notes / comments

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Sunday, February 04, 2007
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REFLECTIONS
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An Armenian bears two crosses, and the heavier of the two is not his own.
*
If talk is cheap and if “he who speaks does not know,” when, O when shall I acquire the wisdom of silence?
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My critical remarks may damage our prestige in the eyes of the world; I am reminded once in a while. To which I can only say, what prestige? Most people are not even aware of our existence or, if they are, they tend to confuse us with Romanians and Arameans. To the rest we might as well be an open book and a political cliché. If they flatter us it may be because we can be of some use to them. Which means their opinions of us is so low that they think they can manipulate us with phony sentiments. I don’t call that prestige, I call that an insult.
*
When does hatred of the enemy end and self-hatred begin? Muslims in the Middle East today hate one another more than they hate the West, and judging by the venom in our discussions forums, letters to the editor, and our recent history, how different are we?
*
Honorat de Bueil: “Nature is jealous of our prosperity. She allots a longer lifespan to thorns than to roses.”
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Monday, February 05, 2007
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GUESSING GOD
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If God exists, He wants us to go about our business as though He didn’t. Gone are the days of the Old Testament when He micromanaged human affairs. No more Burning Bushes, Ave-Maria archangels, angels, and prophets. His message to mankind seems to be: If you don’t make use of the brain I have given you, don’t bother me with your problems.
*
What if our ancestors were smarter than we are? Mention if you can a modern figure comparable to Confucius, Buddha, Socrates, and Jesus. What if the writers of the Old Testament were smart enough to know they were writing science fiction? What if a thousand years from now mankind will study the Old Testament the way we study books on Greek mythology today?
*
When speaking of God, it is wiser to ask questions than to answer them. Or, like Buddha, treat Him as though He did not exist.
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“Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord in vain.” Buddha may be said to have been the only major religious leader who took this commandment so literally that Buddhism is the only major belief systems that is atheist.
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Tuesday, February 06, 2007
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CANADIAN ENCOUNTERS
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The first time I said something remotely critical about an unimportant aspect of Canadian life, an elegantly dressed and attractive lady said: “If you don’t like it here, why don’t you go back where you came from?”
*
When I asked her if she had a favorite painter, a local artist replied: “Eengrass.” It took me a while to realize she had meant Ingres.
*
When after a long interval I met an old friend in the street and asked about his mother, whom I had met on several occasions, he replied: “We don’t know where she is. She ran away with a younger man and we haven’t heard from her since.”
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A CANADIAN IN ITALY
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“How do you say pizza in Italian?”
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PATRIOTS
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Our partisans don’t like my kind of writing. They think I insult Armenishness. And what’s even more absurd, they consider themselves competent judges, even though they have more skeletons in their closet than breathing specimens with brains in their living room. Only utter despair can lead a man to believe in his own lies.
*
I’VE BEEN READING
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Barby d’Aurevilly: “The crimes of the most advanced civilizations are greater than those committed by the most backward barbarians.”
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Blaise Cendrars: “It is in the very things that they share that people differ the most from one another.”
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Sartre: “Half victim, half accomplice, like the rest of mankind.”
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Paul Valéry: “To believe that one understands is a very dangerous state of mind.”
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Balzac: “All power is a permanent conspiracy.”
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Wednesday, February 07, 2007
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QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
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Mention an unsolved mystery and someone is sure to spin a conspiracy theory.
*
Ask an unanswerable question and someone is sure to come up with the wrong answer.
*
People who hate fiction don’t see any contradiction in the fiction that is at the base of their belief system.
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When it comes to understanding, man seems to operate on the verge of starvation: any answer, no matter how untenable and absurd, is better than none.
*
A priest once slapped me because I asked the wrong question. I no longer remember the question, but I remember the slap, which was no answer.
*
MEN AND WOMEN
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To women, men are the most universal sources of disappointment. Did you know that the Chinese word for husband is “good for nothing”?
*
The dumbest woman is smarter about men than the smartest man is about women.
*
The most mysterious thing about women is not women themselves but man’s sudden, unpredictable, and incomprehensible transformation of red-hot passion to arctic indifference.
*
AN IMPOSSIBLE DREAM
