Barbed wire fence dividing two neighbors

There is a lake between Turkey and Armenia that separates the two countries. The Armenians call it "Ağhuryan," and the Turks, "Arpa?ay." The lake is so fertile it is swarming with fish. Neither Armenians nor Turks can fish in the lake. Just 20 minutes from the lake, barbed wire splits a railroad in two.

It is just one segment of the immense railway that stretches through Armenia to Turkey. The entrance to Haygazsor Village at the north of the lake is under the control of Russian and Armenian soldiers. A sharp lookout is kept at the border of the village. It is forbidden for an ordinary Armenian to enter the church of the village, even for the Sunday service. The only way to attend the service is with special permission to enter the village.

Before sunrise, in a cab driven by a Mr. Suren, we hit the road for Gyumri, the closest border point to Turkey and the second biggest city in Armenia. We spoke with Mr. Suren throughout the journey and occasionally stopped at villages to speak to villagers. We were told by 90 percent of villagers that they escaped from various cities and towns of Anatolia, especially Kars, during the events of 1915, to Armenia, which was then under Soviet rule.

The Armenian language they speak has an Anatolian accent. Every village has its own special dialect. Because of this, it is sometimes hard for people in neighbouring villages to understand each other. The villages are no different from typical Anatolian villages and neither are the villagers. They have named the places they live in after the towns and cities in Anatolia they migrated from. Nearly all of the villagers understand Turkish, even if they do not speak it.

Protecting the churches
The major problem these villagers face is the regular supply of water. While Yerevan, the extremely modern and European looking capital of Armenia, is only 40 minutes away, these villages are still without pipes. The villagers also face great difficulties when the temperature drops below -40 degrees during winter. Heating is as much of a problem as water.

We traveled from Yerevan to Gyumri in just over two hours in fits and starts. The first stop for the Hürriyet Daily News was at a journalist's club in Gyumri called Asparez. Without delay, we continued on to the border with the club president, Levon Barsexyan. Along the way Barsexyan acquainted us with the city. He told about the one storey houses built precaution to Gyumri's location on a fault line. Barsexyan said the streets and houses in Gyumri were similar to those in Kars. "The Armenians migrated from Kars to Gyumri and brought their lifestyle with them to this city."

Barsexyan's grandfather was born in Kars. Before the closing of the border, they used to go to Kars for breakfast and be back in Gyumri for lunch. According to Barsexyan, the Soviet rulers demanded the demolition of the churches of Gyumri but the people cleverly built tall buildings around the churches, hiding the churches in within the buildings courtyards. They saved many thousand-year-old churches from demolition this way. When the Republic of Armenia gained independence after the fall of the Soviet Union, the tall buildings were demolished and the churches were visible once more.

During Soviet rule, Gyumri was called "Leninagan," in homage to Lenin. Barsexyan said the city was now known by both names. There are still visible traces in the village of the 1988 earthquake. We walked around Gyumri under Barsexyan's guide and reached the border with Turkey.

Barsexyan warned us to hide our cameras as a precaution as we approached the barbed wire. A few minutes later, we passed down the road, walking along the railway line, half of which extends into Turkey. We reached the border between the two countries, and looking through the mesh of barbed wire, I gazed upon the country of my birth, before rounding up my week long trip to Armenia.