Sevgul Uludag
caramel_cy@yahoo.com
Τel: 99 966518
I had started investigating a group of `missing` Greek Cypriots from Trikomo more than five years ago…
The daughter of Karasavva, Pepa had called me and we had spoken and then after a while I had met her husband, Tasos Georgiou in the house of Sevilay Berk whose parents had been `missing` from Trikomo as well…
Tasos had told me about the suspicions they had about the possible burial site and I had called a Turkish Cypriot reader living in Trikomo and we had gone with him back in 2010 to check the area…
And then I had asked the officials of the Cyprus Missing Persons' Committee to come with us to show them the possible burial site of four `missing` Greek Cypriots from Trikomo… This was an empty plot of land – the house there had been demolished after 1974…
It was across the Panagia Church in Trikomo – the family had a bakery across where the house had been and although the bakery is still there and working last time I had looked, the house had been demolished…
The house was the house of Anastasis Karasavva Sitarenos… He was laying down in bed since he had not been well and his wife Kakoullou was there, as well as his brother Lambros, Agamemnon Sotiriou and his wife Maria and Meletta Dimitriou…
On the 17th of August 1974 as the Turkish tanks entered the village they would stop in front of this house – Turkish Cypriot soldiers were accompanying the Turkish soldiers. They would ask them to get out of the house and put their hands up… They would put their hands up but after a while would get tired and put their hands down… They would be shot and killed and two hand grenades would also be thrown at the house…
Karasavva would survive perhaps because he had been laying down on his bed and they might have thought he was dead. But he would survive to tell the story… He would be taken to the Turkish Cypriot hospital in Nicosia for treatment and on the 24th of August 1974 would be sent to the southern part of our island together with other wounded Greek Cypriots. Lambros would also survive…
Three years would pass from the time we had shown the officials of the Cyprus Missing Persons' Committee, until exhumations would begin in Trikomo for the four `missing` Greek Cypriots and they would find the remains in the place we had shown them in 2013: Three women and a man buried in the yard as was described to us… Now they are still waiting for the DNA identification…
On the 28th of June 2015, together with Sevilay Berk and her husband Mustafa and her daughter Beste – an opera singer – I would go with my husband to the get together of Trikomo people to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the football club Anagennisi (Sylloghos Anagennisi) at the invitation of Tasos Georgiou. We would go to Aradippou and there we would meet people from Trikomo, Sevilay's friends and old neighbours from Trikomo Pervolia like Dimitris Shallis…
We would see the daughters of Papaioakim, the `missing` priest of Trikomo…
We would sit to listen to the speeches and eat and talk… The club would honour those who have served voluntarily for many years and all around would be a form of happiness of being together…
They have also prepared a book for the 75th anniversary of the Anagennisi Club and there, they have put the photographs of the `missing` of Trikomo: Both Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots – the photos and stories of Sevilay's mother and father, Shefika and Huseyin Ahmet Kamber are also in this book… It is people like Tasos Georgiou, the son in law of Karasavva, who have made this happen… Tasos and people like him from Trikomo know that the pain of the `missing` is not `unique` to only one group but it is a common human pain for all Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot relatives of `missing` persons…
We are sitting at a long table and talking and soon I realize that I am actually talking to the son of Karasavva, Phanos Karasavva.
And soon I am shocked to learn that Karasavva also known as `Vrakas` had built the most beautiful house in my mahalle, the house of Zeka Bey from Platanisso, the famous judge very well known in Cyprus.
The story of `Vrakas`, that is Anastasis Karasavva Sitarenos is quite interesting for me and I learn details from his son Phanos and his granddaughter Katerina…
`Vrakas` was born in Trikomo in 1900 and died in Limassol in 1984…
His parents were Elias and Vasiliki and they had three boys and a girl.
His two brothers had got married very young and had left Cyprus, one to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and the other one to the USA.
Vrakas had got married to Kyriaki (Koullou) and they had four daughters and three sons.
The `specialty` of Karasavvas was that he was a very famous builder and one of the biggest contractors in Cyprus between 1925 and 1974.
He was building schools for Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots and also storage houses and houses…
He had built schools for Turkish Cypriots in Korovia, Galinoporni, Pergamos and other places…
He had also built the house of Zeka Bey in Nicosia which is on the street where I live!
He had built high schools in Strovolos, Famagusta and Nicosia.
He had built storage houses in Boghazi, Karpasia, Lysi, Derinia – he had built the cinema `Nicolaides` in Trikomo as well as private houses in many villages in Famagusta and Nicosia.
He had been a very calm, honest and peaceful person and was very well respected by both Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots…
According to his granddaughter Katerina `As well as the people they worked with him, they have been so pleased they have met and worked with him. Some of them they became famous house constructors, both Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots…`
He was a very tall man, 1.90 and according to his son Phanos, he liked to eat fish and over the weekends he would meet with several friends in the taverns, eating and drinking and dancing a little bit.
`We built a lot of schools in Nicosia and Famagusta`, Phanos remembers… `As well as in the Turkish Cypriot villages in Karpasia… We built the cooperative stores in Lysi and elsewhere…`
`Vrakas` would take his young son Phanos with him to work… Phanos remembers that Turkish Cypriots also worked for his father and sometimes his father would ask Phanos to ask one of the Turkish Cypriot workers to sing a song for them while working…
Phanos remembers some Turkish words from those days…
He too moved to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) for work but now is back in Cyprus…
I feel happy and honoured to meet the family of Karasavva who had been a remarkable person and who contributed with his skills in building schools, homes and storage houses… He had been a peaceful person but `war` does not `differentiate` between `good` and `bad` and in overwhelming cases, it is always the `good` and the `peaceful` who suffer because of the war, the innocent wife of Karasavva being killed, along with other innocent people… And all those who paved the way and triggered `the war` somehow have `survived` without a scratch!
I am happy that I have at least contributed with the help of my readers in finding some of the `missing persons` of Trikomo, both Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots… And this humanitarian effort connects me with their lives, helping me to build friendships as Karasavva would want us to… After all, his `heritage` was the friendships he built and his family has continued this tradition by inviting me and Sevilay and our families to this event…
13.8.2015
Photo: Anastasis and Kyriaki Karasavva…
(*) Article published in the POLITIS newspaper on the 13th of September 2015 Sunday.
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