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There is only one way for the moderate to survive in a world of fanatics, and that’s by converting them to moderation. What could be more megalomaniacal to think that one has a chance to succeed where Socrates, Jesus, and Gandhi failed?
*
FANATICS
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It could be said of them that the only thing they succeed in doing is adding to the contents of the cesspool in which they stand up to their necks.
*
USEFUL QUOTATIONS
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Ernest Renan: “He who follows orders is almost always a better person than he who issues them.”
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Marcel Proust: “Every social class has its pathology.”
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Thursday, February 08, 2007
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CONFESSIONS OF AN ABOMINABLE NO MAN
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It is not enough to have all the right arguments on your side, you must also adapt them to the occasion; and if you are dealing from a position of weakness, you are expected to flatter your adversary into thinking he is right and to apologize for making a nuisance of yourself. If diplomacy, etiquette, and brown-nosing are not your forte, avoid criticizing those in power, and their flunkies, hirelings, friends, and relatives.
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SPIRIT OF CONTRADICTION
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If you make an obvious assertion, such as “the sun rises in the east,” or “two plus two make four,” someone is sure to contradict you. Anyone who has ever written for Armenians is familiar with this phenomenon.
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CAUSE FOR CELEBRATION
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Once in a while a reader who has engaged in Internet hooliganism writes to apologize. This is not something that happens every day or year. As a matter of fact, they are such rare occurrences that I am tempted to mark them on my calendar so that I may celebrate their anniversaries.
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LINES TO REMEMBER
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Henry de Montherlant: “Some people acquire a sense of justice only after they have suffered an injustice.”
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Raymond Queneau: “There is deception in all action, as there is error in all thought.”
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Henri Bosco: “Great decisions are not made, they make themselves.”
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Friday, February 09, 2007
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IRREFUTABLE ARGUMENTS
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Our partisans have three powerful arguments against their critics: (one) you are too young to know any better; (two) you are too old to be up to date with recent developments; and (three) you must be a member of the opposition.
*
UNDERSTANDING GOD
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God is too large a concept to fit into anyone’s pocket. If you think God is on your side, He is sure to abandon you.
*
ON FALLIBILITY
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Nothing can be as easy and natural as being wrong – wrong about God, wrong about oneself, wrong about the world, wrong about everything.
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IQ
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Only idiots brag about how smart they are.
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HEAVEN AND HELL
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Heaven is a place reserved only for those who have been through hell.
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SAVING FACE
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If you are out to save face, the gutter is not the best place to do it from.
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TURKISH PROVERB
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“Eshek khoshavnan ne annar?” (What does a jackass know about stewed raisins?)
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LINES WORTH REMEMBERING
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Simone de Beauvoir: “If one lives long enough one sees all victories turn into defeats.”
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Alphonse de Lamartine: “If you miss one person, the whole world seems empty.”
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Jules Supervielle: “I am a perfectly honest man. I disgust myself completely.”
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Francois de la Rochefoucauld: “We get so used to hiding our feelings from others that we end up hiding them from ourselves.”
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Saturday, February 10, 2007
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AFTER MY OWN HEART
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Francois de la Rochefoucauld: “Sometimes one is as different from oneself as from others.”
*
Alain: “An error by Descartes is better than a truth by a pedant.”
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Pierre Mendes France: “Democracy is a state of mind.”
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George Bataille: “I believe truth has only one visage: that of a violent contradiction.”
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Gustave Le Bon: “Sooner or later a crime committed by all becomes a right.”
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Alfred de Vigny: “Something of the student remains in all professors.”
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Albert Camus: “If we fail to reconcile justice with liberty, we fail in all things.”
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Flaubert: “We should get rid of all flags – they have been soiled with too much blood and merde.”
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Paul Valéry: “I say this without any hesitation: a university degree is the mortal enemy of culture.”
#

