The bed at the hotel is one of the best I have ever slept in.
It is strange, but I have not had any dreams yet in Armenia. Your brain never gets a rest here to have a dream.
Yesterday I called the people I wanted to meet to let them know. My list is very short. Only the most essential ones.
The first one is in the lobby of the hotel waiting for me. He is RK. And no, in case you were wondering, he is not Robert Kotcharian (the president of the republic).
RK used to be a prominent member of the former Spyourkahayoutyan Hed Mshagoutayin Gabi Gomideh, the Committee for Cultural Relations with the Armenian Diaspora. A quasi-ministerial authority that managed the relationship between Soviet Armenia and the vastly dispersed communities of the Armenian Diaspora around the world. Armenia did not have its own Ministry of Foreign Affairs then, so this body essentially played that role. The Gabi Gomideh, as it was affectionately called, managed dossiers as diverse as issues of Armenian Diasporan students studying in Armenia, cultural exchange programs of visiting artists from Armenia to the Diaspora, publications of works of Diasporan authors in Armenia, including the publication of some textbooks that were destined for Diasporan Armenian schools. Even reimmigration to Armenia was handled initially by this institution.
Now, more than ever, Armenia needs a Gabi Gomideh. It has not had one since independence.
The Gabi Gomideh was also a channel that the KGB used to learn about and influence Diasporan Armenian politics. So much for idealism. So much for the road to hell always being paved with honorable intentions. This would be the opposite. The road to heaven being paved with brimstone.
Over the years, many went through and rose through its ranks. Soviet apparatchiks, KGB agents, Soviet Armenian intellectuals, and rarely, true and honest patriots who genuinely wanted to make a difference both for Armenia proper and the Diaspora, who used the Gabi Gomideh to that end. They believed that the system was what it was, and the only way to achieve an objective was to use the system and its official as well as unofficial channels. They were pragmatists who had an honest objective.
How do I know about this last group? I had met many of them as a child in my home in Beirut. I had heard them speak with great frankness about the issues and matters that concerned them about Soviet Armenia. I had shared meals with them as an adolescent, and spoken with them about things in Armenia that excited and worried me. They had spoken frankly and in private with my parents, being brutally honest about the failures of an ideology that is now part of the history of this place. They had also spoken with sincere pride about the achievements of Soviet Armenia.
Most of them were my parents' friends. Their Memento Vivi.
Some of them are still around. RK was one of them. I had last met him a few years ago in Montreal accompanying incredibly talented young Armenian musicians, the group known as New Names of Armenia. He had become their Diasporan contact and PR point man.
RK greets me with a great hug. Then he looks at me, and goes:
"Mi kitch tchaghatsel es, Vigen djan", (you have put on a little weight, dear Viken).
He is of course being diplomatic. I desperately need to lose a lot of weight.
As we walk towards his car, he recounts how in the "good old" Soviet times, Sovedagan vakhderoum as they now affectionately remember them, when they visited the various sanatoria for some rest and relaxation, they were weighed in on the first day. On the last day before leaving, they were weighed again and were expected to weigh significantly more than when they came in. Otherwise, they were considered not to have "rested".
He was not kidding.
Nowadays, people pay a fortune to go to spas and to weigh significantly less when they leave. During the same period some would go to the extent to even spend some time under a surgeon's cutting tools to fight the effects of time.
So much for the Soviets getting it right then. So much for bipeds with big brains getting it right today.
Arthur C. Clarke has said, "It is yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value".
Arthur C. Clarke is one of the greatest science fiction writers of our times. He is the author of a short story called The Sentinel, which was the inspiration of one of the greatest films of our times, 2001: A Space Odyssey. The film was made by Stanley Kubrick.
You cannot go wrong with either of them.
Everyone wants to engage in time travel, but only to go backwards. Everyone is in love with their own bodily past. Even with a past which they never had.
No one wants to admit that it is time to move on.
"Helping" people engage in this obsession with a time travel of their bodies into the past is a multi billion dollar industry. Anything to make a buck. Anything to make a billion bucks.
Old things have an incredible beauty. Like the wrinkles on our grandparents' faces. Like antique furniture. Like Renaissance paintings. Like ancient illuminated manuscripts. Like ancient churches perched on mountain tops. They make history what it is.
People though want to forget history.
What I don't know cannot hurt me, is an old popular saying.
For many years, people did not know that there were tiny microscopic creatures, microbes, viruses and their kind, that killed them in the millions, tens of millions and even hundreds of millions.
They believed that scourges like the Bubonic plague, leprosy and all infectious diseases were the punishment of the Creator for their non-pious living.
They kept praying. And they kept dying. So much for popular wisdom and popular sayings.
There are many today that believe that AIDS is the punishment of the Creator for engaging in and enjoying sex outside of the purpose of procreation within a marriage.
Kind of like saying that heart disease is the punishment for enjoying butter laden French cuisine outside the "sanctity" of home cooking.
Kind of like saying that male pattern baldness is the punishment for your vanity of going too often to the barber to get your hair cut.
People want to forget history because they think they can just get rid of their past.
