Month: November 2023

“Courage is contagious. When a brave man takes a stand, the spines of others stiffen.”

—Billy Graham, American evangelist and author (1918-2018)

Unfortunately, there was no “brave man” to take a stand against the unprovoked and brutal attack by the Azerbaijani government on Artsakh, an autonomous Armenian enclave in the South Caucasus, and her 120,000 indigenous inhabitants. Prior to the attack, the 9-month blockade of Artsakh’s Berdzor (Lachin) Corridor—the lifeline and only road where aid from Armenia could reach the people—was blocked by the Azeris. No one, especially reporters, and nothing, was allowed in or out of the region. With so many months of dwindling food, medicine and other essentials, the people were slowly and painfully suffering genocide by starvation. In an instant, an ancient civilization—Nagorno Karabakh to the rest of the world, but to the Armenians always Artsakh—was gone due to the Azeri government’s agenda to rid the indigenous Armenians of Artsakh from their homeland. 

Artsakh was a part of historic Armenia, as was Nakhichevan (an Armenian word meaning “place of the first descent,” and linked with Noah’s Ark). Nakhichevan too suffered the same fate as Artsakh, when in the summer of 1918, the Azeris massacred its Armenian population. In 2006, 2,000 Armenian khachkars (cross-stones) were destroyed by the Azeris, a Turkic people, in the medieval Armenian cemetery of Julfa, Nakhichevan. Today, no evidence of Armenian civilization remains there. Similar atrocities against the Armenians had occurred in the Azerbaijani cities of Sumgait in February 1988; in Kirovabad, again in 1988; and in Baku in 1990. In those pogroms, thousands of Armenian lives were lost as the Azeris slaughtered them, robbed them, burned their homes and expelled those who survived, who fled to Artsakh and Armenia. Armenian history is being rewritten, whose population continues to decrease because of the invasions, pogroms and annihilations over the centuries. 

A small wall rug of Artsakh’s “Papik and Tatik” that the author bought in Shushi (Photo: Knarik O. Meneshian)

The atrocities against the Armenians had also occurred even earlier. In General Andranik and the Armenian Revolutionary Movement, Andranig Chalabian explains that the Armenian revolutionary movement was “clearly a misnomer, since the movement was essentially defensive in nature.” It was formed to save the lives of the defenseless people against the constant atrocities committed against them—the indigenous Armenians of Western Armenia, now eastern Turkey, by the Turks in the 1800s and 1900s. Chalabian writes of the inhuman treatment of the Armenians: “Although other Christian minorities, such as the Greeks and Assyrians, lived in Turkey and suffered discrimination, the treatment of the Armenians was particularly nefarious, because its objective was to eradicate a people living in their own ancestral homeland.” 

The author also includes a chart, showing that the Armenian population in 1000 A.D. was six million; in 1890, it was three million; and in 1920, five years after the 1915 Genocide of the Armenian people by the Turkish government, it was one million. Today, the total number of Armenians worldwide is about 10 million, with under three million in Armenia. He also presents a revolting example of the Turkish government’s treatment of their Christian subjects: “From the 16th century through the 19th century, when an Armenian died in Turkey, a funeral service could not be held without first obtaining a burial permit from the authorities.”  

The following is an example of such a burial permit. “Dressed in a gown as black as tar, the crown of Satan on his head, banished from the throne of the Lord, his beard salt and pepper, his hair black, eyes sunken, body bulky, appearance detestable, religion savage, his existence harmful, he denies God, bad from the start, you cursed creature, you old lizard, priest Nahabet!” The permit continues, “We are informed that one of your multitude of blasphemers…a subject of the majestic Ottoman state…has suddenly died…May the Most High God annihilate and turn to dust all the blasphemers. Although the soil and earth will not accept his detestable and nauseous carcass, what to do…? The heat and air will create a loathsome smell and will discomfort the Muslims…We hereby allow you to dig a deep pit in the dung place of the blasphemers and, while reading and singing, you can throw him in there and bury him.” It was Frederick Davis Green (1863-1962), an American author, clergyman and missionary to Armenia, who responded to the claim that “the Turks are tolerant of members of other faiths…” “Yes,” he said. “So long as Christians submit to all forms of oppression, and make no claims in regards to rights, they are gladly tolerated.”

