"STOLEN EYES" "Before the Berlin Wall fell, the communist regime undertook a campaign for a forcible change of the names of the Bulgarian citizens of Turkish descent with Christian ones." "More than 300,000 were banished from their motherland." "29 May 1989" "The Head of the Council of State of's Republic of Bulgaria Todor Zhivkov will make an announcement on the Bulgarian National Television and Bulgarian National Radio." "Those who launched the anti-Bulgarian campaign brought forth the issue of emigration as they trumpeted around that Turkey was ready to admit into its territory the Bulgarian" "Muslims who wanted to emigrate." "In this connection, on behalf of the Bulgarian" "Muslims and in the capacity of Head of the Council of State, I address my appeal to the" "Turkish authorities: "Open the border for all Bulgarian Muslims who wish to move to" "Turkey temporarily or wish to settle there permanently."" "Fairwell." "Brother, forgive me." "Ayten!" "Is there anybody in?" "Is there anybody here?" "It's me, Grandpa." "Do you remember me?" "I'm a granddaughter of yours." " Seniha?" " No." " Who, Gulfie?" " No." "Sedef?" "The little girl that you gave your last gold coin to." "For earrings to be made." "Hmm, I remember that it was the last one." "Whose child are you?" "Aiten." "Your son Islyam's daughter." "Your father, the fool, was the first to leave..." "The whole village became deserted..." "What do you want?" "I will stay here." "I don't need you to look after me." "I want to live here." "Fine, stay." "Lots of empty houses." "There's a house for every goat." "Come on!" "You're free." "There is somebody else in the village." "He will be a vampire." "Go away!" "Go away, I'll shoot." "I am not leaving." "Shoot, Aiten!" "A FEW YEARS EARLIER" "Two." " Get out." " I want to join the Special Forces." "Get out!" "Right now!" "Don't you see he's been circumcised?" "We crossed him out last time." "Move your legs apart." "Four." "Excuse me, will it be possible not to send me to the Special Forces?" "Don't move." "L four." "What does it mean you don't want to?" "What?" "When we have a common border with two NATO countries!" "When certain reactionary groups are trying to influence the Bulgarian Turks and make them rise against their own mother country." "These must revive today!" "They must realize that they are Bulgarians!" "Because their self-confidence is low." "You see what is happening their birth rate is high and only twenty years from now, they will be the majority in these areas." "Foreign forces will influence them, they will ask for autonomy..." "And then?" "!" "This is why you have been chosen to start a new type... of Special Forces." "Those who feel that they cannot fit in these forces, move two steps to the front." "Who?" "Recruit Ivan Spasov." "So, you don't want to?" "He is from the division." "We took him to help with the decoration." "Artist?" "No, sir!" "A school for woodcarving and interior design." "What sports do you do?" "Chess!" "He is very good!" "He can play without looking at the chessboard." "Chess." "You'll be checkmate in two moves." "That's right." "Yes." "Table two." "Queen from G8 to G5." "Queen from G8 to G5." "Rook moves from D5 to D6." "Check." "The only move you can make is to E7." "Then I move Rook from D6 to G6 and suggest that we exchange Queen for Rook." "No, I move Queen to D2." "However... you'll be checkmate in three moves." "Ok." "Come show us!" "Check to G7." "You can move to these three squares only." "Beautiful, isn't it?" "Now you and I will play one of the most brilliant of the chess games." "We will issue birth certificates, marriage certificates, new identity cards." "Because some of them were born in a certain place, then lived somewhere else." "Still, we are changing their names here." "They have been sorted out according to district and municipality." "And when I say the village of Leshten, for example, you must find it immediately." "The whole country is here." "So to say." "We entrust you with the responsibility." "In fact, you are the most important of us..." "You are the true reviver." "You've been assigned to the Special Tasks