Vartanantz & Harissa

A few days ago was Vartanantz. I told Hagopig it was coming up, tried to explain the significance of it… But he’s two, so he doesn’t understand war, or convictions, or any of the complicated stuff. He’s got a little Roman soldier shirt and hat that my brother-in-law Aram bought in Italy on his honeymoon, but Hagop doesn’t understand what a soldier is. (Probably that’s good, for now.)

I tried to read Hagop the story of St. Vartan from this book of church stories we have (I’ll link it later), but it only has one picture per story so… Hagop didn’t have much patience for it. Instead, we had this exchange:
“Vartan was a Christian. Hagop, are you a Christian?”
“No.”
“Vartan was a General. Hagop, are you a General?”
“Yes.”
“Vartan was Armenian. Hagop, are you Armenian?”
“Yes.”

Hah! At least he got one of the three right. Uh… I’ll have to work on correcting the other two with him.
On another note, St. James had a fundraiser selling harissa, and we ordered a few meals. Oof. Still not a fan… Sorry. Maybe I need to try a different version? With chicken instead of meat? I don’t know. Send me recipes if you have a strong feeling about it.

Christmas week

What a week. January 6th was Armenian Christmas AND the day of the riot at the US Capitol.

I chose to work in the morning, while my mother-in-law had the day off and watched church with our kids. I was planning on celebrating Christmas that evening, but then was so overwhelmed and distracted by the news. I was telling Hagopig, “today is a very important day” – referring to the riot – and Vartan absolutely, rightly called me out on it. Christmas ultimately is more important than anything happening in current events. But I really feel like I missed the opportunity to celebrate and teach Hagopig about Christmas that day.

Thank goodness for the OCTAVE of Nativity, because it gave me the opportunity to try again for the next few days following.

We talked about how we were celebrating Jesus’s birthday, sung “happy birthday” to Jesus, and got Hagop a little activity book about the life of Jesus. It led to some pretty adorable and hilarious singing from Hagop (“happy birthday Jesus birthday hat” and “Jesus shark doo doo” are standouts).

OK, well NOW maybe back.

So right after I wrote that last post, we learned about the attacks on Armenians in Artsakh. That was one thing too many, in our world. I hope all of you, your friends, and your relatives are okay, and/or that you can find peace now. This has been such a trying year. And the ongoing destruction of Armenian people, property, and cultural heritage is so incredibly devastating. Our prayers are with everyone in Artsakh and Armenians across the world. It’s hard to not feel helpless, and to keep moving forward and contributing, but we’re trying our best.

Two positive updates from the last few months:

  1. We finally got the translation back, of the book about Vartan’s great grandfather Hagopos Ayvazian. It’s just a document with the words translated and none of the music or pictures in it, so I think we’ll copy those in and then share it with everyone here.
  2. I got my first commission for the trchnakir art I do! A woman from our church saw a picture of one I had done (because I offered a commission as an item for our church auction), and asked me to make one for her parents. I was so flattered, had fun doing it, and learned a LOT. I think I’m finally going to start selling them and taking more commissions… exciting! Final framed version below, and here’s a link to some more pictures of it: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Qw24YagXEjGw74YDkFDfT0kZQV_rkVah?usp=sharing

I’m back!

There’s nothing like having a BABY to bring you back to what’s important.  I’ve taken QUITE some time off from writing here, because life has been so busy!  Vartan and I had a second child this summer (a girl, Zabel), and it was a very challenging pregnancy so I wasn’t up for writing.  Also, this just in, toddlers are NO JOKE.  Having young kids, working full time, volunteering as we can, taking Western Armenian classes, trying to make progress in our careers, and oh yeah, dealing with a global PANDEMIC… it’s a LOT.  But while I’ve been gone, I’ve seen engagement on this site (hooray, hello!), so I hope there’s something to value here, and I have more to share. More to come… 🙂

Christ as Healer Art Project for Kids

Today was my last day of maternity leave, and so our toddler is going back to daycare full time. I’ll miss having him home with us all the time. As exhausting as it has been, it’s been fantastic to watch him grow every day, and we’ve done some fun activities together. We took a stab at the Eastern Diocese’s “Christ as Healer Art Project for Kids” activity last week. With a toddler, there was less discussion and much more finger paint…! Haha, we had fun… 🙂

Western Armenian Alphabet, Lesson 5C: Bonus letters

You can find the specific (slightly edited) Powerpoint lesson here: Alphabet Lesson 5, The Last Few Letters

Armenian alphabet tutorial, Lesson 5

These last few letters were not originally part of the Armenian alphabet. They’ve been added to the alphabet to help pronounce words from other languages, i.e. Ő–Ö€ŐˇŐ¶Ő˝Őˇ = France.

  • Ö† = [f], f = Like “France”
  • o = [o], o = Like “open”
    • Psych! You’ve already learned this one, we’ve come full circle.
  • Ö‡ = [ev/jev], pronounced “yev”
    • This letter is a combination of “ŐĄ” and “Ö‚” and is shorthand for the word “ŐĄÖ‚” which means “and.” From what I understand, it’s used more often in Eastern Armenian than Western… to the extent that some Western Armenian speakers don’t consider this a letter on its own.

CONGRATULATIONS! You’ve now officially learned the Western Armenian Alphabet!! You should be able to read any Armenian text you come across now.

Feel like you need to check your work? Try FORVO – the online pronunciation dictionary: https://forvo.com/

Make sure you’re checking the location of the Armenian speaker on that site, because it doesn’t distinguish between Eastern and Western… but it’s a great place to start.

Access the rest of the lessons in this series here:

Hagopos Ayvazian book

We’ve finally started on the project with Nayiri Translation Services, to get the small book on Vartan’s grandfather, Hagopos Ayvazian, translated into English.  The delay was because we were so busy, we never closed the loop and got started with them… not because of them!  Nayiri seems to have a great team lined up, and we’re really looking forward to working with them.  They estimate they’ll have the translation to us in 3 months, and we’ll get updates along the way.  We’ve had friends of the family informally translate the content for us before, but there’s so much more we can learn with a professional team.  We’re really excited.

Anyone interested in reading the book in Armenian can access it here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1alyCMpNXasodwMbTQKf5fT7dlVhW9jRR/view?usp=sharing