In a recent YouTube video, an Artsakh Armenian family, gaunt and weak from the blockade, said after fleeing Artsakh, “The conditions were unbearable. Our village was surrounded by Azeri military. There were explosions, bombings and attacks on all sides by the Azeris.” When they were asked how the behavior of the Azeri military was towards them as they left Artsakh, they responded, “If there was a reporter or the French at the border, the Azeri military did not behave badly, but when there was no one to watch them, such as in Shushi, the behavior of the Azeris towards the Armenians was different. It was horrible.”

In another YouTube video, the story of a 13-year-old boy was presented. The boy had completed the ninth grade and had driven his mother, younger siblings, grandparents and a few neighbors to safety in Armenia, as his father was in the military. The boy explained, at times with tears welling in his eyes, “I have never driven a car before, but I had to drive my family and neighbors to safety. If I did not succeed, I would always blame myself…It took us such a long time, many hours—day and night, to reach Armenia…I slept at the wheel to rest sometimes,” he said, and added wistfully, “My father bought me a bicycle, but I never got to ride it, and he bought my mother a washing machine, but we could not bring it with us.” He continued, as he wiped away more tears from his dark, melancholy eyes that had seen far too much, “Now, I must find work to support my family.” Overnight, the small boy of 13 had become a man.

In yet another YouTube video, a frail and elderly man said softly and sadly, “My two sons were killed in the 2020 war, and I lost an eye…Everything can be replaced, and a new life can be started somewhere else, unless one is elderly, but we cannot take the graves of our families with us. What will happen to the graves of our loved ones now?” As the elderly man paused, then sighed, he continued, “This is my destiny, or rather the destiny of the people of Artsakh. We are now relying on the Armenian government. I hope that, to at least a small degree, they will understand the feelings of those who were forced to flee.” It had taken the elderly man 24 grueling hours on horseback to reach safety in Armenia. An Armenian villager and his wife found the man near their home. They explained that the elderly man, exhausted, had been bent over on his horse and unable to get down. The couple had helped him off his horse and had carried him into their home, where they washed his feet and fed him. 

In one more YouTube video, a young Artsakh mother of five and her husband, a military veteran, who had suffered severe physical and emotional trauma, was interviewed. “My husband is no longer able to care for himself or for his family. He has lost his mind,” she said as she lowered her head for a moment, then added, “Now, I must find work and be the head of our family.” She added, with measured emotion, “Let no one believe that we, the people of Artsakh, left our sacred land for the sake of saving lives. We were forced out! We did not leave voluntarily!”

After the forced takeover, or rather the theft, of Artsakh, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan praised what had occurred in Artsakh. Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev stated, “The entire Republic of Armenia is our historic land!” A day after the takeover of Artsakh, Aliyev sauntered into the Armenian government building in Stepanakert, originally called Vararakn (Armenian word meaning “rapid spring”), trampled on the Artsakh flag, which had been strewn on the floor of the building, walked over to a window and opened it. With his hand, he made a gesture, as if to shoo something out the window, as he wrinkled his nose. 

As I thought about what had happened so easily to Artsakh and her people, and the silence of those who could have easily stopped this barbarism, I wondered, is it really true that no one cares? Not long after, I received an email from a Mr. Humberto Ortega, a high school teacher in Costa Rica, who had, on October 25, 2022, read my articles titled “Artsakh and the Edelweiss” and “Pages from Armenian History” in The Armenian Weekly. The teacher said that he was assigning the two articles to his students and was teaching them about Armenia and Artsakh. Then, upon learning that the Artsakh Armenians had been driven from their homes, Mr. Ortega wrote, “Dear Knarik, you do not know how much we are suffering from the new reality that is occurring in Artsakh, and the worst thing is how the world looks the other way. Please keep me informed about what happens.” When I responded to the teacher that Artsakh was now in the hands of the Azeris, he wrote back, “Is it true? Oh, my God!” and included this prayer for Artsakh: “Our Lady of Narek, our Lady of Narek, pray for your people.” He then asked, “How can I get a small image of Our Lady of Narek, the Marian Patroness of Armenia, and a little flag from Artsakh and Armenia? I want to put them on my car. God bless your people and the Artsakh people!”

