Whoa, it’s mid-October already…

Ok, I have neglected my blog for long enough.  I’m really sorry about that, really.  Mostly sorry to myself because so much has happened in the last 2 months and I haven’t been able to process it by writing about it and sharing it…  I could blame it on the sporatic access to the internet, busy-ness resulting in not enough sleep, or a thousand other things… but I’d rather just *start* somewhere, anywhere, and begin writing about some of the things I’ve been doing and thinking.  It’s better than nothing, I’ll just take one thing at a time…

A really special excursion yesterday

Yesterday we ended a 12 hour excursion with a trip to the Observatory to look at the stars at night.  It was sooo clear and soo pretty.   We saw Jupiter, the largest planet, Vega Star, and a galactic cloud through the telescope.  But the most amazing thing was just looking up to see the entire sky FULL of stars.  Some had really strong refraction of light, that it literally looked like it was twinkling, others were clustered together and looked like they were so close to each other, but so far away from us.  The galactic cloud reminded me of what a particle looks like in your blood when you look under a microscope.  Isn’t it amazing that some of the largest things and smallest things in life have similar patterns/shapes/fractals?!

Another highlight was climbing the Ambert fortress and looking out over the vast gorges of the Aragatz mountain slopes.  Thank goodness we were told to bring warm clothes with us, and thank goodness we layered up.  The afternoon started with short sleeved sunny weather, when we were escorted around one of the Armenia Tree Project nursuries by easily the most passionate agricultural connosiuers I’ve ever met in my life, only a short time after that, we found ourselves eating lunch on a field looking out over Ararat and other gorgeous valleys, definitely sweater weather, and shortly after that, around sunset, we found ourselves climbing up the ancient stone pathways of the Ambert fortress, burried in the slopes of the Aragatz mountainside - who’s roads are usually blocked off this time of year due to snow – definitely down jacket weather.  Even within a few hours, in the same day, you’re exposed to a variety of climates here. 

While we were waiting for the school children to get their chance at the telescope, Sevan’s 3 daughters - 10, 8 and 7 years old, were experts at making the time go by quickly.  They taught me a lot of new games – what are those games called when two people do the patty-cake hand clap thing?? Anyway, they taught me a ton of those games.  Then one of my favorites was this other game where you’re 5-ish people and you hold hands in a circle.  One person starts and touches one foot to the person’s next to him/her. Then that person has to move his/her foot that was touched to touch one of the feet of the person next to him/her, and it continues.  But your foot that wasn’t touched, you have to keep it in the same spot. So, basicly everyone ends up in a giant pretzel, like twister but without the board. It’s really fun. I was the one who fell first, lol.

The weather here has been gorgeous lately. The last 2-3 weeks, it’s been beautiful.  It was definitely colder in April and May when I first arrived than it is now, mid-October.  Fruits and vegetables are still abundant, I’m really surprised – pomegranates, persimmons, grapes, pumpkins are in season now.

Graduation and Guests

My friend and roommate, TJ, had her family in town this past week.  She’s graduating with her MBA from the American University of Armenia.  Her mom, dad, sister and nephew were staying with us.  So, it was a full house – 6 people – very normal for here.  And guests always stay with you.  There’s no reason, no such thing as them staying in a hotel.  Hotel’s are for tourists.  TJ’s nephew was the cutest thing ever, he’s 15 months old. He has these soft curls, huge warm eyes, and he’s cuddly as ever.  He touches everything.  He falls constantly.  He just started walking 3 weeks ago.  He loved the washing machine because it was just his height.  I looked up at one point to see his little butt sticking out, his head buried in the washing machine.  His mom says if anything ever goes missing at home, the first place she looks is the washing machine!  Unsurprisingly, he got sick though, he caught the flu and was having a hard time breathing at night.  I was soooo worried about him – I got glimpses of what it must feel like to be a mother.  I can’t even wrap my head around the amount of energy it must take to do that.  

Tj’s sister is SO kind. She’s 33, she’s very beautiful.  Her parents are great, there’s a peacefulness about the whole family.  Everyone’s comfortable in their own skin, a family of adults, everyone participating in their own way.  Her dad, he loves to work with his hands.  Somehow within the week that he stayed there, he fixed our sink in the kitchen from dripping, installed a new toilet, got our bathroom door to close properly, and probably fixed a few other things in between that I didn’t catch. 

