Oldest Karamanli misses home!

[Napoleon]

A rare example of a modern 'Greek' being honest about his true origins.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/n.php?n=oldest-karamanli-misses-home-2009-08-03

[Risto the Great]

The last surviving Karamanli, or Karamanlides in Greek, 98-year-old Stavros Farasopulos, says he misses his friends and his village back in Kayseri, and that he is proud to share his hometown with Turkish President Abdullah Gül.

Farasopulos was born in the village of Ağırnas in the eastern province of Kayseri in 1911 as a member of the local Karamanli community. Karamanli was a Greek Orthodox Christian community whose first language was Turkish written in the Greek alphabet and lived mainly in Kayseri’s Cappadocia region. Their name drives from the Karamanoğulları state that was based there before the growing Ottoman Empire annexed it in the mid-15th century.

The Karamanli community had to leave Turkey during the compulsory population exchange between Greece and Turkey in 1923 when transfer was solely based on religion, even though the Karamanlis’ first language was Turkish and most didn’t speak a word of Greek.

Farasopulos said he has missed his Turkish friends and his hometown since leaving it in 1924. He currently lives in Western Thrace, where his home is full of photos of Kayseri and one featuring President Abdullah Gül.

Among the mementos he keeps are letters dating back to when his family lived in Kayseri, letters in Turkish but written in the Greek alphabet.

Farasopulos’s eldest son, Nikos, speaks fluent Turkish. “My father brought me up as a proper Karamanli,” said Nikos.

When asked about his life in Ağırnas before 1922, Stavros Farasopulos said: “My best friends were Enver and Niyazi. Turkish was my mother tongue.”

Farasopulos then started talking about the period after World War I when Greece invaded Turkey.

“At that time, Greeks and Turks killed each other, but in my hometown nothing happened. That was because there was nothing that separated Turks from Greeks. During Turkey’s Independence War [1919-1922] I seldom saw a Turkish soldier in my village,” he said.

“I know my Kayseri and the Karamanlis. Turks, Greeks and Armenians are the same.”

Farasopulos said when he and his family first arrived in Greece he was discriminated against because the only language he could speak was Turkish.

Years later, in the 1960s, a friend from back in his village, Turan, came to visit Farasopulos in Greece. The first time Farasopulos went to his village after 1924 was in 1970. “When I went there in 1970, I was welcomed with open arms. I stayed there for two months. I didn’t want to leave. They later rebuilt the Ayi Anargri Church in the village. I thanked the mayor,” he said.

The last time he visited Ağırnas was in 2000. “I have grown old. I really want to visit my hometown but how can I?” he asked, citing his age.

A rare example of honesty. I wonder how that discrimination manifested itself? I suspect they learned to hate themselves very much in order to become the good compliant Greeks that their offspring have since become.

[TrueMacedonian]

Rare honesty indeed. It's ashame that today the Karamanli forgot their Turkish traditions which should have been their most valued possession when arriving in Macedonia. This plastic bottle identity their great grandchildren have today must be a depressing thing to see for people like Stavros Farasopulos.

[Soldier of Macedon]

Turkish-speaking Christians, there are still plenty in Turkey. There are still thousands of their descendants in Greece who probably don't know that their family spoke Turkish as a mother-tongue, that is what happens in a xenophobic state that refuses to acknowledge the true history of its land and people.

[Onur]

In the last month`s issue of a Turkish history and geography journal, there was a section dedicated to Karamanlis, Turkish christians. There was some interesting info along with the pictures from one of the Karamanli immigrant`s personal archive;


Karamanli migrants waiting to be deported to the Greece in the city of Nigde;




Various books printed by Karamanlis in Turkish language with Greek script from 1871 to 1914;





Karamanli girls weaving carpet and photos of several objects, work permit papers of artisans and a bank voucher from the year 1912, written in Turkish with Greek script for Karamanlis;





A poster of a meeting organization, a stamp with both Ottoman and Karamanli script, a manual for a Singer brand sewing machine and a vinyl;





A photo from the high school in the city of Nevsehir, 1920. Also it lists the most popular names of Karamanli kids who graduated from the school in 1920;


Some of the most popular Karamanli names in 1920 are; Ayhan, Ayvaz, Arzouman, Arslan, Evren, Kaplan, Kalander, Bayram, Murad, Sahin.

I think there should be many people in Greece with these names today. Probably they are either using it with the suffix "-ouglu" or they changed it with "-lis, -idis" to make it sound more Greek, like "Evrenouglu, Sahinouglu" or "Ayvazidis, Arzoumanidis" etc.



