In Istanbul, Armenian Has No Life Outside the School Walls

A heavy rain had been beating down since morning. I had been walking for quite awhile to get to my destination, the Karakyozian Children’s House located in the Istanbul neighborhood of Sisli. The neighborhood is home to many Istanbul-Armenians.

I was soaked and my spirits had dropped a notch. I finally got to the gate where a Turkish guard asked me for some I.D. My guide, 18 year-old Kayaneh, told him in Turkish that I was a tourist. He let us in without any papers.

As I entered the school, my spirits suddenly lifted; I forgot about the rain and my soggy shoes.

Karakyozian Kindergarten – learning Armenian for the 1st time

A sense of warmth came over me, and not just because it was physically warm inside the building. Kids were running up and down the halls, joking and talking in Armenian.

Arousyak Koch Mone, Director of the Karakyozian Kindergarten, came out to welcome me. She said that Armenian is never heard outside the classroom.

“Children from Turkish-speaking families learn Armenian here for the first time. So, we also work with the parents. We’ve come up with a dictionary of basic words and phrases so that parents can converse in Armenian with their children.”

The Karakyozian Kindergarten was established in January, 2007. It’s the only independent Armenian pre-school now operating in Turkey. Even though it is housed in the Karakyozian School building, the kindergarten has its own administration independent from that of the school’s. The staff is all Armenian. There is no Turkish vice-principal or teachers like in the school itself. Instruction in the kindergarten is in Armenian.

Arousyak regards the kindergarten as an achievement of the Armenian community and the late Hrant Dink, who raised the issue of the need for a new community kindergarten in the pages of “Agos”.

62 children, aged 3-6, are divided into four classes at the kindergarten. The teaching staff is comprised of eight individuals; two to a classroom. The teacher-in-charge must be a college graduate. The other is an assistant with a high school degree.

Getting trained teachers is the major hurdle for the kindergarten. Since there are no Armenian Studies departments at Turkish universities, instructors teach students at home, using the Armenians they learnt from their parents or passing self-taught knowledge.

Textbooks from Armenia unusable

Obtaining textbooks is the other problem facing the pre-school. The staff and the principal put together their own teaching materials and aids. When they’re lucky, they get their hands on publications authored by Armenian experts in Europe.

Due to linguistic differences, books and syllabus materials from Armenia aren’t practical for use by the Istanbul-Armenian community.

Like other Armenian schools in Istanbul, this kindergarten also survives solely on contributions raised in the community and the payments of parents.

The Karakyozian Kindergarten instills a love of art in the children from day one. There are classes in pottery and music alongside instruction in English, Armenian and logic. During our visit, Kayaneh, one of the kindergarten teachers, had dressed the kids up in tiny smocks. She was showing them how to work with clay. Lined up in the cabinet, worthy of display, were the clay works of her students from past years.

Kumkapi school caters to “illegal” Armenian kids

After leaving the Karakyozian Kindergarten, my friend Kayaneh Chalikian, a Bolsahay native, said we must visit another kindergarten and school operating in Kumkapi, an Istanbul neighborhood along the Marmara Sea.

Children of Armenian families illegally residing in Turkey attend classes at the school. These kids cannot attend Armenian schools run by the Armenian community since they have no residency papers despite the fact that Turkey is obliged, under international conventions regarding migrants, to guarantee their education, regardless of residency status.

This neighborhood was once home to many native Istanbul-Armenians and, over recent years, has attracted many migrants from Armenian as a place to live and work. The area is the site for textile, leather and other factories. The Istanbul Patriarchate of the Armenian Apostolic Church is also located here. No wonder, then, that Armenians from the RA have converged on the area.

The illegal kindergarten and school are housed in the lower floor of the Armenian Evangelical Church (Gedikpaşa), a towering structure founded in 1850. The school only goes up to the 5th grade.

We enter and a “mini-Armenia” opens up before us. In the unheated corridors, children are dashing here and there, speaking a hodge-podge of Armenian dialects and accents.

Many children only know Armenia through pictures

“Most of the children are from rural areas in Armenia, “says Heriknaz Avagyan, who serves as the principal and Armenian language and literature instructor. “Some children were born here and only know Armenia through pictures.”

In Armenia, Heriknaz worked as a teacher at Yerevan’s Avan-Arinj High School 180. She moved to Turkey in 2002. She first worked as an elderly attendant for Armenian and Turkish families. Later, she met Istanbul-Armenian jeweler Vartan and got married. Her son also attends the “illegal” school.

It was 5pm and some parents had come to pick up their children.