Division called Lightning 327." "Any questions?" "When we change their names." "Restore them!" "Yes!" "When we restore their names, they don't correspond to their religion, right?" "Are you religious?" "No, sir." "Which means that their youths aren't either." "With the older, we will be more insistent." "Anybody bearing a Muslim name, dead or living, three generations back in the line, must be erased." "It is a state secret and the one who does not keep it will go to prison." "They will take care of you;" "you will take care of the seals!" "MARRIAGE CERTIFICATES" "BIRTH CERTIFICATES" "REGISTER" "Come in." "I don't need you to persuade me." "Then, what name would you like?" "What is your old name?" " Mine?" " Yours." "Vildan." "Well, now you will be Valentina." "So I am putting down Valentina." "What is your father's name?" "He is dead." "I'm sorry." "What was he called?" " Rejeb." " Rejeb that would be Racho." "Surname?" "Mustafa." "So you will be Valentina Rachova Taneva." "But." "How's that!" "?" "What?" "Valentina Rachova Taneva." "Where were you born?" "Hambar Dere." "Such village doesn't exist any more." "It does." "It is a natural reserve, granny!" "A reserve!" "They breed deer and boars for those in power." "And my little house is still there." "We will make you a townsperson, just for you to see that we are human beings!" "I don't want that!" "I was born in Hambar Dere." "I was born in 1947, and here it says 1957." "Is it so?" "Are begging us to make them younger and you..." " Do you want me to change it?" " Yes." "I see, it's about your pension." "Ah, I get it." "You don't want to work for ten more years." "You'll wait." "Granny!" "The goats are coming back." "Help with the goats today, child." "Come on." "It's forbidden to speak in foreign languages." "I'm Granny Valia." "Don't you know me?" "Granny Valia, the astronaut." "If you want to have it your way." "Your dinner." "I am not hungry." "We'll leave it here." "You can eat when you are hungry!" "Well, I will eat a little." "I am sorry but I have to take the dirty dishes." "Can I wait for you to finish?" "Sure, sit down." "Sit down." "Feel at ease." "No, no." "Are these seals?" "Yes." "This is the whole of Bulgaria!" "Where are you from?" "Why?" "Tell me." "Hvostyane!" "Row 3, column 2." "Look." "Can I try one more time?" "Oreshar." "Column 14, row 3." "Which column?" " Which village?" " Oreshar." "Column 14, row 3." "Looking at you I remember a film." "Train station." "The main character, a young man, well, he's never." "You know." "And his colleague brought it to the office in the evening." "Then our man came in and saw that his colleague had been stamping her." "Bum." "He had stamped her whole bum." "Just imagine how he felt seeing that." "I mean those seals were of that little station only." "And these here are the seals of the state." "And you." "Have you seen this film!" "?" "Stop!" "Close your eyes." "Don't look!" "Ready!" "The boy and the girl are naked." "It's light in the room." "The boy's lying over the girl." "He gets up to draw the blinds." "The blind falls." "He picks it up." "Covers himself." "She watches him." "He begins to roll it up." "Rolls it up and just as his..." "is about to be seen..." "But you are..." "I'm a kindergarten teacher." "Of Bulgarian and Turkish children!" "Come on, Godfather." "Gather the seals!" "But they'll get mixed in the sack." "I'm responsible for the seals." " Put everything in the sack!" " In the sack they will get mixed..." "Put them in!" "I really am responsible for them!" "Are you a moron?" " Don't worry." " Hug me..." "And if you try to betray me, each of us to our own God!" "Yes, I got it." "Don't worry." " Kiss me!" " Pardon?" "Kiss me." "More truth-like!" "How?" "Give them a sign!" "Why me?" "You give them a sign!" "Why did you give me a true kiss?" "Why, is that bad?" "You ran your fingers over my breasts!" "You aren't married, are you?" "That's none of your business!" "Aren't you too young to be an assailant?" "Give it back to me!" "What do you need the seals for?" "Give me the grenade back!" "What do you need the seals for?" "And you, how come you're going to give birth