The Man Who Brings Luck

In Ararat region at the junction of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkey there is a village. Noyakert village is quite significant for the huge number of refugees living there. The village is also famous for its broken streets and deep puddles…

74-year-old Svetlana Rubenovna Vardanyan is a refugee from the village Upper Aza of Ordubad rayon in Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. The old woman has 8 grandchildren and 8 great-grandchildren. With a smile on her face she is saying that another one is on the way to this world. Her family has been living in Noyakert since 1988. Despite the deep roots they have taken there, they are still dreaming of returning to their homeland. 

The Past…

 “The Upper Aza was always inhabited by the Armenian, while the Lower Aza – by the Azerbaijani. In the 60s lots of Armenians left for Yerevan and the Azerbaijani would buy their houses. Those were the days when we started living side by side with the Azerbaijani. Our days were peaceful. Our relations were frayed as soon as the Movement started”, says the old woman.

The Armenians and the Azerbaijani would pay visits to each other, play a game of lotto in the evenings, dance at each other’s weddings – they would live as one family. Everything changed the day Tavad, an Azerbaijani neoighbour of theirs, said that that night the Azerbaijani dwellers of the nearby village would come to slaughter the Armenians. “We stayed at his place for three days. Tavad’s father gave us weapons for self-defence, but we did not take them. With great hardships we reached Meghri, all our way our cars were attacked by stones. We were lucky to reach our destination without any victims”, says Svetlana Rubenovna.

Her 49-year-old son Karen Babayan says that the Azerbaijani administration would artificially create severe conditions for the Armenians, thus forcing them to flee their homeland.

 “My father was forced to leave for Baku for his studies. Those who sent him there knew quite well that the young never returned to Ordubad from Baku. However, that time they played a wrong card for my father came back as soon as he finished his studies”, he says with a smile. He was forced to pay a bribe to get a simple workman’s job. But the Azerbaijani never had such problems. There had always been this policy, but it was unveiled in 1987…

 Memories…

Karen Babayan still refers to the Azerbaijani, that protected his family, as a friend, but Karen does not think he is in the red to the man. When the glowering Armenians came to Noyakert, at the risk of their lives, the Babayan’s hid their Azerbaijani neighbours in their house. “We had been to the same hell. How could we leave them in distress? Those guys were refugees from Azerbaijan, they were not as lucky as we were. There were crosses burnt on their bodies”, says the man.

 “We always trusted the Azerbaijani. Before fleeing I left my gold and valuables in our neighbor’s house. In case were murdered on the way, our children would get that. They then returned everything to us. We realized we would never go back to our homeland. We had gone through many hardships to build a good house, we were going to live a great life”, says Svetlana Rubenovna.

When she was asked to confide her best memories about her homeland, the woman would think of the crumbing Armenian Church in their village. “There were many Armenian churches in our neighbourhood. Within 10 km from our village there were 18 churches in Agulis village. I have heard all the churches were destroyed…”

A New Life

The first years of life in Noyakert were very hard for the family. “My husband would work in the field;
I stayed in the house we had bought from the Kurds. It took my son years to turn the place into a descent home. But he never did”, she says with a smile.

Babken Babayan – Karen’s father – died in 1996. His son Karen is sure the grief for the lost homeland took his father’s life. The history repeated itself – Karen’s grandfather and his brother were killed by the Turks, who took away their property and the two-storey house. The day his father died was the hardest one for Karen. “My mother became handicapped when I was only 6 months old, that is why it took me a day in 1996 to “grow up”. I do not complain, I have mastered several professions – I have worked as a driver, cobbler, I have followed the plow and now I am a school guard. I live in my country and that is important”, says the man.  

Broken Dreams

“My children often suggesting leaving Armenia. All I want is to return to Nakhchivan. I have dreamt of going to my homeland for 27 years. In 1991 I was so close to going home when we heard the Armenian Army had entered Sadarak. I now soothe my yearning with books, in which my native shores are spoken of. When I read I recall every single stone and bush and tree. Each had a name”…

Karen would also think of his Azerbaijani friends from the Upper Aza. He remembers his sister’s firstborn’s arrival into this world. He remembers the field where he was drinking mulberry vodka and biting after with his Azerbaijani friends, who came to congratulate the freshly minted uncle.

 “We were 12-13. We all hit the bottle soon enough and on the way back we fell into a stream. After bathing in the stream we sobered up, though we still could not explain to our parents the reason for drinking”, he says laughing.

 The Homeland of Gusans and Aram Khachaturyan

 Karen is proudly telling about his forebears’ homeland – Goghtn province which was famous for Armenian gusans (lyriscist-singers). “My great-grandfather was a gusan. My father would always tell stories in which the great-grandfather always won the contests against Persian ashughs. The contests would take place in the shed near our house. Turks killed my great-grandfather by a well. The history repeats itself”, tells Karen sighing.

Karen is also proud of being of kin to composer Aram Khachaturyan, who was his grandmother’s nephew. “Gran would often speak about their visits to Khachaturyans’ Yerevan house. My father showed me their Lower Aza house which, however, belonged to the Azerbaijani at that time. Though one could instantly tell it was an Armenian house for the Azerbaijani had changed nothing. Back in the day I had no idea of the grandeur of the world-known composer. Now I am proud of the being even a remote kin of his”, says Babayan.

The Future

Nowadays hardly anyone is leaving from Noyakert. Most of the refugees who had the chance had left the village long before. Nevertheless, there are still refugees from Nakhchivan, Baku, Khanlar, Mir-Bashir and other Azerbaijani regions living in Noyakert.

Karen Babayan is a grandfather now, but he thinks his grandchildren have no future in Armenia. “Why do I have to live far from my sons? Why do they have to live in Yerevan only because they can find a job in the capital?” wonders the man. Karen earns his family’s living by farming and working as a school guard.

 “I am not complaining, we have never known hunger or cold. We have always worked and shaped our destiny. However, we cannot control the situation. I am a villager, I raise garden truck for market, but I cannot sell it the way I used to. There are now less people in Yerevan who can afford my fruit and vegetables. Their financial situation affects mine”, he says.

 The Optimistic Refugee

Karen’s spouse Astghik Petrosyan does not think of herself as a refugee, though all her forebears came from Sasun – a district that has been Turkish for a long time now. With a smile on her face she says that everyone – especially the village teachers and children – love and respect her husband. “He is always cheerful and he japes all the time. There is a man with a donkey. Every time he continues his way only after having had a conversation with my husband. I cannot speak for the donkey, but I know that after the conversation the man always has a good day. We do not want or need much. We just wished for jibs so that our children could support their families”, she says with a smile.

“Villagers are used to complaining of a hard life. They most like complaining to journalists. I don’t believe it’s necessary. One can and must be optimistic. I remember forcing Babken and Narek to learn Armenian patriotic songs. Years went by. My sons are grown-ups now; they have successfully served in the army. The fact that I am proud of my sons’ contribution to Armenia’s security means that all my effrots were not in vain”, says the Noyakert optimist.