The Ottoman state was responsible for many genocides against the people and beliefs of the region.  Armenians, Syriacs, Yazidis have been some of the victims.

Many families survived the Armenian genocide, which was carried out by the Ottoman Empire in 1915, and settled in Rojava.

One of these families is the Buxisiyam family who migrated from Xerzan in the region of Batman in North Kurdistan to Qamishlo in Rojava, West Kurdistan.

Apriham Buxisiyam was born in 1966 in Qamishlo, after his family settled there, and learned details of the Armenian genocide from the stories and memories told by his parents.

His duty is to pass on these stories to future generations.

Two of Apriham's aunts were brutally murdered in the Ottoman genocide. Apriham said: “Both aunts were slaughtered in Xerzan. They were 13 and 15 years old”.

The Buxisiyam family, which kept defending their beliefs despite the oppressive and racist attacks carried out by the Ottoman empire, opened the first church in 1918 in the village of Mêharka, in Qamishlo.

In order to help his family to get along, Apriham started working as a car mechanic when he was 12. 

At the same time, he was learning old and traditional songs by listening to Kurdish and Armenian dengbejs (storytellers).

Ten years later, Apriham, who opened a car repair shop in the neighborhood of Kornish, also carries out cultural activities with the dengbej works in his shop.

Apriham's father left a gramophone for his son, and Apriham filled up about 100 cassettes on this gramophone.

Preserving the cassettes in his shop as an archive, Apriham carried out his works in Kurdish and Armenian.

He said that he shows his feelings with his work. "The anguishes that the Armenians have suffered for centuries are hidden in the dengbej laments. When I sing my work, I share the anguish of the Armenians. History is preserved in the dengbej songs”.

Apriham, who uses the shop both as a place to repair cars and sing melodies, says he will leave neither his work nor the dengbej art.

Apriham said that the Ottoman empire tried the Turkification of Armenian people and carried out massacres. But, the dengbej said, in Rojava Armenian people has found a new life based on co-existence.