to me?" "Do you know how it feels to wake up being another person?" "As if you never existed." "Are you out of your mind?" "I hope you don't realize what you're doing." "Don't you fear your God?" "Why do you want a second Cypress?" "Give it back to me!" "I am responsible for it!" "It belongs to the school!" "Take the grenade and go!" "Allah, help me..." "Allah, help me..." " The Christian priest had hidden them." " In the church?" "In his house..." "To hell with him!" "Where were you born?" "Hvostyane." "Ivan, Hvostyane!" "I can't let you get on..." "Please let us get on..." "I can't, I'll be sacked." "It's forbidden to let people wearing Turkish clothes get on..." "Please, please." "It is freezing cold!" "And speaking a foreign language." "Do you want me to show you the written order?" "You can get on!" "C'mon." "Get on!" "Mayor, we're observing the order." "There's no breach, right?" "Fatime." "I've told you not to come here dressed like that..." "Brother, the clothes don't make the person." "They took us our names." "They closed the mosque, forbid the holy days, don't let us get on the bus..." "Look at you!" "What do you want of me?" "It is intolerable any more!" "People everywhere are rising." "It's only us keeping quiet here." "It's a man's job." "I've done my share." "It is everybody's job..." "And you are the teacher." "They all believe in you..." "I'm here because tomorrow it'll be three years since my husband's death." "There's news from Tundjai." "I don't want to know." "I don't care." "Aiten!" "I'm not Aiten any longer." "I'm Ana." "What shall we do then?" "You want him to go to prison?" "I needed him beside me then." "He made his choice." "He fled to save his name." "We, too, made our choice." "We're rising at Bairam." "Bairam?" "..." "Bairam." "Yes." "There's no more Christmas and Easter, neither Ramazan and Bairam..." "There has always been Bairam..." "Take your ram and put it into jars!" "Clear!" "?" "Listen to me, Hristo may not celebrate, but Halil will celebrate..." "He will?" "He will celebrate." "I'm Aiten and Aiten will be!" "Come on, Fatime." "WE WANT OUR NAMES BACK!" "Go home!" "Disperse!" "Move!" "Drive!" "We want our names!" "We want our names!" "Move!" "Drive!" "Move, drive!" "They all are ex-patients!" "They come back because they are equal here!" "For the rest of the world they are the insane." "How are you Ivan?" "Fine." "I'm sure that she's here." "Look!" "Do you think it is her?" "Who else?" "!" "It might have been done by an envious person." "As you can see different art forms are used in the art therapy." "The basis of the therapy is that we use the inherent human strive for creation as a non... medical approach to help our patients." "Ivan's case is a good example." "His diagnosis is reactive psychosis." "The causes I am not going to comment on." "What I am going to tell you..." "Can I, Ivan?" "What?" "What you were." "And what was I?" "Our patient had an excellent visual memory before the incident." "He was a brilliant chess player." "He lost this visual memory after the incident and developed a highly emotional memory..." "Here are his works." "These are eyes." "Thousands of eyes." "If you look more carefully, you will see that they are mostly women's eyes." "It's not accidental." "Here." "Look." "If you look closer at this work, you will notice the image of a woman emerging from the sea of eyes." "Why are you so sad girl?" "You don't want to swim?" "Why?" "16 million years ago, when the whole of the earth's surface was a vast sea, a tadpole plopped in the water." "Flood is on its way, girl." "It'll engulf the whole universe." "Julie!" "Who are you?" "Ofelia..." "Building 7..." "Room 3..." "Bed 2, near the window!" "So you are... at the festival." "I'm not crazy!" "I live in the dormitories..." "But you are an artist?" "!" "A modernist?" "No!" "An impressionist?" "No!" "A socialist realist!" "Why have you..." "done your hair that way?" "Are you a Muslim?" "Ofelia." "Ofelia is my stage pseudonym!" "In fact, my name is Pezka." "And why are you asking whether I am Muslim?" "Because I am looking for someone." "Doesn't matter." "Could you tell