notes and comments

[Sako]

Re: elegy

Its like a "group" project in school. 1 person usually ends up doing 90% of the work. Nobody takes the first step, the majority just take a step back defaulting their responsibilties to those that don't back out.

The sad part is that we aren't dealing with group projects in school. So many serious projects being taken forward by serious people here in Yerevan and around the world don't get the respect or help they deserve and it's not because people don't have money ... it's because people are lazy in most cases. This has nothing to do with CA at all. I'm not complaining. I'm talking about so many other projects out there ... much more serious projects.

i do hope today's entry (MEMOIRS)
will explain why some readers
find my notes and comments alien, hostile, and
sometimes even incomprehensible.

It does actually ! Now I understand why others can't understand you at times. It's because on many occasions even you couldn't understand what you were writing. You just somehow "knew" you were right and threw many different ideas into one post. I'm afraid many won't understand you if you don't write more clearly and go from one idea to another, one at a time. Slow and steady is better then fast and bumpy.

sometimes i don't reply to questions
because i am inspired by them
and i do not wish to repeat the same answer.

Please stop making it sound as if you've answered so many of our questions a hundred times because you haven't properly answered them even once!

It's not that we aren't patient or that we don't respect you. The problem is that you don't discuss what you write. You just expect people to read and understand you or keep trying very hard to understand. Imagine if all books, articles, blogs, etc. were this way. Would anyone be able to understand anything? Reading your entries on many occasions makes a person feel like he/she is reading a book with his/her glasses off ... trying VERY hard to make out the words, forming the sentences and then trying to understand what they mean. Pretty difficult process.

The question I've been asking all this time is ... are you just posting entries (nothing wrong in that) or discussing them?

[Eddo211]

Re: elegy

I thought his donkey joke was very funny..............Ara, I still think you need to relax more, you are posting among fellow Armenians and you have a lot to offer to the new generation.

Cheers.

[seruven]

Re: elegy

It does actually ! Now I understand why others can't understand you at times. It's because on many occasions even you couldn't understand what you were writing. You just somehow "knew" you were right and threw many different ideas into one post.

I don't think that was his message.

Something similar happens in the realm of ideas dealing with religion, ethics, and justice. I accepted them as facts rather than as prejudices, misconceptions, assumptions, fallacies, theories, or hypotheses. As a result, ideas that I encountered later in life – ideas like atheism, agnosticism, the brotherhood of all men, democracy, and passive resistance – appeared at first as alien, sometimes even as incomprehensible. Which is why intolerance comes naturally to all of us.

I think, in the quoted part, he means that sometimes his ideas are thought to be alien or not comprehended by others. Because these ideas are contrary to people's believes that they initially formed without questioning, most probably under the influence of the environment and the society they are living within. And if we learn to be tolerant, we may start to understand ideas which we claimed to be incomprehensible initially.

I might have misunderstood him though. Nonetheless, not planning to push myself too hard for understanding correctly .)

[Sako]

Re: elegy

I might have misunderstood him though. Nonetheless, not planning to push myself too hard for understanding correctly .)

How do you know you've understood him correctly? And what exactly have you understood? I don't doubt that you have bro, I just want to know. I might be able to learn something.

[KanadaHye]

Re: elegy

Everything can be said correctly and still be interpreted the wrong way. I've worked with a lot of different types of people and mentalities over time, and I'd have to say communication is the number 1 problem in the world. I've also gotten so well at reading people that even though I can only make sense of half or quarter of what they say due to language barrier, I can still make out what they mean as it relates to something I'm familiar with (my job).

Take poetry for instance. A poet knows what he/she is writing about yet the language used may be interpreted in different ways by the reader. Only the writer knows the true meaning and intention of the words.

Ara shouldn't have to change his style for others to understand. The reader should look deeper into the subject matter to correlate the words and language to the thoughts behind them. But who has time for that nowadays?

[Sako]

Re: elegy

Only the writer knows the true meaning and intention of the words.

Not always!

But who has time for that nowadays?

Many do ... they still don't understand though on many occasions (not their fault) and the writer at times doesn't seem to really care.

[arabaliozian]

Re: elegy

Friday, June 25, 2009
*****************************************
ACADEMICS
************************************************** ****
If the overwhelming majority of our academics stay away from Armenian studies, it may be because they have no desire to submit their intelligence to someone who may not have enough of its himself – namely, bosses, bishops, benefactors and their flunkies. As for the very few who get involved in Armenian studies, they invariably end up recycling the propaganda line that says, we did nothing wrong and the rest of the world did nothing right. To say otherwise would amount to biting the hand that feeds them.
If history is the propaganda of the victor, these academic charlatans seem to be saying, we will make ours the consolation of the loser.
*
What have we learned from history?
Only this: power means above all the power to cover up blunders and to misrepresent defeats as moral victories.
*
Because 2500 years ago Herodotus introduced his book with the warning that he intends to speak of the great deeds and accomplishments of both Greeks and barbarians, he was torn to shreds by Greek critics (among them Plutarch) as a lover of barbarians.
*
“If you are nice to them, they will be nice to you.” This is a rule that works with gentlemen but not with bastards -- and the world is full of them – and I don't mean gentlemen. And the trouble with bastards is that you can never be nice enough to them. Lower your pants and they will resent you for not bending over.
*
Three things to remember: (one) a fruitful failure is better than a sterile success; (two) “Thou shalt not” does not always work; and (three) Sooner or later a prejudice will bite your ass.
*
What I write may best be described as a digression in a footnote of a book that I will never write.
#

