They were Biashir, the forester, and his son Eldar, engaged in delivering gas in 40-liter tanks to kitchens in the villages of the Askeran District by a truck rigged for the purpose.

There had even appeared purely Azerbaijani villages, about ten of them, in Mountainous Karabakh.

Being unaware of these minutiae at the mentioned meeting, I still responded to the Grisha’s question in the affirmative as long as it concerned the right of peoples for their self-determination. The right which is as fundamental as the freedom of assembly (hmm!), as inalienable as the freedom of speech (hmm-hmm!), as sacred as the freedom of thought and religion (someone shut me up please!)…

So naive and stupid idiot was I at that moment and scratched my signature among the uncountable other autographs collected in the region.

Four years later I confirmed the accord by taking part in the referendum on the Declaration of the Republic of Mountainous Karabakh.

That day Stepanakert was being bombarded without even the lunch break, nonetheless, I ventured to the town theater and ticked “for” in my voter ballot. And even today, with my status plunged down to that of a refugee, I’ve got no regrets because up till now that right seems irresistibly attractive to my simple mind.

However, back to "in order of appearance"…

A month later there was another surprise meeting to collect donations for the victims of the Spitak earthquake in Armenia (the seismic magnitude at the epicenter in the range of 10 to 12, 25 000 dead, 514 000 homeless, 140 000 crippled).

I donated 2 rubles and 50 kopecks, all I could contribute without losing a chance of surviving up to the following payday.

The Biology teacher, Rafic Shakarian, a ready-made Roman senator by his looks, began to carp: “No need for kopecks!” I had to curb his patrician pride by reminding that he, personally, was not the target of my offering, and 50 kopecks were equivalent to 2 bread loaves… The discussion dried up, the kopecks were accepted.

In February, Lenin Square in Stepanakert saw the outset of mass rallies in the support of exit from under the Azerbaijani jurisdiction and unification of Mountainous Karabakh with Armenia. The Regional Council of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region sent petitions on this account to Moscow, Baku and Yerevan…

From the jokes of that period:

“They clear up the heaps of debris in place of the houses tumbled by the Spitak earthquake. The derrick pulls up a huge piece of concrete flooring, reveals a man still alive, miraculously.

‘Is Karabakh given back to us?’, asks the survivor.

‘No, man! No!’

‘Drop the fucking slab back then!’"

Some stuff to perk you up, huh? Still, I heard then folks laughing at it…

Laughing even after the beastly carnage of Armenian population in the city of Sumgait, 27 – 29 February 1988.

I cannot write on that. Physiological stoppage. Hands hang, spasmodic clutch at the throat to keep back senseless whine of a small kid. Looks like senility has its say already. Maybe…

The troops of the Soviet Empire did not interfere, kept on stand-by for three days and nights. When they entered the city to disperse the ferocious mobs, 276 soldiers got bruised.

There followed a bubble of hush for a couple of months, when multi-thousand streams of evacuees filled the highways between Armenia and Azerbaijan: Armenians from Baku to Armenia and Karabakh, Azerbaijanis from Armenia to Azerbaijan. Counter-directed migration of peoples…

The leadership of the USSR responded to the situation by sending special troops to Stepanakert, by means of the curfew imposed there, and by visits of high officials to dissuade the people from their urge to unite with the rest of Armenia. They made speeches in the Lenin Square, the visitors did.