first two days in london

Day 0:  arrived at my cousin Sue's house in London at almost midnight.  Her  16 year old son Stepan was already asleep, as he had school the next day.  My other cousin, Maral, who is Sue's sister Ginny's daughter, was there at the house, but she was going to leave the next morning to return to Paris.  Day 1: slept until around 3:30 PM (due to jetlag), and nothing blogworthy happened.

Day 2 was when things became kind of exciting.

I went downtown with Sue and Stepan.  Stepan and I went to the London Dungeon, which is a sort of a combination between a haunted house and a history museum.  Basically, there are people in costumes telling you about the creepiest, bloodiest, and grossest things that happened in the history of London, but they would also try to scare you as well.  One of the actresses was teaching us about how she tortures people, and showing us the tools she uses for that.  Featured in this tour were the plague, some stuff about the 1666 London Fire, Bloody Mary, and of course, Jack the Ripper.  While being full of things that startle people, it was also very interesting from a historical perspective as well.  Props to Kiana for having suggested that I go there.

That evening, Sue and I went to a viewing of a short film.  I forget the name of the film, but it was about an Armenian oud player named Armenak who goes to Istanbul to search for a lost piece of his family history.  Initially he hates the city, for what it reminds him of in his family history (for what happened there to his grandfather in the genocide).  In the city, he finds the house which used to be his grandfather's oud shop, (his grandfather was a master oud-maker), and becomes friends with the Turkish woman and her daughter who live there.
After the film, we had a discussion panel about the film, and what it represents.  The audience consisted of both Armenians and Turks alike.  The director, and the lead actor were both there.  Sue was leading the discussion panel.  Many topics were brought up about relations between the Turkish and Armenian people.  The film, which was made by a mix of Armenian and Turkish people, required the crew, including the director himself, to come to terms with both sides of the issue at hand.  I learned some very interesting things from this.  First, all of the most respected Turkish scholars agree that the Genocide did take place.
Secondly, there was a lot I didn't know about the late Hrant Dink, an Armenian journalist who was a citizen of Turkey, who was an advocate of reconciliation of the Armenian and Turkish people, and was assassinated in 2007 by a nationalist.   What I didn't know was that while he advocated Turkish recognition of the genocide, he opposed the movements of the diaspora trying to make other countries such as the US and France recognizing the genocide.  His views on the foreign recognition of the genocide alienated him from other Armenians.  His reasoning resounds what Tip O'Neill said about how "All politics is local"*.  It's Turkey's responsibility to recognize what they had done.  Not America's.  Not the UK's.  Not France's**.  No, it is Turkey's responsibility.

*What Tip O'Neill meant to say was "All politics is loco".  just kidding
**Rant about the recent French legislation pending since it is 3:34 AM here and i need some sleep.  Tomorrow I'll probably post the rant about the french legislation as a comment to this entry.  

the blogging resumes/return to Armenia

When I returned from Armenia, I claimed that that would be my last blog entry.  However, I have decided to go back to Armenia again this spring semester.  I am currently in the Dulles Airport in DC, 1 hour exactly from departure, on my way to London, where I will be visiting my relatives for a week on the way to Armenia.  This time in Armenia, I will be there for a little over 3 months, (adding  the time in London on the way there, and the time in Paris on the way back, and a conference in NYC immediately after returning to the states, it totals to being gone for 4 months).  I am going to try to figure out a way to change the title of the blog to something more general than "Hayastan: summer 2011" to something more general like "my journeys across the world," except less cliché, while keeping the same URL on blogspot that I currently have.  I will post more at a later point in time.

What has happened since my last journey?
1)  I have applied to the college of William and Mary, and will find out first week of February if i get in.
2)  I continued my work at Jefferson Lab.
3)  I found out that my masters thesis requires more revisions than could be done prior to leaving for this trip, and therefore I will have to work on revisions while in Armenia, and then defend it when I get back.
4)  I became very good friends with a very nice young lady named Kiana, whom my aunt had introduced me to (or, to borrow the colloquialism, "hooked me up with".  lol.)
5)  I went to New York City on a mission trip last weekend to hand out food and clothes for the homeless.
6) J'ai appris un peu du français avec une livre que j'ai acheté de mon vasin à une vente de garage pour deux dollars.

#6 was a very good investment, and it will come in handy when I am à Paris.  Noctis Wolf, whom I haven't met in person in a little over a year, claims there is a conspiracy behind #6.  I will make mention on this blog as well as on facebook as soon as get into W&M.

