Chidem Inch: The Armenian Genocide 105th Anniversary

     Every April, I dedicate a post to the commemoration of the Armenian Genocide. I have done this since I started this writing project, first as a monthly e-letter in 2004 and then, in 2009, as this blog. In many years, I have written about the Genocide years.
     The Genocide drove most of the Armenian nation out of the ancestral homelands and created the diaspora from where I am writing. It was a such a traumatic and devasting event in our recent history that it dominates us well after the generation that survived it has essentially all passed on. Their children are now dwindling in numbers. 
     I am not sure of the percentages, but there are a large number of Armenians that love our culture and heritage and strive to keep it central in our lives no matter where we live. Many of us in the diaspora, sadly, have melted away into whatever country they live in and lost any most of what the rest of us fight to maintain whatever degree we can. 
     The 100th Anniversary of the Genocide came in 2015. We did commemorate it grandly with all the reverence due to those that perished and what we lost as a people. We commemorated with proud who we are still hear maintaining our culture and heritage. We commemorated with political demands for recognition and reparations. Collectively, we made all the martyrs saints. 
     We wrote novels, poems, and historical analyses. We produced works of fine art and had concerts from folk and classical to jazz and pop. We made films. We did this all to proudly remember and honor our past but proudly, and a bit defiantly, celebrate that we are still here, still Armenian, and we are not about to let that go. 
     Countries around the world began to acknowledge that what happened from 1915 – 1922 in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire was indeed a Genocide. Countries did this in spite of significant lobbying from Turkey who adamantly denies that it was Genocide providing all kinds of spin and distortions of history to make the Armenians, Greeks, and Assyrians war criminals instead of victims. There is as resolved to never admit to any crime that could lead to reparations as we are to reclaim our lost lands.
     In this country, we have been fighting, lobbying, and advocating for recognition of the Genocide by the US Congress. Whenever we have been close to having the votes, Turkey would influence our State Department and President to pressure the Congress, particularly the House of Representatives not to pass the resolution. Almost every President claimed to be a friend of the Armenians when they were candidates and then let us down to support Turkey because of an airbase or other diplomatic leverage they had over us. 
     President Trump made no such promise. Yet, in late 2019, the resolutions commemorating and recognizing the Armenian Genocide passed both houses of the US Congress. H. Res 296 on October 29, 2019 by a vote of 405-11 in the House of Representatives. A few short weeks later, S. Res 150 was passed by the US Senate on December 12, 2019 by unanimous consent. It a wonderful culmination of years of effort by Armenians in this country. We never thought we would see it happen and finally it did. It could be argued that Congress was condemning the Turkish incursions into Northern Syria to battle our Kurdish allies more than they were doing something for Armenians. 
     Since the passage of these resolutions, nothing more has happened as the world’s attention is now focused on the Covid-19 pandemic. Aside from this, I do not expect Turkey to cave in and offer the Armenians anything remotely related to admission or reparations. The government there is adamant and definitely racist. They are not about to do anything positive for Armenians who haven’t lived there for over a hundred years. Heck, they consistently suppress and harass their Kurdish population who are actually Moslem. But this will not keep us from demanding and working for justice. 
     What else can we do? We must focus on the Republic of Armenia. We have to bolster its economy and shore up its defenses as it lies between Turkey and Azerbaijan. We, in the diaspora, need to strengthen our own communities lest our heritage simply assimilates away. 
     I have read and appreciated the posts of family, friends, and acquaintances on social media to commemorate the 105th Anniversary of the Genocide. Many have added a border to their profile photo stating that they are a descendant of an Armenian Genocide survivor. Others have posted photos of their grandparents and great-grandparents before the Genocide in whatever village or town they hailed from. Others posted quotes from a survivor grandparent or great-grandparent reminding us what a horrific and dismal time it was and thus putting this pandemic into a different perspective.   
     Me? I recorded a lament on the oud. It was Adanayi Voghpuh, a song commemorating the 1909 massacres of Armenians and Assyrians in Adana. It is the saddest and most hauntingly beautiful song I have ever heard.  

My rendition of Adanyi Voghpuh 

     I leave you with the words of a dear friend, Nvair Kadian Beylerian, on Facebook: 

On the night of April 24, 1915, over 250 Armenian intellectuals of Constantinople were arrested, deported and eventually executed. The act, which was ordered by the Minister of Interior Talaat Pasha, was intentionally premeditated to deprive the Armenian population of leadership and any chance for significant resistance. Arrests, deportations, starvation, executions, rape, murder, pillaging ensued ultimately stripping historic Armenian lands of any identifiable Christian Armenians and the death of nearly 2 million ethnic Armenians. We rise from the ashes. 105 years later... We survive. We thrive. We remember.