She was a nucleus of light

the mountain and what it teaches

"I was now in the mountains... I had to adapt to the mountains and resemble those in the mountains to be able to stay among them. First, my clothes changed: my thick khaki trousers, my equally thick khaki shirt, my many-pocketed vest, my scarf, my belt around my waist, my ponytail hair—I had become similar in appearance. I didn't know what the future held. My only aim was to hold those accountable who sacrificed my dreams for their momentary pleasures and to fight for a better world. I had to endure harsh conditions, kill if necessary, or die. Merely resembling in appearance was not enough for this. One had to resemble ideologically, know the cause, believe, and possess the necessary equipment of a guerrilla. Military and political training were essential. The leader promised a new world. Everything intended, being done, and to be done was for the freedom of our people. Peoples had the right to self-determination. An independent, democratic order where identities, languages, and cultures could be freely lived, without the impositions of the state, religion, and traditions, under our flag, with freedom, justice, and equality would be established. The feudal structure dominated by the landlords, tribal chiefs, and sheikhs, and the capitalist bourgeois exploitation system would end, labor would not be exploited. We had a long and tiring road ahead. Revolution demanded sacrifice. The dominant powers, feudal landlords, bourgeois, in short, the ruling classes, nations, capitalist imperialist, bourgeois states would not allow this. Revolutionaries had to be ready for this tough struggle. Revolutions had often been and would continue to be bloody. Armed struggle was necessary. It was necessary to organize, develop military and political revolution strategies, and make the masses conscious to assert their identities. Liberation would come with a planned, programmed, disciplined, effective guerrilla war; the mountains were important, military training was essential. I knew dialectics, materialism, Marx, Engels, in short, philosophy. Therefore, I had no difficulty with ideology. The mountains, where I had climbed with goats since childhood, knowing its grass, flower, thorn, rock, cliff, water, bird, wolf, snake, and caves, were not unfamiliar to me. There was no problem there. I didn't know the Kalashnikov, aiming, using weapons, military terminology, signs, tracking, command, camouflage, most importantly fighting, and killing. In a short time, I had learned the characteristics of pistols, machine guns, grenades, mines, bazookas, mortars, anti-aircraft guns, and similar weapons and how, where, and when to use them, even their ranges. Among what I learned were setting traps, making bombs from kitchen gas cylinders, sabotage, ambushes, laying mines, camouflage, military terms, signaling, types of operations, and close combat techniques. In short, I had learned almost everything a guerrilla should know... Havin showing me how to disassemble and reassemble a Kalashnikov once was enough. Within two days, I was the fastest at disassembling and reassembling a Kalashnikov in the group. After a month, I had become the group's brightest and most successful guerrilla, fully equipped with political, ideological, and military knowledge, with practical shortcomings, a promising guerrilla...

There was also Memo... Poor boy... He had come to the mountains at fifteen and had been in the mountains for three years. Black-haired, black-eyed, mustache just beginning to grow, swarthy, well-built, and handsome for his age. One midnight, they had taken his father; Memo was only ten years old then. His father had never returned... a missing person... The scar on his eyebrow from the butt of a gun he ate that night, the screams of his mother still in his ears, he had a revenge to take. I had been in the mountains for a year, but I was an amateur compared to him.

One day, after training, tired, I leaned my back against a rock, reading Ahmet Arif: 'My soul is strange, my soul is silent, my hopes are shattered,' Ahmet's love didn't leave him, my anger didn't leave me... I was burning with revenge... I looked, and Memo was bringing me tea with great courage, smiling. I say great courage because such bourgeois-influenced relations, male-female closeness, and sexuality were forbidden. The leader had a strict order. But Memo was both flirting with me and sneaking glances at Havin. He seemed to want to make Havin jealous. I couldn't refuse; I took the tea, but while drinking it, I told him not to do it, reminding him of the rules, warning him that he would burn us both. But the young, hot-blooded, reckless, had nothing to lose to be afraid of death. Havin was across from us. I wasn't looking at her, but I felt her glaring at us angrily, preparing for the scolding we would receive. It came sooner than I expected... She scolded me so harshly for not taking my tea myself that I had never been scolded like that before. Memo tried to say, 'What's wrong with this, she's my sister?' 'Look at me, you'll eat the bullet, your voice will be cut off, and I'll... now... fuck off!' she said, chasing him away. While chasing Memo away, I saw the jealousy peculiar to women in Havin's eyes, that she was jealous of Memo from me, but I didn't dwell on it much. You will understand better why I told this after what I will tell shortly.