And I am posting this right before I get on the plane.  

my last post

Right now, as I post this blog entry, I am already back in Vienna VA (not Austria). I have sort of procrastinated on posting it. I will post the remaining pictures on facebook sometime within the next week (if I am not continuing to procrastinate).

I'm just going to continue from where I left off:

On Wednesday night, for our havak, we went to the Vanatur restaurant, and were encouraged to invite our host families with us. My host parents came with my, but not the kids. Others invited their host brothers or sisters or parents to come with them. This dinner was a sort of fairwell party for the volunteers in Gyumri, since all of us except for Allegra were leaving to go back home in the next week or so.

Thursday night

One of our volunteers, James, invited the rest of us to come over to his house that evening for some coffee and tea. However, I told him I'd be a little bit late, because Allegra, one of the other volunteers, had asked if she can come over to my apartment and take pictures of me with my host family in my apartment. (this was part of her volunteer work, to take pictures of the other volunteers with their host families, and tonight was my turn for this). What ended up happening was that my family insisted on having her stay with us for dinner (which was not cooked yet), and then doing the photography. (I'm probably going to be tagged in a lot of pics on facebook soon). So, then we arrived late to the party at James' place. I played the duduk there, and James's host father asked me to play not only for them but also fo his relatives in moskow, who were on skype with him

Friday:

after my duduk lesson, Gagik took me to the museum, where we saw some artwork by various artists. Paintings of Gyumri, and of several monasteries and stuff.

Saturday:

We had an excursion, first, we did a train-ride, then we did bird watching and then we went to Khor Virap, (this was my third time in Khor Virap) and then we went to a village and talked to the locals there, and then we visited a tomato farm. One of the volunteers, Mona, had invited her Swedish coworkers to come with her on the excursion. Unfortunately, our normal tour-guide, Suren, wasn't with us this time, and so instead, I helped explain the story behind Khor Virap (which I had been to twice before this) to the others on the tour.

Monday, Tuesday.

after a debriefing in Gyumri on Monday, I took a taxi to Yerevan, and met up with my friend Rafayel there. I stayed at his house Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights. Tuesday morning I had another debrief in Yerevan.  I will not be surprised if I will have been the last Birthright volunteer to have been placed at GITC for the volunteer position.  After their problems with not assigning me work to do for 3 consecutive weeks, it is unlikely that any future birthright participants will be placed at GITC.  

Wednesday, September 21 = Independence Day

today marked the 20^th anniversary of the independence of the republic of Armenia. There was a parade on the street in the morning, which we watched from the balcony and from the roof of the Birthright office. There were military personelle marching in the streets and riding in various types of tanks, trucks, etc. In the sky, helicopters flew in formation, and there were planes releasing sky-writing clouds of red, blue and orange, (the colors of the Armenian flag).

After the parade was over, I met up with Rafayel again, and walked around the town for a while. One of the places we saw was the Komitas Conservatory, which is dedicated to the music of Komitas, a very famous Armenian ethnomusicologist/composer/priest who in the early 20^th century went through many villages in Armenia, studied the folk music therein, and wrote these songs onto paper. Much of our folk music in Armenia would not have been preserved after the genocide had it not been for Komitas. Several of the songs that Gagik had assigned me to learn on the duduk are Komitas's compositions. Another stop in Yerevan was the vernissage, where I bought some gifts for my family.

Since I had not eaten any pomegranates yet in Armenia, and they don't grow in Virginia (since they were not in season during the summer) I asked Rafayel where I could buy some. We went from market to market looking for them. Finally we found one market where they had them, in packages of 2 for 1500 dram (about $4.50). I decided to save them for the homeward journey the next day.

Later that night the streets were very crowded. People were cheering “Hayastan! Hayastan!” (the armenian name for Armenia is “Hayastan”), and others were carrying Armenian flags. I didnt stay for the concert in the republic square, since it was too crowded and I was getting tired already. I took a taxi back to Rafayel's apartment. From there, I could see that the radio tower in the distance (which is normally changing colors every few seconds) was a steady red at the top, blue in the middle, and orange at the bottom, (the colors of the Armenian flag, to celebrate the occasion. Also, we saw some fireworks out in the distance as well.

Thursday:

I only got three hours of sleep that night, before I went back to the states. I ate one of the pomegranates in the Yerevan airport for breakfast. Since I didn't want any complications with the US customs office, I decided to eat the other one at the Moskow airport for lunch. During the flight, they showed a world map, showing where there is daylight and where it is night. Because it was so close to the equinox, the separation between night and day was almost a straight line. (the 23^rd of september is the equinox, and I was flying on the 22^nd).

Etchmiatsin, etc.

