Story Of Honest Markar

     The first time I heard about Markar it was from uncle Bedros in our apartment in Hollywood.  Known as Bedros Akhbar, our visitor's stories carried weight in our home because he was the one person  who had known my grandfather's home in Anatolia before the Genocide and his wife Marie was somehow related to my neneh Vergine.  Because Bedros Aghbar was also a frequent visitor  to our house in Armenia and had shared some of my family's forced peregrinations, my father was always very excited and nostalgic to have him over. He would sit in our apartment in Hollywood, much as he had in our house in Yerevan and reminisce, providing a crucial voice of validation to my father's own memories. In fact, I remember the balcony in my grandparents home, where Bedros Aghbar along with their other visitors, would discuss the life that had taken them from Anatolia to Yerevan, Armenia.
 
      For my grandparents and their friends life had meant starting all over again several times over, often leaving behind people and places they loved deeply. Many of them had had to split their lives into parts, with their childhood and youth in one place,  families started in another, old age experienced in a third and finally many would go on to meet their end in yet another country.  Bedgros Aghbar's life had so far taken him from Anatolia, to Lebanon, to Cuba, to Argentina, back to Lebanon, to Soviet Armenia and then to Los Angeles, USA.  It had been a circuitous path even by our standards and in fact, my father would always tell me that we should go and record everything that Bedros Akhbar knew because, well,  the man was past ninety.

    And so it was on one of his last visits, as he sat in our living room with his proper, short and rock solid frame against the light in the window behind him, that he mentioned Markar.  Sitting on the edge of the cushioned seat, his hat resting on his baston, and his other hand gently bringing the cup of Turkish coffee to his lips, he began his story. With the gravelly voice of a life that had taken him virtually around the world  and finally landed him in the San Fernando Valley, he spoke about Markar.

      "Babam,why you have to be the most correct man? " Bedros Aghbar recounted, "Just say it is a meter! Why make life hard?".
  
       This is what Bedros Aghbar was saying about a man who simply insisted on exactly measuring every piece of wood, when people's lives consisted of measuring less and taking home the remainder-- basically, stealing.  However, this was the Soviet Union after WWII and stealing could  have meant that you were warm and fed.

      "Mortsir aylevs. Forget it, I told him, but no," he continued. "He had to measure everything to  millimiter. Even in good time, you don't have to be so right.  Why now? I say it. I say it to him. Usi, usi iren."

     My mother, father, and Bedros Aghbar all shook their heads. They shook their heads, paused at the memory of Markar and then the conversation moved on. A couple of years later, at the forty day commemoration of Bedros Aghbar's passing, when everyone was gathered together, I asked to hear the rest of Markar's story.

     "Ah, you mean Markar, Arsho's brother?", my father asked. My father loved to draw connections, go off on tangents and fill in details as he told a story.  With Bedros Aghbar and several others of his caliber gone, it was now my father's turn to become the supreme storyteller at large.  Sitting at the edge of the cushioned seat, his head cocked to the side for emphasis and his hands opened with palms facing outwards, my father's eyes rounded and his eyebrows rose. This was always a good sign and sure enough, sitting there in Bedros Aghbar's living room in the San Fernando Valley, I got to hear the rest of Markar's story. 

    "I tell him.  I say, look here Markar. One flower spring does not make, understand?  Look where we are.  Chors ghoghmd naye. Look to four sides of you. Asi voch Ekiptos eh, voch al Lebanon, voch al Fransa. This is not Egypt, Lebanon or France. They send people to prison here. What you think? You change everything? I tell you, mek hat zaghik karun chiner.  One flower spring does not make. You learn a little. Look around.  See how they are and go like that. A little. I tell him that.". 

    "And then what happened? I mean what did he do?" I asked.

    "He write letter to government. Complain about work.  Complain why Khrushev hit his shoe on table in New York.  He write that government not good communist. In good communism, people get good money for work.  He complain too much lying," my father said. 

    "Oh my God, then what happened? They sent him to prison?" I asked. This was making me so uncomfortable. I thought then that faced with the same situation, I would do as Markar was doing but somehow wasn't so sure. 

   "No, they no send him to prison. They give him his own site. Construction. People die for chance like that. I mean you get rich.  People with site have everything. Wood to burn, wood to sell.  But he complain. Noren. Again.", my father continued.

   "Ok, now they sent him to prison, right?".  I was sure this time that I'd guessed the outcome.

   "No.  They go visit his house.  See that he live with two sisters and no have food or heat.  They take construction site away and give him beer stand.  You know what that is? You be a millionaire with that! Government give you a hundred cup of beer.  You mix with water.  Sell two hundred and keep the rest of money.  This is guarantee, " my father said.

   "And what happened? " I asked.

   "He make people wait.  He keep a line of taxi driver wait outside so he make sure the cup is full to top.  Completely. No foam.  Taxi driver given him change.  He throw it his face. Tramt ar. Yes murastkan chem yev voch al gox.  Take your money, I no beggar and I no thief. And he write more letters.  In English.  He speak four language.  He write in English to American Embassy."

   "Ok, now they sent him to prison, right?" I asked.  This was the most absurd story I had heard so far and I'd heard plenty. 

    "No. They feel sorry.  They say he crazy.  They give him job where he no do nothing.  Just sit.  Nothing.  And they pay.  But no good.  As al cheghav. He write letter and go every day to complain."

    "They killed him?" I asked. 

