A bit late, I know
WARNING: This is faaaaaar too long because I haven't had the time to post yet. Read as much as you like and comment on whatever aspect you like.
This post has been a long time coming, I realize. I arrived Thursday night and since Friday have been out and about nearly every day. We returned from our overnight trip to Spitak last night. Before that I was only able to check my e-mail once before. We were using the computers of the Menua tour operators in the hotel lobby. The girls who work there are a lot of fun. I just got back from lunch with them.
A few observations before I launch into all that we've done since we started filming on Monday:
* My understanding of Eastern Armenian is slowly getting better, but I still can't speak a lick no matter how much I try.
* I don't mind cigarette smoke all that much, but I'm sick of smelling like stale cigarettes. In the morning, when I wash my hair, I can smell the cigarettes in the steam as I wash off the tobacco. Blech. Just sitting here in the Internet cafe with three smokers in a 20-by-20 foot room, I feel like I'm choking. Arg.
* It's DAMN cold and it seems people still never really got used to that cold. Or so some locals have told me. After all these years, you'd think they'd be more accustomed.
* Visiting in the summer is a totally different experience, somewhat akin to going to camp. You see familiar faces, etc. The winter brings to mind an idea of what it must have been like in Soviet times. The grim cold, the dark overcast skies; it all seems so depressing. But now, with Internet on every corner, every kind of restaurant imaginable (there are now THREE sushi bars), it's a totally different world.
After nearly 24 hours of traveling I arrived in Yerevan on Thursday night. Landing at Zvartnots Airport feels a bit like being in on a secret. Some get misty-eyed, others cheer. It’s more complicated for me. This land, our land, is more than just the mother country. It’s like returning to history, like slipping into an era unknown to most in the world.
Stepping off the plane I braced myself for a blast of bitter cold. Instead, the fresh, crisp air of Hayastan greeted me. It was like I could breathe again.
As I made my way through customs and out the door, Harry was standing outside smiling. He hugged me, kissed my cheek and said, “We’re in Hayastan, cousin.” It feels good to be back.
Friday, Dec. 3
A sleepless journey allowed me a good first night’s rest. I slept for nine solid, restful hours. Stumbling out of bed I made my way to the westward-facing window in my sixth-floor room at the Ani Plaza Hotel. Harry had told me we have a view of Ararat, but I didn’t expect much. The peaks are usually shrouded in a thick layer of fog and clouds, hidden just behind the Turkish border. Carefully I pulled back the curtains and through the old Soviet-era buildings there she stood; the peak of Big Ararat and just through the clouds a glimpse of a more bashful Small Ararat. Perfect.
Armenians describe Ararat in their own words. Some call it a “hars,” or bride. I like to think of the two peaks as the grandparents I never knew. The big peak represents my grandfathers, imposing, intimidating and mythic. At their side, is Eleeza, my father’s mother; a bit more graceful and removed, but no less majestic or mysterious.
In the afternoon, Harry took me to see Arthur Grigorian, director of Armenia’s State Musical Theater. We took a taxi to an old building next to Vernissage. Taking an elevator up to the theater’s office, we walked into a smaller office where nearly 20 singers were cramped into a room only slighter bigger than my bedroom. They shared the space with a baby grand piano, a desk, a table and now, the two of us who were there to watch them rehearse.
Arthur sat at the desk, a cigarette in one hand and a bottle of Jermuk filled with cognac at his side. He ordered two glasses to pour us our own shots. And they sang with the joie de vivre you would expect from a five-year-old who doesn’t have a care in the world. These singers are young – all 16, 17, 18 years old, even a pair who couldn’t have been more than 11. They commit themselves to their art no matter what circumstances they face.
Armenia is a familiar place. It’s home in many respects, but for me there is still a sense of being an outsider, of not understanding the hardships my brothers and sisters have endured. It’s more gray than black and white. At dinner with a friend who spends several months of the year here, I began to understand what it means.
“I feel like I’m finally a part of something,” he said.
Saturday, Dec. 4
Armine is just what I imagined her to be; serious and rational, but good-humored and good-hearted. She is strong and strong-willed and an Armenian woman of character and stature.
Sitting at a teahouse on Sayat Nova, I began to get a taste for Armine’s story.
A doctor, Armine is also fighting off a cold. She’s determined to be well for the shoot, which begins Monday. She ordered a tea and nibbled on some of the snacks we ordered for ourselves. Her figure is slight. It’s clear she eats lightly. But there is a determination in her eyes that makes it clear she is no stuffed suit. She is all substance and thought.
