A special meeting

In one of my previous logs I mentioned Hein Tolboom, a Dutch guy currently working for a human rights NGO in Nagorno-Karabagh, and his weblog. Right now, this post is the last one on the page. Anyway, Hein wrote in his weblog about a seminar he recently attended in Tsaghkadzor organized by the Helsinki Citizen's Assembly office in Yerevan. This seminar was special, because apart from four Dutch people, two Georgians and about 15 Armenians, 4 young people from Azerbaijan also attended it.

Apparently the participants engaged in heated debates about their countries and the conflict surrounding Kharabagh, with one Armenian guy even looking back as far as ancient Roman and Greek writers for support! These discussions made it clear to 'outsider' Hein that both countries and peoples have hugely different views on the region's history. Hein writes, that for the majority of the Armenian participants, this was the first time ever they met an Azeri in person. Hein quotes one of the Armenian participants as saying: "I never expected to be able to sit and talk so peacefully and without aggression during my first meeting with an Azeri. I will keep very good memories [of this event] and I exchanged email-addresses with (...) Azeris. I am looking forward to toasting with Armenian cognac together with our Azerbaijani friends in Baku."

Hein notes how the participants from Azerbaijan were constantly followed by two men from the Armenian secret security. They had only limited freedom of movement and had to always ask permission before going somewhere. Officially, all these measures were necessary to secure the Azeris' own security, but basically it was done mostly to secure the Armenians' security.

The Missing Word

I spent some days in Spitak catching up with some friends, but mainly to celebrate the birthdays of my Armenian "nephews" Tigran and Armen. Tigran turned 9 on Sunday, Armen 8 on Monday. They are my best friends' nephews (her brother's children). Both kids are crazy about me (the feeling is mutual :-) ), and by now they have started calling me aunt. But because we couldn't find a suitable Armenian word for aunt, they are using the Russian word tyotya. Like the English word aunt (and as far as I know its equivalent in all other languages) , tyotya doesn't specify the origin of the 'aunt-ness', whereas the available Armenian words for aunt all express the origin of the relationship. Horaqujr literally means father's sister and is obviously only used for the aunts of father's side. Moraqujr in the same way means mother's sister and is used accordingly.

So despite Armenian being such a rich language, there is one word missing (or maybe two, the one for a biologically unrelated uncle-like person as well). Does anyone know of an Armenian word that could be used in such circumstances, to express that someone is considered as a relative without biologically being one? For my friend's parents (Tigran and Armen's grandparents) it is easy, they just call me their youngest daughter, for my friend I am her sister, but for the kids we haven't found an (Armenian) solution yet.

A night in the village

Earlier today I came back from a visit to Rada and Elada and their family (I previously wrote about them here and here). I stayed overnight and again I came back with a big bag filled with fruit and vegetables from their own garden. No matter how hard I refused, they insisted on paying my busfare back to Yerevan as well.....Again I had a very good time with them, with lots of laughing, talking, eating, drinking. I was thrilled to see how much progress Elada had made since I last saw her, she was able to walk short distances with support of her mom. Apart from all the fun we had, I also learned more about their situation, their history. The better I get to know this group of women, the more I like and respect them. They have such a history behind them and gone through so much hardship, from bad marriages with crappy husbands to moving from Baku to Uzbekistan and back and eventually to Armenia, trying to set up a new live here, facing unemployment, corruption, a non-cooperative state, and to top it all off, Elada's accident.

As I wrote in one of my previous logs about this family, they were able to move out of the dormitory / kommunalka / obshezhitie to a borrowed house at the edge of the village. They will spend the winter in their two small rooms in the dormitory again, though, because it is easier (and cheaper) to heat those rooms. Last night they showed me their place in the dorm (where theyhave to live with five or six people, Rada's mother has a separate room on the second floor). It was probably the most depressing living quarters I have seen in Armenia: rundown, noisy, with electrical wires hanging from the ceiling and sticking out of the walls, old furniture given to them by a friend from the village, a separate kitchen and bathroom to be used by all the families on their floor and with the local youth (guys) hanging around in the stairwells bored to death because there is nothing to do. Apparently, Rada, her sister Gayane and their mother are entitled to certificates and/or money from the state to be used to buy a house. However, all they would get is about $400 each, which is obviously far from enough to buy even a small one-room shed in a faraway corner of Armenia!!

Another problem they face is Elada's education. She is obviously unable to attend school due to her condition, but she really wants to and she should - she is too bright not to. However, the school director told the family, that they have to pay money in order to get books for Elada to study at home; they'd still have to pay even if they only borrow the books. Last year Elada's best friend came over to their house after school to study with her so she wouldn't fall behind. I guess, they'll have to come up with a similar solution this year, as they obviously don't have money to spare for this. Besides, even if they would, I have a feeling Rada's pride would prevent her from paying anyway! These are just two examples of the problems that the family faces. Most of their problems seem to involve corrupt officials who are trying to take advantage of their situation and refugee-status.

