Lazos (Eng. Laz) or Pontios (Eng. Pontian)? Scholarship on this question asserts a clear distinction between the two identity labels and, thereby, the groups that they describe. A second-generation descendant of migrants from Giresun, all of whose siblings were born in New York City, offered the following recollection of the difference between Pontians and Laz. “I heard [the term Lazos] years ago. Very often, there were even some of the Pontians here [who] referred to themselves as Lazoi. I heard my brothers using that term too, ‘Eimaste Lazoi.” (Eng. We are Laz). They would say that! I’m going back now [to the] 1930s – 40s and even beyond .. into the 1950s. My mother may have used that term back then but very seldom. And then we found out, Lazoi is something entirely different. It’s easy to make the association by using that expression, ‘Ellas zei!’ It has nothing to do with Ellas. [The term Laz] wasn’t derogatory…sometimes mainland Greeks would use that in a derogatory fashion. It seemed to me [that the term Pontios started to be used] more or less maybe in the last 50 years or 60 years at the most. By that time, most of us had learned that we had no connection [to the Laz]. We shouldn’t be using that term. We learned this gradually through books, literature, and people who had studied us in the past..like Dr. Hionides… [and] Harry Psomiades.” Pictured is the descendant’s mother.