The picture Mr. Humberto Ortega sent with his prayer for Artsakh

In my reply to Mr. Ortega, I asked if he was Armenian or part Armenian. He responded that he was not Armenian, that he was Costa Rican, but loved Armenia and the Armenian people. I then wrote to let him know that I was in the process of collecting and mailing to him all the items he had requested, plus the English language book (translated by Thomas J. Samuelian) titled St. Grigor Narekatsi – Speaking with God from the Depths of the Heart, and St. Nerses Shnorhali’s prayer, “In Faith I Confess.” Upon receiving the package, Mr. Ortega wrote a “Thank You” note. Soon after, he wrote the following about Artsakh:

“‘To see a crime calmly is to commit it.’—Jose Marti, Cuban poet, writer, philosopher, nationalist leader (1853-1895)

This idea is what runs through our heads and does not allow us to adequately reason why it can happen that two countries that are located next to each other…one of them (Azerbaijan) wants to take by force a territory (Artsakh) that does not belong to them…It tries to take it by force, without taking into account the mistreatment, the deaths, the expulsion of what belongs to the indigenous Armenians, as well as the erasure of any signs of their religion, churches and customs.

From Costa Rica, a small country in America, that tenaciously defends its democracy, I want the voice of one of its children to reach out and cry out for the application of justice. It cannot be that by force they try to destroy a region like Artsakh, and that they also are trying to take away an entire area of southern Armenia, Zangezur/Syunik, by any means possible. To remain silent is to agree with these crimes, which is why we must make the cry of the Armenians and those who are being expelled from Artsakh reach everyone. I finish my words with another quote from Jose Marti, apostle of Cuban independence:

‘Freedom is not a flag in whose shadow the victors devour the defeated and overwhelm them with tireless resentment: Freedom is a robust madwoman who has a Father, the sweetest of parents—Love, and a Mother, the richest of mothers—Peace. Without mutual love, without mutual help—always a stunted country. Happiness is the prize of those who create, and not of those who destroy.’ 

Your people have been, are, and will be an example of effort, struggles and love for others.”

After reading Mr. Ortega’s message, I read Alexander Pope’s (English poet, 1688-1744) poem “Universal Prayer.” The last two stanzas reminded me of the Armenian people of Artsakh, their ordeals, their current plight—homeless refugees, who were forced from their ancient homeland by the Azeris, their sacred soil where much blood was spilled, and far away now from their centuries-old churches and monasteries, learning centers, ancestral graves, ancient graveyards and Armenian headstones—the khachkars (cross stones). 

One cannot help but wonder what will become of the khachkars; the fourth century Amaras Monastery and Church in Artsakh, founded by St. Gregory the Illuminator; the fifth century first Armenian school at Amaras, founded by St. Mesrob Mashtots, the creator of the Armenian alphabet; the 12th century Yeghishe Kouys Church; the 13th century Anapat Church; the Monastery of Dadivank, built in 1214; Gandzasar Monastery, built between 1216 and 1238; Gtich Monastery, built between 1241 and 1248; the 14th century Monastery of Spitak Khach; and other churches of antiquity, and more recent.

For now, Artsakh, like the Edelweiss, the sweet-smelling flower that dwells high in the mountains of Artsakh and symbolizes “deep love, sacrifice and devotion,” as well as “rugged individualism,” will dwell in the hearts of the Armenians of Artsakh. Their land was also their altar, the blossoms in the fields their incense, the moon and stars their candles, the birds their choir and the rain their blessed water. 

To think that on November 30, 1920, months after Azerbaijan became the first Soviet Republic in the Transcaucasus, Azerbaijan recognized “Mountainous Karabakh (Artsakh) as an integral part of the Socialist Republic of Armenia,” but suddenly, in 1921, they again claimed Artsakh, and in 2023, they simply took it. 