Gayane told me how they don't feel welcome in this country, that they are treated like second-rate citizens by the authorities and by part of the population and are not able to receive what they are entitled to by the state. In addition, especially Gayane suffers from a language problem. Before coming here, the family had never lived in Armenia, they had always lived in Baku or Uzbekistan where they would generally communicate in Russian (or Azeri). As a result, Gayane never learned to speak Armenian well. She only started learning after the family arrived here. By now she understands the language fairly well and can manage speaking Armenian, but she is still far from fluent. She told me how she often encounters a hostile attitude in shops for example, both when she speaks Russian ("This is Armenia, you are Armenian. Speak Armenian!") and when she speaks Armenian ("This is Armenia, you are Armenian. Speak Armenian better / fluently!").

Despite everything these people remain so incredibly optimistic: "Everything will be better. If you compare how we live now with how we used to live when we just arrived in Armenia, we are doing much better now." I have nothing but respect for the way they manage and the way they keep their spirits up. I think that in the end this will pull them through.

While talking with the women, I realized the refugees from Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabagh have something in common with many of the people who survived the 1988 earthquake in the north of Armenia. For both groups adjusting to the new, post-Soviet circumstances has been particularly painful and difficult as both groups lost almost everything they had and had to start from scratch again, often having to "learn" or adapt a completely different way of living. Which, by the way, is not to discredit the hardships of other people and other parts of the population.

0-1

This was the final score of yesterday's football match Armenia-Holland. I am not going to give you a review of the match itself, there are other places for that. Suffice it to say that the Dutch didn't play that well, they were kind of expectd to win by a larger margin (the Dutch newspaper-sites I checked today were rather negative). As in the previous match between the two teams in March in Holland, Armenian goalkeeper Roman Berezovsky played very well.

My boyfriend and I went to the match together with Sanne and Marieke, the two Dutch "Bem-girls" (yes, Onnik: we finally met! ;-) ). When we were walking towards the stadium and we kept passing all these Dutch fans who were talking Dutch, the three of us got a very weird feeling: all of a sudden we were able to understand what people were saying around us (well, I understand Armenian as well, but this was obviously different) and -worse!- we had to watch what we were saying, because they would be able to understand us. I guess there have never been this many Dutch people in Armenia at the same time! The stadium itself was less than half full. One of the Dutch newspapers picked up on this, saying this was due to the high ticket prices, though they mentiond 12 euro as being the price of the cheapest ticket, whereas in fact it was the price of the most expensive ticket (they were sold for 6000, 5000 and 3000 drams). However, even 3000 drams for a ticket is a price many Armenians cannot afford.

In the stadium we were sitting among the Armenia-supporters. We met Armenians from Holland, Iraq, Vienna, Lebanon. There were even some Lebanese-Armenians who had come to Armenia especially for this match! In the stadium we also ran into many Armenian friends. During the match Sanne, Marieke and I got some text-messages and phone calls from Holland, asking where exactly we were sitting (nice seats behind the Dutch bench, if you happened to see a banner saying "Sanne groet thuis" - that was us). At one point Sanne got a text-message from Holland saying that their tv-screens went black, apparently there was a temporary problem transmitting the images. We obviously had a big laugh about that!

I am not a football-fanatic, nor am I very nationalistic or chauvinistic or particularly attached to Holland. So before the match, I wasn't 100% supporting Holland, part of me was also rooting for Armenia, I guess it was about 50-50. The Dutch would win anyway, but I wanted the Armenians to play a good match. However, once the match started, I noticed that the 50-50 percentage changed dramatically in favor of the Dutch. ;-) Knowing myself (or at least I thought I did...), I didn't really expect that to happen. I didn't think I would be yelling and rooting for the Dutch and waving the Dutch flag the way I did. I guess I am not as Armenian as my Armenian friends keep telling me. ;-)

After the match we went for a drink and a bite and my boyfriend and I went to Monte Christo for a while before heading home and getting to bed at five in the morning. I woke up today with a hangover and a lack of sleep, so I am taking it very easy. My boyfriend had to go to work today (he is really suffering now!), but he just called me that he had his one big dream fulfilled: before the Dutch team left their hotel this afternoon, he managed to get a picture of him and Marco van Basten, the Dutch national coach and one of the legends of Dutch football and my boyfriend's hero in a way. A good end to a fun weekend!

Okay, I'm off to the kitchen now to make myself some more coffee.

Rock & Football

I just came back from Republic Square, where I listened to some of the bands playing at Rock 'n' People. Bambir rocked! I had never seen them live, but I had heard that they are very good. It was so nice to hear some good rock music played in public instead of the usual rabiz, Russian and Armenian pop.

Two minutes after I came home, my boyfriend rushed in from work to collect his gear (read: his orange hat and jacket, Dutch flag and a camera) and off he was again to the public training of the Dutch football team. To get things straight: my boyfriend is not Dutch, I am. But in spirit he is much Dutcher than I am and he has been a fan of the Dutch football team for twenty years or so. So you can imagine how thrilled he is that he finally has the chance to see them play tomorrow. He looked hilarious and very happy at the same time wearing his Dutch fan-outfit. He is having the time of his life!