[KanadaHye]

Re: elegy

Friday, June 25, 2009
*****************************************
ACADEMICS
************************************************** ****
If the overwhelming majority of our academics stay away from Armenian studies, it may be because they have no desire to submit their intelligence to someone who may not have enough of its himself – namely, bosses, bishops, benefactors and their flunkies. As for the very few who get involved in Armenian studies, they invariably end up recycling the propaganda line that says, we did nothing wrong and the rest of the world did nothing right. To say otherwise would amount to biting the hand that feeds them.
If history is the propaganda of the victor, these academic charlatans seem to be saying, we will make ours the consolation of the loser.
*
What have we learned from history?
Only this: power means above all the power to cover up blunders and to misrepresent defeats as moral victories.
*
Because 2500 years ago Herodotus introduced his book with the warning that he intends to speak of the great deeds and accomplishments of both Greeks and barbarians, he was torn to shreds by Greek critics (among them Plutarch) as a lover of barbarians.
*
“If you are nice to them, they will be nice to you.” This is a rule that works with gentlemen but not with bastards -- and the world is full of them – and I don't mean gentlemen. And the trouble with bastards is that you can never be nice enough to them. Lower your pants and they will resent you for not bending over.
*
Three things to remember: (one) a fruitful failure is better than a sterile success; (two) “Thou shalt not” does not always work; and (three) Sooner or later a prejudice will bite your ass.
*
What I write may best be described as a digression in a footnote of a book that I will never write.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: elegy

I don't think that was his message.



I think, in the quoted part, he means that sometimes his ideas are thought to be alien or not comprehended by others. Because these ideas are contrary to people's believes that they initially formed without questioning, most probably under the influence of the environment and the society they are living within. And if we learn to be tolerant, we may start to understand ideas which we claimed to be incomprehensible initially.

I might have misunderstood him though. Nonetheless, not planning to push myself too hard for understanding correctly .)

Seruven:
you did not misunderstand me.
that's exactly what i meant. / ara

[arabaliozian]

Re: elegy

AN INTERESTING STORY
*********************************
Un jour, dans un café arménien du quartier arménien de Toronto entre un Noir. Il s’approche du juke-box, sort une pièce de sa poche, l’introduit dans la fente et appuie sur un bouton. Aussitôt, le café se met à résonner du chant bien connu des Arméniens : Grounk, dédié à la grue cendrée. Les clients arméniens esquissent un sourire moqueur à l’idée que le Noir s’est trompé de bouton. Le disque terminé, le Noir retire une autre pièce de sa poche, l’introduit dans la fente, appuie sur un bouton. Et aussitôt, pour la seconde fois, le café se met à résonner du chant bien connu des Arméniens, etc. Cette fois, intrigués les clients arméniens se lèvent et viennent entourer le Noir. « Il vous plaît ce chant-là, lui demandent-ils ? Et pourquoi ? Racontez un peu. » Le Noir les regarde, perplexe, et leur répond : « Vorohedev, yéss Hay ém. » (Parce que je suis arménien). Et le voilà qui raconte son histoire de long en large devant les yeux écarquillés des clients arméniens du café arménien de ce quartier arménien de Toronto, disant qu’il est un haut fonctionnaire travaillant dans une administration au Pays-Bas. Puis avisant, le patron du café, il continue : « D’ailleurs, si vous passez par Amsterdam, je vous invite à me rendre visite. » Des mois passent, un jour le patron du café arménien du quartier arménien de Toronto et sa femme se trouvant au Pays-Bas, sonne à la porte du Noir. Ils sont accueillis par une magnifique femme blonde, deux garçons métis et le haut fonctionnaire. Ils passent une agréable soirée. Les deux Canadiens prennent congé, et tandis qu’ils s’éloignent, ils entendent la femme blonde de l’Arménien noir lui dire, étonnée : « Mais tu ne m’avais jamais dit qu’il y avait des Arméniens blancs ? »

*

Cette histoire vraie est un effet de la grande Histoire, quand des Arméniens établirent les premiers contacts avec l’Ethiopie au Moyen-Age, et surtout quand ils s’y installèrent après le génocide de 1915, grâce à la protection du Roi des Rois Haïlé Sélassié. Elle ne dit pas que les enfants métis parlaient l’arménien ni que l’épouse blanche, en vacances en Ethiopie chez ses beaux-parents, n’ayant de contacts qu’avec des Arméniens noirs, n’était pas mesure de penser qu’il existait d’autres types d’Arméniens. L’histoire ne va pas plus loin, mais on n’ose pas imaginer ce qu’elle aurait donné si l’épisode du café s’était passé en Arménie.

*

P.S. Le récit de cet Arménien noir, rapporté par Serge Avédikian, Arménien blanc, vous a été raconté par Denis Donikian, Arménien gris.