Sevgul Uludag
caramel_cy@yahoo.com
Tel: 99 966518
We meet at Alphamega Engomi in Nicosia on Friday the 13th of May 2016 in the morning and we have our coffee… Niki has come from London and has come to Nicosia to see me and also give samples of her DNA for her `missing` auntie Eleni… So as we drink our coffee, her `missing` auntie accompanies us in our thoughts and in our words… We talk about how she had met Mehmet Djon, the famous Turkish Cypriot coffee maker, how she had lived, how she had `disappeared`, taken from her house in Nicosia… Eleni, the petite woman who perhaps had witnessed the murder of three Greek Cypriots at the bakery across her house back on the 23rd of December 1963 – this might have been the reason why she would be taken from her house and she would go `missing`… Because it had happened the same night when some Turkish Cypriot soldiers would knock on the door and Eleni would open the door, they would take Eleni and no one would ever see her again…
Years ago I would come across her story and would investigate, trying to find out what had happened to her… Years ago I would write her story and someone would see it in POLITIS and would contact Niki to tell her that `the story might be about her missing aunt…` So from London where she lives, Niki would call me and we would speak and then she would write to me and give me more information… She would also send me a photograph of her `missing` auntie Eleni, an old photograph in black and white, taken in a studio… In the photograph Eleni would pose with her sister Despinou, who apparently had also been married to a Turkish Cypriot called Kemal… Despinou on the right, Eleni on the left… Despinou would survive the stormy days of 63, Eleni would not…
We drink our coffee with Niki who is the daughter of Panayiota, the only sister of the four – Eleni, Despinou, Anna and Panayiota – who had children. Neither Eleni, nor Despinou or Anna had children… So as we had spoken four years ago, back in 2012, today I would take Niki to the Cyprus Institute of Neurology and Genetics to give samples of her DNA… No one had ever given DNA for the `missing` Eleni and this would be the first time and I am so happy that we found each other with Niki so that if the remains of Eleni is found, she would not stay in a corner in the laboratory of the Cyprus Missing Persons' Committee… That there would be DNA to run tests – Niki will also ask her own sisters to give samples of DNA when they visit Cyprus because they all live in London and this way, we would have more than enough samples to run the tests…
At the Institute an official takes us to a small room and we sit and talk… He draws a sketch to place the family line of Eleni and trace the relationship of Niki to her…
Niki answers his questions and I watch as two samples of her DNA from inside her mouth is taken… The official, Mr. Manolis I think, tells us that in about a month's time, Niki's DNA will be in the system where the relatives of `missing persons` are… I smile, feeling happy – 53 years after the disappearance of Eleni we will now have a `matching` sample of DNA in the system, in case her remains are found or in case they have already been found and sitting in a box in the laboratory… Because there are the remains of at least 50 or 60 `missing persons` in the laboratory where there has been no `match` with the DNA samples yet. She could be one of those or she might not be…
After 10 years of struggle and resistance, excavations have begun last week at the Tekke Bahchesi in Nicosia where Eleni might have been buried since they buried some `missing` Greek Cypriots there who `disappeared` in 1963-64… We struggled quite a bit for the cemetery at the Tekke to be dug but there had been strong resistance from particularly the military circles but with the coming of Mustafa Akinci to the leadership of Turkish Cypriots and with his insistence on the opening up of military places where `missing` might have been buried, things would shift and we would have a chance for Tekke as well… There are many Turkish Cypriot `missing persons` from 1963-64 buried in the Tekke and some Greek Cypriot `missing` as well so we would have to see the results of the digging… Half a century after their `disappearance` there is `hope` if you can call it that because despite the fact that it was known that some `missing` were buried there, the authorities would not allow digging at the Tekke for five decades!!!! What great shame!!! Just like the Lakatamia cemetery where our journalist friend Andreas Paraschos had discovered that some `missing` Greek Cypriots had been buried but the authorities would not admit that, Tekke is also a great shame… Ten years ago as I would write the story of Tekke, I would get quite a bit of `reaction`, just like the `reaction` Paraschos had got back in 1995… Things fall into place years later and truth is trying to seep through the soil and see the light of day… Breaking down the taboos, trying to find out who might have been buried at the Tekke or at Lakatamia had been tough but as in the words of Mahatma Gandhi, `First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win…`
When we finish with the Institute of Genetics, we go back to Alphamega for lunch with Niki…
Niki would tell me stories of her family from Trikomo, their grandmother whose husband had died and she would move to inside the walls in Famagusta because it was cheaper to rent a house there… Her grandmother's brother had kicked her out of the house although the title deed had been in her name and she had also fields in her name in Trikomo but she did not know in those days and would move to Famagusta to survive… That must have been how Despinou would meet Mr. Kemal who had been the head of the railways in Famagusta and they would get married. Despinou and Kemal would decide not to have children since if it would be a boy, which army would the boy serve, Despinou would tell Niki years later… `The Greek Cypriot or the Turkish Cypriot army?...`
Still a valid question after so many years…
In Cyprus, as Cypriots, we have not been able to create space for Cypriots and the `two sides` force us to `choose` between `the two`… I think the whole essence of the so-called `Cyprus problem` and so much blood and tears is exactly this: That there is actually no space for Cypriots to survive on this land, whether they speak Turkish or Greek… The `system` created on this land forces you to choose between `the two sides` and does not allow any space for you to survive as a `simple Cypriot`…
Niki has to go back to Limassol and I have to go back to work so we say our goodbyes and I feel happy to have met her after four years of writing to each other and speaking with each other on the phone… She will come back in August and October and we will meet and go places… I will take her to where Eleni used to live with Mehmet Djon in Nicosia and perhaps we can go to Trikomo or Karpaz or Famagusta or wherever she likes to go… I am honoured to be connected to the relatives of Eleni and Despinou… Despite everything, our friendship will continue on this land where perhaps one day, there will be space for Cypriots to survive…
15.5.2016
Photo: Despinou on the right - Eleni on the left…
(*) Article published in the POLITIS newspaper on the 5th of June 2016, Sunday.
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