Shortly after I had mailed my package to Mr. Ortega, I learned that the Armenian Evangelical Church’s (Mt. Prospect, Illinois) guest minister on Sunday, October 22, 2023, would be Pastor Joel Tenney, who has been involved in missionary work with his wife, also a missionary, in Artsakh and Armenia for the last three years. He has produced videos about what has been going on in Artsakh and Armenia. His documentary titled Artsakh’s Cry will be shown on YouTube, social media and in select theaters in a few weeks. His book on Armenia titled I Entered the Land of Promise will be available before year’s end. Pastor Tenney, who had initially studied to become a Catholic priest, decided he could serve God better by becoming an evangelist and serving people, especially widows, orphans and unfortunates. Pastor Tenney is 27 years old. He and his wife have five children. Their youngest, born this past August, was given the middle name Ani by their parents because of their love for the Armenian people. The pastor and his wife have applied for Armenian citizenship, and he has learned to speak Armenian and has studied Armenian history and music, especially the works of Komitas Vardapet.    

While Pastor Tenney waited for church to begin, he began to play the piano—a piece by Gomidas Vartabed (1869-1935, ordained Armenian priest, composer, musicologist and considered the founder of the “Armenian National School of Music”). It was the deeply moving song, “Hov Arek Sarer”—”Make a breeze dear mountains, make a breeze. Bring cure to my agony…” After opening prayers, the pastor began to speak, at times with tears in his eyes, as he described some of the things that he had witnessed in Artsakh behind blockaded “doors,” upon entering the territory “illegally,” as he described it. “There was sniper fire, children decapitated, women raped and murdered, and other horrific things too difficult to speak about.” He paused to compose himself and then continued to describe the hungry and emaciated parents, who did not eat in order to give their meager morsels of food to their children. The pastor’s children had said to their parents that because they had everything, they wanted their Christmas gifts this year to be given to “the children of Artsakh, who have nothing.” Pastor Tenney then spoke of the situation in Goris, Armenia. “The situation there is unimaginable, with six to 10 thousand people flocking into the area, collapsing from exhaustion and severe malnutrition. They are nothing but skin and bones, like the photos you have seen of the emaciated people in Auschwitz…” 

Pastor Joel Tenney with Mrs. Arakelian, who drove down with her family from Sts. Joachim and Anne Armenian Church in Palos, Heights, IL (Photo: Knarik O. Meneshian)

Pastor Tenney then stated, “While other countries receive billions of dollars in aid from the U.S., Armenia has received only one million dollars.” The pastor continued, “Plenty of Armenians have been speaking out about the situation in Artsakh, but there is no response.” To do his part in aiding the people of Artsakh, the pastor has become the voice for the Armenians in Washington, D.C., and has “warned” officials and politicians that they will not be reelected if they do not help the Armenians.

After the sermon, Pastor Tenney and the congregation opened their song books and sang hymns, followed by the singing, in Armenian, of the “Hayr Mer” (Our Father), led by the pastor. At the end of the church service and luncheon, as Pastor Tenney walked out of the church and into the parking lot, he looked up toward heaven and began singing, “Hov Arek Sarer.” We listened with amazement to the young American pastor who had become an Armenian at heart. As he walked to his car on his way to St. Gregory’s Armenian Church in Chicago he said, as he looked up toward heaven again, “Gomidas’s song is a prayer.”

There are people who, indeed, do care about the Armenians of Artsakh. These lines from Mary Carolyn Davies’ (American writer, 1888-1974) poem titled “A Prayer For Every Day,” describes a caring heart, similar to those mentioned in this article. “…Help me to know the inmost hearts of those for whom I care, their secret wishes, all the loads they bear, that I may add my courage to their own…” 

We are living in dangerous times, when extremes have become a powerful presence, creating uncontrolled instability. Our modern history offers compelling evidence. The Committee of Union and Progress (Young Turks) came to power in the pre-WWI Ottoman Empire, when a wave of constitutional reforms reduced the power of the corrupt sultanate. The CUP used its power to drive the crumbling empire into wars and genocidal policies in a vain attempt to restore the territorial glory of the Ottoman past. Instead, they degenerated into the lowest form of human existence, with the genocides of the indigenous Armenians, Assyrians and Greeks and the depopulation of Christian communities, creating an infrastructure void due to their central economic role. Another extreme followed with Mustafa Kemal Atatürk’s secular but ultranationalist policies that Turkified the nation while building institutional discrimination against the remaining non-Turks. 

