From Saigon to Brussels – Burying Hate into History

See the fright on my face in the tunnels

I have not been able to sleep much since my visit to the Ci Chu tunnels. A few seconds after getting into the hot, humid and narrow underground tunnels I knew I was not going to cope well. My two Vietnamese friends were crawling in front of me and more tourists were behind me; this meant I could neither hurry out nor turn back. Despite my pounding heart and shortness of breath, I gave into my pride and kept quiet. Thoughts paraded through my mind – I could die at any moment! How hard it must have been during the war, with no lighting – and the tunnels had been enlarged for tourists. It was like been buried alive. Imagine running from imminent death, from enemy fire, or raining bombs. I wonder if the discomfort I was experiencing now could have frozen me into giving into death above ground had I been fighting with the Vietnamese back then. How did people put up with this for over 30 years, defending their freedom first against the French and then the Americans?

Ho Chi Minh City is actually a beautiful part of the world. It is warm, green and full of life. Everything is constantly on the move. Motorbikes dominate the roads, portraying a strong sense of individual liberty and confidence. The population is young, on average in their early twenties. A large variety of cafes and restaurants decorate the streets with elegant designs and emanate enticing aromas. You cannot ignore the signs of poverty, but this does not seem to have destroyed the social fabric. You feel part of one united community. The Vietnamese seem to be just digging their way out of poverty as a community, with a confidence, determination and patience that brought them victory in the Ci Chu tunnels, where they fought against the mightiest army and crushing cruelty. During this short visit, my admiration for the Vietnamese, strong individuals, with close-knit families and patriots, grew immensely.

Chemicals sprayed over forests caused catastrophic natural damage and genetic disorders in many generations to follow.

I cried in Ho Chi Minh City. Twice. First during my visit to the War Museum, secondly at the Women’s Museum. Emotions took over as I made my way through the exhibition, looking at the Illustrations of the atrocities of war and its civilian victims. Tears started to involuntarily make tracks down my cheeks. I rubbed the tears off with the palm of my hand and kept telling myself, “Nobody should have to suffer like this.” Yet, history keeps repeating itself. We do not learn from the horrors of the past. Not even from the very recent past.

It is estimated that four million people were killed during the war. Americans lost about sixty thousand troops. Australians, New Zealanders, Koreans, Thais were all fighting alongside Americans; these people suffered casualties too. However, these deaths are incomparable to the price paid by Vietnamese, fighting a war against colonialism. They won the battle against the French, but that was immediately followed by war with the Americans for another twenty years. Colonists fought a proxy war, exploiting local grievances with the promise of power in the proxy colonial rule afterwards.

Chinese Nung soldiers interrogating a Vietcong

Many war crimes were committed during the Vietnam War. Atrocities committed by the Americans and Koreans are well documented. The two museums exhibit photographic evidence, provided by international journalists. I was surprised when I come across a torture scene perpetrated by the Chinese Nung soldiers. The Nung are a Vietnamese minority group of ethnic Chinese descent. I later learned that Nung soldiers were recruited and trained by the CIA; they were famous for their loyalty to US Special Forces and were the most feared fighters of the war. Here is a documentary showing how they were recruited [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59Bd9tjbZ7U] The Nung won the admiration of US soldiers, but lost everything else [nunglosteverything] They suffered heavy losses as well, and when Americans left, some managed to flee abroad, but the majority were not able to and were abandoned to their fate.

We witnessed the same pattern in the first Iraq war. America encouraged Kurds to rise up against Saddam, then they decided to pack up and leave. Americans relocated some of the Kurds who had been directly working for them on an island in the pacific but those left behind were left to the mercy of Saddam; this resulted in the Halabja massacre [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halabja_chemical_attack].

In times of conflict, religious and ethnic diversity can become a vulnerable area that is open to exploitation by the enemy. Some countries have tackled this risk with compulsory relocations. For example, the Kurdish population living in the Caucasus under Soviet rule was moved to Kazakhstan. Had Russia left this population in Caucasus, the Kurds could have allied with Germany during the Second World War, opened up another front in the war, carving a state for themselves. After dealing with its own weakness, Russia used Kurds to fight on their behalf, exporting its ideology to Turkey.

