The happenstance(inings)

Over a week without a post, and I was keeping up so well before! Things here have started to get a little busy and more and more little things start to pile up.

So I over the past few weeks I've seen little things that I'll guess I'll talk about.

1) Warm gata! The link shows it with honey, which I've never had, so that one looks kindof glossy. Gata is an Armenian dessert, online it's referred to in English as a sweetbread. Imagine a baklava having babies with a croissant and you have a pretty good idea of what it is. Sometimes it's more like one than the other, but most of the time it's just good. Anways, my host mom had just made some and I had them with dinner and they were still warm from the oven. That was new for me and they tasted amazing. Like warm cookies from the oven, only better. Okay now I really want warm homemade cookies, and sort of want to take back what I just said about the gata but oh well, too late now, I don't revise these things!

2) A bustle in my hedgerow. I was eating lunch at a local cafe, trying to kill some time until my class at 3 pm that afternoon. This cafe always has some sort of Russian MTV channel on, and the music never syncs up with it. During that particular day I was surprised when I heard something that sounded like the very to Stairway to Heaven. Only it actually was Stairway to Heaven. Sweet! Reminds me of growing up, and then after that I heard The Scorpions and a few other American 80s bands so that was pretty cool and unexpected.

3) Metaphors. I was teaching my 1st year University students and we were focusing on the metaphor used to describe the US as a 'melting pot' and as a 'tossed salad' and looking at the change over time, watching the old Schoolhouse Rock video about the former and reading other things about the latter. I then had my students come up with their own metaphors about Armenia. They came up with some great ones, and so I wanted to share:

Armenia is a(n) (apricot) tree. Apricots are sort of Armenia's national fruit, and a tree has roots, which represent the country of Armenia, and the many different branches represent the diaspora that exists all over the world.

Armenia is like a stone or a the rock (that make up so much of this country). My student had a little trouble articulating this at first, but then spoke about the strength of rocks, and about Ararat a national symbol of Armenia and one that they are all very proud of. I mentioned earlier during my trip to Kapan that it can be seen from the capital and for a good two, three, maybe even four hours on the way down there. If you were up high enough (so that other mountains wouldn't be blocking your view) you could probably see Ararat from most of Armenia. The sad thing about this is that Ararat is actually in present day Turkey. A lot of Armenians like to say that while it isn't part of their country physically, it is more important that it is in their hearts, and for them, that is enough.

4) Yerevan. Visited Yerevan for a friend's birthday and ate Chinese food. Awesome stuff. Afterwards we went to a hippie bar. Pretty awesome place, reminded me of the Hookah bars in Pittsburgh, especially The Sphinx. Lots of smoke, but no hookahs (that I saw). There were a lot of expats and other types and I even met some PCVs from Kazakhstan that have just finished their service. There was a MIIS PCV in my program that I had corresponded with via email so I asked if they knew her and sure enough they did. Small world. I also briefly met a couple of Fulbrighters in Armenia. Then, to further prove the point of the metaphor above, I met Armenians from Iran and Syria, who were studying in Yerevan. About three times as many Armenians live outside of Armenia, than actually in Armenia's national boundaries. And with that I'm going to end with a quote from an Armenian American writer, which makes me smile:

"I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard and prayers are no more answered. . . . Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a new Armenia."
William Saroyan