Here is another idea for a story.
In this other world, the most valuable commodity is a drug called timemorph. Timemorph allows the inhabitants of this world to change their pasts. It is a very controlled substance because it could literally wipe off their whole universe as people try to change the past time flows to gain benefits in the present, like allowing themselves to go back and gain a better education, more income, select "better" ancestors. Only a specialized elite can use it.
In the end, as the drug gets smuggled out of the inner circles, the whole society becomes addicted to it and recedes deeper into their past time lines. Their present has no meaning, because it is continuously changed. People can steal, murder, cheat, even burn and pillage and commit genocide because there are no consequences in the here and now. Everything is changeable by a single dose of timemorph.
The trouble is though that one has to keep more and more track of the options and various time "paths" to ensure safe navigation through the time lines. Eventually, things get so complicated that someone decides to solve all the complexities and to play the Creator, he arrives to the singularity of their "Big Bang" and decides to change that. Their whole world vanishes and goes poof.
The only thing their Universe has left to do is have a new Big Bang. It is not even certain that after billions of years new bipeds with highly evolved brains would emerge. In fact, it is quite uncertain that it would do so.
The universe has learnt its lesson. Why repeat an unsuccessful experiment?
We should be careful with our addictions.
We arrive at RK's office. It is in the ground floor of the Khengo Aber Library of Children's Literature.
Khengo Aber is the literary pseudonym of Athabeg Khengoyan, a writer of children's stories, fairy tales, poems, nursery rhymes and fables. He was a teacher, author of textbooks and a publisher. He died in 1935 at the age of 65. He was born in the Spitak region of Northern Armenia. Spitak was completely destroyed in the 1988 earthquake.
Khengo Aber's works are still very popular in the Eastern Armenian language that is spoken in Armenia. Schoolchildren still learn his poems and read his tales. In the Western Armenian culture of which I am an inheritor, Khengo Aber is now almost a complete unknown. I would get just puzzled faces from the children if I mentioned his names in the Armenian schools in the Diaspora. I would likely get puzzled faces from the teachers of the Armenian language if I mentioned his name in the Armenian schools of the Diaspora.
No one writes fairly tales in Armenian any more. No one writes fables in Armenian in anymore. Neither in Western nor in Eastern Armenian. Armenia is supposed to be a modern land of business and investment. In fact, I have seen an interesting weekly. It is called "Kapital" but has nothing to do with its Marxist namesake. It is billed as a piznesi shapatatert (business weekly). I wonder why they couldn't call it arevdragan shapatatert (business/commerce weekly) which is the correct and perfectly useful Armenian translation of the word.
It is now the fashion to use English (sounding) words in Armenian. They appear more piznes-oriented that way.
If I started publishing a French weekly in Montreal and called it "un hebdomadaire de business" I would receive a call from the Office of the French Language, or what we Quebecois call the "language police". I would actually be fined for using English words in a French context when there is a perfectly good and equally legitimate word in French (affaires). I am not kidding.
We need Armenian "language police" for sure. But that would require a leap of the imagination.
Nowadays, imagination is deemed unnecessary and wasteful. Ditto for the Diaspora.
However, The 8 bipeds who will come from all over the world and are about to go through a tear in their universe of what being an Armenian is about believe otherwise. I am one of those eight bipeds. Along with my friends ML and her husband P. Some more of us will arrive tonight.
I chat with RK in his office. Someone brings coffee. The thick sludge Armenian coffee I am used to and crave. It tastes as it should. It is not fake.
I ask RK about his preoccupations. His main concern is the new generation and the role models they see all around them. He is concerned that as children grow up they will be very far and removed from values of civic duty, spiritual and cultural heritage, excellence in the arts and literature, responsibility for society and duty of care towards their country.
"Look at the candidates we had in the recent elections", he says. "Democracy aside, why should we settle for such mediocrity? Why shouldn't we have thinkers and visionaries as candidates? What has happened to them? Why should we settle for people who focus only on the material? Why should we give our fellow citizens only such limited choices? Our country and countrymen deserve better".
I point out to him that things will take time. "We don't have time", he responds. "We can lose the essence of what we are, then it will be too late".
RK has not changed. I remember him this way over at least a period of 4 decades. More proof that he is authentic. RK gives me hope that people like him are still around in Armenia.
RK however is no longer young. He already is a grandfather. While officially retired, he keeps himself busy with involvement in a series of ventures, from publishing to tourism, to organizing Diasporan concerts for the amazing young talent of Armenia. He has a vast network of influential contacts both within Armenia and around the globe, and uses it to the maximum for the best of his country.
RK is a very rare breed indeed. That's why I definitely wanted to see him.
He asks why I am here. I explain that it has to do with children, creativity, technology and the future of Armenia. About something unlike anything else in the world. He is discreet, and does not push to know further.
He says that the situation outside Yerevan is not very good. Unemployment is rampant. "Most men just smoke and play nardi (backgammon) all day", he says. He is particularly concerned with the situation of children outside of the capital.