Extremists often gain power based on a reaction. Hitler assumed power in the 1933 election on a promise to restore the dignity and prosperity of a nation that had not recovered from its crushing defeat in 1918. His warped sense of national pride quickly became a racist policy of exterminating the substantial Jewish community during the Holocaust, leading Germany into utter destruction once again. One of the reasons the West undertook post-war reconstruction in Germany and Japan was to prevent another reactive government from taking advantage of a frustrated and defeated population. The investment eventually resulted in stable and trusted allies in modern Germany and Japan. Radical policies and leadership rarely solve problems but rather create them. A quick review of of extreme leadership in Rwanda, Cambodia, Bosnia and Darfur illustrates their tragic connection with genocide. Quite often they provoke economic decline and instability, such as the recent history in Venezuela.

The work of extremes is not always violence but rather manifests in political ineffectiveness. The United States is not immune to this phenomenon. Many Americans are frustrated by the gridlock and inefficiency of the political process in Washington, caused not only by the conflict between the two political parties but the growing ideological divide and obstructionist thinking within our nation. There was a time when the predominant political thinking in Washington ranged between left and right of center. President Kennedy was a moderate who would probably have an identity problem with the Democratic Party today. Likewise, Eisenhower and the Bushes would have similar challenges with today’s Republican Party. We just witnessed about half a dozen representatives hold up the election of a House speaker for nearly a month. There was a time when it was considered a vital responsibility of partisan colleagues to “reach across the aisle” to empower our democracy. That aisle gets wider as the fringes of each party gain power. Representatives who dare to vote in a bipartisan manner are deemed disloyal. Regardless of which party is in power, the opposition sees its role as obstructionism rather than collaboration and compromise. Meanwhile, polls show that most Americans reside in the middle of the ideological spectrum and are frustrated with the low productivity of Congress. Politics is a dirty business, but our system of remarkable checks and balances works best when we find ways to work together. Extremism only produces a lack of results and reduction in public confidence that we see today. Ambivalence is a dangerous attribute in a democracy.

The contemporary Armenian nation has been severely impacted by external extremist thinking. Putin has been very clear about his belief that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a profoundly negative event. His long tenure as the leader of the Russian Federation has been driven by the desire to restore some form of Russian hegemony. As we have learned, painfully, he and Lavrov have a unique definition for the term “ally,” closer to a vassal state or a subordinated “strategic partnership.” While Putin has worked to recover former Soviet territory either by overt aggression (Abkhazia, South Ossetia, eastern Ukraine) or through regional influence (Belarus, Central Asia, the Caucasus), Russia has become isolated and weakened. In desperation, Russia has looked east to China to align with another extremist power, setting a dangerous global dynamic. Putin is enabled by an autocratic political process with virtual authority, particularly in foreign affairs. 

Turkey’s Erdogan is slightly constrained by the remnants of a pseudo-democracy that he has worked diligently to weaken over the past two decades. Erdogan is enamored by Turkey’s criminal Ottoman past and talks openly of returning some of its former glory. After decades of secular societal institutions, Erdogan advocates a more Islamic Turkey. Perhaps his most dangerous beliefs lie in the Ottoman pan-Turkic policies, which fueled the Armenian Genocide and today have led to a radical alignment with Azerbaijan. His regional thinking on Nakhichevan, “Zangezur,” “one nation, two states” and other issues is aligned with the racist policy of pan-Turkic political and territorial unity. The Republic of Armenia is in his sights, just as the western highlands and Cilicia were the target of the Ittihads. These are not reasonable people. His administration has an insatiable appetite to remove all non-Turks in its path of regional unity – a constant and dramatic reminder that the Turks have not honored any agreement they have signed. The Republic of Turkey has made a mockery of the Treaty of Lausanne that diminished Armenian rights. Its meddling in the Armenian church is a clear, systemic, decades-long violation. The November 2020 ceasefire agreement in Artsakh has been ignored from day one. We evolved from negotiations for guarantees of the rights and security of Artsakh’s Armenians to the deportation of an entire population. The Azeris and Turks will honor no agreement, given their global strategy. We should work towards peace but never become dependent on trusting their commitments. We must be wary of the extremes they harbor in their foreign policy towards Armenia.

