22 Mart 2019 Cuma

TNT Matchbox Diary: A Turkish POW in Russian Prison Camp (1915-1918)/Part XL

//Ed. Note:  Fuad Bey's diary has reached about the half-
way point. His life in captivity is constraining, of course,
but relatively pleasant.  Over the next few days TNT, will
juxtapose this relative comfort with brutal reports of 
other Turkish prisoners in Russian POW camps during 
the same period.//

m fuad tokad ile ilgili görsel sonucu
                    M. Fuad Tokad


21 August 1916 Monday
The weather is pretty nice but there are some clouds in the sky. There’s 
no warmth at all. After lunch I received a note from Şerif and went to 
see him. We spent the afternoon making the top portion of his suit and 
chatting. Then I returned. Poor Halis was upset at having been left 
alone. In the evening he let me know it with a number of gestures. He 
was right and I deserved it. Because just as I don’t have a close friend 
beside him he doesn’t either. Just as when I get upset I need his 
consolation, he no doubt needs me to be there for him in the face of 
insolence. But I had left him alone and had caused his distress to 
multiply. My shyness, first of all, and secondly, profoundly, the effects 
of the calamity of 328 (1912) still have on me, irritate dear friends like
this and cause them to feel badly. Damn you calamity and shyness! 
When will I be rid of you? In particular, shyness is the reason for all 
I’ve suffered, right?

22 August 1916 Tuesday
The weather is quite nice. Time is passing relatively well, too. But 
some thoughts have cropped up as the result of our being occupied 
with work and both the future and the past have come to life in my 
imagination. The phases of the past are marching along like a parade.
 A person feels a twinge of emotion at this time and the effect of this 
leaves one in a state of extended perplexity. This environment is 
paralyzing me in a terrible way. But the emotion that the past 
sometimes elicits may be attributable to the environment, too. Yes, 
this small place is strange. Since everyone’s level is the same the 
thoughts are different. Too bad there aren’t many young fellows here 
who give any thought to humanity. Some of the others busy themselves 
with  just enduring, while the rest are occupied with pointless and 
inhumane things. Nobody wants to discuss the issues that matter most 
in life and they’re not interested in taking common advantage of these 
days in captivity. They just  want to kill time. These are the things that 
anger me most…Kör Mehmet and Şerif came  to see us and we had a 
talk. The Turks are advancing on the Russian front and in Iran. 
Romania is near to making a peace agreement with our allies. At night 
I went to bed early.

23 August 1916 Wednesday
I went to the hospital because of a mosquito bite on my foot that I 
kept on scratching without thinking and now the wound has worsened. 
There’s a little corridor with many rooms on each side that are all for 
examinations. Something that caught my attention: even in the hospital
there’s a lamp with a picture of Jesus on it. Russian fanatics! In any 
event, they spread some iodine on my foot, bandaged it and I came 
back. The hospital is nice and clean. 

In the afternoon Şerif and Yahya came and we sat for a while. After 
the evening meal Ethem summoned Halis. They spoke  for more than 
an hour and Ethem had quite a lot to say. I had a feeling that I knew
just what Ethem said and what his intentions were. Then, when Halis 
came back up he first lay on his bed under the pretext of a stomach 
ache and this made me very suspicious. Two hours later, I heard 
Ethem say to Salah these words while they were playing chess: 
‘corner seclusion and I separated them.’ Right away I went over to 
Halis and we began to talk. Ethem had told Halis that there were 
lots of things happening to his detriment and that Halis should talk 
more carefully with everyone, especially me. Halis told me that for 
a little while anyway he would speak more seriously and carefully 
so that he can rid himself of these things…I thought and then spoke 
definitively. We’re still together, we’ll live as one, everything we 
have together but our behavior and attitude must be more serious 
than before. The poor fellow was so frightened that he was saying 
that we wouldn’t be able to speak with one another anymore…but
a couple of days ago when I had said to Halis ‘let’s not attract 
attention from others’ he had said ‘as long as we’re honorable no 
one can say or do anything to us.’ But today we’re afraid to talk 
intimately. It’s clear that Ethem’s words had the desired effect on 
the poor fellow.


24 August 1916 Thursday
The bitterness of last night prompted me to get up early in the morning. 
The distress in my heart  continues. Even if I’m able to console myself
 I can’t shake off the bad feeling I have from what’s happened. I spent 
the morning lying on my bed. A little while after lunch Halis, Hasan 
and I went to the bath and got cleaned up. Then I lay down on my bed 
again and pulled the blanket over me. Halis went outside for a walk and 
I fell asleep for a while. At this time Salah recited a poem and he 
seemed to be aiming a dart at me. It appears he achieved his goal. I lay 
there until the evening meal. Zühdü and Hikmet came and asked 
‘what’s wrong? Are you sick?’. Halis keeps on saying ‘please get up. 
If you don’t then I’ll start thinking and be worse off than you.’ After 
dinner I went out into the garden and walked around a bit by myself. 
Later I felt a slight stomach ache and I laid down again. Halis came 
and tried to console me. But the effect of Ethem’s remarks yesterday 
wouldn’t allow him to spend more than a brief time by my side. 
Halis is more careful now, more noticeably protecting himself but this
wasn’t right. In the evening , actually at night, we talked one-on-one.
I said these things to him and advised him not to worry. Let’s see how 
this will turn our. What will fortune do to us? The weather is bad. We 
heard with joy the news that the Turkish army has reached Beyazid
and Eleşker. Success.

25 August 1916 Friday
Since I went to bed early I got up early. The weather is nice. After 
drinking tea I lay on my bed and rested. Zühdü came at noon. He 
tried to comfort me, saying my disposition of the past couple of days 
had changed for the better. In the afternoon, in fact after the fellows 
had returned from their walk, Yozgatlı Saffet came to me. We sat on 
the bed and talked. He was complaining to me about how lousy our ,
surroundings are and that we don’t have any serious work to keep us
busy. Anymore, Halis doesn’t come by to see me very often but after 
dinner we chatted for a while. After than I told him to got out in the 
garden and walkd a bit. I laid down again. I looked around with a view 
from afar…everyone was in their own mood. About an hour and a half 
later Halis came and he was laughing. He had spoken with Saffet and 
Saffet had told him lots of things about me. Saffet said we shouldn’t 
pay attention to the words of the intriguers and he complained a lot 
about our environment…Halis appreciated these things. He came to 
the realization that Ethem’s advice had been a bluff, a lowdown trick. 
Halis is stroking my face and eyes from happiness and he regrets 
having been overwhelmed by emotion. He says that he should be 
forgiven for the behavior, which happened because of his 
inexperience. Anyway, we had a long talk. We consoled each other
for having gone through such a difficult time…I was very touched 
by Saffet’s magnanimous act in enlightening the inexperienced 
Halis about this matter. News: the Turks are advancing in five 
columns, trying to surround Erzurum. The action is proceeding
successfully. The Bulgarians have turned back the French and are 
taking Kavala Siroz.

//END of  PART XL//

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