ABSTRACT
When Armenak and I first became leftists, we worked for the Armenian community. The new generations of Armenians still scattered all across Anatolia were forgetting Armenian, on account of there being no schools. Around that time, it emerged that there were, especially in the east and the southeast, Armenian villages in which they spoke only Kurdish. When we found out about this, we decided to go out and collect these young Armenians and bring them back to Tbrevank. With this in mind, we went to Mardin-Midyat. In Silopi, we found Siament Agha’s Varto tribe. Here we stayed with the villagers who lived in tents. That’s how we first made contact with my [future] wife Rakel’s village and its inhabitants. After that, we went to find the Armenians in neighboring villages.