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Thursday Afternoon:

After my duduk lesson (which was moved from friday to thursday this week, since Gagik was out of town on Friday), I went to the arts and crafts festival in the hraparak (town square). There were performances of the youth playing musical instruments and dancing, and people were showing off different types of arts and crafts in booths.

Saturday:

For our excursion, we rode bicyles (provided by Birthright) from Yerevan to the holy city of Etchmiatsin. Our first stop in Etchmiatsin was St. Hripsime's church. A bit of history about this church's name sake:

Hripsime was a beautiful virgin from Rome, but she fled from Rome to Armenia because she had refused the Roman Emperor Diocletian's marriage proposal. She refused because he was a pagan, and she had devoted her life to God. In Armenia, she faced a similar problem: King Drtad also wanted her to be his wife. (this is the same Drtad who had imprisoned Gregory in the pit at Khor Virap. Gregory was still in the pit at this time) Hripsime refused to marry Drtad for the same reason. So, the king asked Kayane, the leader of the group of nuns that Hripsime belonged to, to convince Hripsime to marry him. Kayane refused to convince Hripsime to marry the king, and instead encouraged her to resist him. Therefore, Drtad tortured both of them to death, along with their companions. First, he had their tounges cut off and eyes gouged out, and then had them stone to death. That is, heavy stones were placed on top of them until they died.

The church that bears Hripsime's name is built on the spot where it was believed that Hripsime had died. There are stairs leading down to the spot directly below the altar, where Hripsime's tombstone is located. On the right hand side of the main sanctuary is a very curious painting. It shows in the foreground, a young woman, Hripsime, standing on top of a king, Drtad, and she's holding a full-sized cross. There is an angel holding a crown over her head. Behind her in the background, are on the left, and image of a woman being stoned to death, and on the right, a soldier who is about to cut a woman's tongue off with a sword.

Here's my interpretation of this painting: The crown above her head given by the angel appears to be even more glorious than the crown upon Drtad's head. This represents that the crown of life given to those who are faithful even to the point of death (Revelation 2:10). While Hripsime would have received a queen's crown had she married Drtad, what she had received for her faith was the crown of life from God, which is much more glorious and lasts forever. The images of her being tortured in the background are behind the image of her victorious of Drtad, because those things happened in the past. She is victorious over Drtad in the image, because historically, she was victorious over him, not in a physical manner (as is shown) but in a spiritual manner. He failed to convert her to paganism, and after she had died, her death haunted him to the point of insanity, which could only be cured once Gregory was set free from Khor Virap and converted him to Christianity.

Our second stop was the main church/seminary complex of Etchmiatsin. There is a large cathedral there, with many paintings therein. It was said that after Gregory had converted King Drtad, Gregory had a vision in which Christ had told him where to build this church, as well as where to build the other chapels to honor Kayane and Hripsime. We had only a short time to visit it though, because Vahan, one of the BR coordinators, told us to come out so that we could meet the Catholicos, who is the equivalent of the pope to the Armenian church. What is interesting is that he was dressed all in black robes, indistinguishable from any common derhayr (Armenian priest). I would not have known he was the Catholicos if nobody had told me. None of us had expected to actually meet him. He had only one remark to say to us: “If you were to meet the president, or the leader of the parliament, would you be wearing those clothes you are wearing?” (most of us were wearing shorts and comfortable outfits, since we had just biked there from Yerevan).

Afterwards, we visited St. Kayane's Church, named after the leader of the aforementioned group of nuns. We had to leave early, because there was a wedding about to take place there. In some of these famous churches, there are multiple weddings per day at the same church. This was definitely the case the day we were there, because we saw one bride, and then not too long thereafter, another one.

On the way back, the tire on my bike went flat, (I was not the only one this happened to), and so I signaled the people running the bike tour. Rather than fixing it or replacing it with another bike (which is what I wanted them to do), they put the bike in the back of their truck and told me to get into the van (which was moving next to the bikers). I assumed this was because they didnt have any bikes in the truck that they could switch out my bike with. I later found out that there were indeed bikes that were good in there. So, after a riding in the van for a little while, at one of the stops, I got out of the van and asked if they could give me a different bike so I wouldn't have to sit in the van. And so they gave me another bike to ride for the remainder of the trip.

Sunday:

At GITC, I was been assigned the task of “teaching assistant”. However, the only class that I could be of any help is the Java class, which is taught only on sundays. All the other classes are on things I don't know anything about. So, after church, I went to GITC to help out. I was actually able to help the other students. Mainly with very simple problems such as syntactical errors in Hello World programs, and with errors caused by being in the wrong directory and therefore the JVM cannot find the right file. This is their first time ever coding anything in Java, so this was very easy to help out with it.   