I ask him what he has been working on. He proudly shows me a children's home and cultural center which he has helped establish in Gyumri. For abandoned children and children of meagre means. In it they have boarding for some of them who don't have homes. They provide food and shelter, as well as an education in music, singing, graphic arts, dancing and performing arts. They also help them with their schoolwork. There are close to 75 children at his center. All is free. Funding is provided through his contacts.
He says that their center is so good that regular kids want to attend it too. The children are very talented he says. They take to creativity naturally he says.
I know. All children in Armenia are very talented. Millennial inspiration is all around them, that's why it comes naturally.
He says that he would be willing to assist me in any of my projects in any way he can. Specially if it has to do with children. He said he would be willing to put his center at our disposal to assist us. I thank him. I know he is sincere.
RK is my friend. I am glad he is. That's what friends are for. RK gives hope to the children of Armenia. The eight of us, coming together from all over the world in Yerevan, were doing so for the same reason. We had come to bring hope to the youth.
I tell RK that I have to see someone I have not met but only heard about. His name is Tevan Poghosyan. I was referred to him by someone else I have not yet met. He is VK out of Toronto, Canada. VK and I are members of an Internet forum and have exchanged a few emails and seem to have some convergence of ideas about global conflict resolution initiatives. When he heard that I was coming to Armenia he told me to definitely see Tevan.
Tevan is the executive director of the International Center for Human Development (ICHD). It is a think-tank based in Armenia, working, among other things, to advance Armenian society through a committed citizenry and to engage in a track 2 diplomacy for conflict resolution with the adversaries of Armenia, mainly the Azeris and the Turks, through very small trust building measures.
I ask RK for directions. He assigns someone to accompany me. The ICHD offices are within a 10 minute walking distance from his office. They are housed on the business floor of the Ani Hotel, another leftover from the Soviet times.
I wanted to see Tevan, because I wanted to see the new intellectual opinion shapers in Armenia face to face. I wanted to learn about their ideas, their worldview, their recommended courses of action. I had checked their website and found it very interesting (http://www.ichd.org/) and I wanted to see who was behind it.
The ICHD offices do not overwhelm you. They are very sparse and utilitarian. A set of offices. A small display area for their publications. A waiting area. And a well-organized conference room, where I wait before Tevan joins me.
There is a stack of documents on the table. I glance at their titles. They are all related to organizing an anti-smoking campaign across the country; in various settings, at work, in public spaces, at home and with lots of ideas for promotional material on the topic. It was likely that a workshop was being held on this theme in that same conference room before my arrival.
One thing is for sure, Armenia desperately needs an anti smoking campaign and I was glad someone was taking on this issue.
A young man in his thirties with typical Armenian features walks in. He is Tevan. He has a firm and confident handshake and a very business like allure. I introduce myself and describe the reason for my visit. Basically, a courtesy call to familiarize myself with their work. Once I mention VK then the initial hesitation disappears. Tevan talks enthusiastically about their work. He used to be the representative of the NKR in Washington. He had even visited Canada. Chances are that we had likely met at some community get-together.
He talked about similar organizations in Azerbaijan and how they occasionally met in various conferences around the world. How they had jointly organized some events within their respective countries focusing on track 2 (non-governmental) diplomacy, how they were facing similar funding challenges. How the ICHD interfaced with their Georgian colleagues and even with Turkish NGOs. He talked about the think-tank approach to influencing public policy. Their innovative approach to even put on cultural events, such as theatrical productions, to highlight the need for dialog and understanding. To make the citizens of Armenia understand the different paths that go beyond direct conflict.
He showed me their publications and gave me one as a gift. It is called "Armenian-Turkish Track 2 Diplomacy Projects: Assessment of Best Practices". The book describes and analyzes the various joint projects in question. It is interesting that it has a chapter on TARC, the ill-refuted Turkish Armenian Reconciliation Commission which turned out to be a US State Department hatched plan. I shall have to read the book more closely to judge things for myself. Considering that the publication was funded by the USAID and the Eurasia Foundation, both of which are definitely not ideologically neutral and tend to focus more on issues of free market economy and are closer to the US worldview, I shall be extra cautious in passing judgment.
In any case, Tevan knew what he was talking about. In fact, he mastered it. He is articulate and projected the image of a man of action. When I bid him farewell, I asked that he sign the book he gave me; he refused. "It was a team effort", he said, "so I have no claim to authorship". In the end I am glad I had made this small detour from my agenda. Regardless of whether one agrees with their approach, the ICHD is doing important work that needs to be done, which no one else seems to be doing.
I am hoping for the best.
I walk back to RK's office. At the corner of the street, two stray dogs start following me. I do not chase them away, which I have seen people here usually do. They even cross the avenue with me.
Maybe it is my cologne. Maybe it is my non-aggressive stance towards them, and they figure out that I could be even kinder and offer them food. Right before I reach the Khengo Aber Library, the dogs abandon their quest and retire under the shade into an alley. Who knows why? Who knows what a dog thinks?
Who knows what anyone thinks for that matter?
Hey, maybe they were not dogs at all. Maybe they were specially modified and electronically wired sent to follow me and find out about my intentions. It might have been true in the old Sovedagan vakhderoum.