The volunteer group currently is great.  I really feel like I have close friends here, and there’s little drama, which is super nice.  Talene’s great of course, we were basicly married for a while, especially while in mourning when we lost Amy Hunter to Philli.  Shahan’s back from Boston, basicly the most natural integration into society every – I swear he is a part OF Armenia.  Then there’s Tracy, my new friend, she’s from Maine. Tracy reminds me so much of Amy, my sister Amy. She talks like her, thinks like her, even moves her mouth in the same way sometimes. It’s really crazy.  I feel like I’m hanging out with sister at times.

Armenia’s Charm

In terms of my time here, I have less than a month left of time.  It’s crazy to think about the people who came for only 2 months.  I had a night of insomnia the night before my 2 month mark – thinking of all that I have left to do, people I want to see, reasons I came here for, etc.  Since then, I feel my time has been unwinding little by little.  I feel I’m enjoying every minute, at the same time I can’t help but begin to mentally prepare for the next steps personally and professionally - being in Michigan for the holidays, job arrangements, plans for continuing Armenian language classes in the States, buying gifts for people, business ideas, educational ideas, etc.  

I’ve planned a small stay-over in London on my way home.  I’ll visit with grad school friends there, do a bit of hostelling or couch-surfing.  I will also visit Cambridge and Oxford, as I didn’t get to see those places during the semester that I lived there in 2003. 

I think and hope that this is just the beginning of my ties here to Armenia. There’s a charm here that’s different than in the States. Things are more simple infrastructure-wise - nothing’s at the level sophistication that the US has, like government paperwork, water systems, anything.  Food preparation, agriculture, grocery shopping – these things are more simple.  Things are more complex socially, because so many different dynamics because all communication is face-to-face. 

The language works with the amount of personal interactions that people have socially.  There’s so much more emotion built into the language, creating expressions that just don’t exist in English.  There’s so much more to say on this, it’s a whole other blog post, but to describe briefly I’ll give an example.  “Tsavet tanem” means “Let me take your pain”, and it is used for anything from “You are driving in the wrong direction, let me take your pain, but you need to turn around and back-track” to little kids running through the park and using it in the midst of the games they’re playing.  It makes me see English in a different light – as a functional, business language.  English has a gracefulness about it, in that you can say things several different ways, politely, directly, implying something, etc.   There are different styles and ways to use the English language to protect you from hurting the person you’re talking to.  Everyone’s sensitive, in any culture, because we’re all human.  In Armenian, there’s emotional understanding expressions used for comforting, and there’s a cultural norm to argue, react, shout etc.  In English, there’s ways to prevent reaction, by saying something indirectly, or using euphemisms, etc.   

Anyway, this all results in a difference in relationships. I respect that it’s very different here from the States.  I notice I’m very different, and I have a very different mentality. Everyone does from the diaspora, people who lived in Canada, the US, France, England, Lebanon, Iran, Russia – everyone is a product of where they grew up. It’s really fascinating.

Bottom line is that I want to continue to go back and forth between the US and Armenia in my adult life.  But right now, I’m just taking one day at a time.

“When we read we begin with ABC. When we sing, we begin with do re mi.” When we browse we begin with HTTP.

I wrote a post for the Armenia Volunteer Corp blog yesterday, and figured I’d share it on here as well.  Enjoy! 

After I finished Grad School, in 2006, I made my first trip to Armenia with my 3rd cousin who is one of the few people in my family who speaks the Armenian language.   We were the first ones in three generations to come back to the country.  I fell in love with so many things here during that trip, and I made a few promises to myself at the same time.   I fell in love with the way that people are connected to nature and the weather, the passion that the community has for the arts, the way that everything from the colors of a dance costume to a tombstone has meaning, and the drive of the local Armenian youth that I saw.   I met countless people who speak 3+ languages, talented musicians, people hustling and ecstatic to meet me and get to know me and show me around.  This is not what you’ll find in the average U.S. city.

The 2 biggest promises I made to myself during that initial trip was to a.  come back to Armenia and volunteer, and b. learn the language so that I can speak to locals and connect with my culture one-on-one, on their own turf.  So I worked for 3 years and saved.  Now, with my stuff stacked in boxes in my parents garage, I’m living, learning and growing each day here in Armenia.  Six  months into my stay, I can easily say that this experience has been richer than I ever could have imagined it would be.

