The Hundred-Year Walk: An Armenian Odyssey by Dawn Anahid MacKeen

Author:Dawn Anahid MacKeen [MacKeen, Dawn Anahid]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Tags: History, Middle East, Turkey & Ottoman Empire, Modern, 20th Century, Biography & Autobiography, Cultural; Ethnic & Regional, General, Historical
ISBN: 9780544582927
Google: fWIpBgAAQBAJ
Amazon: B00S46SO9G
Publisher: Mariner Books
Published: 2016-01-12T08:00:00+00:00

The Desert’s End

1916

“YOU ARE BEING SENT BACK HOME,” a Chechen guard announced. “The deportations have ended, but to avoid overcrowding on the roads, you will return in small groups.”

By now, the tens of thousands of exiled Armenians knew better. They didn’t cheer, not like before; instead, a paralyzing fear clotted their throats. The wait in this Mesopotamian camp of Suwar finally seemed over; August had become September, and September had become the end. They knew what came next. At the dirt podium, the official called out specific villages and towns, the first supposed convoy home. Stepan listened for his, Adabazar. The memory of living comfortably with his mother and siblings in the days before deportation and war scarcely felt real anymore.

The cracked earth surrounded them, with few signs of life. This was the desert’s end, for him and everyone else. Beside him, thousands stepped forward on bloodied and bare feet and assembled into a line. Stepan couldn’t believe their passivity; no one was resisting, not one person, the fight gone. In their arms, some carried bedding, in hopes of needing it, in hopes of a future. He studied their faces, noticed their quivering lips. No words were coming out; the procession formed in absolute silence. Are they whispering their last prayers to God, or are they delirious?

At last, the trembling convoy waded out to the opposite bank of the narrow Khabur River, beside armed guards. Then the official named another town, and the scene repeated itself. Some men around Stepan couldn’t take it. Alone like him, and starving, they declared, “Whenever or wherever we’re sent, we’re going to die. We’re condemned to die. It would be better to die sooner than later.”

“Let’s die and be saved,” said another.

Sometimes, Stepan thought that too. But he wasn’t ready yet. He wanted to live, even for one more day.

Another three weeks elapsed as Stepan waited for Adabazar to be called. September turned to October, and the guards barricaded in the Armenians left behind. No one could roam beyond the tents clustered outside the hamlet. Not even the animals, which were now tied up to starve. Asdvadz! Asdvadz! Everyone left began to cry out, summoning God. Some retreated into their tents to wait. On the floors, Bibles were butterflied open, pages turned. The pious bent knees and clasped hands, locked in perpetual prayer, their favorite psalms read aloud. Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me . . . Some, already starving, stopped eating, remembering how Christ had done so and how they used to purify their souls during Lent. The abstinence gifted them with something unexpected—control, when there was none.

Names of new hometowns thundered down onto the crowd, and thousands more people stepped forward. Stepan felt cornered. Still no Adabazar, so Stepan stayed put. Some Armenians tried to escape. He watched the Chechens gun them down. Others attempted to buy their way out with a baksheesh, like Khachig from Bursa.

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