TheVillageofBarekamavanin the Tavush Marz is some 200 kilometers fromYerevan.

The village is in a canyon, and to someone looking down from above, it resembles a plate. This plate-like position has given the neighboring Azerbaijanis complete control of the village and its fields, which have lain fallow for fifteen years now.

 “Whoever comes here is amazed that we have stayed,” said Head of the Village Administration Hovik Kharakeshishyan. The 440 hectares of private land in the village are covered with minefields, and in the sights of enemy snipers. “People live off the crops they grow in their kitchen gardens; several keep animals, but most receive help from relatives living abroad, “ he explained.

In 1990 Barekamavan had 890 residents; today there are only 340, mostly senior citizens. “ 80% of the population are pensioners,” Hovik Kharakheshishyan said, and pointed to the huge school building. “In the 1980's there were 300 students in the school here. Now there are only 45. To put it in perspective, in one village in theVolgogradregion ofRussia, there are 65 schoolchildren from Barekamavan.”

One after the other, the elderly are leaving this world. Fourteen people died last year. Only seven were born. One of them seven-month old Diana, who looks wide-eyed at the camera. She is the third child of 39-year-old Jonik Mikayelyan. Her big sister Liana and brother Mikayel are already in school.

In 1989 Jonik came back from the Soviet Army to his village, which had already been drawn into the conflict.

From the first day till the end of the war he fought in the trenches defending the village, and he can't imagine ever living anywhere else. His brother and sisters left forRussialong ago, but he stays on in Barekamavan, where he owns three hectares of private land that he is unable to cultivate.

“If I could cultivate these three hectares, I could get 10 tons of wheat, and if I could feed pigs on it, the value of that10 tons would double,” Jonik explained.

Throughout fifteen years in tough condition, Jonik never considered leaving Barekamavan, but the government's most recent decision had forced him to think seriously about his children's education. The problem is that because there are so few students, the village school was reorganized—some teachers were fired and classes were combined. Now, first and second graders, and third and third and fourth graders study in the same classroom at the same time. The teacher teaches the third grade for twenty-two-and-a-half minutes, and the fourth grade the rest of the time.

“The kids come home confused. They don't know what to pay attention to, the stuff for the third grade, or for the fourth?” Jonik said. As Jonik sees it, the children are not getting quality education, although it's not there fault that they were born in this particular place and time.

Out of 300 villagers, twenty are on the state payroll—fifteen schoolteachers, three employees of the village administration, the local doctor, and the mailman. Everyone else is unemployed. Jonik is among them.

From 1991 to 1995 he worked as a contract serviceman in the army. Later, contract service was outlawed. Then he was a member of the village council, but he resigned from the position. He says that they did whatever they pleased, so he left.

There is no land, no jobs, and no interest on the part of the powers that be. If things go on like this, according to Jonik, the village will cease to exist in fifteen years.

“So there is no hope for things to get better?” I asked.

“There is hope. There is always hope, “ he said. “But what we hope for is for someone to care. If the land was safe, we wouldn't look to anyone, but in this situation, if only they'd build a small factory here.”

“It's a matter of risk,” I said. “No businessman is going to put his money under fire.”

“If businessmen won't take the risk, then the government should come up with something. If we all now get up and leave, who will the soldiers be in the trenches for?” he asked.

I said, “ In a free market economy it doesn't make sense for the government to create production.”

“I know it doesn't make sense, but they could give some privileges to people who live on the border. They don't even give us compensation for the mined land that can't be used, “ Jonik Mikayelyan said.

“Maybe you're not asking hard enough,” I said to myself, and then looking at Jonik's children, immediately understood my own stupidity.

My thoughts took me toYerevan, where the streets are blocked around the clock by luxury cars, where elitist construction has no limits, where fancy international shops are always full of customers. I returned to Barekamavan, and found that I had forgotten to jot down Jonik Mikayelyan's last words: “We are not making unrealistic demands. Whatever we want, we know it can be done.”