In between jumping off waterfalls, hiking through mind-blowingly beautiful gorges, asking questions to the Minister of Economy, stumbling through conversations in Armenian with local families, store attendants,  and taxi drivers, I manage to find time to dedicate 30 hours to my volunteer placement.  I quickly realized that going to work is very different here than in the States.  It’s a transfer between one form of family to the next – people care about you.  We eat lunch together around a picnic table everyday, and coffee breaks are doses of time dedicated to joking or catching up with the people around you.  This is even reflected in the vocabulary – “unkutyun” is the word for “organization or company”, and it literally translates to “friendship”, “gords-unkerner” means “co-workers” but literally translates to “work friends”.

Finding a good fit for a volunteer placement was very important to me since I’m at an early point in my professional career.  I had been working in web design for 5 years and don’t want to put the brakes on this.   At the same time, I aspire to turn my career toward an international direction… it is very important to me not to stay cooped up in the U.S. for my adult life.   So, after a bit of pro-active networking and researching, I found a perfect fit for myself with TUMO.  TUMO is an educational organization, aimed at teaching technology and art to high school students in Armenia.   TUMO embraces innovative ways of teaching and learning, and will offer a learning environment that will nurture creativity and teamwork in the student body – two things that are not available in Armenia’s current education system, still a carcass of the Soviet Era.

Web development education is taught differently at every education institution.  Just in the last 2 years, a movement to standardize the education of web development in the field has begun.  I’m involved in this movement now, in an environment so close to my heart – working to benefit Armenian kids – in Armenia!   I’m taking a brand new curriculum framework being worked on now by the movers and shakers of the web design field, and adapting it to meet the needs and vision of TUMO.   I’ve defined the skills that the students will need to learn, how those skills group together to accomplish learning goals, and I’m writing a collection of activities to teach specific skills to the student body.    Many students here will not have been exposed to computers before, and their English language skills may not be strong.   So we’re using a lot of images and visuals to teach the skills, and basic concepts to teach terminology.   We’ve visited schools and had students come in to test the activities.  I’ve gotten the chance to be a part of this innovative education project from the beginning and I’m so lucky for that.

Technology is a sector with a lot of potential in Armenia because Armenia is not rich with natural resources like other countries, so it is key to tap into the creativity of it’s people.   TUMO is investing in society’s people right now, it’s intellectual capital.   TUMO will give students the opportunity to get hands-on with technology and art, leaving them with a portfolio of work to have as their own.  Students who are inclined to continue on and compete in the digital design world will have a strong base to do so.  Others will have these skills under their belt to add value to any organization that they’re working in – be it to work on their website, produce video work to spread information, work on presentation or marketing animations, etc.  The bottom line is, my work has meaning, both for me and for students and for society.

I have to agree with what one of my fellow volunteers said when I showed him all the things we’re working on – “This is the type of work that you simply can’t find in the U.S.”   I whole-heartedly agree.  Armenia’s current social fabric offers an opportunity for a massive innovative endeavor such as TUMO.   The energy of the young high school students here are just going to eat this up.  And the actualization of this vision can thrive in the social fabric of Armenia in a way that it never could in the U.S.

Needless to say, after being here for this extended period, I’ve made more goals for myself.  My life ahead has a growing list of “to-do’s” with a flexible itinerary.  I can’t wait to drive down these new roads I’ve discovered.

Greece. Wow.

Greece was phenomenal.  We went to Athens for 4 days, Santorini for 3 and Rhodos for 3.  Ancient history is embedded all throughout Greece in the buildings, excavations, stories, etc.  We saw the posts where the Rhodos 8th wonder of the world stood, and heard the story and saw the rendition of the statue elsewhere.  It fell a while back and because it was made of bronze the people stole pieces of it and there are not enough remains left to reconstruct it from it’s original material.

The new Acropolis museum opened just this summer.  Pieces from the ancient city that were found during the construction of the metro in 2004 were on display.  There’s a glass floor where you can walk over the stone walls of the ancient ruin remains and look down into the old city.  The architecture, cleaning methods for the stone historical pieces, and excavations was the information that the museum mostly highlighted.  There’s no audio tours or tour guides yet, so the historical setting/context isn’t there unless you walk around with someone who knows it for themselves.  This is likely why entrance costs only 1 Euro at this time.  The architect is Swiss.