I am not that important for such a costly enterprise. Plus I already told you what I am looking for. I am here to face the dragons that my mental map of Armenia says are here. I said so in the first instalment of my blog.
Yet, these days, no one believes you when you tell them the truth. The truth is stranger than fiction.
Here is a true story.
In the 1960s, the CIA was so obsessed with getting secrets from the Soviets that they started a project called Operation Acoustic Kitty. They spent about $15 million in research and eventually succeeded in surgically altering a cat that carried eavesdropping equipment in its belly and its tail contained an antenna. The idea was to let this cat loose around the Soviet embassy in Washington and have it transmit conversations back to a parked van in the vicinity.
The first time the cat was let loose, it got struck by an oncoming taxi and was killed instantly.
I am sorry for the cat. But it had long ceased to be a cat when it was killed. It had already lost eight lives in the experiments to get it to that stage and was hanging on to its last ninth one.
I laughed until I cried when I read this story a few years ago. Or maybe it was the other way round. It doesn't matter.
If you don't believe me, you can find more gory details here
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/11/04/wcia04.xml
So much for the brilliant spy agencies who were entrusted to save the world from a nuclear nightmare of mutually assured destruction.
Those days are gone now. We have moved on.
Or have we?
I enter back RK's office. I give him my impressions. He says he is pleasantly surprised that an organization in Armenia is engaged in track 2 diplomacy. He tells me the story of how, during the initial toughest years of the economic blockade in the mid nineties, he engaged in such initiatives himself and was instrumental in opening an air link between Istanbul and Yerevan. The air link eventually brought much needed food, supplies and visiting international contacts into Armenia. I do not press him for details. I want to be as discreet as he is.
He shows me proudly a new publication on his table which has just come out thanks to his efforts. Sponsored by his contacts at the Calouste Gulbenkian foundation in Lisbon. It is a magnificent small book. Essays, lectures and articles by Yervant Kotchar.
Yervant Kotchar was the brilliant Armenian sculptor and painter, born in Tbilisi in 1899, who in the 1920s was in the forefront of the world cubist art movement in Paris. He gave several group and individual exhibitions there, his friends included all the giants of the movement, including Picasso, Braque, Matisse, Chagal, Mondriaan, de Cirico, Kandinsky, Duchamp and so on. He is arguably the greatest Armenian sculptor of all times. He is the sculptor of the unique and most wonderful monument to David of Sassoon, erected in front of the main train station in Yerevan, celebrating the 1000th anniversary of the birth of the great epic of the Heroes of Sassoon in the mountains of historic Armenia.
But more on David of Sassoon and his statue later.
Yervant Kotchar spent 2 years in KGB dungeons from 1941-43 for his refusal to bend his creativity to the edicts of the Stalinist system.
Yervant Kotchar died in 1979 a few months short of his 80th birthday. in 1997, the UNESCO declared him one of the greatest artists of the 20th century and the year 1999 to be a year of the celebration of the 100th anniversary of his birth under its prestigious auspices.
He was an incredibly talented genius whose writings have remained relatively unexplored. My friend RK has thus had a hand in resurrecting his thoughts. Memento Vivi.
RK asks me where I want to go next. I tell him that I'd like to visit Yerevan school no. 133 in Nork district, named after my uncle, the poet Karnig Attarian. He calls his driver Davit and gives him instructions. He is supposed to drive me there, then pick me up in an hour or so to drive me to my hotel.
I say goodbye to RK and we hug again. I promise to see him again soon. It will not be likely on this trip. He understands.
Friends always understand friends. There is usually no need for words.
Davit drives me up to the district of Nork. On the way, he points out the areas that were all tree lined but all trees were cut down during the tough winter of the early nineties. People burnt them in stoves. There was no other heating source.
Davit is a cultured man. He is not from Yerevan. He talks about the situation in the country. He talks about the same things that RK did a couple of hours ago. He is concerned that people are emigrating. I ask whether he would consider it himself. His answer is short. "Never".
We go up winding streets. Most people here live in either depressing Soviet style, prefabricated cement block apartments which have long outlived their lifespan of 20 years, and are literally coming apart at the seams. Others are still living in brick huts with corrugated tin rooftops. A strong earthquake would level both structures, but chances are that only those living in the huts would survive.
We find the school, it is on the side of a hill. I do not expect to see anything resembling what we have in Canada. There a few boys and girls in the playground (an empty space of asphalt) who seem to be in their late teens. Probably 16 or 17. The boys are all dressed in suits and the girls in fancy dresses.
"Today is the last day of school. We call it vertchin zang (last ringing of the bell)." Says Davit.
We ask about the principal. It seems that he is a certain Mr. Samvelyan. Some of the kids guide us to the main hall. There is a lot of noise coming from there.
We go up the stairs. The noise increases and we start to distinguish whistling, clapping, singing. There is too much of a crowd. The hall likely seats about 200 but is now filled by over 500 people, between children, adolescents, parents, teachers. There are people on the window sills even. Someone is running around with a videocamera taping the event. I literally squeeze myself through the human mass and get all the way up front, asking for Mr. Samvelyan. He is sitting right in the middle of the front row, flanked by a clergyman and some officer of the army. I cannot tell the ranks, but he looks very stern and statemanlike.
