By Matheos Eblighatian
Translated by Vahe H. Apelian
Edited by Jack Chelebian, M.D.
It is to this end that I pen my memories and impressions. I do not have in mind Krikor Zohrab solely as a writer, nor as a lawyer or as a politician. I will write only what I know, have seen or been told I have been able to verify.
Krikor Zohrab did not have a happy childhood. His father died prematurely. His mother remarried a lawyer of ordinary means. After graduating from the local Armenian school, he was enrolled in the Franco-Turkish lycee’ of Galatasaray.
This school was established during the reign of Sultan Abul Aziz at the request of Napoleon III. It had an illustrious period especially during its initial years. Many of its teachers were noted professors who were appointed by the French government. The natural instincts of Turkish politicians were honed in this institution. In the beginning, the Galatasary lycee’ offered courses in law and engineering as well and many Armenian young men took full advantage of these unique opportunities, so did Krikor Zohrab. He studied engineering.
Across the Galatasaray lycee,’ there was a Turkish pastry shop that later became Ohnigian’s tobacco shop. Every morning young Krikor Zohrab would walk from his home (I believe in Ortakoy), to the school. For lunch, he would use his allowance of 50 piasters to buy bread and halvah from the pastry shop. In spite of the fact that the purchasing power of his allowance diminished over time, the kind shopkeeper continued serving Krikor Zohrab the same portions. He liked this poor but intelligent lad.
He was very popular among his classmates. He was the youngest in his class but was always the first in the academic ranking. Years later when Zohrab became a prominent lawyer, his one time classmates, who had become renown engineers, would relate about their former classmate’s uncanny ability to solve accurately and fast complex engineering problems.
It is not hard to envision that after years of living off of bread and halvah and walking for hours under snow or rain, young Zohrab would have been eager to graduate in order to attain a better life for himself. That day came and Zohrab graduated the first in his class.
As it was customary then, the list of the graduating engineering students, with their academic ranking, was sent to the ministry of public works to have each student assigned an appropriate post. The country was just beginning to organize itself along European standards. There were few decent roads and bridges in the country. Even the governing centers of the many provinces did not have engineers or any official worthy of the name.
The ministry assigned Krikor Effendi to an important office commensurate with his academic ranking to be the main engineer of the Trebizond province with a monthly salary of one thousand eight hundred piasters, which with pension and other allowances, added to 16 Ottoman gold coins. His days of bread with halvah were over. Was it a result of his destitute childhood or his innate character? He exhibited early on a deep desire for lavish spending and enjoyment of life.
Like the rest of his classmates, on the assigned day, he presented himself to the minister’s counselor to receive his assignment. The orderly escorted him to an ornately furnished hall where, in one corner, a short man was sitting behind a desk. When the counselor understood what the young lad is here for, he asked:
- “Well my son, why did not your father come?”
- “My father is dead”
- “Who is Krikor then?”
- “Myself”
- “How could that be? Are you the first engineer of the Trebizond province?”
- “Yes, your Excellency”
The counselor rang a bell and ordered to have the young engineer’s dossier brought to him while Krikor remained standing and waiting anxiously.
It took the official ten minutes to study his dossier. He added a few notes on the cover and instructed Zohrab to meet him in a week. Zohrab became very apprehensive and assumed that there were some obstacles in on his way even though at that time there was no overt animosity against the Armenians, but then, was he not a Christian? Life had not been kind to him yet. He had always encountered difficulties. This delay was an ominous sign for him, Zohrab thought, especially that most of his classmates had already received their assignments and were preparing to transfer to their posts.
Zohrab was so inexperienced then he had not even inquired the name of the official who had suspended his hopes. The following week he presented himself with trepidation. This time around the minister’s counselor spoke to him in Armenian.
“You are lucky, my son. The government has noted your exceptional talents and your age and has assigned you as a vice administrator in this ministry at a salary of 900 piasters monthly”. That post was indeed an exceptional opportunity for him even though the salary was only half as much as it would have been in Trebizond. However, the post was in the capital city, Istanbul, with all its comforts and bearing in mind the expected year-end bonus, the difference in the salary would not have been that much.
Zohrab was taken back and took leave without responding. Once he found out that the person he had met was no other than the well-known Krikor Odian, through intermediaries he sent word to him asking for his other post. Krikor Odian remained puzzled knowing that those in the countryside would have looked forward to changing their position in favor of a lower ranking and paying post in Istanbul. Furthermore, he noted that Zohrab was way too young to have his say over his older subordinates in the distant provinces. He added: “How can I throw him to the beasts?”
When Zohrab finally understood that his post in Trabizond was not to be, he became exceedingly angry. No one understood that he was cut from a different cloth. He was not the type to sit in an office smoking and sipping coffee all day long doing little. The very next day he tended his resignation from the job offered to him refusing henceforth to be an employee of the state.
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