me..." "Is the water clean?" "Why are you splashing the water?" "!" "I know these eyes from somewhere!" "These aren't your eyes!" "Thief!" "To hell with you!" "Her name is Ana..." "Hey, Ana, Ana!" "Come in, sit down." "I want you to tell me everything." "You will see that you will be relieved..." "I can't." "Fine, let's try something else." "I will be asking you questions and you will just reply with a yes or a no." "Doctor, I don't want to be treated..." "I don't want to." "Fine, I'm not going to ask you anything else..." "I know that you don't take your medicines." "And you don't need to!" "But you must stay here for some more time!" "The insane here are fewer at least." "I just want you to know that I don't approve of what was done to your people..." "No one approves of it." "But you kept silent and just watched." "What is it, Ivan?" "What do you want to know?" "Reactive psychosis, reactive psychosis, what is it?" "It's a psychic disorder caused by a negative experience." " Like mine?" " Like yours?" "It's her." "I recognized her eyes." "Why is she in Building 3?" "Ivan, there are things that we call medical secrecy." "It isn't written here whether she had a child." "We write what we know." "Ana." "Ana." "She is a Turk, isn't she?" "Ivan, there aren't Turks in Bulgaria any more." "Help, help, she's beating me!" "I scared it..." "Puppy." "Thief!" "Inhale!" "Exhale!" "Concentrate now!" "Right." "Under the water." "Exhale above the water." "If you exhale under the water, your chances of drowning are high." "Dangerous, aren't they?" "We'll be sailing across oceans, And here you had a creek stop you!" "Ana!" "You are the boy who was responsible for the state seals." "Seals." "What seals?" "Military secret!" "Poor he." "You had fainted." "And you were holding the seal in your hand." "This was the seal bearing the name of my village, Hvostyane." "I then realized that you didn't want to be my Godfather." "You had wanted to save me from the humiliation." "Why are you here?" "Looking for..." "Who?" "Looking for someone." "For me?" "So you aren't insane?" "Look, I must tell you something!" "Why didn't you betray me then?" "Ana, I have to tell you something..." "I am not Ana!" "This is for when you ran your fingers over my breasts!" "You're copying me!" "You filthy, mean..." "You're copying!" "It's the same." "How do you know?" "I was there." "I drove the machine, I ran over the child..." "Dolls!" "Disperse!" "Don't do this, Lieutenant!" "We want our names." "We don't want anything else." "Move back!" "Back!" "Drive on!" "Move back!" "Move back!" "Drive ahead!" "We want our names" "How long has he been like that?" "They brought him like that." "He is still in shock." "A child was killed." "He isn't guilty in any way..." "They came out with their children, as if they were going to a wedding." "Ivan?" "Ivan, do you hear me?" "He doesn't hear you, Lieutenant." "He isn't here." "But he'll be ok." "And will he remember what's happened?" "I don't know." "We'll send him to hospital." "The case shall remain confidential." "No information, no documentation, nothing..." "There haven't been any victims." "And it would be best if he didn't remember anything..." "Is that clear?" "I've been looking for you since then." "Blood for blood..." "Have you heard this?" "I sacrificed my daughter..." "It's not true, you are lying!" "You are not a fanatic!" "You're lying!" "We brought the child." "You have to bury her with a civil ritual." "In the common cemetery." "This is all." "Mayor, we have our own cemetery." "Our ancestors are there." "Who is it?" "I am Krassi Cholakov's boy." "From Bukovo." "Dad sent me to tell you to protect the dead in the cemetery." "What?" "Who did you talk to?" "What is this noise?" "Where are the graves?" "Where is my child?" "My girl." "Where is my girl?" "Fatime!" "Allah, help us!" "Allah, You are almighty," "Help us!" "My God!" "Where are you going?" "Come on." "Tell me where you are going." "Tell me only this." "Who is he?" "A mad man." "Young man, leave us, we've got a long way ahead." "Just tell me where you are going." "We are going to our village, we've got work to do, the tobacco