Armenians shoulder Laleli’s dwindling suitcase

Armenians shoulder Laleli’s dwindling suitcase
Thursday, March 25, 2010

VERCİHAN ZİFLİOĞLU

ISTANBUL – Hürriyet Daily News

The Emniyet Bus Station in Istanbul’s Aksaray neighborhood is the nexus for the suitcase trade between Turkey and Armenia. Every Wednesday, 15 buses go to Armenia one after another. Many Armenians make their living relying on the trade, but those who can’t afford the $50-$70 return journey risk overstaying their visas and becoming an ‘undocumented worker’

In the back alleys of Istanbul’s Aksaray district, the Emniyet Bus Station looks as if it has long been abandoned. A more careful glance, however, uncovers notices in Armenian and Georgian plastered on windows of bus company offices.

The station was mainly used by Russian and Romanian passengers in the early 1990s for shuttle trade, but lately it has been serving those from Armenia and Georgia who pack their suitcases with items to sell at street markets back home.

Every week, scores of buses depart for Turkey’s eastern neighbors, charging passengers between $50 and $70 depending on the final destination. Wednesdays are especially brisk with the majority of buses heading to Armenia via Georgia departing that day.

The Istanbul-Yerevan journey would take 22 hours, but because the Turkish-Armenian border remains closed, the actual travel time is 36 hours. For those who can afford the luxury of air travel, there are constraints; flights depart from Istanbul’s Atatürk International Airport bound for Yerevan twice a week.

Traders in Laleli, a neighborhood in Aksaray famous as a shuttle trade hub, insisted on speaking on the condition of anonymity out of a growing anxiety that the trade is coming to a halt.

On one of the ordinary days at the terminal last week, passengers reached the bus station early in the morning, followed by porters carrying heavy luggage. Suitcases and cardboard boxes were weighed; bargains were made and the cargo was loaded up. Passengers making the journey have a luggage allowance of 200 kilograms.

Falling into the ‘undocumented’ gap

One passenger, speaking to Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review on condition of anonymity, said Armenians generally come to the city with between $2,000 and $5,000. Those who come with less money typically cannot find enough money to return to Armenia when their visas expire and consequently become one of the “undocumented workers” who were threatened with deportation by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan during comments made last week.

A.H., a 44-year-old nurse identified only by her initials, worked in hospitals for many years in Armenia. "I have worked in Turkey doing domestic work for others and have saved money,” she said. “Now it’s time take off.”

H.B. is from Gyumri, an Armenian city not far from the eastern Turkish province of Kars, and said he makes his living off suitcase trade.

“Why are the politicians plaguing poor people like us? Why are the borders closed? Why are we not allowed to pass freely? It sometimes feels like I have all the weight of the world on my shoulders.”

Kohar Gasparian, 50, said he runs a luxurious boutique in Yerevan. “I come because textiles are cheap and of good quality here,” he told the Daily News.

Almost all spoke fluent Turkish and many of the passengers, bus company employees and drivers know each another.

Bus driver Mehmet Kapıcıoğlu said he has been driving passengers to Armenia for 14 years. “The journey takes 36 hours, sometimes 38 hours. Some passengers cover the distance without food and water because they have no money. Seeing that is really painful.”

Ali, declining to give his surname, said he had been working at the bus station for 12 years and is fluent in Armenian. “I’ve learned it by talking with passengers as the years go by,” he said, adding that Armenians have been crucial in reviving Laleli’s otherwise-fading shuttle trade.

“From the mid-1990s until last year, there used to be 30 bus trips per day from Turkey to Armenia. This year, the number decreased by half,” he said.