Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

[Hyegirl]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Congrats on your awesome heritage and welcome to the forum Hyegirl. You gonna like being Armenian.....don't get discouraged.

Thank you. It's nice that someone gets my light-hearted and friendly hello there.

I will not get so discouraged that I give up. In the end, I am the one that has to live with me, and I must be true to who I am and what is important to me. I truly appreciate your comment.

[Hyegirl]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

We expect 100% or nothing. Take it or leave it

I would gladly take the 100%, though some experts seemed to suggest that a merged identity is healthiest. Of course, who would not be proud to be Armenian if they knew the history.

Seriously though, I'm curious as to why your interest has suddenly increased. I can tell you that I really didn't think at all that culture and/or being Armenian mattered till my grandparents who had a great deal of influence in my upbringing passed away.

It’s actually not all that sudden, but built up more and more since late high school after an earlier decrease in interest. (Thanks for asking. ) I’ve already been in the university Armenian club for two years before graduating (I was considering being an officer the last year, but that required me to miss Father’s day with my father, among other things). I also interned a couple years ago at an Armenian organization a couple years ago (best summer of my life), volunteered at the Navasartian Games in California a couple of times, and lobbied Sacramento with the Armenian National Committee last year for genocide/Armenia related bills, and was going to an Armenian church for a while before I was effectively no longer able to go. I suppose a more active approach to this may have come from the fact that it was up to me to figure out what to do next in terms of pursuing my education and such as my parents were then of limited resources (my mom is disabled) and I had achieved some sort of functional degree, though perhaps that fact that my mom had another diagnosis might have had some small influence, and I met a (Christian) best friend who was born in Saudi Arabia who re-awakened some of my international interests that had been set aside for the future for matters of practicality. Before going to university, I was trying to get a genocide awareness event going when I was in student government at community college and was excited about the opportunity to get involved with more Armenians at the university. It’s funny though: I never saw any other Americans doing this who were not Armenian, well except for the two Romanian girls who hung out with in the Armenian club and the Iranian girl who was an officer when I joined.

It was after starting college that we got better internet, which meant opportunities to read about Armenia/Armenian related things and listen to more Armenian music. Also, that is when our library had more books that actually mentioned Armenia in more than a basic nation stats or passing manner.

In jr. high/high school, I was less interested than before because that was when my mom was first getting sick, I was a self-involved adolescent, and people who didn’t know me would not believe or think I was silly about having an interest in being Armenian (Didn’t this come up in some for[u]m recently…). Between 9/11 (my mom’s uncle was investigated for having a middle eastern last name and my mom worried about my brother having a beard, plus the Armenian store closed ) and some ignorant comments I got at the community college, I needed to educate myself better to help education others who were so culturally ignorant. (But then I'm just American. It's not like I have much reason to care about things like that, right?)

When I was younger and saw more of my family, some of whom are now dead, I was interested in it because I was interested in who they were. Through that, they taught my little girl mind how to see the world is as much as could be shared with a little girl. Some stories, such as the details of the genocide before leaving Armenia were never told or were told only late in life to preserve for the next generation. Some things were just who they were, be those things Armenian or not, but taught me how to see the world with faith, love, passion, etc. It is through their eyes that I learned to see life and people as best as little girls can. Now I am a young woman who makes her own decisions influenced by those people.

This is something that has actually been building up for years, as I have hopefully demonstrated some part of. I am interested to see how this might influence my life in the future. A few years ago, I was planning to do a graduate degree involving comparing economic development in Armenian with less developed parts of the US or something of that sort. Since THAT much math is not how my brain was built, I am in accounting and planning/doing some writing, hopefully some of which will positively influence policy and perspectives toward Armenian Americans among other groups, as this and the effort with the recent census was among inspiration for some of it. I hope that if I can work out the details, I can participate in Birthright Armenia or some other volunteer program, but at very least, visiting this country that some of my family came from is a top choice for international destination hopes.

Go ahead anyone who wants to tell me that nothing I have said here makes me at all Armenian and all I can be is American. Call me a fool, a fraud, and a fake if you want to any time I say anything about myself being at all Armenian, but don't expect me to deny part of who I am just because you don't see it yet.

[Hyegirl]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Seriously though Hyegirl, I don't think Mos is trying to discourage you... besides, I see some Armenian peeking out from this statement:

MOS, maybe you should give me some benefit of the doubt and get to know me from more than a couple of posts before you judge me and my motives/perceptions.

After all, if you really want to get to know who someone is, the last thing you should do is see how they reveal themselves over time.

Not discourage me from learning about Armenia, sure. Not discourage me from thinking that I am in any way other than genetics Armenian... I think he has made his view clear.

No, the real Armenian in me is the reaction to you guys are telling me that my FAMILY doesn't matter. My family is part of who I am. They are a big and important part of my life. And I am being told they don't matter. [retracts claws] My family includes Armenians who have influenced my life growing up. In fact, outside of my immediate family, it is the Armenian side of my family who more than the others in my family that most influenced my life and served in various ways for years as a model of who I want to be. This is reality that you guys cannot deny any more than you can deny that the Americans in my family influenced my life growing up.

[Hyegirl]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

I was just asking Eddo a question. And I am not hounding her, just was making sure she goes into all of this with the correct mindset.

This is why you went and "made sure [I went] about all of this with the correct mindset" in the other threads as well? Should I have said my family’s genocide instead?

Mos, I am sure it is easy to put things in black and white when you sit up in a country that is 97.9% the same ethnic group, but when you live in a place where crossing cultures is a way of life and only 60% of the state are your race, cultural divides are no longer as black and white. Both Armenians and Americans have been in my life since birth (well, technically before). I am in some ways the hyphenate reality of many Armenian-Americans, not all Armenian, but also not all American either.

[Mos]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Let me just highlight this line:

I will always be only part and die American at heart...

[Eddo211]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Well, we're going to ostracize real Armenians because they are too Armenian and then give their title to anyone that wants to join.

Sometimes you gotta give till it hurts....

[KanadaHye]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Seriously though Hyegirl, I don't think Mos is trying to discourage you... besides, I see some Armenian peeking out from this statement:

MOS, maybe you should give me some benefit of the doubt and get to know me from more than a couple of posts before you judge me and my motives/perceptions.

[Mos]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Well, we're going to ostracize real Armenians because they are too Armenian and then give their title to anyone that wants to join.

[KanadaHye]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Eddo jan, how is she going to be Armenian?

Well, we're going to ostracize real Armenians because they are too Armenian and then give their title to anyone that wants to join.

[Mos]

Re: Hello and Parev (getting in touch with my roots, and not with hair dye)

Mos, you made your point several times already; why do you keep harping on it? What is your purpose in continuing to hound the girl in her introduction thread? Are you trying to chase people off right from "Hello"?

I was just asking Eddo a question. And I am not hounding her, just was making sure she goes into all of this with the correct mindset.