Monday:

we had a special forum in the kitchen behind the birthright office.  learning how lavash is made.  Lavash is sort of like a tortilla, except flatter, Armenian and not Mexican, larger area, and made of like wheat or something instead of corn.  Anyways, they roll out the dough, throw it onto this like rounded thing to make it even flatter, stick it onto the wall of a cylindrical oven, and then do the same for the next piece of lavash, and when a piece of lavash has been in there long enough, they take it out.  They do this really fast, pipelining the entire process.  

Odzun, Kobayr, etc.

Since last post:

Wednesday:
(after posting my previous entry) We had a forum about the architecture in Gyumri.  We have a forum every wednesday, but I haven't mentioned the previous ones in this blog because they weren't very noteworthy.  Week 1:  human rights issues.  basically, the point is that laws protecting human rights aren't very well enforced here in Armenia.  Week 2:  crazy long-winded soviet-nostalgic feminist lady tells about how much better it was back in Soviet times, and only rarely stops talking in Armenian to allow Shoghik to translate for her.  Now, for week 3, we learn about something much more exciting: Architecture.  This time, we didn't need any translator, since the woman who was lecturing us is an American and speaks perfect English.  She showed us pictures of architecture and gave us physics-based reasons for why people built things the way they did.  Also, she talked about how poorly built the soviet buildings were (most of which fell down in the '88 earthquake).  She explained why it's actually a good thing that the ugly bank in the central square exists; because it makes people aware of how much better the other buildings are.

Saturday:
Excursion.  First we visited the Odzun monastery, which is located inside of a village.  I had already been there, with LCO.  Then afterwards, we went down to our second location called Kobayr.  In this location, we climbed down a cliff into a valley to reach the ruins of a small monastery, which was built into the side of the cliff.  The monks who worked there lived in cave-houses.  Actually, from an architectural standpoint, this is a very useful trick for what my professor, Dr. Siochi, would refer to as appropriate laziness.  Why build 4 walls, when you only have to make one wall around the opening of the cave, and then install a door?  Then, we climbed down even further into the river valley.  At the bottom of the valley is Deveri Get, the "river of the dragons" (this river is so called because the river is shaped like a dragon.

Sunday:
This time, I made sure to bring my liturgy book to the church service.  Last week, i didn't go to the service because I was with my host family in their parents village, and the previous week, I was in Yerevan.  So, halfway through the service I was able to find where in the liturgy book we were at, and after the service, I went with a few of my BR friends to visit a museum, and then to another monastery.
At the main exhibit of the museum were maps of historic Gyumri, as well as everyday items traditionally found in households in Gyumri.  In another exhibit were sculptures of heads of deceased people.  Some person whose name I do not remember carved sculptures of heads of people after they die, and this exhibit shows these sculptures.  The eyes are closed, and they appear to have a solemn dead expression on their faces.

Monday and Tuesday:
I'm still awaiting being transferred by Birthright to another volunteer position, other than GITC.  I had talked to Shoghik on Thursday about my problem with there being no work for me to do there, and she said she would try to transfer me elsewhere if they cannot find any work for me to do there.

Since last post:

Friday August 26th:
I met up with Gagik again, and he sold me the new duduk.  It sounds much better than the old duduk.  I noticed that Gagik is attempting to learn English, and has asked me how to say English words like, "hear", "breath", "read", "repeat", "play", etc.  He decided to take a sticky note and write down all of the words in english he's trying to learn on there:  the Armenian word, followed by the English word transliterated with Armenian letters.  The sticky note looks like this:
լսել           հիր
շունճ        բրիտ
կարտալ   րիդ
նորից անգամ    րիպիտ
նվագել    պլեյ
տուն        հոմ
դու           յու
հանգիստ    րելաքս
հոգնած       թայրդ
etc.