Santorini is like walking through a postcard.  Everything is perfect.  Rhodos, you can see more of the real life aspects, villages, locals, etc, scattered among the heaven-like beachfronts and ancient acropolis’ and gorgeous nature there.  I stayed at friend’s families places the whole time, so this is why I was able to go financially, not having to pay for accommodations.  Greece will suck up your money faster than you can blink an eye if you let it.  12 Euro for a launchair and umbrella, 6 Euro for a coffee, 3 Euro for a bus ride, the cheapest thing I saw was 1.20 Euro for a gyro on the street.

I came to understand 2 important concepts in Greek Culture.

1. The importance of “rest time”.  I fought that concept in the beginning, wanting to optimize on every minute of the day and night, but then after deciding to try this thing they call “rest”, I fell asleep within seconds of lying down for a nap at 4pm in the afternoon, rightfully, the hottest time of the day, and I never questioned it again.
2. The reason why local Greeks never order Greek food in the restaurants.  I got to taste the home-cooked meals a time or two and saw how the flavors completely blow anything in the restaurants out of the water. 

One of my favorite things we did there was swimming to the middle of a bay in the Aegean and doggy-paddling 360 degrees over and over to see the views of the beaches from afar, the rock cliffs creating the bay, the boats docked and the endless sea.  It was amazing.  My other favorite part was taking yoga shots everywhere we went.  We only got stopped once by the guards at the Acropolis in Athens telling us to take “normal pictures only”. 

Inside a family in Shushi

I saw a peaceful happiness in the Kharabaghtsi family that we stayed with.  The mother she woke up in the morning and worked hard, without complaining.  They weren’t supposed to have us as guests, it was their first time hosting volunteers from Birthright, and they accepted on the spot, when we were there at 11pm figuring out where we  were going to stay because the woman who was supposed to host our group wasn’t answering her phone.  To help, Saro, the war hero/police officer of the town who was hosting other of our volunteers, gave our “dad’s” the number of this family, and they accepted and welcomed us into their home at the very last minute.

One morning, Maria was pulling the feathers out of a turkey at 8am when I got up to go to the bathroom and get started with our day.  This was a sacrifice for her son who’d just gotten back from the army within the past month.  They’ve done one other sacrifice, and will do another bigger sacrifice later this month.  They cook the meat and then give it away to the first 7 neighbors they see as a gift.  They keep the worst parts of the animal for themselves to eat.

The table was always set when we woke up.  Maria would stay up late, wake up early, go to work at the hospital as a hashvapah (accountant) and she got little sleep.  She had a headache on Sunday, when we got home from the hike, and I gave her a massage.  She said I had completely cured her.  She said I did such a good job, that I must have done this before. Her head and neck were sooo tiny.  Her frame reminded me of dad’s sister’s body type.  Strong in mind, her body has no extra fat on it, her hands and arms and legs, they’re indicative of a woman who’s worked hard her whole life and found pleasure in it.  Talene, Tsoler and I couldn’t help but respect her, and we said to one another that we could see ourselves in her and hoped that had we been a product of her circumstances, that we’d be like her.

The girls I stayed with, their personalities felt like sisters to me.  Talene, I found out is a scorpio, so this is why we became comfortable with one another seemingly immediately.  She’s traveled abroad so much that she feels settled in everywhere she goes.  The world is her oyster, .  Tsoler is a complete sweetheart and she is happy to be here and comfortable with the differences, with the people, with the culture here, she’s taking it in, enjoying herself and not judging anyone, and teasing people along the way in a soft, loving way that ties the group together.  Our personaliites blended really well, among the three of us and our family for the time we were there.