There was excepts from the memoirs of an American doctor named Esther Lovejoy who worked in Greece in 1922-1923 for helping the refugees;

Retimo was in greater need of help. The refugees in this town exceeded the normal population in number. In addition to the "Greek" refugees from Asia Minor, all of whom spoke Turkish and whose forefathers had never set foot on Greek soil. Housing was out of the question. It was a case of shelter from the wind and rain. All the old mosques, churches, school buildings and rookeries of every description were utilized. The "Turkish" population helped the Greek-speaking "Turks" from the interior of Crete; the Christian population helped the Turkish-speaking "Greeks" from Anatolia.




Dr. Ruth Parmelee was, of course, the moving spirit in the reopening of the nurses' training school. Language presented unusual obstacles in teaching. The official language was Greek, but the refugee student nurses were from Asia Minor, and, although they were considered Greek, their native tongue was Turkish. Many of them had been educated in the American and English mission Schools of Turkey, and now they were required to use Greek.

[lavce pelagonski]

Onur
Karamanli migrants waiting to be deported to the Greece in the city of Nigde

Nigde in Macedonian means nowhere interesting

[Soldier of Macedon]

Various books printed by Karamanlis in Turkish language with Greek script from 1871 to 1914......

What lends weight to the suggestion that groups like the Karamanli were Turkish-speakers by origin is the fact that there are a number of examples where the Macedonian, Albanian and Vlach languages are written in the Greek script also. So it wasn't uncommon during that period, or even earlier.

[Pelister]

This is a rare admission, and a valuable piece of history.

[lavce pelagonski]

the zaspani pushkari try to play as if they dont care. They say he is a Greek missing his Greek friends and employer in Turkey lol

[Onur]

It is a valuable piece of history indeed. As you can see, these people had a vibrant culture and society in Ottoman era. I didn't know that even the banks was issuing vouchers in Turkish with Karamanli script and artisan work permits, instruction manuals etc. In the journal, it says that they also had 70-80 year old newspapers from 1840s `till 1920.

These people are one of many cultures which got destroyed by Greek assimilation machine. They also erased Romaika, Pontic and Byzantine Greek spoken by people in Izmir and Istanbul. As you know, 100.000s of Pontics gone to Greece and there is no one in Greece atm who can properly speak their Pontic dialect and ironically, they wander around Blacksea mountains these days, trying to find Turks who can still speaks Pontic dialect and they are trying to learn it from them!!!

So, they willingly killed several unique languages and dialects and now they are trying to rediscover those in Turkey but they were the ones who always claimed that we Turks assimilated Greeks. If that would be the case then why these dialects still survives in Turkey but doesn't exist in Greece anymore???

[cultea]

Farasopoulos gives many interviews. He gave one to the newspaper “The News” which is exactly the same with the one reproduced (?) in the Turkish newspaper but is a little more extended. Here’s some parts.

“We Greeks were traders and we were known for producing the traditional pastrami. Our most important art, however, was the handmade carpets. Every house was earning a salary for trading handmade carpets. Turks were farmers. It was only later, they got involved in trade" says Stavros Farasopoulos. He does remember, however, and never omits to mention that the uprooting of Greeks from Cappadocia did not start in 1922, but was only completed then.

"The uprooting was not in ‘22. Our basic persecution was in 1908 when the Sultan was overthrown by the Young Turk movement. The Greeks enjoyed privileges given by the Sultan in the Ottoman Empire. We had autonomy in education, the implementation of our religious ceremonies, and our legal cases were settled within the community, by the church and the body of elders. When the Young Turks came, they abolished the privileges of the Greek community and then started the exit of Christianity from Cappadocia. And they went to many parts of the world, from America and France to Cyprus, Egypt and Jordan. Of those who stayed, most went from small communities to large ones and integrated for safety reasons as there was a climate of nationalism that didn’t leave minorities to breathe freely any longer. The rest, who stayed in their villages, converted their churches into mosques and continued living as Islamized populations. "

"What I can say is that in 1922, we killed and got killed. We made mistakes and it doesn’t make any sense now, after so many years, not to admit it. We were exchangeable populations who ran away from Turkey, same as Turks left, respectively from Macedonia. Anyway, we didn’t leave under war and of course when we learned that we would leave, around 1924, I remember the people were grieving but they also had a sense of relief, since we knew, of course, the uprooting and bloodshed in Smyrna and the coastline. We could see our return to Greece as the best solution, because we had heard a lot about the motherland, but we never had seen it up close"

http://www.tanea.gr/ellada/article/?aid=4524937

[Risto the Great]

Greece being the motherland of these people is "optimistic". Macedonia being anything to these people is downright theft.

[El Bre]

Looks like Thessalo-Niki is back

[Daskalot]

Looks like Thessalo-Niki is back

It sure does, he must love us.

Welcome back Thessa. What have you been up to lately?

[Soldier of Macedon]

Given that he has been banned several times in the past, he will be afforded zero leniency. Not sure if we should even allow him to stay at all. Let's see.