fields are waiting..." "I will come with you..." "Let me come..." "Fine..." "Go take your luggage." "We'll wait for you." "What is it?" "Nothing." "Our people built a shrine..." "What shrine?" "In memory of Fatime..." "Today's the opening." "We'll put a memorial plaque later." "I will not go." "No?" "I don't know where my child's grave is." "And you, a shrine!" "I don't want shrines." "People will be choking drinking and eating there." "I don't want people roasting lambs and dancing there." "I don't want some to destroy it, others to rebuild it..." "Will this end some day?" "There." "The church." "They... they were coming." "It was here." "Right here." "They were coming from there." "I had pulled up." "It was here." "Not there, it was here." "The women and the children were coming from there." "They told me to drive ahead." "The Lieutenant told me to drive straight ahead and I did." "Here, not there." "It was here, you must..." "Right here, not there." "I told you he was insane!" "It's him." "Stop!" "I stumbled towards the fire." "She didn't sacrifice her child." "I ran over the child." "Are you going to tell me where I tripped and fell?" "!" "I drove." "I drove." "Is it you the one to tell me who's guilty?" " I drove." " Come on." "I drove." "29 May 1989" "The time for playing games is over." "Turkey should open her borders for the world in accordance with the international regulations ...and agreements as People's Republic of" " A lie!" "A filthy lie!" "Bulgaria has already done so." "They are driving us out of the country, Halil..." "They don't want us!" "Keep an eye on my house!" "Water my garden!" "I will." "Here you are." "You must eat it yourself..." "What is your name?" "The official?" "Not the official..." "Verhat." "Verhat?" "Do you have children?" "Aiten, I arranged for us to pass the border tonight..." "The column is three kilometers long, we'll be waiting for a week." "A car of German registration will give us a ride." "Good day." "Can I have a coffee?" "A coffee!" "Come on, get out!" "I will not leave until you tell me where Ana is." "I know why you don't want to speak Bulgarian, I know why you don't want to make but tell me where Ana is." "Young man, you seem out of your mind." "Yes." "I'm coming from the madhouse." "Say so." "Allah doesn't bestow everybody with such honour." "Which Ana are you talking about?" "The one whose girl died..." "She isn't Ana, her name is Aiten..." "Aiten!" "?" "They left with her brother." "I don't know where they are." "Their grandfather lives in the deserted village." "He might know." "Wait, sit down." "I'll make you a coffee." "Aiten." "Go away, I will shoot." "I will not leave." "Shoot, Aiten!" "You didn't want to kill me, did you?" "I don't know." "Aiten." "What does it mean?" "Moon-like." "Moon-like." "Nice name." "These shots are for hares, not for people." "If you want him dead, you need shots for boars." "I think I have some." "We'll take him to Salih's house." "Are you leaving?" "All the best!" "I'm not leaving." "Don't." "We are meant to be together, don't you understand?" "This time I will kill you!" "I mean it!" "What do you think?" "That I'll be able to go to bed with you?" "!" "Go away!" "I will not go!" "I love you!" "Dirty Bulgarian!" "Battle time has come!" "Our hearts are thumping fast!" "Here our enemies come!" "I love you!" "Grandpa Ibrahim, you must circumcise me." "I want to..." "Well, well..." "And what will your name be after that?" "Ivan." "Not possible." "True faith is needed." "I have faith." "I am..." "I must..." "I love her." "I don't know about that." "Well, since you say so." "But after that..." "You can't stitch it back, you know, right?" "What is it with me?" "!" "I've slaughtered so many sheep and goats..." "To boost our courage." "Here!" "Grandpa, no, you can't!" "You can't!" "He asked himself." "Pull up your pants!" "Come on, before me!" "Before me!" "Grandpa." "Halil." "Aiten." "Two, three." "Seven." "To bring us good luck." "If you make me a baby, I'll kill you." "But we..." "Yes." "But I will kill you!" "Hey..." "What is it?" "WE DEDICATE THE FILM TO OUR" "CHILDREN WHO WILL LIVE IN THESE" "LANDS."