Some of the things I’ve learned about her story so far:
• Now 30, Armine was 14 the day of the earthquake.
• She was on the third floor of a sewing factory when the ground began to shake. Suddenly, looking up, she saw the clear sky and realized the building was literally coming apart.
• She and a friend were standing near a machine that both saved their lives, but also crushed her leg and arm.
• Her sister, 8-year-old Christina, was crushed in the girls’ school. Their father went to search for his daughter and knew her fate when he saw her shoes lying in a pile of rubble.
• Armine was quickly sent to Yerevan, where her leg was amputated. Three days later, she and her mother were flown to Moscow for further treatment. She remained there for three months.
• One month after returning to Armenia, Armine was flown to Los Angeles alone. Her mother stayed behind. Going from a communist country to the west for the first time was a terrifying experience, she said. “It was a totally different world,” she said.
That was just the first cursory interview. More will come to light in the next week. We leave for Spitak tomorrow at 1 p.m. and will stay overnight in Vanadzor. For Tuesday’s anniversary of the earthquake we’ll be in Spitak for memorial services and to meet Armine’s parents. We’ll spend the rest of the week following Armine’s daily life.
Sunday Dec. 5 was a day of rest. We saw some friends. Went to Pizza H.T. The "U" is missing, maybe for fear of a copyright lawsuit. We surmised it to stand for "Hye Tad," Armenian for the Armenian cause. I like that explanation better. They even had a salad bar, albeit with several kinds of mayonnaisey Russian salads. I should've just had the pizza.
Monday, Dec. 6
We head to Spitak around 1 p.m. After a brief stop for a burst water pipe, we were on our way again. We got to Armine's parents house around 4 p.m., after filming some of the city center. Red and white carnations were for sale on nearly every corner for the next day's ceremonies.
After an initial interview with Armine's parents, where they related their experiences of Dec. 7, 1988, we head to Vanadzor and the hotel, where we'd spend the night.
I should mention that we were a group of 9, 10 with Armine. Me, Harry, two chauffeurs (one minivan, one SUV), Mike Agyan (who heads the crew) and his staff of a sound guy, a camera technician and two crane operators. Yes, a crane. A 21-foot one to be exact, which they used to film the city. And yes, after dropping Armine off, I was the only female left in the group. Suffice to say, dinner was interesting.
Tuesday, Dec. 7
We pick up Armine, her father Madzo and brother Garik in the morning and head to the site where the factory Armine was visiting that morning once stood. Now there sits an empty plaza with a large monument. Off to one side is a large boulder, the only remaining rock from that three-story sewing factory.
The air was cold on Tuesday (at least -5 celsius), but the sky was bright and clear, just as it was 16 years ago, Armine tells us. In fact, the weather was unsuually warm in 1988. Earthquake weather, we call it, now an omenous symboli for Spitak-tsis.
From there we went to a khachkar (stone in the shape of a cross), where the clergy said a prayer and several wreaths were laid. Few people were out. We were told the numbers grow less and less every year. Even fewer were at the church for a short service. Maybe 30 in all.
Most spend the morning at the cemetery. The road to the cemetery, which sits on a hill overlooking the city, is packed. Everywhere you turn, gravestones are marked with "1988." The faces inscribed on those gravestones are stoic, like those of the relatives who've come to visit them. In that crisp mountain air, you hear hardly a cry. It's as though they don't want to acknowledge the pain this town has suffered for so long.
Worse yet, is the empty lot where Christina's, Armine's sister's, school once stood. There is only some scattered rubble. It's as though no one wants to build over the land where so much young blood was shed.
Wednesday, Dec. 8
This afternoon we went to Pyunic, the association for the disabled, where Armine works three days a week with young children and their parents in the early intervention program. Armine was one of Pyunic's first patients, which was established in 1989 to help children disabled in the earthquake. It has since grown to help more than 3,000 disabled children of all ages across Armenia and even sponsors several athletes in the paralympic games each year.
Pyunic is housing in a cold, crumbling stone building overlooking the football stadium and former President Levon Ter-Petrossyan's massive house. There is no central heating and therapy sessions are held in cramped rooms. It's a wonder they've accomplished as much as they have.
Tomorrow we accompany Armine on her rounds at the hospital.
Stay tuned ...
This post has been a long time coming, I realize. I arrived Thursday night and since Friday have been out and about nearly every day. We returned from our overnight trip to Spitak last night. Before that I was only able to check my e-mail once before. We were using the computers of the Menua tour operators in the hotel lobby. The girls who work there are a lot of fun. I just got back from lunch with them.