We shared the bathroom like sisters.  There was one point where I knew these girls were my kind of girls.  They had both taken a shower the first day, I didn’t because I was comfortable and there was no need.  So the other volunteers are all comparing their bathroom facilities, and Talene and Tsoler are both describing how great ours are.  There’s a shower head, there’s a system with levels of heat, they loved it so much that the others got jealous.  When it came time for me to take my shower, I went downstairs and outside to the hut with the shower.  It was functional, it was all anyone needed.  Inside there’s the water system that’s the newest thing in there, the walls are cemented together haphazardly, the floor is uneven and broken with two or three types of cement, tile or crates, there’s flies around it, the door is a wooden door with a rickety slide lock.  There was nothing fancy about it, and nothing wrong with it.  I felt just as refreshed, if not more, from that shower than from one at a Marriot hotel.  But these girls were raving about it.  I thought that was awesome.  This is when I knew I was not with complainers, I was with girls who understood and appreciated the way people lived here in Shushi.  It made me smile.

This layer of society is about comparable to my host family in Yerevan.   Both families have just as much money as they need to get by.  There’s not usually more to spend on little luxuries.   Maria in Shushi seemed to never stop working and her family speaks calmly, intelligently.   Nairi her son is going to school to be a dentist, away from home in Yerevan, but he’s home for the summer.  He wants to come back to Shushi after his studies because it’s so beautiful and he loves it here.  Mara in Yerevan takes care of everything in the home, she’s going through the mourn of losing her husband and she takes responsibility to push the kids to study.

The difference that stands out to me between the families at this level in Yerevan and the families at this level in Shushi is this – in Shushi, they know life is hard but they want to live here, they love the mountains, they’re proud of the land, especially after the recent war, and feel happy to work hard and live on this land.  The families in Yereven, they know that life here is more difficult than life in the diaspora and they want more.   They have an idea of they luxuries of living in Europe or the UK or the US.  They seem to think that the US = wealth, they have friends who’ve moved to Los, family members who’ve lived in Georgia, Russia, etc.  They have friends who’ve lived in France where their socialist government helps families who’ve lost either the husband or the wife, they’ve seen another system that works seemingly better than the system here.  There’s a corrupt government in power now in Yerevan, and everyone knows it but doesn’t feel empowered to change it, so there’s a lot of complaining and carelessness.

It makes sense, the situations and personalities of people are all different.  Everyone will react in a slightly different way, and will have their own individual opinion.

Learn it by experiencing it

I have a lot to catch up on, and learn about.  Everyday there’s something new I hear about – history, economics, business, traditions, music, artists, languages, etc.  I have a lifetime to do it, I suppose.  I was quite protected growing up, and now I feel like a baby in comparison to the knowledge and experience of the people I’m meeting now.  It’s an entirely new form of education.  Half the time i feel like a stupid American, but try to hide it,   So, no laughing at me when I say something wrong or get my facts mixed up, cause you understand that I’m learning most of this from scratch.

I’m excited to go to Greece and see the Acropolis.  I’ve been reading a bit about the areas.  Of course we’ll vacation in the islands and see the tourist spots, but it will be neat to walk on the streets of Athens that people have walked on for 3,000 years.  The home of the philosophers Socrates, Plato, Aristotle.  Iread about the battle of Thermopylae before I left, and read about David of Sassoon here, they remind me of the David and Goliath story of the Bible.  They each have similar themes.  Although the Greeks didn’t win out in the end of the Battle of Thermopylae, which is disappointing to me, but I guess doesn’t take away from the significance of the story.  I guess I have the American romantic Hollywood expectation of a happy ending lingering with me, this, I’ve had to chuck out the window.

Another conversation at lunch today was about the museums in England and France housing sphinks and jewels and riches from the rest of the world that they stole during their imperialist eras.  It’s human nature, and if it wouldn’t have been Britain or France, it’d have been the Ottoman Empire or Persian Empire, etc.  It’s just a matter of what the leaders end up doing with what they steal, and how they end up treating the people.  But in the end, it’s just a globe full of people trying to impose their own ideas on another group of people, in a game for power.

The idea that the ancient Greek kingdom was the birthplace of democracy is fascinating to me too.  I see how the philosophers ideas ring true today, in treating people as their own individuals, etc.  It makes me think how Greece had it’s glory, and had a combination of religion, philosophy and social structure.  Armenia has been an early adopter of religion but has not adopted or effectively implemented a social structure in it’s history, which is why it’s land continues to get stolen.  However, it is a morsel of a good-hearted culture in a region that is the cortex of a mix of soooo many different cultures, religions, languages, traditions, etc.