Hung Kings Temple, next to the botanic gardens.

On the way to Ci Chu tunnels when our tour guide was talking about the atrocities that Americans and their allies had committed, I heard a Korean boy behind me telling his girlfriend from the Sultanate of Brunei how thousands of Koreans tried to get out of compulsory military duty by applying as conscientious objectors and thus avoid fighting the Vietnamese. You cannot put collective blame an entire nation for the atrocities of the past. If it were not for the bravery of international journalists relating what had really happened and thousands of people marching against the war, the atrocities in Vietnam would have continued until the entire nation had been wiped out of existence. I felt sorry for the Korean boy, he must have felt guilty about what he was hearing. Then I felt guilty. My Vietnamese friends had told me, “It does not matter where you come from. If you are white you are referred to as American in Vietnam. There are 80 different ethnicities in Vietnam. Just as you are not able to tell the difference between us, it is difficult for us to differentiate between white people.”

My Vietnamese friends, Kim and Phung, called the tour guide to come over. He sat in the empty seat next to us. Phung objected to what he said. Kim asked him to change the tone of his narrative. They said, “We need to look to the future. We do not want to scare people away. We want them to come back, bring their friends and come here to do business and help our country to grow.” This made a great impact on the tour guide. On the way back he said, “The war ended forty years ago and we hope that it will never happen again. Neither in Vietnam, nor anywhere else in the world. Wars are the worst act of humanity. Wars destroy everything. We don’t want destruction. We want to build a future together. In order to create, we must eradicate hate and love each other.”

Youngest member of Brussels regional parliament

There is so much that can be brought to the Middle East from Vietnam. The region is a fountain of ideas and diversity. Innumerable religions, sects, ethnicities, ideologies and identities coexist here. Despite catalogues of treachery, betrayal and cruelty, the majority of the people do not take part in the power struggles. We should not allow indiscriminate hate to overcome love nor should we allow the wounds of the past to become chronic sources of conflict.

While in Ho Chi Minh City, I received shocking news from Brussels. Mahinur Ozdemir, a good friend and youngest member of Brussels regional parliament, had been expelled from her party CDH (Christian Democrat Party). She had been telling me for some time about the problems she was having with senior members of the party due to wearing a headscarf and her Muslim identity. Mahinur has a strong popular base in Brussels; this too was probably seen as a threat by career politicians in the party. The excuse that was used to expel Mahinur was based on what happened in the Ottoman Empire a century ago.

The Ottoman Empire was a mosaic of over 70 different nations administered like a federal kingdom; it stretched over three continents. Countries which had an eye on minerals and resources on vast Ottoman lands, countries that wanted to have access to the Mediterranean Sea, countries that wanted to control trade routes – all these wanted to carve up the Ottoman Empire and take pieces for themselves. They successfully exploited the nationalist sentiments of the Ottoman
citizens in their campaigns. The Ottomans lost much of their land in Europe to the uprisings in the Balkans. Russians orchestrated similar plans in the Caucasus with the Armenians. In 1914 Ottomans started to fight in the First World War; the allegiance forged between the Armenians and the Russians posed a great threat – Ottoman forces were already stretched in fighting on many fronts. In 1915, the Istanbul administration decided to relocate the Armenian population from the Caucasus to Syria.

Mount Ararat, highest mountain in Turkey.

Today there is a strong Armenian lobby which tries to have this process of relocation recognized as a genocide. Nobody denies that many Armenians died as a result of poor conditions and attacks from local vigilante. The Ottoman Empire collapsed after the First World War. The Turkish Republic, viewed by many as the heir to the Ottomans, does not accept that these events were a genocide mainly because the intention of the movement of the Armenians was not for killing them all. The Turkish government has opened its archives and invited Armenian representatives to come and examine them together more than once. This invitation has never been accepted. There is much that can be said about this sad episode of history. I will leave the rest for a specific article on the subject. Nevertheless, many people of Turkish and Kurdish heritage find it difficult to label these events as genocide. It is not easy for any person to classify your heritage into the same category as Nazis. However, the Armenian lobby has successfully passed laws through parliaments of many countries which bans questioning their version of history and effectively prevents the freedom to express any objections. Such enforcement through laws is an act of seeking revenge. Belgium is not one of these countries. Mahinur does not deny the hardship that Armenians suffered either. She only refusing to call it a genocide.

