Boston Globe, MA
May 18 2008
Time, chance weave life threads
By Liz Henry
Globe Correspondent / May 18, 2008
This is a story about three disparate parts of my life that should
have absolutely no connection with one other. One: I am Armenian. Two:
I am from Dorchester. Three: I am a new teacher developer. And this is
how they connected.
I am the daughter of an Armenian father, an Armenian Genocide
survivor, and an American-born Armenian mother. While I was growing
up, my father did not speak often about being a survivor; he was too
busy trying to survive here in Boston. In his 80s, he returned for the
first time to his birthplace. When he got back, he started to tell us
what little he remembered, as a 3-year-old, of his trek across the
desert, when he and his aunt and cousins escaped.
The story he told most often was of the day that a Turkish soldier on
horseback scooped him up from the fleeing refugees. My father had
blond curls and blue eyes. They were remarkable into his old age; they
must have been incredible on a little child in Armenia, where dark
hair and eyes are the norm. The gendarme held him as he rode into a
Turkish village and deposited him with a family. My father said he
remembered a group of men playing cards and smoking. He was the
soldier’s gift to the family. But then, according to Dad, he started
to cry and kick and scream and whine to the point where the impatient
card-players could not stand it anymore and gave him back to the
soldier, who returned little Anoosh to his aunt. He came to America in
1917 or so, moved to Watertown, got an education, married, had
children, and lived a happy life until he died in 2004.
Two: I was born and brought up in the Codman Square area of
Dorchester. My world was our street, Wheatland Avenue; Kaspar Brothers
Market, which my great-uncles owned; my school, the John Greenleaf
Whittier on Southern Avenue; my cousins’ house on Talbot Avenue; and
the Codman Square Branch Library. I played Barbies with Gail across
the street, jumped the hydrant on the corner, and watered the flowers
with my grandmother, who lived upstairs. A treat was taking the bus to
Ashmont Station, meeting my girlfriends at Washington Station, going
to Filene’s Basement, the Windsor Button Shop, and then having lunch
at Bob Lee’s Islander. I was 10.
Later, at 12, I would walk from my house to Girls Latin School in the
center of Codman Square. After school, I would stop often at my old
familiar library.
We moved from Dorchester to Watertown when I was 17, after my
80-year-old grandmother was mugged and her eyeglasses broken. It was
the last in a series of seemingly minor assaults, which collectively
had too much of an impact. We were out of there.
Three: In August 2007, I was appointed a new teacher developer for
Boston Public Schools. In this role, I mentor and support 14
first-year teachers for BPS. I look forward to Thursdays because that
is when I go to Noonan Business Academy in the Dorchester High School
complex. From my home in Winchester, I drive down I-93 south, down
Dorchester Avenue, up onto Melville Avenue. I take a left onto
Washington Street and go back to my childhood. On the left is the
former Girls Latin School, now an apartment building for the
elderly. In front of me is my beloved library, now a community health
center. A couple of short blocks later, I take a left onto
Peacevale. And this is where it all comes together.
more stories like thisOne of my new teachers, Rob, has been teaching
the Armenian Genocide as part of his History Alive/Facing History and
Ourselves curriculum. What I see today in his class takes my breath
away. Students are making posters, poetry, or essays to reflect on
what they have learned. This in and of itself is startling. I never
learned about the Armenian Genocide in school. It was never written
about in books or acknowledged by any of my teachers. Mr. Martinelle
has taught an entire unit on it as a prelude to the Holocaust.
"Miss, what does genocide mean? What is its root word? Where does it
come from?" This from an African-American young man about 8 inches
taller than I am. I explain that "genus" means species and "cide"
means . . .
He knows what it means, and after thanking me, goes back to his seat
to continue writing. Devon writes a haiku about how no one
listened. Stephanie draws haunting pictures. Each one can explain what
the Armenian Genocide was/is. I tell them the story about my father
and the horseman. They listen raptly. They ask me questions. I answer
as best I can.
They awe and inspire me. I shake my head as I reflect how this little
class could bring three such different and distinct parts of my life
together. To listen to these students protest the injustices against
Armenians and Jews and Rwandans and themselves, with such dignity, is
amazing. I am honored to be in their company.