The behavior of Israel is on the minds of many Armenians today. It has been difficult for Armenians to understand the Jewish state’s deadly relationship with Azerbaijan and refusal to recognize the Armenian Genocide, given our shared histories. Hamas is an extremist group, but it came to power partially because of the brutal and oppressive policies that Gaza has been subjected to over the last 30 years. Netanyahu’s policies are extreme and supported by those who feel justified in pursuing territorial encroachment and subjugation. The war in Gaza has degenerated from the right to self-defense, to retaliation, to unthinkable carnage. The killing of innocent Israelis by Hamas is unconscionable, but is the killing of thousands of Palestinian civilians any different? Netanyahu’s policies will not bring peace to Israel. His actions are creating new recruits for the Palestinian cause, who are growing up with destruction, death and hopelessness. There are many who disagree with the policies of Israel and are clearly not anti-Semitic. The answer lies with reasonable people in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank understanding that the Jews and Palestinians are not leaving. Moderate policies in Israel will empower moderate leadership in Palestine. Gaza is a virtual prison with all support infrastructure controlled externally. Over 80-percent of residents depend on humanitarian aid and have lost hope. Hamas has radical views of Israel, and Israel has policies that have significantly divided their nation. This is tragic, but change can only happen with moderate thinking. We have two extremes fighting each other, and it will result in more problems than solutions. Do we desire peace enough to compromise?

Armenia is facing a similar dilemma. We are negotiating with extremists who have little appetite for compromise. The only buffer is the fragile support of western nations and duplicitous Russia. Compromise is usually the recipe for peace and stability. In a sea of uncertainty, Armenia must pursue parallel paths of forming alliances with reliable security partners and building military infrastructure while negotiating with unreliable parties. Will that formula work, considering our adversaries lack credibility? What is the required threshold of trust? Can physical guarantees (i.e. peacekeepers) overcome the credibility gap of extremists? 

I have always felt that labeling contributes to division. We should vote or advocate on an issue-to-issue basis, not based on pseudo loyalty to a party or person. On some issues, I support a liberal position, and others a more conservative policy. I find it unfortunate when we are packaged into a convenient label with generalizations. If we focus on the mission, we will rarely fail. As Armenians, we tend to spend too much time criticizing others rather than articulating a path that supports a vision. Investing in neutralizing others is polarizing and widens the gap to eventual compromise. Avoiding the edges of the political spectrum offers all of the best possibilities for stability.

Like so many Armenians who moved from Syria to Armenia, Hagop was a millionaire before destiny decided that he would cut men’s hair for a living in the suburbs of Yerevan. Before the war, he had never been to Armenia. Life in the Levant on the shores of the Mediterranean was too good, and a $300 plane ride to the homeland seemed like an unnecessary expense. However, as is axiomatic of life, misfortune eventually struck, and an ironic, cruel world forced Hagop to make his one-way journey to Armenia. He arrived not as a millionaire, but as a poor man who would perhaps forever be despondent as he reminisced about his glorious past.

Yet Hagop, like many Syrian Armenians, was remarkably resilient. Although Armenia, the homeland, was still foreign to him, at 40 years old he did what he could to survive. He quickly relearned an old skill of cutting men’s hair. After mastering a few types of haircuts, he opened a modest barber shop in one of the many narrow allies of the city. He wasn’t particularly skilled, but he knew enough to lure in older men who couldn’t care less about what type of haircut they got. For some locals, Hagop’s broken Eastern Armenian was all they needed to hear to trust him. For them, Hagop was from abroad; hence, he was dependable. One of our nation’s enduring defects is trusting in everything that is from abroad.

When some clients would ask Hagop about his experience, he would falsely claim that he used to own a four-chair women’s salon before moving to Armenia. Impressed by this piece of information, the client would sit somewhere in the shop and Hagop, by winning over another naive customer, would move one step closer to regaining his millionaire status. To quell all doubts among his new customers, he would often employ superfluous theatrics when cutting hair. He would pretend to do impressive tricks with his scissors or act annoyed by how much the customer is moving his head. Without exception, while completing the final touches of the six-minute haircut, he would put some sort of gel on the freshly-cut head of hair and proceed to tell the customer that they wouldn’t find this gel anywhere in Armenia. It’s imported from abroad – where everything is apparently better.

