"Was it easy to adjust to life in Armenia?"
It was much harder when I emigrated from Lebanon to Canada. Then, I got the feeling that my personal value dropped somewhere across the oceans. No Canadian experience meant no working experience. Took a couple of years to overcome the urge to quit, to adjust.
It was much easier this time. We were coming from a technologically advanced country to a less developed country. Also, we created our own jobs, did not go through the whole local-experience tragic/comedy black drama.
Have I adjusted to life in Armenia? After five years in Armenia, I know there are certain values to which I won't adjust. Like Women issues.
As soon as we start discussing women issues: like getting higher paying jobs for women, pay equity, more women involvement in decision making processes, women in politics, the 'F' word is slapped to our faces. 'F' standing for Feminism and being dirtier than the four letter word.(Step two) It will be mentioned that foreigner (whores) are bringing their own dirty values to Armenia and these issues will be aligned with homosexuality and globalization. (Step three) It will be followed by phrases like 'traditional values' and the traditional role of the Armenian woman and the Armenian man in the family: woman's place being in the kitchen, taking care of the kids; man's place supporting the family and in politics. (The traditional Armenian family unit is under threat.)
An Armenian queen built the two monasteries in the North: Haghpad and Sanahin, after her husband's death. She dedicated them to her two sons. She also ruled the country.
Another princess sponsored the building of 40 monasteries and churches including Arakelotz church on Sevan island; they were spiritual, religious and educational centers of the time.
A mother queen (Gandzasar) gave up her status, her richness to the poor, and went to Jerusalem. As a pilgrim she lived by making needlework. embroidery and by alms given to her.
An Armenian Cilician queen, Zabel, whose first husband was imprisoned, did not enter the bed of her second husband for many years. It was a forced marriage to keep the kingdom in a Nationalistic Armenian family. She also used to wear ordinary citizen's clothes and leave the palace at night to help the poor and the ill.
Current day, the Armenian woman is beautiful, conscious of her appearance, hard working, intelligent, educated and responsible for the education of her kids and the kids of the nation.
In healthcare and education, more than 83 percent of employees are women, yet when it comes to administration women in these two fields have less than 13 percent representation.
She's also less paid, less involved in decision making process, more submissive.
60 percent of women in Armenia have highest education (meaning university degrees), though the average income of women is 48 percent of the average income of men.
Registered unemployed figures: men make 35.6 percent of which 37.5 has highest education; women make 64.4 percent of which 62.5 has highest education.
1918-1921 women had voting powers in Armenia and five percent representation in the parliament; today the figures are the same.
When did we mess up our traditional values? The Armenian queens were more liberated, they knew what they wanted, they were strong and made decisions for themselves and the country, they were feminists before the word existed.
Did we change when Yerevan was a war zone between Turks and Iranians for two hundred years?
Was it Soviet times?
For the past century (if not longer) patriarchal and matriarchal family units have coexisted in our society. I will explain: in the last fifteen years because of the war we lost more than seven thousand (mostly men), a million left the country (more men than women), and many job-seeking husbands left to foreign countries not to return; in the II WW three thousand Armenians died, and in 1915 survivors of the Genocide were more kids and women.
We've had it with each generation, but the fact has not registered in our conscious.
Traditional values change; they're not the same as moral values.
As a country we've got many issues to resolve and need collective strategy thinking and involvment of both sexes. We can't afford to keep more than fifty percent of population away from statebuilding procedures.
It was much harder when I emigrated from Lebanon to Canada. Then, I got the feeling that my personal value dropped somewhere across the oceans. No Canadian experience meant no working experience. Took a couple of years to overcome the urge to quit, to adjust.
It was much easier this time. We were coming from a technologically advanced country to a less developed country. Also, we created our own jobs, did not go through the whole local-experience tragic/comedy black drama.
Have I adjusted to life in Armenia? After five years in Armenia, I know there are certain values to which I won't adjust. Like Women issues.
As soon as we start discussing women issues: like getting higher paying jobs for women, pay equity, more women involvement in decision making processes, women in politics, the 'F' word is slapped to our faces. 'F' standing for Feminism and being dirtier than the four letter word.(Step two) It will be mentioned that foreigner (whores) are bringing their own dirty values to Armenia and these issues will be aligned with homosexuality and globalization. (Step three) It will be followed by phrases like 'traditional values' and the traditional role of the Armenian woman and the Armenian man in the family: woman's place being in the kitchen, taking care of the kids; man's place supporting the family and in politics. (The traditional Armenian family unit is under threat.)
An Armenian queen built the two monasteries in the North: Haghpad and Sanahin, after her husband's death. She dedicated them to her two sons. She also ruled the country.
Another princess sponsored the building of 40 monasteries and churches including Arakelotz church on Sevan island; they were spiritual, religious and educational centers of the time.
A mother queen (Gandzasar) gave up her status, her richness to the poor, and went to Jerusalem. As a pilgrim she lived by making needlework. embroidery and by alms given to her.
An Armenian Cilician queen, Zabel, whose first husband was imprisoned, did not enter the bed of her second husband for many years. It was a forced marriage to keep the kingdom in a Nationalistic Armenian family. She also used to wear ordinary citizen's clothes and leave the palace at night to help the poor and the ill.
Current day, the Armenian woman is beautiful, conscious of her appearance, hard working, intelligent, educated and responsible for the education of her kids and the kids of the nation.
In healthcare and education, more than 83 percent of employees are women, yet when it comes to administration women in these two fields have less than 13 percent representation.
She's also less paid, less involved in decision making process, more submissive.
60 percent of women in Armenia have highest education (meaning university degrees), though the average income of women is 48 percent of the average income of men.
Registered unemployed figures: men make 35.6 percent of which 37.5 has highest education; women make 64.4 percent of which 62.5 has highest education.
1918-1921 women had voting powers in Armenia and five percent representation in the parliament; today the figures are the same.
When did we mess up our traditional values? The Armenian queens were more liberated, they knew what they wanted, they were strong and made decisions for themselves and the country, they were feminists before the word existed.
Did we change when Yerevan was a war zone between Turks and Iranians for two hundred years?
Was it Soviet times?
For the past century (if not longer) patriarchal and matriarchal family units have coexisted in our society. I will explain: in the last fifteen years because of the war we lost more than seven thousand (mostly men), a million left the country (more men than women), and many job-seeking husbands left to foreign countries not to return; in the II WW three thousand Armenians died, and in 1915 survivors of the Genocide were more kids and women.
We've had it with each generation, but the fact has not registered in our conscious.
Traditional values change; they're not the same as moral values.
As a country we've got many issues to resolve and need collective strategy thinking and involvment of both sexes. We can't afford to keep more than fifty percent of population away from statebuilding procedures.
posted by Nigol at 10:34 AM
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