Vanadzor and Vahagni

Posted on November 12, 2017March 14, 2019 by Lark

After our morning marathon of alphabet-related sightseeing, we made our way to Vanadzor and eventually Vahagni.

Vanadzor is the third largest city in Armenia, after Yerevan and Gyumri, with a population of about 85,000 people. Like so many other cities in Armenia, it had its peak population around the 1980s, before the collapse of the Soviet Union, and has been on the decline since then. At its height, it was an industrial city, home to Soviet factories and chemical plants. After the collapse, industry shut down, and thousands of people lost their jobs. The same type of thing happened in much of Armenia which is part of the reason (though there are plenty of other reasons as well) why the new republic struggled so much in the years following independence. Today, Vanadzor is back to being an industrial center but at nowhere near its former glory.

Despite all of this, I was pleasantly surprised by Vanadzor. Maybe my expectations for everything are very low because it seems like I’m pleasantly surprised by a lot of things, but hey, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Our first stop in the city was the train station. Since I had never been to Vanadzor, I put together our sightseeing list from things I found online.

Inside the train station. I apparently didn’t take an exterior picture, but I think that you can kind of guess what the outside looked like based on this.

When we pulled up and saw the hideous block of a station, I thought, “What on earth was I thinking when I made that list?” Then, thankfully, I had an “aha” moment where I remember that it was described as being built in “classic Soviet architecture style”. So yes, that’s what we were there to see… its hideousness. The station used to connect Vanadzor and Armenia to Eastern Europe, but now you can only travel within Armenia and to Tbilisi on trains, leaving it eerily deserted most of the time aside from the bustling parking lot outside that serves as the central bus station.

Right across the street, there’s a park with a church in it. According to Google, it’s called the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary (quite the mouthful, huh?), but it’s also just called the Russian Church. There used to be a wooden church on the same site, and after that one burned down in 1826, the current stone structure was built to replace it in 1893. They were doing some construction inside, but I was just excited to see that there’s stained glass! Clearly not an Armenian church because that’s really not a thing here. It was cool to see a church in a completely different style from most of the churches we’ve visited.

Inside the Russian Church. Stained glass!

After the train station and church, one of Mike’s Vahagni friends, Hovsep, met us to say hi and show us around the city a bit. He speaks English and works in Vanadzor now, so it was nice for Mike to get to see him again and for us to have a little local knowledge leading the tour for once (rather than just me reading whatever info page I found on the internet).

Hovsep took us to the next thing on my list, the Church of the Holy Mother of God/Karakilisa Church/the old church. If you’re asking why these things can’t just have one name, I’m right there with you. On the walk there, he explained that not only are the churches in the town name confused, but actually the town itself has had a thousand names too (note: 1 thousand = 3). It started out as Gharakilisa, meaning “black church”, was renamed to Kirovakan during Soviet days, and was renamed again to Vanadzor, meaning “valley of Van”, after independence. Talk about an identity crisis.

Inside the old church. Check out those ceiling paintings!

The current “old church” was completed in 1831, replacing the previous structure that was destroyed in an earthquake in 1826. The orange and black tuff was brought from Gyumri, and it was one of the only churches that actually operated as a place of worship during the Soviet years. I loved the inside of the church. The paintings and patterns on the ceilings were absolutely beautiful. It’s the little touches of personality that you can find in each church that make it worth going to see more even when I’ve already been to what feels like a million churches in Armenia already.

There were a bunch of very old khatchkars outside the old church

From there, we strolled the streets a bit, Hovsep took us to a spring with natural bubbly water, and we made our way to the next church, Saint Gregory of Narek Cathedral/the new church. It was completed in 2005, and like so many other new churches, it just didn’t have the same personality as the old church. I mean, it was beautiful, don’t get me wrong, and it actually was much better than a lot of the new churches that feel stark, but I’d pick the old church any day. I did love the paintings though! Paintings and stained glass are almost guaranteed to make me like a church.

The park… I seriously can’t get enough of these fall leaves.

