questions of society and of human existence. I was impressed by the lack of a competitive spirit in the way they talked, a lack of hatred and a feeling, not of love, but I would say, of acceptance.
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 Orhan, whom I met at the last bi-communal gathering at the Ledra Palace hotel was one of those young people I met six years ago. “I am the one who made you the sandwich”, he reminded me shyly, trying to disperse the mist of time.
-Another person standing next to us seemed to be trying to join us in our conversation Was he a Greek Cypriot or a Turkish Cypriot? Trying to work out who is who is an interesting game we play in these bi-communal meetings. “Let me introduce you to my friend Fevzi” Orhan said. “Fevzi, Fevzi…Cyprus is so small whether unified or divided” I said with a smile. In another meeting at Pyla, for Hade, I met a girl whose surname was Fevzi who came from Tochni. “She is my cousin”, he said. Günsel Fevzi was a subtle intellectual who lives in London and was telling us that day how, a few years ago, she had gone to Tochni and went to her old home in the midst of many difficulties. Herself being pulled by the passion of returning, even for a little while, to the house she was born, she dared this journey which ended up, as always, in tears. Maybe she went precisely for this reason; to cry.
+Another person standing next to us seemed to be trying to join us in our conversation. Was he a Greek Cypriot or a Turkish Cypriot? Trying to work out who is who is an interesting game we play in these bi-communal meetings. “Let me introduce you to my friend Fevzi” Orhan said. “Fevzi, Fevzi…Cyprus is so small whether unified or divided” I said with a smile. In another meeting at Pyla, for [[en:magazines:hade|Hade]], I met a girl whose surname was Fevzi who came from Tochni. “She is my cousin”, he said. Günsel Fevzi was a subtle intellectual who lives in London and was telling us that day how, a few years ago, she had gone to Tochni and went to her old home in the midst of many difficulties. Herself being pulled by the passion of returning, even for a little while, to the house she was born, she dared this journey which ended up, as always, in tears. Maybe she went precisely for this reason; to cry.
 I agreed with Orhan and Fevzi to meet again in the next bi-communal meeting. They said to me, “But we want you to tell to the people of Tochni to come to the Ledra Palace as well”.
-{{tag>  Condition:"Needs Translation":"Needs Turkish Translation" Condition:"Needs Translation":"Needs Greek Translation"
+{{tag>  Condition:"Needs Translation":"Needs Turkish Translation"
 Magazines:"Hade (Issue 0)"
 "Decade:Decade 1990-1999"