ASIA MINOR… OVER AGAIN
The Register Book:
“They were gone but have returned…
They are more then welcomed, the pleasure is ours”. 
 

Carr says “The historical progress is continual, if we don’t know how present will be reflected to the future; we would never be able to understand how the past is turned into present. Every generation must review the history. The history that is not been reviewed from time to time slowly dies, and stagnant views of the traditional declarations take reign instead of the dramatic ups and downs of the social formation.”

No doubt, reviewing the history needs to be done via written documents. But, if there is no or insufficient documents, history can be written without them. History is made with words and songs. History is made with paintings, engravings, through soil, caves, tiles, olives, wines and seedlings of grape wines. History is also made with research and studies of archaeologists on stones, of geologists on rocks, of chemists on the old metal items. But of course, history is made mostly through memories.

This documentary, is planned to experience a different way of making history, based upon the re-interpretation of memories as mentioned above The general opinion of today about the Mediterranean region is: although it has different nations and races, that it is the bed of of a common cultural atmosphere. Nowadays the world is leaving the cultural differences behind, near future; will especially be the era of more in depth searches for cultural harmony

With this documentary, today in 2007, we are planning to review the World War II time relationship of Greece that was involved in the war and Turkey, which was never officially involved in the war. We plan to evaluate something that was missed in the searches until the present day. In fact, the adventure of Turks and Greeks living together, having a shared life, being neighbors, being closer does not end with the exchange. When the Fascism of Germany took captive of the Greeks in WW II, some of the Greeks, especially from the Greek islands, headed towards Turkey. On the Aegean Sea coasts, in Alaçatı, in Çeşme, in İzmir, in Kuşadası, in Marmaris, a common life was established. When we review the documents, even the title of the register book where the newcomers were logged is “The Book of Returning Immigrants.”

In summary, as Croce said, all history is “contemporary history” because, although the examined facts seem to belong to the past, in fact, history is related with the needs and necessities of the current time in which those past time events are remembered.

RESEARCH METHOD

In this documentary- historical method shall be used.. This method shall be based upon and formed by a) Data from archives, b) History and life stories being told verbally c) Personal documents, d) Visual materials, e) Public documents and search of published literature. Since the project is concerning the near future, the verbal document records will be the main sources. And due to the same reason, official documents both from Greece and Turkey shall be very rich.
 

AIM OF THE PROJECT

The aim of the project is to form a watchable film that is about the relation of two nations that deeply influenced each other and except foreign politic affairs, to see how those influences will shape the two nations socially. Therefore we have aimed transferring stories of people to the next generations, telling and sharing stories, and share our belief and pass this belief to next generations that due to the nature of life, in the stories of people, there can be no permanent enmity continuing forever.

This project being about the near past makes it easier for our country our efforts to record our history. Nowadays the youngest generation that remembers those days is in their late 60’s. So, this project is aiming to protect some witnesses from the hands of the time.