Before heading out, we stopped in the park across the street to enjoy the fall colors a bit before taking on the final stretch to Vahagni. Remember when I said that the road between Vanadzor and Vahagni was under construction? It. Was. Awful. The very few parts that were finished were fantastic, and the rest was horrible. I don’t even get carsick and I was feeling nauseous.

When we finally made it into the village, some conversations with random, loitering strangers led us to Mike’s host family. Oh yeah, did I mention that no one spoke English? None of the people we were visiting. Zero. And how’s Mike’s Armenian, you ask? Ha. Haha. Hahaha. Dad and I were basically in the hot seats, responsible for translating and attempting to carry the conversation. I won’t lie; it was rough. We did our best, but Dad hasn’t spoken Armenian since he was last in Armenia 16 years ago and before that when he was like 4 years old. I’m 4 months in on basically learning from scratch. Not ideal, but somehow, we made it work. The conversation was never smooth, but conversation happened.

Soon enough, we were all being force fed, and that’s basically same in every language. Things went more smoothly from there. I haven’t been force fed in a while, since I stopped living with a host family, so I had to dust off all of my “please stop feeding me or I’m going to explode” vocabulary. It ended up being a lot of fun, even if I had a headache from thinking so much/trying to understand what was going on.

Also, side note but there’s a big gap between understanding and translating. There were times when I understood the gist of what was being said but couldn’t have told it to you in words if you gave me a million dollars. Ugh. This Armenian thing is hard. Still, though, I felt good about the whole thing at the end because no matter how much I didn’t understand, there was a lot that I did, and that’s something to be proud of.

We popped in for a shorter visit with the other family in town, and that ended with me leaving with a new number in my phone and the invitation to come and visit anytime. Talk about the nicest people in the universe…

The family Mike stayed with while he was here

The drive home was, as anticipated, pretty close to miserable. The Vahagni to Vanadzor portion of the drive was, once again, vomit-inducing, and about 5 minutes after reaching the end of it and driving on real road again, we got a flat tire. Oh, I wish I was kidding. Watching the tire-changing process was the most Armenian thing I’ve ever seen. All of the men got out of the car and looked at the tire. Okay, definitely flat. The tools came out. Everyone participated, either in action or in word. We didn’t have the right sized wrench. Cars driving by were flagged down. More men came to look at the tire. Still definitely flat. This guy doesn’t have the right wrench. Neither does that guy, but he says he’ll go get one and come back. Oooh! This guy has one! And against all odds, that tire got changed. Q: How many men does it take to change a tire? A: At least 8.

Oh yeah, and the guy who said he’d come back? He did, just as we were finishing up. Where does that happen? A stranger says he’ll go completely out of his way for you and then follows through. Despite the less-than-ideal situation, it did give us a chance to experience some good, old-fashioned kindness.

Mesrop Mashtots and the Alphabet Adventure

Posted on November 10, 2017March 14, 2019 by Lark

Side note: I think that someone should write an Armenian children’s book called “Mesrop Mashtots and the Alphabet Adventure”. Though I guess it wouldn’t have the same ring to it in Armenian… eh, minor details.

The longest day of the week was Day 3, and we’re going to put all of the blame for that on Mike. Just kidding… well, kind of kidding. Yes, it was definitely due to him that it was such a long day, but we don’t need to assign blame because it was also a good day.

When Mike was here four years ago, he spent most of his time in Vahagni, a town in the northern part of the country near Vanadzor (the third biggest city in Armenia). One of his requests for our schedule was to go and visit the two families who hosted their group. It would have been nice if Vahagni was closer to Yerevan… Oh, that would have been wonderful, but of course, no such luck. It’s about 3 hours away normally, but the road between Vanadzor and Vahagni is currently under construction which means that one of those hours is much longer and much bumpier than usual.

