Bursa: The “Non moral” victory of the Aysor.am reporter

Before the football match

We arrived to Bursa by ship. During the 2 hour ship trip the only subject of discussion was the football match. We were trying to guess the score of the Turkey – Armenia match.

On reaching the stadium after Ataturk we saw the young fans gathered there who met the journalists with shouting.
The only amazing thing was that along the way there were Turkish flags for sale, as for the Armenian flags as we were told by one of the sellers, they were sold long time ago. By the way the price of the Turkish flags was 1.5 USD dollars, while the Armenian flags were 20 USD dollars.

During the match:

The security staff warmly received the Armenian delegation of the journalists. Then the group was met also by the young people going to tribunes, they were even making jokes that like the Armenian football especially in the Turkish field.

The Armenian and Turkish journalists were sitting next to each other. We had managed to get acquainted with some of them even before coming to the stadium; there were also journalists from Germany, England and Switzerland.

There were Turkish flags everywhere, and 6 Azerbaijani flags as I counted. There were only 96 Armenian fans in the stadium. They had arrived from Istanbul and had got the invitation tickets only a few days ago and had only one Armenian flag. There were Fetie Cetin, the prosecutor of the case of Hrant Dink, her friends and some relatives of her.

The game started on time, and we all took out our 3 hidden flags. Form the very first minutes the Turkish journalists and the fans in the neighborhood started to protest, they had already forgotten that they had come here to watch the game. It went so far that the security officer and the representative of “FIFA” came to speak with us.

During that time the Turkish journalists were flattering the Turkish flags and when we were showing it to the security officer the journalists were passing the flags to the fans.

We asked the representative of “FIFA” to present a written document proving that we didn’t have the right to care the Armenian flags, and he, noticing that we are more stubborn than the law, said: “I put my arms down” and left us with the Turkish security officer.

The latter tried to take the flag for several times but met more defenses. We were flattering the flag higher as he was coming closer and closer. And as better we were flattering the flags as better the Turks were throwing sunflower seeds on us.
After the first match, seeing that some more security officers approach I hid the flag under my coat and went to the rest room. After staying for 15 minutes in the rest room and supposing that the second half of the match had already started and everybody’s attention will be concentrated on the game, I entered the stadium. It turned out that not everyone was interested with the Turkish – Armenian game.

From the very first moment the security officer was trying to pursue me not to flatter the flag but simply to put it on the bench. To my question how can I put the flag of my country on the bench and sit calmly he said if I didn’t do that I would have problems after the match with the Turkish fans and our National Football Federation will be fined.

I didn’t think about what will happen after the match and didn’t think at all about the Armenian Football Federation.
At last, seeing that the most of the journalists have put the flags on the benches I asked him to take me to a place from were I will be able to flatter my flag without problems, otherwise I will not undergo their rules.

The Security officer offered me to join the fans group that has arrived from Istanbul and to the question whether it is dangerous or not to join those fans he answered frankly: “You can wait for everything from the Turkish fans, but I will not allow anyone to harm you.”

Turkish security officer agreed to provide my security till the end of the game. I did not trust him, but he saved me from the first beatings. Turkish football funs began to throw empty bottles on me and the officer covered me with his body.

The whistles and bottles thrown didn’t bother me during the rest time of the match. My officer didn’t leave me even for one minute. Noticing that my flag is to large and I have some problems to flatter it alone he joined me. His compatriots began to curse him for it.

When it was a minute to the end of the game, the officer asked me to join the other journalists, I agreed.

After the match:

When we met with the head of the Armenian Football Federation Ruben Hayrapetyan he said, that he was informed about one of the Armenian journalists, who had contradicted with a Turkish officer.

We asked him whether that journalist could serve a reason for the Federation being fined.

“It does not matter, you be fans, and it’s ok with the Federation being fined. The presence of at least one Armenian person with Armenian flag in the tribune is very important.”

P.S. Bursa will stay in my memory for a long time. I loved that small and calm town, I loved flattering an Armenian flag there and I was proud for being Armenian…