Krikor Sahagian with his father

Recently, when my father visited Armenia for a few weeks, he wanted to get a haircut. Back in Jerusalem, my poor mother could never convince him to preemptively get one before his hair got embarrassingly messy. My father would delay this affair for as long as he could. I assume it was because my dad didn’t feel like he had anything to prove to anyone. In his mind, he had built a decent life for himself and his family – which is difficult to achieve among those who are hell bent on making it without surrendering any of their principles. Most importantly, my dad had married the most beautiful Armenian woman in the entire Middle East. Thus, to my mom’s discontent, my father never cared about how he looked. Physically, he only tended to his iconic mustache that had become an indivisible part of his identity.

However, there was a second, simpler reason why my dad delayed his visit to the barbershop. Jerusalem did not have an Armenian barber. At the barbershop, he was forced to speak in Arabic or Hebrew about things that were hardly near and dear to his heart. For the simpleminded like myself and many others, hearing local gossip at the barber is always interesting. While my dad would engage in these conversations, deep down he did not care. Instead, with his broken Arabic and great difficulty, he would always try to shift the conversation to Armenia. As a child, I would sometimes go with him, and I would hear my dad speak about our small homeland and about how he was eventually going to sell everything and move there to a tiny village overlooking Ararat with his consumerist wife and his four spoiled sons. The poor Palestinian barbers, deprived of freedom and the ability to travel, would never find out for themselves about how much my dad exaggerated the beauty of Armenia.

For 63 years, my dad went to a barber and spoke to them in a foreign tongue about everywhere but home. This recently changed, however, when my dad and Hagop the barber crossed paths. My dad has been to Armenia more than a dozen times, but work and the hustle and bustle of life would only allow him to visit for a maximum of 10 days at a time. He had never visited a barber in Yerevan – until his last visit, when my mom told him calmly and affectionately that he would not be welcome back unless he got a haircut during his trip. 

I accompanied my dad during this visit. We entered Hagop’s shop without much fanfare. Initially, we did not realize that my dad had never been to an Armenian barber – until my dad sat on the chair and Hagop asked him in Armenian how he wanted his hair cut. Back in the Middle East, the answer was simple: tarteeb, meaning “to put into order.” Usually, he did not go into further detail when speaking in Arabic, because it required too much mental effort to dig deep and find the right words.

However, when he was asked the question this time, for a split second my dad froze and realized that he had never answered this question in Armenian. He cracked his characteristic cynical smile and told Hagop that this was the first time he was visiting a barber with whom he could speak Armenian – not just Armenian, but Western Armenian. Hagop did not get the novelty of it. I assume he did not believe my dad either, because coming from the large Armenian community of Aleppo, he could not understand how the Armenian community in Jerusalem did not have a single local Armenian barber. 

Throughout the haircut, the two bonded. Naturally, politics flooded the conversation between the two men, who for decades had felt the turmoil and turbulence of the region on their skin. They laughed as they spared no political leader both in the Middle East, Armenia, or even the world. Every politician was either a criminal, a crook, a thief or simply an idiot. As a person who is yet to give up on my naive idealism, I am often shocked to discover how pessimistic older people, who have seen so much, could be towards a world that despite its many flaws is still so beautiful to me. Hagop lamented the fact that he, as a Syrian national, could never make his pilgrimage to Jerusalem to reaffirm his Christian faith, which, based on my modest observations, did not seem very visible to begin with. My father similarly bemoaned the fact that he could not visit Syria. He would have loved to eat the exquisite cuisine the country was so famous for and admire all the things that the Armenian community had built in one of the great metropolises of the world.

The haircut ended way before the conversation did. My dad and Hagop were quite different and did not agree on almost anything. Yet for the first time ever, I felt like my dad was trying to draw out his visit to the barber. He had years and decades worth of conversation that had been built up inside him that could only be released while visiting a barber who could speak Armenian and feel the subtle nuances of tone and meaning in his voice. My dad was elated. At 63, he had finally experienced a haircut at an Armenian barbershop. 

The haircut was so good, that my mom approved of it quite quickly. As he left the shop, my dad told Hagop how great his visit to the homeland had been this time. Hagop expressed his cordial farewells to my dad, surely thinking that he is just another naive Diasporan Armenian, who wouldn’t speak so highly of Armenia had he lived here.