[arabaliozian]

Re: notes / comments

Sunday, February 11, 2007
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THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM
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When it comes to our identity, the elephant in the room is the Genocide. Whenever Armenians are mention in the foreign press, it’s in connection with the elephant.
*
As a child I was told about our Golden Age in the 5th Century AD, but I was not given an opportunity to draw any sense of identity from it. When I read Dostoevsky at the age of thirteen, I immediately made contact with what it means to be Russian; for the duration I felt more like a Russian than Armenian. Something similar could be said about Philip Roth and xxxishness, Negro spirituals and Negritude, Thomas Mann and German identity.
*
At one time or another I have been fascinated and deeply touched by many cultures, but I am afraid I cannot say the same about Armenian culture notwithstanding the fact that I have written a great deal on the subject, including a textbook titled THE ARMENIANS: THEIR HISTORY AND CULTURE. Speaking of which, on reading the manuscript of this book, I remember my editor complaining: “I don’t get a sense of place.” He probably meant to say identity. In my defense I said that I was not writing a book about Armenia but about Armenians, some of whose most noteworthy achievements – from Byzantine governance to contemporary finance -- had been made outside Armenia.
*
The question of Armenian identity came up to me while reading a collection of brief essays and memoirs on xxxish identity titled MATZO BALLS FOR BREAKFAST & OTHER MEMORIES OF GROWNG UP xxxISH by Alan King and Friends (New York, 2004). What does it mean to be Armenian? I regret to say I can’t come with a clear answer. In Greece where I was born and raised, I knew I was not Greek. In Italy where I studied for five years I never came close to feeling Italian. In Canada where I have spent most of my life and where I also acquired Canadian citizenship (as opposed to being the offspring of stateless Nansen refugees) I know I am not a Canadian, which is neither here nor there because most Canadians don’t know it either. I ask again: What does it mean to be Armenian? What do I have in common with my fellow Armenians, except the awareness that I share a tragedy in our recent past? I grew up hating Turks, but I see that now not as a positive but a negative, something to get over with as opposed to something to be nursed and hoarded, which is what our Ottomanized Turcophile pundits encourage us to do. There is nothing Armenian about being victimized by an oppressive regime. Oppressed people -- from American Indians to Untouchable Indians -- are a dime a dozen. Massacres from the Golden Age of Greek history (5th Century BC) to the present, have been a constant in human history.
*
Perhaps being Armenian means, for me at least, to be open to all cultures and to reject all forms of tyranny and barbarism. And when I speak of barbarism I don’t mean the barbarism of our enemies, but the barbarism that is within all of us.
#

[gmd]

Re: notes / comments

Sunday, February 11, 2007
************************************************
THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM
*****************************************
When it comes to our identity, the elephant in the room is the Genocide. Whenever Armenians are mention in the foreign press, it’s in connection with the elephant.
*
As a child I was told about our Golden Age in the 5th Century AD, but I was not given an opportunity to draw any sense of identity from it. When I read Dostoevsky at the age of thirteen, I immediately made contact with what it means to be Russian; for the duration I felt more like a Russian than Armenian. Something similar could be said about Philip Roth and xxxishness, Negro spirituals and Negritude, Thomas Mann and German identity.
*
At one time or another I have been fascinated and deeply touched by many cultures, but I am afraid I cannot say the same about Armenian culture notwithstanding the fact that I have written a great deal on the subject, including a textbook titled THE ARMENIANS: THEIR HISTORY AND CULTURE. Speaking of which, on reading the manuscript of this book, I remember my editor complaining: “I don’t get a sense of place.” He probably meant to say identity. In my defense I said that I was not writing a book about Armenia but about Armenians, some of whose most noteworthy achievements – from Byzantine governance to contemporary finance -- had been made outside Armenia.
*
The question of Armenian identity came up to me while reading a collection of brief essays and memoirs on xxxish identity titled MATZO BALLS FOR BREAKFAST & OTHER MEMORIES OF GROWNG UP xxxISH by Alan King and Friends (New York, 2004). What does it mean to be Armenian? I regret to say I can’t come with a clear answer. In Greece where I was born and raised, I knew I was not Greek. In Italy where I studied for five years I never came close to feeling Italian. In Canada where I have spent most of my life and where I also acquired Canadian citizenship (as opposed to being the offspring of stateless Nansen refugees) I know I am not a Canadian, which is neither here nor there because most Canadians don’t know it either. I ask again: What does it mean to be Armenian? What do I have in common with my fellow Armenians, except the awareness that I share a tragedy in our recent past? I grew up hating Turks, but I see that now not as a positive but a negative, something to get over with as opposed to something to be nursed and hoarded, which is what our Ottomanized Turcophile pundits encourage us to do. There is nothing Armenian about being victimized by an oppressive regime. Oppressed people -- from American Indians to Untouchable Indians -- are a dime a dozen. Massacres from the Golden Age of Greek history (5th Century BC) to the present, have been a constant in human history.
*
Perhaps being Armenian means, for me at least, to be open to all cultures and to reject all forms of tyranny and barbarism. And when I speak of barbarism I don’t mean the barbarism of our enemies, but the barbarism that is within all of us.
#

Do you see an opportunity within the new Republic to create a clear and unifying identity which we lack?
I think at least among some there is a greater sense of pride in the success of Artsak. I realize this is not the same as an identity but it seems to provide a certain unifying factor on the political front.

Garik M.

[crusader1492]

Re: notes / comments

Do you see an opportunity within the new Republic to create a clear and unifying identity which we lack?
I think at least among some there is a greater sense of pride in the success of Artsak. I realize this is not the same as an identity but it seems to provide a certain unifying factor on the political front.

Garik M.

Garik,

Does Ara B. ever respond to you. I get the feeling he thinks he's above everybody. Do you get this sense?