There is a large Armenian population still living in Turkey. Turkey and Armenia have common borders. Armenia’s route to connect with the rest of the world is through Turkey. Instead of raising walls of isolation, Turkey and Armenia should build bridges and focus on building a prosperous common future. It is important to recognise what happened in the history to heal wounds and ensure that the same mistakes are not repeated. However, history should not be used to aggravate animosity or justify revenge.

Unfortunately, in Mahinur’s case, this issue has been exploited for internal party political manoeuvring. If a Christian Democrat Party cannot give some space to a member who believes in Islam and defines her identity as Muslim, expressing her identity through her dress code, then they should drop the democrat from their name and call themselves the Christian Party.

more photos from can be found at
https://www.flickr.com/photos/126721982@N03/

Published originally on June 28, 2015 by Daily Sabah

Villa Delenda

This is my first blog entry! I decided to share what I experienced because I would have loved to read something like this a couple of weeks ago.

I am writing this in my single room on the ground floor of Villa Delenda.

In the background on TV, there is a movie in a language that sounds familiar but I cannot understand. The story contains extreme drama. I would have believed if someone told me that this was a dubbed Turkish (Yesilcam) movie. The characters look similar, the exaggeration is an exact match.

The room is decorated with antique furniture. The TV stand, wardrobe, table, chair, and the bed frame are probably a hundred years old. I usually do not feel comfortable with old furniture due to prejudice about their cleanliness. This room feels clean after settling in. There is no dust on the furniture and the bedding is new. The two carpets on the floor have distinct flower patterns and they have a dominant red colour.

The frames on the wall show a picture of lace. I saw this lace in real at the history museum on the Republic square. It is actually a very familiar pattern. I have seen my grandmother and my mother make it. They look very pretty on small service tables. My mother once made it for a table of twelve. I took her a couple of years to complete. It is probably the most valuable piece of my sister’s dowry. I hope she will appreciate the effort that has gone into it and I hope it will be inherited from generation to generation with appreciation and respect. I hope those who inherit it, will acknowledge how wise and talented their great-grandmother was. Today is mother’s day. I spoke to my grandmother and mother about an hour ago. I think I still feel a bit emotional.

The room makes you feel like you have travelled back in time. Especially if you are already familiar with this culture. However, it also has all the modern conveniences. The Wi-Fi connection is invaluable for the travellers of this age. The bathroom with a working shower is also a must.

There are seven other bedrooms like this, and a reception room in the hotel. In the basement there is a kitchen and a dining room and a showroom where hand-made pottery is displayed and sold. The building was the private residence of Mnatsakanyan brothers  built in 1906. Each room in the house is named after a city. Some of these names are cities within the territories of Turkey. Kars and Malatya are not far from where I was born. On the same street with the hotel there is a very nice restaurant called Antep. The caption under the name says “Western Armenian Cuisine”. I do not want to imply that this is a sign of pan-Armenian nationalism. During the collapse of the Ottoman Empire there were a lot of forced movements of people when the new countries were being set up. The biggest of these happened in Caucasus ans Balkans. However, the people who were uprooted and moved to new homelands never felt at home where they went. They always thought one day they will be able to go back to where they were born and had been living for centuries. In Europe these traumas were overcome with the most successful peace project of recent times, forming an economic union and allowing people to move freely. I hope one-day the wounds of people of Caucasus will be healed by becoming a part of European union or by achieving  similar neighbourly relations amongst themselves.

Villa Delenda is run by a charity called “Family Care Foundation”. This is a charity that sponsors the Spitak Art School that was established to train the orphans of 1988 earthquake. You can see and buy the ceramics from the Spitak art school in the showroom of the hotel.

I would highly recommend you to stay in this beautiful hotel if you happen to travel to Yerevan. It is very central, within walking distance of many attraction sites. And the personnel is very friendly. The breakfast in the morning is very traditional. It is exactly what my grandmother used to put on the table in my childhood about 300 km to the west of Yerevan.