    "No.  They put him to xentanots. Crazy hospital.  He stay for some time. He get out.  They give him new job and ...", my father's voice faltered.  He didn't want to continue anymore. 

     "So, what happened? Is he in LA?" I asked, because somehow the protagonists of a lot of these stories ended up living around the corner in Hollywood or the Valley.  Where my father stopped, my mother picked up.  She'd been following with occasional, validating nods. 

     "No, he died" she said and with her right hand made a slashing sign across her left wrist.  She did this in a very casual way, however, like it was just as likely an ending to the story as any other.

    "It happen to a lot of people," my father said. "Many people do that.  Panm ne. Is something.  Amen mart chi grtsav.  Not everybody could."

   "Many people do that.  Many.  Not everybody could," my mother repeated, again with that very casual tone.  Casual, resigned yet somehow tinged with a certain pride.  Perhaps it was not pride, but certainly there was in the way that my parents's and uncle Bedros's telling of this story and others like it, a sense of accomplishment.  Many people couldn't, but they did. Menk timatsank.

    In front of me, on the coffee table was a beautiful doily, most likely the handywork of Digin Marie, Bedros's wife.  On the doily were various pastries and nuts in little bowls with gold and blue images of Romeo and Juliet.  I grabbed the corresponding serving plates and promptly started to eat baklava. Marie was a petite woman who had devoted her life to her family and I looked at her as she spoke with her almost girly voice.

    "Bedros had all sort of ideas.  When we first come to Armenia, he want to be farmer, work on land.  I say to him. Look, know what? Kides inch? I no go anywhere.  We get up and come here and from here I no go anywhere anymore.  Aylevs chem ertar.  We stay here and you do what you know to do.  You want to be farmer, go be farmer.  Yes deghmnal chi bidi kam.  I no go anywhere anymore," she said.  As she said this, her two daughters sat smiling at this memory of their father.  He had never lived down this desire to farm.

    "After that, he see things no easy.  Hard living in city.  They give him hard time sometime, but most of time we ok.  One day, he come home very late.  After night.  He no say where he was.  He tired, but he never say what happen.  I think they question him.  After this, nothing.  We ok.  He good workman, all engineer and architect ask his opinion and take his word on everything, " she said.

    "He was a good workman," my father concurred.  "He work on many buildings. The library too."  I had seen the library on my one and only visit back in 1994.  It was strange to think that after the regimes change and people move, the things that were built still had the touch of the builder's hands.

   "They take me in one day too, " he added. " I saw a man in hat and black coat waiting for me on the way to the factory. I think, Haroutiun, habu glletsir.  You swallow the tablet.  That is it.  I know already that my turn next.  All other guys they went, now my turn.  I know the question they ask.  They take me in.  They sit me.  And from morning to night, they ask the same thing.  Same thing.  Again and again.  They know everything.  Everything.  Where my shop in Alexandria.  Where my father's shop.  Everything.  They ask you know so and so who live on such and such street.  Over and over.  I know, I can't lie.  They know.  I say, babam, I know the people.  I know, but just say hello.  That is all.  I say hello every morning when I pass shop.  That is all."  My father shook his hand, but his eyebrows were still raised and his hands open with the palms facing upward. 

   "In the end, ask if I want to work for them, " he continued. " I say, I know nothing.  I not read or write, not very smart. I no education.  Usum chunim.  Not very smart.  You no want me. I no help you.  Really.  Many hours they ask the same thing.  At the end, they let me go.  I worry about my parents.  Kidem tghakner usadsen.  I know, the guys have told them I no go to factory.  They know where I go.  Nobody say, but they know." 

    We all shook our heads and I kept eating nuts.  My mom sat with a funny look, waiting for her turn somewhat impatiently.

    "Your sister sit, right? Nstetsav?", Digin Marie asked my mom, meaning sit in prison. 

     "Four years," my mother answered.  "Hayrs al, my father too".

      "What happened to Markar's sisters?" I asked, somewhat impatiently.  I'd already heard about my aunt and grandfather.  I found it irritating that my mom acted like it was the only story going when clearly there were so many others and besides, it was impossible to get a chronologically detailed story from her.  You had to piece them together yourself, whereas my father lived to fill in the details.

     "Oh, you saw her, Arsho come to our house " my father said.  "When we coming to America, she come and sit at house when nobody home.  People know you leaving and come to steal when no one home, " he clarified. 

       I remembered a woman not much bigger than my twelve year old body with a scarf on her head.  She was with a Russian speaking girl, sort of blondish.  "She take care of their older sister and the children of the other brother who was in open exile in Siberia," my father added.  I hadn't realized that all along Markar had had an exiled brother who had married a Russian woman while in Siberia.

      "She never marry," he added about Markar's sister Arsho. 

      "What happened to them, " I asked.  I wanted to know what happend to Arsho and the blond girl.  I wondered if they were here in LA like us.  My father didn't think so. 

        "Oh, we know if they here," he added.  "We hear something. But we no hear, so they not here.  Arsho old, so who knows.  The brother's children maybe go back to Siberia.  Who know." 

         We all sat for a while and ate nuts and drank coffee.  In the room with the beautifully arranged artificial flowers and the plates with Romeo and Juliet, it was really comfortable.  I complimented Digin Marie on her tseragorts, her doilies, and reiterated my desire to learn how to croche.  I was beginning then to realize the futility of this desire. Some people spend a lifetime learning things, you can't just pick it up in a couple of lessons. You don't become a master craftsman in one hour, it takes time.  Soon, it was time to go back home-- back to Hollywood.