No matter how tall the mountain of material things/carnality/selfishness is, the path of culture and literature spans them. The security provided by material wealth to the perceptive world is bound to cultural and literary wealth.

For as long as I can remember, I have appreciated people with high cultural awareness. Time spent with them is a great benefit. It renews and strengthens. Cultured, lettered people are just as important as books for self-knowledge and self-development.

Rabi Fehmi Bargello is a person who loves his home country and is consummate with Syriac culture, currently living in Sweden. He put his fleeting memories down in Swedish writing in novel form so that they might not be lost to the racket of passing time. This novel was translated into Turkish. I think he did a good job. Kudos and many thanks.

I found the opportunity to visit him in his home in Midyat. It was a pleasant time. He had a nice surprise for me. It was his novel titled GABRO (A Syriac in the Turkish Army), newly published by Belge Yayınları. I was overjoyed by this gift. I have not read this novel yet, a military memoir depicting the contradictions between people, cultures, and classes. But I believe it should be read by all those who attach importance to the mosaic of common life and value human dignity.

Our prized writer Fehmi Bargello takes care to entertain his readers with the memoirs of his main character "Gevriye".

As he says, every book that has not been read is new. Every new book one reads is an occasion to shed one's old skin. When we neglect our spirit, our mind bothers us. It exhausts and fatigues us. When the spirit is active, the mind settles down and becomes productive. This brings peace of mind.

"The ink of the pen is the fountain of immortality."

We are thankful to the Fehmi Bargello for allowing us to drink from the fountain of his productive pen...

Malfono Yusuf Beğtaş

President of the Syriac Association of Language, Culture and Literature