“Even if no one else from the village goes, I’m still going to go,” Gor said when the head of the Tsaghkaberd village informed that there will be a draft and everyone will be going to fight. In the beginning, they said that everyone would be drafted on October 10th, but they went on the first day of the war.
He was young- only 24. He had only been married for one year. He and his wife had planned how many children they would have, how they would live, and other goals they had. The family received news on September 29th that Gor Harutyunyan was wounded.
“We were looking for Gor all day. We tried to look for him in every hospital but to no avail. We went to Goris and still couldn’t find him. They told us at the hospital in Goris that they don’t have any patients with that name. Then my father-in-law said, ‘We couldn’t find him among the living, so we have to look among the dead.’ So he went to the morgue. I kept calling Gor. My father-in-law called Gor when he got to the morgue, and he heard Gor’s phone ring…” Gor’s wife, Nelly Manvelyan, said.
Read also
“Look after my beloveds, look after my baby, and look after yourselves. I’ll be back soon. He didn’t come back. He said it, but he didn’t come back.” That is how he said goodbye to his family.
Nelly is only 18 years old, and her son is not yet one. She said that the baby probably felt that his father died because he wasn’t feeling well all day; he had a high fever. “He couldn’t sleep until he saw his father. No matter how tired his father was, he had to play with Aren for two hours before he relaxed. He was so kind and outgoing. He helped everyone. He wanted everything to be fine with everyone,” Nelly said. She smiled as she spoke about Gor because, as she said, Gor was a cheerful person. He loved to make everyone happy. “I don’t know. I can’t believe that he’s gone.”
His wife remembered that, when they first got married, Gor had to go to the military base. “And he was the first one to go,” Nelly said.
Nelly Babayan