A few observations before I launch into all that we've done since we started filming on Monday:
* My understanding of Eastern Armenian is slowly getting better, but I still can't speak a lick no matter how much I try.
* I don't mind cigarette smoke all that much, but I'm sick of smelling like stale cigarettes. In the morning, when I wash my hair, I can smell the cigarettes in the steam as I wash off the tobacco. Blech. Just sitting here in the Internet cafe with three smokers in a 20-by-20 foot room, I feel like I'm choking. Arg.
* It's DAMN cold and it seems people still never really got used to that cold. Or so some locals have told me. After all these years, you'd think they'd be more accustomed.
* Visiting in the summer is a totally different experience, somewhat akin to going to camp. You see familiar faces, etc. The winter brings to mind an idea of what it must have been like in Soviet times. The grim cold, the dark overcast skies; it all seems so depressing. But now, with Internet on every corner, every kind of restaurant imaginable (there are now THREE sushi bars), it's a totally different world.
After nearly 24 hours of traveling I arrived in Yerevan on Thursday night. Landing at Zvartnots Airport feels a bit like being in on a secret. Some get misty-eyed, others cheer. It’s more complicated for me. This land, our land, is more than just the mother country. It’s like returning to history, like slipping into an era unknown to most in the world.
Stepping off the plane I braced myself for a blast of bitter cold. Instead, the fresh, crisp air of Hayastan greeted me. It was like I could breathe again.
As I made my way through customs and out the door, Harry was standing outside smiling. He hugged me, kissed my cheek and said, “We’re in Hayastan, cousin.” It feels good to be back.
Friday, Dec. 3
A sleepless journey allowed me a good first night’s rest. I slept for nine solid, restful hours. Stumbling out of bed I made my way to the westward-facing window in my sixth-floor room at the Ani Plaza Hotel. Harry had told me we have a view of Ararat, but I didn’t expect much. The peaks are usually shrouded in a thick layer of fog and clouds, hidden just behind the Turkish border. Carefully I pulled back the curtains and through the old Soviet-era buildings there she stood; the peak of Big Ararat and just through the clouds a glimpse of a more bashful Small Ararat. Perfect.
Armenians describe Ararat in their own words. Some call it a “hars,” or bride. I like to think of the two peaks as the grandparents I never knew. The big peak represents my grandfathers, imposing, intimidating and mythic. At their side, is Eleeza, my father’s mother; a bit more graceful and removed, but no less majestic or mysterious.
In the afternoon, Harry took me to see Arthur Grigorian, director of Armenia’s State Musical Theater. We took a taxi to an old building next to Vernissage. Taking an elevator up to the theater’s office, we walked into a smaller office where nearly 20 singers were cramped into a room only slighter bigger than my bedroom. They shared the space with a baby grand piano, a desk, a table and now, the two of us who were there to watch them rehearse.
Arthur sat at the desk, a cigarette in one hand and a bottle of Jermuk filled with cognac at his side. He ordered two glasses to pour us our own shots. And they sang with the joie de vivre you would expect from a five-year-old who doesn’t have a care in the world. These singers are young – all 16, 17, 18 years old, even a pair who couldn’t have been more than 11. They commit themselves to their art no matter what circumstances they face.
Armenia is a familiar place. It’s home in many respects, but for me there is still a sense of being an outsider, of not understanding the hardships my brothers and sisters have endured. It’s more gray than black and white. At dinner with a friend who spends several months of the year here, I began to understand what it means.
“I feel like I’m finally a part of something,” he said.
Saturday, Dec. 4
Armine is just what I imagined her to be; serious and rational, but good-humored and good-hearted. She is strong and strong-willed and an Armenian woman of character and stature.
Sitting at a teahouse on Sayat Nova, I began to get a taste for Armine’s story.
A doctor, Armine is also fighting off a cold. She’s determined to be well for the shoot, which begins Monday. She ordered a tea and nibbled on some of the snacks we ordered for ourselves. Her figure is slight. It’s clear she eats lightly. But there is a determination in her eyes that makes it clear she is no stuffed suit. She is all substance and thought.
Some of the things I’ve learned about her story so far:
• Now 30, Armine was 14 the day of the earthquake.
• She was on the third floor of a sewing factory when the ground began to shake. Suddenly, looking up, she saw the clear sky and realized the building was literally coming apart.
• She and a friend were standing near a machine that both saved their lives, but also crushed her leg and arm.
• Her sister, 8-year-old Christina, was crushed in the girls’ school. Their father went to search for his daughter and knew her fate when he saw her shoes lying in a pile of rubble.
• Armine was quickly sent to Yerevan, where her leg was amputated. Three days later, she and her mother were flown to Moscow for further treatment. She remained there for three months.