I introduce myself. I am surprised he hears me over the noise. He is shocked to know who I am. I am after all the nephew of the person after whom the school is named, and I just showed up unannounced, out of nowhere, and during essentially what would be considered the equivalent of the year end graduation ceremony/prom (that is the best I could describe it). The chances of that happening is almost like winning the lottery, without even buyng a ticket.
He immediately invites me to sit close by. Davit leaves and will be back in an hour.
"Mart asdoudzo, intchi loor tchek dvel?" (My God, why haven't you advised us before hand?), says Mr. Samvelyan.
"Vertchin robeyi voroshoum er" (it was a last minute decision), I respond.
The stage is sparsely decorated. Basically there is a large kitschy canvas with the traditional Ararat valley picture. Then there is sound equipment in one corner, a couple of microphones.
One of the graduating young men picks up the micro and starts to rap in Armenian. A few of the young girls in short red skirts join him and provide background dancing.
The words are too rapid for me to comprehend any meaningful phrase. But then again, I realize that I cannot comprehend rap in any language.
Armenian teenagers are no different than any teenagers anywhere. When we were their age, our high school graduating class had a rock band that played rock music. They were called the Hovmans.
My high school was the AGBU Hovagimian Manoogian School for Boys in Beirut. It no longer exists. Its name has been transplanted on another institution and has been combined with another high school for girls. Even the location is changed from where it used to stand for several decades. I am told that my school is now bulldozed into a parking lot.
The Hovmans were the band of my high school, and that's where they got there name from.
The Hovmans, my high school, and my youth have all gone poof together. I am now a middle aged man trying to remember what it was like finishing high school. Trying to understand the youth on this stage here and now. Memento Vivi.
To each generation their own rebelliousness. That is the way it should be.
I suddenly hear my name being announced and I am called to the stage. I have been in Armenia for less than 2 days and I am already speaking in public.I speak in Western Armenian. I tell them that it is the language Karnig Attarian spoke and wrote in. I tell them that as much as Eastern Armenian belongs to me, the language that I speak belongs to them as well.
I tell them that it is my first visit to Armenia and that it has taken me so long to take this step, but that now I have taken a long journey to come to contribute my share to the well being of its future. I tell them that I have not visited any tourist sites yet nor gone to see any museums or churches, but have decided to see this school before anywhere else.
I tell them the truth.
I also tell the graduates the "bad" news. That they better get prepared for a lifetime of learning which will never stop. That is the reality that they are graduating into.
Finally, I express a small personal hope that at least one and only one of every graduating class in every school in Armenia decides on and finds a true personal vocation in the career of teaching. The most important profession in any society. It is a people that make a country, not its buildings, and specially not its ruins.
I get a thunderous applause, and as I am stepping down, many come and shake my hand and want to hug me. I am overwhelmed with the outpouring of emotion.
It is strange, but after close to half a century of living, I will now be part of the memory of all who were present there, on this other side of the world. For the graduates, I will be in their memories of their vertchin zang. Memento Vivi.
And many years after I and even they would be gone, I would live on the videos of this day which many were recording to pass on to their families. Memento Vivi turning to Memento Mori.
I owe it all to my name which I inherited from my ancestors. Everyone in the world owes their name to their ancestors. We are their Memento Vivi. Our names are their Memento Mori.
And it all came together in that school no. 133 in Nork.
You can learn about them here.
http://schools.ascp.am/school133/133%20.html
There is an intermission. The principal and some senior teaching staff join me in the principal's office. We talk and exchange coordinates. I apologize for my sudden appearance. We have coffee.
We then move back to the hall, where the second batch of students is presenting their show. They suddenly interrupt it and present bouquets to a middle-aged woman. I realize that she is one of the mothers of the two fallen soldiers who were graduates of this school. Memento Mori.
I stand up and hug her. Her son was truly just a child when he got killed by an Azeri bullet.
I wonder whether at this time, somewhere in Azerbaijan, a mother is being presented with a bouquet to commemorate her son, killed by an Armenian bullet.
We are so warped that we give bullets nationalities. What is wrong with this picture?
Everything.
There are many people around the world who cannot get nationalities. They are called refugees. My four grandparents were refugees when they survived the genocide. In the end they got some nationalities. None of which were Armenian.
I am Lebanese by birth, Canadian by naturalization, Armenian by identity. I have lived, studied and worked in at least half a dozen countries on three continents.
Now what does that make me? A chameleon?
Someone with too many roots I would say. I don't mind roots. Roots anchor you. You cannot go on a safe journey without the ability to anchor yourself.
I mind not having roots. You are then rootless. Rootless people end up being ruthless. There is something missing in their lives. They cannot be whole. They cannot experience being fully human. So they want to take others' roots from them.
Kind of like heartless people ripping out the hearts of others. Literally and figuratively.
I don't want to present flowers to commemorate the dead.
I want everyone to plant things. I prefer Vivi to Mori.