The distance that people in the US have from this history helps me to understand why young people aren’t interested in this type of thing in school, or going to museums etc.  It’s something that if you read about in a book, it’s not as interesting, but if you see things, experience things, listen to stories, etc, you’re much more likely to understand the significance and impacts of things, and it sparks interest.  It’s like the theory of the activities we’re putting together for the Tumo project here in Yerevan.  They want the kids to experience the art, get hands on, experience technology, try things out and makes sense of it on their own.  Turn it into a game, have the students make their own color theme, translate the webpage into Armenian or Russian to read it, type in an IP address in the url bar, then the URL address and see how the same webpage appears.  This type of thing, just like how grandpa would have us throw the laundry down the laundry shoot, then run down the stairs and see where it ended up.

I guess it’s all about learning and seeing for yourself.  Processing it in your own individual way.

3 month mark: I’m clearly adapting

The fact that I only just now, 2 hours later, even *thought* about *trying* to pay while sitting next to a Yerevantsi guy clearly indicates how adapted I’ve become over these last 3 months… You’re not in the Kansas anymore

It sure is amazing how one adapts.  I’ve been getting these little bulb realizations lately, left and right, after the fact.  I think I’ve hit a turning point in this experience.

Another one is leaving the last bite in a plate in the middle of the table (all meals are served family style here).  You just don’t take the last bite.  It’s the “bite of shame”.  So, today I assumed we were finished with the tabouli instinctually.  My friend who’s been here a week, looked at me like I was crazy when I asked if we were done.  “No there’s one more really good serving in there”.   I look down and, yes, of course there is.  I had essentially blocked it out as off limits to the point where I didn’t consciously see that last bite.

In terms of adapting, I think the important thing is not to impose outside norms on a place that already has it’s own norms. But instead open dialogue about the modes of operatum, and adopt what works and makes sense in each situation.

Hearing statistics in isolation such as “thousands of kids don’t go to school in Armenia because they don’t have shoes” is something that’s hard to understand. But when you get in the context of the situation, it makes more sense. Of course they don’t have shoes. It’s hard for me to find appropriate shoes here living in the capital city and in a financially stable situation, comparably. So, families living in the village with difficult access to stores and enough money to buy food but not save, this has become a norm. The context is that there’s a sense of community, helping one another, relationships and caring for one another that is also a norm.

In the end, we’re all human, we’re all impressionable, and we’re all products of our environment.

Traits that persist through the generations

There are a lot of things here that I notice have persisted through 3 generations of our family.  Keep in mind the Armenian side of my family has been living in the US for over a hundred years.

Giving Gifts

Giving gifts is incredible here, just like my mom who has closets full of “treasures” for gifts for people.  At home in Michigan, I don’t have to go to the stores if I’m in need of a house-warming gift, wrapping paper, bows, etc.  I say one word, i.e. Phil’s having the group over for a Christmas dinner, and mom appears within 5 minutes with several options that she pulled out from who knows where in the house.

If I didn’t stop my host family, they’d give me their whole house and everything in it.  Tatig is preparing apricot jams and juices for when my family arrives, and everyday she says a bigger number of how many jars she will give us.  I will only let them accept 2, in the end.  She offers to sew me a new purse, try on their whole closet for the wedding, etc etc.  Mara, my host mom runs to the kitchen with laundry detergent in hand when she hears me put a load in, she pulls out bobbypins when she sees me playing with my new haircut in the mirror…  Walking down the street yesterday there was a man holding a flower on the corner of the street, as I walked by he handed it to me and said something related to “for you”, and he went on his way and me, mine.  Never seen him before.

Getting the best deal

At family holidays and gatherings, there’s always the topic of the latest deal you’ve gotten – you won’t believe this jersey I found, it was 50% off then 25% offf then 10% off of that – and it’s not only mom, everyone finds excitement in this.

There’s flower shops on every corner in Armenia, but Mara and Toma went to the street of the best quality flowers for the lowest price to get the dozens of roses they needed for the family gathering.   It’s the same with fruits.   They’re EVERYWHERE, and tsiron are generally 300 AMD a kilo.  I found myself in 3rd Mass district of Yerevan, only to be completely surrounded by fruit vendors for blocks and blocks and blocks.  I was in amazement.  The prices here were 100 AMD per kilo, and they were the sweetest tsiron I’ve tasted.