• One month after returning to Armenia, Armine was flown to Los Angeles alone. Her mother stayed behind. Going from a communist country to the west for the first time was a terrifying experience, she said. “It was a totally different world,” she said.
That was just the first cursory interview. More will come to light in the next week. We leave for Spitak tomorrow at 1 p.m. and will stay overnight in Vanadzor. For Tuesday’s anniversary of the earthquake we’ll be in Spitak for memorial services and to meet Armine’s parents. We’ll spend the rest of the week following Armine’s daily life.
Sunday Dec. 5 was a day of rest. We saw some friends. Went to Pizza H.T. The "U" is missing, maybe for fear of a copyright lawsuit. We surmised it to stand for "Hye Tad," Armenian for the Armenian cause. I like that explanation better. They even had a salad bar, albeit with several kinds of mayonnaisey Russian salads. I should've just had the pizza.
Monday, Dec. 6
We head to Spitak around 1 p.m. After a brief stop for a burst water pipe, we were on our way again. We got to Armine's parents house around 4 p.m., after filming some of the city center. Red and white carnations were for sale on nearly every corner for the next day's ceremonies.
After an initial interview with Armine's parents, where they related their experiences of Dec. 7, 1988, we head to Vanadzor and the hotel, where we'd spend the night.
I should mention that we were a group of 9, 10 with Armine. Me, Harry, two chauffeurs (one minivan, one SUV), Mike Agyan (who heads the crew) and his staff of a sound guy, a camera technician and two crane operators. Yes, a crane. A 21-foot one to be exact, which they used to film the city. And yes, after dropping Armine off, I was the only female left in the group. Suffice to say, dinner was interesting.
Tuesday, Dec. 7
We pick up Armine, her father Madzo and brother Garik in the morning and head to the site where the factory Armine was visiting that morning once stood. Now there sits an empty plaza with a large monument. Off to one side is a large boulder, the only remaining rock from that three-story sewing factory.
The air was cold on Tuesday (at least -5 celsius), but the sky was bright and clear, just as it was 16 years ago, Armine tells us. In fact, the weather was unsuually warm in 1988. Earthquake weather, we call it, now an omenous symboli for Spitak-tsis.
From there we went to a khachkar (stone in the shape of a cross), where the clergy said a prayer and several wreaths were laid. Few people were out. We were told the numbers grow less and less every year. Even fewer were at the church for a short service. Maybe 30 in all.
Most spend the morning at the cemetery. The road to the cemetery, which sits on a hill overlooking the city, is packed. Everywhere you turn, gravestones are marked with "1988." The faces inscribed on those gravestones are stoic, like those of the relatives who've come to visit them. In that crisp mountain air, you hear hardly a cry. It's as though they don't want to acknowledge the pain this town has suffered for so long.
Worse yet, is the empty lot where Christina's, Armine's sister's, school once stood. There is only some scattered rubble. It's as though no one wants to build over the land where so much young blood was shed.
Wednesday, Dec. 8
This afternoon we went to Pyunic, the association for the disabled, where Armine works three days a week with young children and their parents in the early intervention program. Armine was one of Pyunic's first patients, which was established in 1989 to help children disabled in the earthquake. It has since grown to help more than 3,000 disabled children of all ages across Armenia and even sponsors several athletes in the paralympic games each year.
Pyunic is housing in a cold, crumbling stone building overlooking the football stadium and former President Levon Ter-Petrossyan's massive house. There is no central heating and therapy sessions are held in cramped rooms. It's a wonder they've accomplished as much as they have.
Tomorrow we accompany Armine on her rounds at the hospital.
Stay tuned ...
posted by eva at 4:50 AM
5 Comments:
Sleezy,
Great post! Your writing, as always, is brilliantly descriptive and beautiful. I can't wait to see the final product of all this hard and rewarding work.
Keep on postin'! And stay warm!
Love,
Ali
Wow. Amazing. You are amazing, this story is amazing. I can't wait to read more. I'm so happy for you that you're getting to experience this. Write more soon.
That last one was from me. Oops. I'm new to this blogging thing.
Kimmy
Reading this I am struck by what an articulate, remarkable, amazing woman you are Eleeza -- and how astonishingly blessed I am to count you among my friends. I am truly the better for knowing you.
I love you Armenian Twin! Stay safe, stay strong!
-Jessey
I was trying to think of something cleverly sarcastic to counterbalance this love-fest, but the fact is, Sleezy, you rock. Keep up the good work (and, most importantly, don't forget to bring back some Armenian liquor).
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