I plant words on the blank screen with a keyboard. My father and uncle planted words on the blank page with a pen.
My hope is that the words I plant will live. If someone reads them. Eventually.
Davit is here, he makes a sign that it is time to leave. I shake the hands of my hosts and squeeze my way out again.
As we go down, I glance in the hallway and find the large bust of my uncle. I ask Davit to take my photo with it.
We all need mementos. Regardless of which type.
Davit drives me to my hotel. I ask him that in the end, as more and more people give up and emigrate, who will ultimately defend the country when the need arises. "I will. We all will", he says. I know he is right.
We say good bye. He smiles a hearty smile. I have not known Davit for very long but I have decided that I like him. No wonder that he works for RK.
It is now late in the afternoon. I call up my cousin, Artur Papazian, the world renowned pianist who has moved back to Armenia a couple of years ago from New York.
Artur has been called a "monster pianist" by the Washington Post. He is arguably the planet's leading interpreter of Chopin. In 1995, he achieved a world first at Carnegie Hall by interpreting, in an all-Chopin program, all of the composer's 24 Etudes and 24 Preludes. No one has ever matched that feat since. I don't think that even Chopin himself had done that. It was a unique artistic happening. Artur was a child prodigy.
Armenia has many child prodigies. The trick is to find them. I have come here with my friends to think of a way to find them. We want to cause a tear in this universe.
Artur's wife is the amazing painter Maral Bedian-Papazian who is also a scientist/geotechnical engineer; she now devotes her time exclusively to painting.
You can familiarize yourself with them here
http://www.papart.com/
Artur's maternal grandfather is my maternal grandmother's brother. They were both genocide survivors. Artur's mother, my mother's first cousin, was born in Greece. My mother was born in Mossul, Iraq. We are second cousins, Artur and I. He was born in Armenia and I in Beirut. Our genes are influenced by all the ancient places in this world. We had been childhood penpals. And, many years later we became good friends as adults, specially after he moved to New York. I had to see him. I missed him a lot.
Artur is not available. He says though that we all would be welcome to visit them sometime later on Sunday night. Since all have not arrived yet, I cannot make any promises. I will have to contact him again.
One last place to see and I should be done for the day. I am exhausted. Jet lag is also dragging me down.
I call up the house of Rouben Hakhverdian. He is the famous Armenian chansonnier/composer who, in Soviet times, was the leading dissident singer in Armenia and one of the most famous in the USSR. His concerts would fill stadiums, city squares, huge halls. People would travel long distances just to listen to him. Roubig as he is better known in the Diaspora, is also called Roubo by his friends.
Over a decade ago, while he was on several months' long tour around the world, Rouben's family had stayed at my mother's home in Montreal. We had developed a close friendship since then. I was curious to see his son Aram; Aramig as we used to call him. Aram, who was barely 10 years old at the time, had developed a special affection for my son Armen, who was a mere toddler then. He would call Armen, gyankee eemasd, the "meaning of life". I agree with Aram. Armen is the meaning of life.
All children are the true meaning of life.
Rouben answers. "Don't go away", he says. "I am coming to get you in 20 minutes. Then we'll come to our apartment and eat together. You'll see Nana (his wife), the kids and we'll catch up".
I go down to the lobby a few minutes later. And then wait for him outside. Some more waiting and he soon appears with his familiar gait.
We hug on the sidewalk. He asks me how I was feeling.
"I don't know yet. Being for the first time in my country", I respond.
"Your country? You mean this s%^*$t?", he says.
Roubig never minced words. He has been shocking people ever since he was born. I love his art, but I don't have to feel the same way towards the person. He knows that.
Roubig's father, academician and professor Levon Hakhverdian, was one of the greatest literary and theater critics of Armenia; he was my sister's teacher when she studied theater and children's literature in Armenia. He was also my father's friend. Levon Hakhverdian went poof in 2003. I have several books of his in my library. His style is exquisite. Memento Mori.
Roubig however preferred the street life to one of an intellectual. His art was genuine because it came from the streets and the slums of Yerevan.
As I said elsewhere, to each generation its own rebelliousness.
He waves for a taxi. One stops. Suddenly the driver gets out of the car, comes to us and then him and Roubig hug.
"I can't believe it", says Roubig. "This is my street friend Gago (slang for Gagik). I haven't seen him for over ten years and now I meet him because of you. Get in! Get in!"
We drive around the streets of Yerevan. Roubig and Gago are talking. They suddenly switch to Russian. They don't know that I understand Russian fairly well and can speak it too. They are talking about seeing a few other friends and how they could get away with it now. They are talking about something that had happened to Gago.
I do not intervene. I try to focus my mind on other things to respect their privacy.
"Do you mind if we take to a small side alley", says Roubig."I need to see a few people I haven't seen for ages".
I brace for new adventures. I am just a passenger on a lifeboat.
We duck into some side streets. Go under passage ways and eventually emerge out. Roubig gets out. I and Gago as well. There are a few people on the street. It is not paved but is a small dirt alley. There are houses reminiscent of old Yerevan on both sides.