Sousan Voskanyan hails from Vanadzor, Armenia. She came to pick up her granddaughter. She and her entire family have been living in Turkey for the past 15 years.

Sousan works at Istanbul’s Kapalıçarşı (Grand Bazaar), repairing old rugs and other handicrafts.  She doesn’t plan to return to Armenia.  Nevertheless, she is concerned about the future of her grandkids since they are deprived of a full education. After finishing the 5th grade, the boys are sent off to learn a trade. The girls remain at home where they are self-taught.

The Vanadzor native urged the governments of Armenian and Turkey to find a way that would allow the school to at least go up to the 8th grade.

In one of the tiny classrooms, with photos of Armenia’s president and the Catholicos attached to the wall, along with an Armenian tricolor, Donara Bebouryan was reviewing some class work with her pupils.

Back in Armenia, Donara taught at PS1 in Gyumri from 1992-2000. She’s been living in Istanbul with her family ever since. Her two daughters also work alongside their mom at the school. One teaches Russian, the other, English.

“I’d return to Armenia, but the school needs me”

Donara told me that she definitely would return to Armenia but that the school needs her. The classes here are based on a syllabus used in Armenia and the Diaspora Ministry sends them the textbooks.

The school opened its doors in 2003. There were only 7 pupils back then. Now it has 70. 20 children attend the kindergarten.

The kindergarten, housed in two small rooms, cannot accept new kids due to a lack of space. Even now, the children take naps in shifts; some on cots and the others lying on couches.

“There are a lot of parents who want to send their children to the kindergarten. It’s really a convenience for working families. We take care of the kids till 7pm. We just don’t have the means to accept any more,” says Heriknaz Avagyan.

Classroom space is so scarce that parts of the hallway are partitioned off with curtains to devise make-shift rooms for grades four and five. The school has no cafeteria. The kids usually bring lunch from home or the teachers order out.

The Caritas organization has promised to construct a small kitchen area by year’s end and to supply the necessary equipment and furnishings.

Right now, the school uses furniture brought from the Karakyozian Kindergarten. Heriknaz says Karakyozian helps out whenever possible.

The driving force behind the school’s founding was Alex Ouzuroglu, a member of the Bezciyan Alumni Association.

Bolsahay community didn’t want trouble

At the time, those wishing to create such a school also sought the assistance of the Armenian Patriarchate. A meeting was convened to discuss the issue.

Heriknaz also sat in on the meeting. She says it reminded her of Yervant Odian’s satirical work Comrade Panchoonie. After hours of tedious detailed discussion weighing the pros and cons of the planned school, the risks and benefits involved, the Patriarchate gave its official thumbs down to the idea.

Principal Heriknaz says that most likely the Patriarchate didn’t wish to ruffle the feathers of the Turkish authorities.

Later Rev. Krikor Agabaloglu, pastor of the Gedikpaşa church, lent a helping hand. When Heriknaz asked if he wasn’t afraid to assist, Rev. Krikor replied, “These are Armenian children…”

Turkish authorities know about the school, but have not interfered.

The church lets the school use its basement for free. Parents pay $60 a months for operating expenses. Neither does the school pay for utilities, since most religious institutions in Turkey are exempt for such expenses.

Heriknaz says that the numbers of those leaving Armenia for work in Turkey is constantly increasing. Thus, there is growing pressure on the school to expand, both in terms of physical space and in the number of grades. The legal status of the school remains an unresolved issue as well.

Rev. Krikor has plans to build a school on church grounds recently returned due to a court case. Turkish authorities have still not granted a construction permit.

My Bolsahay friend said there are a number of Armenian schools in Istanbul, now closed and empty, that could have been put at the disposal of the “illegal” school, had the church and community agreed.

“The Bolsahay community should have taken care of it but, like always, Armenians from the RA did what needed to be done on their own.”

I then realized why my friend suggested we visit these two schools.
Comparing the two realities of both, leads me to believe that in Istanbul, just like many other diaspora communities, the divide between Armenians from the RA and the traditional diaspora is still a wide gulf to be breached.

In many ways, Armenians from Armenia still haven’t “found their place” within the traditional Armenian milieu, and thus, they create their own parallel reality.

P.S. On Sept. 14, 2010, the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg ruled that Turkish authorities “failed in their duty to protect the life and freedom of expression of the journalist Firat (Hrant) Dink.” Turkey was ordered to pay 105,000 euros ($135,000) in compensation to Dink’s widow, children and brother, who brought the case to court. Rakel Dink, Hrant’s wife, announced that a portion of the amount would go to the Gedikpaşa School.