The clothes and shoes here are either super expensive or cheap. The cheap ones are either good quality and hard to find, or low quality and not so cute. But I did find a cute pair of wild ballerina shoes that the girls in Gyumri bought! They’re bringing them for me this weekend so we’ll all be matching, haha

Shouting across the house

Mom will ask us from upstairs to bring something from the garage to her when we’re in the living room.  Armen, from Montreal says his mom does the same thing.  In my host family here, this happens all the time…  Hrach you’re in the kitchen, bring me the kitchen towel, I need it to wipe down the table… Toma, make us some coffee, there’s 4 of us drinking…

Arts and Crafts

For those of you who know my mom, this is a no brainer how crafty she is – painting walls, painting shirts, coming up with kindergarden activity ideas, wrapping gifts, making candles, bracelets, scrapbooks….  This is everywhere here – my host aunt makes jewelry, host grandma sews dresses, she took me through her closet and everything in there was handmade.  She saw a skirt of mine once last week, and shows up today with a brand new version of it in a dress form for my host sister…

It’s amazing the habits or traits that thread through 100 years.

I’ve come across some very charactered individuals

The people who are successful here are very charactered individuals.  Aram yesterday was talking about the effects of this lack of a system, where the people on the street are helping one another. It’s good that people want to help, but when they don’t know the best way to help, it’s not good.  The people who stand out to me here are the successful people who have this honesty and level of experience with not only their profession, but with real life.

Sevan, Raphi at VivaCell, Pegor Papazian, Tom Samuelian, Mika & Aram… they’ve all got this understanding of the challenges around them, have accepted it, and are living within it doing what they can to improve it.  The other characteristics I notice in each of these people is their calmness, patience, ability to clearly communicate in order to work through problems, leadership in allowing people to make their own individual decisions.  I’m lucky to have them as role models here.

They notice where their work fits in with the rest of society because they’re close to it.  There’s an understanding of why they’ve decided not to register their company as a legal company, how the communist mentality effected the people around them, how history and government and religion effect the fabric of the culture today, how the cheating to rise up in government will always exist as it’s human nature, how stealing among the population will exist, how rude drivers can be frustrating and disrespect for the walking signs can be frustrating, but that these things can change little by little when people lead by example, one situation at a time.

It’s like they’ve been rubbed with difficult situations, and this has shined the diamond and made them stronger and more respectable people.  I have a lot of respect for these people.

The Birthright experience: a crash course on sociology through the lens of Armenian society

Birthright arranges a forum each week to get exposure to an aspect of society here.  This week happened to be a big one – Minister of Economy, Minister of Defense, Army initiation ceremony for 18 year olds, and an art museum all in one day.  Next week’s forum is with two leaders in the IT industry.  We’ve also toured VivaCell headquarters here, the leading phone company with 80% of the market share here, opened only 5 years ago, and doing clean business in a transparent way.  We meet with youth groups, lawyers, Tumo lead a forum here for Birthright volunteers, we’ve met with NGO’s, that type of thing.  It’s an amazing way to “travel”.

We met with the Minister of Economy yesterday – it seems he’s got some initiatives in IT, small business, entreprenuerial initatives, and tourism… people are still frustrated though with the lack of efficiency, lack of jobs, yet so much to get done.  But then you look at how much has changed and how fast things have changed since the Soviet times… the construction that’s been built, education had to do a 180, Armenia’s society was left and abandoned after the Soviet Empire fell.  There was a fallout in ‘91 after independence.  Electricity was hard to get, so people didn’t have heat in the winter.  In response to this, people cut down forests in the north leading to deforestation, thus leading to the laws now that you’re not allowed to cut down trees even for the Christmas season.  Not that everyone follows the laws, but you know.  The internet cafes, restaurants, tourism companies… these are all new and built after independence.  There’s still a legacy of the communism mentality.  For 70 years, people didn’t get rewarded for working harder and so there was a laziness and sense of defeatism that developed.  You had the basics, but you don’t have what you feel you deserve, nor do you feel you can earn more in a fair way.  So people wait to be given more, try to share with their neighbors or steal from their neighbors or cover up to their neighbors so as not show that they have more than their neighbors…

Anyway, the conversations I’m having here are really interesting.  There’s a guy at work who reminds me of grandpa where he doesn’t mind talking and describing and teaching and repeating things, he enjoys it. I learn a lot from him.  Then of course the volunteers, they’re from this layer of society where some have lived in 2-3-4 countries, know 2-3-4 languages, know politics and basic human nature and basic economics, business, arts and culture like the backs of their hands.   I’m exposed to so many things I’ve never even heard of before in my life here… Che Gueverra, Charles Aznavour, Neighborhood Agreement, of course names of regions, presidents, leaders, cities, warriors, etc, movies, words or phrases in Armenian, French, Russian, Persian, Spanish…  So, my mind is completely expanding, it’s a huge challenge but a really rewarding one.