We walk into a typical pag (courtyard). There is a table with a few older men playing dominoes. They keep track of the score with an abacus. Look it up if you don't know what that is. It is the world's oldest calculating tool.
Roubig has turned to Roubo here. He introduces me a to a stern looking fellow named Zavo.
"Ganatayits a yegel" (he has come from Canada), is all he says.
Like everywhere with greenery, the yard is unkempt. There are weeds everywhere. In a corner, wild poppies are growing. I snap a photo. Roubo has disappeared. I wait for about 15 minutes. Passers by greet everyone with "barev tsez" (greetings to you) and receive the traditional "Asdzou barin" (God's good greetings upon you). They all look at me intently, since I am the obvious stranger, but since I respond to them in Eastern Armenian, the suspicion disappears quickly. Gago and Zavo are watching the men play. I know the game and watch it with them.
By the time Roubo comes back, the game is finished. Some men get up and leave. There is a mountain of a man who stays at the table. He was introduced earlier as Alik. He seems to be a local who is Gago's and Zavo's friend.
Roubo arrives with two bags of stuff. He takes out two bottles of vodka (oghee they call it here). One larger and one smaller one. One very small bottle of Scotch whisky (quarter liter). Two cans of olives. A can of pickles. Several cartons of juices. Nice thick dark Russian bread. A bundle of sliced salami. Several types of cheeses. Alik brings out some Armenian ganatchi (mix of various greens, leafy plants, shallots and fresh herbs). Gago and Zavo seemed to have brought glasses and some cutlery.
It is now about 6 p.m. and we were supposed to be at Roubig's house. I say nothing.
The glasses are filled with vodka. Roubo says that the doctors have told him not to drink for two years, and it has been actually 4 months since he has touched alcohol. He has a serious liver problem and almost died a few years ago. His life was saved then by a liver transplant, courtesy of his friends in France. I guess that it has not been easy since then.
"But" he says, "this is really a special day. I haven't been back on my street for so long. I haven't seen Vigen here from Canada for over a decade. I just met Gago and Zavo both of whom are my street buddies (poghotsayin engerner) who have been missing from my life. This I must drink to".
"The doctor told me not to drink oghee. So I will not drink it. I will drink whisky instead."
"Lavn asatsi tche? "(wasn't that a good one?) he goes and bursts out laughing.
Who am I to argue? The man is on a mission. He pours himself some scotch.
And the drinking and talking starts and does not stop. I am mostly a listener. As time passes on it gets more colourful. It covers politics, women, lovers, neighbours, neighbourhoods, schoolmates, old friends, new friends, Gharabaghtsis (whom they all hate with a passion), gays, non-gays, "fake" people who would do anything for money, "true" friends for whom honour and friendship is above all, and on and on and on.
I, of course, have no clue who all these names are, what the adventures talked about represent in terms of local heroism. All I know is that I hear:
"Vay yes nra here, eni gyot a .... " (F&^%#k his father, he is gay ...).
"Nra hern el, nra mern el ....." (F&^%#k his father and mother ....).
"Aber djan bazhagt tarmatsnem? Lav asatsir, koure nra, mern el hede ..." (Let me refill your glass my friend. You said it, f&^%k his sister, motherf**&^^%%er).
"khmenk isgagan baregamoutyan genatse, vor mez djagadapats e pahoum, vorovhedev pozeri bes menk mez tchenk vadjaroum." (let us drink to real friendship that keeps our heads high, and because we don't sell ourselves like prostitutes).
The more time passes, the more glasses are refilled, the more colorful the language gets, the crudeness increases and I am simply completely desensitized to everything. I make sure that I do not drink over my limits. There is already a big spectacle unfolding here. I do not need to make one of myself.
Suddenly big Alik raises his glass and says:
"Menk shad ban asatsink, bayts ouzoum em asel te amen intchits avel ints hamar garevorn en a te touk bolort intch ek anoum es poghotsi hamar?" (we said a lot of things, but most importantly for me, I would like to know what each one of you is doing for this street?).
"Yes esdegh em amen or, yes geghdern em havakoum, yerekhekin oushatroutyoun anoum, megin vor mee ban e bedk, oknoum em. Douk esdegh ek egel himi oudoum khmoum enk myasin, medz medz khosoum ek; bayts douk intch ek anoum?" (I am here every day, I clean up the place, I look after the well being of the children here, if anybody needs anything I help them. You have come here, we are eating and drinking together, and you are talking haughtily. But what are you doing?).
There is a tension in the air. It could turn ugly.
"If you would allow me, I would like to raise a glass", say I.
"Lretsek dgherk djan, lsenk Vigene intch a asoum" (shut up boys, let's hear what Viken has to say), thunders Alik. He is a sickly old man, but his physical stature is overwhelming. Everyone listens to him. Even Roubo shuts up. A small crowd has gathered around us, some have joined in the drinking. It is getting dark. It should be around 9 p.m.