I might need to start charging him for English lessons one of these days.  Maybe 5000 dram an hour.  that would be about half the amount he charges me for duduk lessons.  Also, he taught me how to do the vibrato  (vibratsia in Armenian)

Saturday August 27:
Birthright Excursion at Lake Sevan!  We left Gyumri on the bus at 6:30, while it was still dark, to go there.  In the later part of the morning, we went birdwatching.  We saw several types of birds through the binoculars.  Unfortunately, no storks today, but I did see some a few weeks ago and got a picture of two of them.  Then, we went to one of the shores and picked up trash, for a community service project.  Afterwards, we went on a boat cruise, in a wooden boat designed to look like the ancient boats from the Kilikian kingdom era, but with a modern engine and stuff inside.  It was cold and windy, but it was fun though.  Then, we went to the peninsula (which I had visited previously with LCO) where there are two churches on top of there.  Since this was my second time there, I decided to have a look around to see if there was anything I didnt see the first time I was there.  Behind the churches was a trail, leading to a summit near the end of the peninsula.  At the summit is an abandoned building.  I climbed onto its partially-destroyed roof, and surrounding on all sides (except for a thin isthumus) I could see water.  It was a breathtaking view, which I did not get to experience the first time I had visited the peninsula.  Afterwards, we went back to Gyumri, and by that time it was already dark again.  So we left in the dark and returned in the dark.

Sunday August 28:
Since it was a free day for me, I went with my host family to the village where my host father, Tigran, is from, and visited at his dad's place.  Tigran's father owns a grocery store, which is connected to his house.  There, we had khorovats (Armenian barbeque).  In the backyard, the two boys (Hayk and Gevork) and I played games such as hide and seek, and also stick fights.  I had to go easy on the kids, because ...they're kids.  They had a lot of fun.  Afterwards, we went back to Gyumri

Monday August 29:
Not much really happened.  Another duduk lesson with Gagik, improved on what I had learned the previous lesson.  At the end of the day, I asked Amalya, my supervisor at GITC to tell me what my next assignment is.  She said talk to Arevik, the receptionist, but unfortunately Arevik had already left for the day.

Tuesday August 30:
I met up with my cousin Vahan, who had decided to come up to Gyumri with his friends for the day, for lunch.  It was fun.  We explained to his friends the story about how we had met in Yerevan 6 weeks ago and that I had not recognized him (scroll back through previous blog entries to read the full story).  After lunch, I showed him and his friends my workplace, and introduced them to some of the staff there.   After he had left, I asked Arevik what I'm supposed to do.  She said talk to Aram, one of my coworkers.

Wednesday August 31:
First thing in the morning I met up with Aram.  He said to hold off until tomorrow.  On another note (no pun intended), during the duduk lesson while attempting to sight-read a traditional song Dle Yaman, I accidentally played it fast and jubilantly, ignoring the tempo marking "andante cantible".  Gagik's response was something in Armenian, about how it's a sad song about the 1915 Genocide, not a happy song.  Playing Dle Yaman like it's a happy song is kind of borderline offensive.  Oops...  He then showed me the correct way to play it, andante cantabile, like it say on the music.  He also assigned me a few other songs to practice.  I'll have to make sure to read the tempo marking next time I sightread music.  

The Duduk Master

Yesterday (tuesday), I met with Gagik Malkhasyan, a professional duduk player, who also teaches people how to play the duduk.  The first thing that Gagik told me when he saw my duduk that I bought from the vernissage was "vat e" (it's of low quality), both the duduk and the reed are of low quality.  A good reed makes it much easier to blow into it, and with a good duduk, it doesnt take special effort to play in tune.  So, he ordered a new duduk for me from Yerevan, which will be here on Friday, and he arranged for lessons for today and for Friday.  He said it would take me only one or two months training with him to reach professional level.  Also, it costs 10000 dram, (about 30$) for each 1 hour lesson, and we would begin the next day.  Throughout the entire conversation, my friend Shoghik from BR was translating between me and Gagik.  I asked her if she would come and translate for him again for the next day's lesson, but she said she wouldnt make it.

Today I met up with Gagik again, this time to start lessons.  It turns out he does know a little bit more English than I had thought he did, more cognitive than conjugative though.  And with the amount of Armenian that I know, i was able to understand most of what he said without a translator with me.  He showed me his own duduk (made of real dziran wood, and not cheap wood from idk what type of tree), and showed me the difference between his and mine.  The dziran wood is black (rather than brown) and more dense than the other wood (this he demonstrated by having me hold my duduk in one hand and his duduk in the other hand and feel the difference in weight).  Also, a good reed makes it  actually sound like a real duduk, and not like a cheap saxophone.

He told me to bring 10k dram next time for the lesson, 20k dram for the new duduk, and 5k dram for the new reed.  35k dram (about a hundred dollars USA).  Gosh, this is expensive.  But fortunately, everything else is inexpensive here (100 dram (~ 30 cents) for a bus to anywhere, and for food, lunch rarely costs more than 1000 dram (about 3 dollars)).

As for the duduk I currently have, I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it.  I'm probably going to give it to a friend as a souvenir, but I'm not sure yet who to give it to.  Souvenir duduk?  anyone?