Survivors remember Armenian genocide

As the 93rd anniversary of the Armenian genocide approaches, the few remaining survivors continue to tell their stories in order to make sure that the world knows what happened and does not soon forget about it.
The anniversary is commemorated on April 24, which marks the date that the Armenian Genocide began in 1915. From 1915 to 1923, 1.5 million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire were killed by Young Turks. An additional 500,000 were exiled.
Survivor Onorik Eminian, now 95 and living at the NY Home for the Armenian Aged in Flushing, was just a little girl playing ball outside when the Turks invaded her home in Izmir. Two Turks entered her family’s home, pulling her hair and slapping her as they asked where her father was. They took Eminian’s father away with them, but the Turks returned to her house.
“They killed my father and they brought his jacket and pants (back), all (covered with) blood,” Eminian said.
Eminian saw her mother and grandmother shot and killed and her baby brother thrown and killed. She was also hit with a rifle butt that she still has scars from.
Eventually, the Red Cross took Eminian in and placed her in an orphanage. She later went to Greece and moved to the United States in 1930.
Born in Palu on December 22, 1909, Perouz Kalousdian was six years old when the war started. One of the first things she said happened was all of the men were taken away and never seen again.
“After that, they took everything away from us,” said Kalousdian, also a resident of the home in Flushing. “I’ll never, never forget.”
Charlotte Kechejian, a 95-year-old survivor who was born in Nikhda, remembers walking through the desert with her mother, feeling tired, thirsty and hungry. Her mother kept promising her that it would only be a little while longer and that in the end she would have comfort and happiness.
“Thank God I had my mother,” said Kechejian, who came to the United States with her mother when she was 10 and is now living at the NY Home for the Armenian Aged. “If I didn’t have my mother, how would I have had courage (at) eight years old?”
Survivor Arsalos Dadir’s father was also killed. Being that her family was wealthy, Dadir, now 94, and her mother, grandmother and great-grandmother were able to find safety with a wealthy Turkish family that they were on good terms with. The family eventually moved to Constantinople, where Dadir married and raised two children, moving to the United States later in life. She now also lives at the home in Flushing.
Armenian genocide expert Dr. Dennis R. Papazian estimates that there are roughly 200 to 300 survivors still living in the United States.
On Sunday, April 27, the Armenian genocide will be commemorated with an event in Times Square at 2 p.m. There will be free bus transportation to and from. In Queens, there will be a bus at Baruyr’s at 40th Street and Queens Boulevard.
For more information, visit www.knightsofvartan.org.