I tell them simple things. They are simple, crude but genuine people. I tell them that I have come not to visit Armenia. That I have come to help build it. That I have come not even to seek old friends like Roubig, but that I have come with new friends like me from all over the world who will gather in Armenia and who want to give a unique gift of incredible value to its children. And that that gift is something called a secure future, confidence to take on the world with their amazing talents. I tell them not to lose hope in this country, because there are many like me in the Diaspora who believe in it and will come to help it. I tell them to be patient, because things will get better.
Again, I tell them the truth.
"Ba, ba, ba, Vigen djan. Yes tchkideyi vor etkan khelok ou bari mart es eli ...", goes Roubo. "Asdvadz vga, dgherk djan, yes gyankoums myain yergrort ankam em iran desnoum. Lour el tchounem te intchi a yegel esdegh". (Wow, Viken, I didn't know that you were such a smart and kind man. I swear to God boys, this is only the second time in my life that I am seeing him. I didn't know why he was here).
He then plants a big wet kiss on my cheek and laughs heartily. They all laugh and drink to my health.
The bottles are all empty now. We can therefore leave. I bid farewell to the people of the street. Zavo makes me promise to visit again. I say I will. Again I don't know when I will fulfill my promise.
We walk to Gago's taxi. He has of course had a few drinks, but insists that he will drive us to Roubig's apartment. I do not wish to insult him so I get in.
He actually drives pretty well, and we are soon dropped off in front of the apartment complex. He rushes off.
As we are walking to the elevator, Roubig says:
"En Gagon ou Zavon, yergousn el nsdel en" (Gago and Zavo, both of them have sat).
Although well versed in Eastern Armenian, I am unfamiliar with the local slang.
"Vordegh en nsdel?" (where have they sat?), I go.
"Ay mart, hanksdyan vayroum, bantoum, yergousn el dasse dari" (In the resting area, man, in prison, both for ten years), laughs Roubig.
"Isg intchi hamar?" (and for what crime?), I ask.
"Gago killed someone. With a knife. But it wasn't really a murder", he goes.
"And what was it?".
"Well, it was an honour killing. Someone had raped his sister, so he had to kill him".
I just realize that Armenia still operated with tribal rules.
"And what about Zavo? Has he killed anyone", I ask again.
"No. He just emptied a whole warehouse of its contents but got caught."
"I guess that wasn't really stealing, was it?"
"No not really, he had a family to feed".
Roubig was trying to tell me that they were not criminals. Otherwise they wouldn't be his friends. I did not want to engage in any debates on morality, or on modern criminal justice for that matter.
We enter his apartment. Nana welcomes us and ushers us in.
We talk and talk. She wants to recover all those years she hasn't seen us. She tells me her elder daughter is already married and has two children. Then a charming young girl walks in. She is Anoushig.
Nana was pregnant with Anoushig when she left Montreal. Anoushig has some assignment to write on the Sahara desert. I tell her that in Arabic, Sahara actually means desert, and that it was named first by the Arabs and that's why it carries that name.
Anoushig is thrilled. She now knows something that likely even her teacher doesn't know.
Children love to own secrets. They want to know good secrets. Secrets to a better life.
Adults on the other hand, hold their secrets as nightmares throughout their whole lives. Those secrets eventually destroy them.
That is why, to change a country, you are better off working with children.
A young man walks in. He is Aram. Tall, strong, intelligent. Aram asks about my son Armen. he will be graduating from university this year. He will then serve in the army for two years.I mentally pray for peace.
We talk about a lot of things. Roubig still behaves in his shocking ways. He says he hates all Gharabaghtsis. He calls them Turks. When I mention that his wife is from there, he switches the topic. He says he wants to leave Armenia and settle in Australia, because he loves beaches. He then says he would like to be a Buddhist. I point out that Buddhists do not hate anyone. He says that he invented his own Buddhism that allows him to hate whomever he wishes. He then says that Faulkner is the greatest writer ever. That Russians have no great authors. He then remarks that he does not know English, so he has read English writers' works only in Russian translations or in Armenian translations from the Russian translation. I retort back with a few names like Shakespeare, Steinbeck, Vonnegut, Dostoevski, Chekhov, Gogol.
"All failures", he says. "except Vonnegut, I grant you that. Breakfast of Champions is a masterpiece. And Saroyan of course, but he was Armenian. Great writer, his gambling ruined him".
I don't argue. On Vonnegut I agree of course. It is late. I have to leave.
Aram accompanies me onto the street to hail a taxi. On the way we talk. He is very smart and mature. We talk about democracy, we talk about reforms, we talk about human rights, we even talk about gay rights.
Aram says that Armenia is not ready yet for gay rights, that's why the people will react negatively when these issues are forced upon them. I agree with him. I also explain to him that those rights in Canada really are not about marriage, but about the financial, legal, contractual and other related issues that flow from the status of a couple in a committed relationship. I could never have talked about these issues in their apartment.
I tell him that he is welcome in my house anytime. I kiss him farewell.
All this time he has been referring to me as Hopar Vigen (uncle Viken). I carry that title with pride.
I arrive at my hotel. I rush up and start blogging.
Within two days I have met some of the most honorable people in the country and shared food and drink with criminals.
Could I ever ask for more?
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