“It’s a pity I don’t appear in the photo...” Mher is looking at a picture of three friends from Hrazdan, Albert, Rubik and Ararat, taken in 1993 during the Karabakh war. Albert appears in the center of the photo with his arms resting on the shoulders of his friends. Mher smiles and says, “The best threesome from Hrazdan.” But his smile hides some sadness. The three in the photo are Ararat Sahakyan, Albert Alaverdyan and Rubik Asatryan.

When the Karabakh liberation movement began Mher was 16 years old. In 1989 Mher and some friends staged a sit-in demonstration at the bus station in Hrazdan. Their slogan was, ‘The youth of Armenia must serve in the Armenian army’. This is where he met up with the ‘best threesome’. “The boys would come and talk to us out of respect. They were always around.” Mher recounts. Since he was the youngest the others nicknamed him the ‘chick’.

Events unfolded quickly. When it was apparent that hostilities would soon break out Albert, Rubik and Ararat left for Yerevan to find out what they could do. They told Mher, “You’re young, and they won’t take you.” Mher says, that, “ I was at a loss. How could they leave without me?” It’s the first time that I ran away from home. I told everyone that I was leaving for school. I packed a few things and took off for Yerevan. They had no choice but to take me along with them.” Mher’s eyes start to light up. His friends were really fond of him and excused his disobedience and mischievousness. 

“They always looked out for the younger guys; so that they didn’t get into trouble, even though they were young in age as well.” Mher recalls. “It was in Getashen, in April, that I first met Tatul Krpeyan. I was coming out of the woods when I spotted a cake with the number 27 on it. I asked myself whose birthday could it be? It wasn’t Haykaz’s birthday nor was it Smbo’s. Later, when I found out it was Tatul’s, I was astonished. The guy looked more like a 40 year old.” The Azeris called Tatul the ‘bearded teacher’ since he taught history in school. Tatul was killed a few days after his birthday.  

Mher always felt that his older friends looked out for him and says that it was due to them that he survived many battles during the war years.

“A battle was raging in Malibeil. I was wounded during the night. Blood was streaming down over my hand. I told Ararat that I had been hit. He answers back, ‘Are you sure?’ and I tell him, ‘Yeah, they hit me’. ‘Where did you get it?’ he asks and I say ‘In the hand’. Aro looses his temper and yells, “I’ve told you a thousand times not to stick your nose everywhere.” He moves heaven and earth to transport me out of there. I’m lying down wounded and Apo comes over to me and asks, ‘does it hurt?’ and I say no it doesn’t. He asks, ‘do you want a smoke?’ and I say that I do. He cries out, ‘Quick, get this guy a cigarette’. Some time passes and I recover from my wounds. I’m standing up smoking when out of the blue Abo rushes over and berates me saying, ‘Didn’t I tell you not to smoke...?’

After the war Mher became a builder. Ararat lives in Australia with his family and is employed as a driver. Ararat frequently calls Mher on the telephone and says that he misses his friends, the country, Hrazdan and that he longs to return home. Rubik lives in Yerevan and has already become a grandfather. He’s a driver for the advisor to the President of Armenia. Albert, who appears in the center of the photo, was martyred. Mher stares at the photo for some time, resting his palms on it to stop his hands from trembling. “Albert left us his son Armen, who looks more like his dad with each passing day.”

“Let me describe his last day. There was a stretch of no man’s land in the Karakhambeli area of Fizuli. The guys would circle the area in small patrols just to make sure the Azeris wouldn’t advance. We would have set up positions there but we were few in number. That day Abo and a few others went out on patrol. Suddenly, out of nowhere the enemy appeared before them. I was sick that day but we remained in communication with the patrol. I heard that there were some wounded and later on their numbers grew. I told them, ‘I’m coming out there’ but they replied that I should stay put. When I heard that they had run out of ammunition I quickly dressed, grabbed some ammo and took off. By the time I reached them they already had been fighting for four hours straight. Seven of the fourteen guys who went out on the patrol had been killed and there was wounded as well. Some others were sent out as reinforcements but they lost their way and didn’t make it. I started to shoot off some grenade rounds as soon as I arrived on the scene. A grenade went off close by and nearly severed Abo’s foot. But he didn’t loose consciousness and told me to cut off the foot to make it easier to carry him away. I shot him up with a bunch of painkillers and bandaged the foot with my clothes. I was talking with him all the while. On the way back a doctor tried to help but his wounds were too numerous. Abo died in the hospital on January 10, 1994.

“After we lost Abo I was by myself, alone. I couldn’t abandon my position; I didn’t have orders to do so. For about 30 minutes I was fighting off the enemy single handedly. I was firing back from a variety of spots. At one moment something deafened me; I couldn’t hear a thing. I was on the radio screaming for help. I was firing from a prone position. Soon I felt a hand on my back. I turned around to see that it was Gharib who had reached me with the guys in tow.

“When Abo would go off to battle he’d say that, ‘the hunting will be fabulous’.

Please let me tell you another story about Abo. The stories are unending. “Another time…” and here Mher smiles because he knows the story is a funny one, “we’re in the Shahumyan region, in the woods. I, Ararat, Abo and Rubik, Karot and a few other guys are protecting the villages of Manashid and Erkedj. We’ve been in the woods for a bout a week and there’s no food to be found. We can’t hunt because we’re not allowed to fire our guns. One day while sitting around on empty stomachs sipping rosehip tea I spot Abo, who had been missing for about a half an hour, walking towards us with a rooster under his arms. Out of despair he had gone off and got hold of a rooster. He then proceeded to secretly kill the bird and bury the feathers in the ground. To this day I’m still amazed at how he was able to feed all 17 of us”

During the war Mher almost never went back home. “One time went I went back home I knocked on the door and from the other side my father asked, ‘who is it?’ and I answered back, ‘It’s me’. He asks, ‘who bare you?’ and I say ‘its Mher’. My father opens the door, looks at me, and slaps me out due to the joy he felt. I’ll never forget that for a whole month my father camped out at the airport, never returning home. He had received no news from me and was waiting there for my coffin to arrive.”

When I asked him what he had kept from the war he answered that he had given his military uniform to a friend. “I want to forget…” He didn’t want to continue the conversation, to tell me what he wished to forget. After some silence he said, “Well, my friend’s a soldier; let him make use of it. But I’ve kept a set for myself. You never know, the war’s not over yet…”