Using your Talents

I heard a funny joke:

An Armenian went to France and came back and said – I couldn’t believe how many Armenians there are in France, France is full of Armenians!  Everyone says “Merci” to me!

I haven’t written much about my work here so it’s a good time to start – I tried to tie my volunteer work in with my “career”.  I‘m working on writing activities for an education program here, called Tumo,  that will teach kids how to do web design; a high school-aged, Armenian version of my MA program.  Progress on the web design activity writing is kept on this website - this is where I work to polish up ideas and combinations of tasks for the students.  You can also find info on the mission of the program here.

At times, it’s a bit slow because there’s no one to put pressure on me, or push me to my limits; my pace and productivity depends on my own motivation.  It’s a very different style of work from the “grind”-like environment you get in the States, and creates a completely different environment.  It’s softer, slower, take it easy, sort of pace and environment.  There’s more vacation time, people are in and out.  Resting and exceptions for family events are respected.  As I said in an earlier post, you’re moving from one form of “family/friends” to another, at work.  Everyone has something in common, that you’re Armenian…

I want to travel to other countries and see some things and explore – and use Armenia as my home base.   Here, my life is starting to take form.  This is nice, because I will get the most out of the experience this way.  I have a great language teacher, she’s got a passion for teaching that is hard to come by – “I’m going to conqwer the world!” she says to me about spreading the news about her Armenian language book that she released last year!  I’ve made so many friends here, and it’s only been 3 months.  I love that I can walk down the street in the city and occasionally run across people I know, to say hello.  This makes me feel like a “Yerevantsi”.

I had a detox period for a bit, adjusting from the mentality in the States, and really in the last month have I begun to sink

into the culture.  It’s mind-opening.  Some of the things that are different are the closeness you have to people – in the States

I learned to be careful what you say, be cautious to be consistent.  Here, you say what you think, there’s a kindness mixed with being direct.  In personal interactions, people are comfortable socially and put in effort to make sure others are comfortable.  When I arrived, I was whisked around the city to barbeques, invitations to people’s houses, concerts, coffees, university student meetings, scouts groups – I honestly met about 200 people face to face, “hi my name is Mandy” type meeting people, in the first 2-3 weeks.

The thing about my career choice is that I’m not sure how much impact it has on people’s lives. I want to do something that is meaningful to society – to satiate my flower child inside of me.  I appreciate the talent and arts in the culture. Armenia especially cherishes the painters, writers, poets, singers, this type of thing that enriches life and that is unique to each person. I want to find my strongest talents and use them to their fullest. At the same time, I want to optimize on all the effort and work I’ve put into my education and career thus far…

I met a woman yesterday who commented that she left her media career behind her after coming here and worked primarily in NGO’s and the non-profit sector. She doesn’t regret any of it, but in hindsight she realizes she could have linked the two and utilized her past experience more so than she did in leaving it behind.  This urge to do something meaningful, I can relate to with her story.  And I want to be smart about it and learn from her experiences as well.

As far as web design goes, I am passionate about getting information out to people in a creative way.  This is why I love working in the Internet & Technology field, because this is the new form of education in the Information Age we live in.  This is also why I love working in education, and why I love learning and experiencing new things myself, thus traveling.

But as far as business & making money, etc -how does this directly relate to life, to helping people?  It seems to remove you from life, on the contrary.  I think it’s important to keep the economy going so that people can live life, but the living life is the important part – learning about culture, appreciating the arts, connecting with people, exploring nature, learning recipes, discussing history, politics, family.   Feeling the joys and the pains, and using your talents to move something in this world forward.  This is why I love working hard, being efficient and productive.  And naturally, I want to be rewarded for this effort – thus business.  So, maybe I’m attracted to business more than I think…