Instead of just going straight to Vahagni and straight back, I also wanted to fit in some sightseeing and stops to break up the drive a little. A few of the things on my overall list were in the right direction, so that’s how we ended up at Surb Mesrop Mashtots Cathedral at 8:50AM. For those of you unfamiliar with Mashtots, he’s the guy who created the Armenian alphabet. If you’ve been following my ongoing Armenian struggle, you know that I’m not exactly his biggest fan. There are 39 letters in the Armenian alphabet, and interestingly enough, about 39 reasons why I don’t like him. What a coincidence, yeah? I won’t make you read the whole list, but here’s are the first five reasons:

ԶՁՋՉ
ՇԾ
ծժճձ
զցգքջ
My name in Latin letters: Lara – My name in Armenian letters: Լարա. No, you’re not seeing things wrong. The “L” and the “r” are basically the same. He made all of those funky looking letters, and two out of the three in my name are nearly identical in both alphabets. Thanks for nothing, Mashtots.

Etc, etc, etc.

Like come on, if you’re going to create an alphabet, at least be creative enough to make all the letters look different. And if you can’t come up with 39 different looking letters, you probably don’t need them all. I guess to be fair, he only made 36 of them. Three were added later because while he was busy drawing about 12 letters that make the same sounds as each other, he forgot a few.

Okay, I’m finished ranting, and in case you’re wondering, my Armenian learning is actually going pretty well. Despite my complaints, I can read and write decently well, and I feel like I’ve been making some breakthroughs with speaking recently. One step at a time!

Back to the church… Surb Mesrop Mashtots Cathedral. Mashtots died in 444AD, and he was buried in Oshakan. A small chapel was built on his tomb, and that chapel has since been replaced with the current church, built in 1875. The church is pretty and looks different from most other Armenian churches because it has a bell tower instead of a dome. The best part of it, though, is how seriously they took the Mashtots theme. The alphabet is everywhere. EVERYWHERE. They have alphabet front doors, an alphabet window inside, an alphabet stone on your way down to Mashtots’ tomb, a work-in-progress gravel alphabet, a book monument with the alphabet carved inside, and an army of khatchkar-style stone letters. And that’s just what I can remember off the top of my head! I’m sure there are more alphabets hidden away somewhere.

I hadn’t been there before, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. I’m very glad that we went, though! I’m surprised that I haven’t heard more about it because it’s very close to Yerevan and is really cool! I only even learned about it because I was looking up the OTHER alphabet monument. That one is more popular, but honestly, I think the letters at this one are much prettier, plus you get a bonus church and celebrity grave to check out.

Since we were in the area already, we also made quick stops at Saghmosavank and Hovhannavank, the two churches that I visited with Shant and Carineh when we went on our made-up hike into the gorge. You can read more about that HERE. I think they’re worth the visits, especially if they’re not too far out of your way, because the views are fabulous, and the churches are pretty and have some personality.

After that, we completed our alphabet pilgrimage at the famous alphabet monument that’s located randomly on the side of the highway. That monument was created in 2005 to celebrate the 1600^th birthday of the alphabet. I’m not sure how they picked the location, but it is kind of nice because you can see Mount Aragats in the distance. Random, though. It’s definitely random.

Anyway, once we were finished taking cliché pictures with our name letters, off we went, back on the long road to Vahagni.

To be continued… (the suspense is killing you, I know)

Areni and Noravank

Posted on November 9, 2017April 27, 2020 by Lark

After our long first day, I think everyone was happy that Day 2 was only a part day outing. Our schedule included a bunch of things that I actually hadn’t been to yet, so that was exciting but also slightly nerve-wracking because I didn’t have a good idea of how long we would need at each thing, where exactly they were, how to get in, etc. I did as much research as I could, but the internet only tells you so much, and it tells you even less in Armenia.

Our first stop was Khor Virap, one of the monasteries that I visited for the first time with Sarah. You can get an awesome view of Ararat from there, assuming that the air is clear, but we unfortunately had a pretty hazy day. Instead of having the mountain jump out at you like it usually does, it was more like a phantom lurking in the background, and you could see it only if you focused extra hard.

If you want to read all about the legends associated with Khor Virap and St. Gregory’s imprisonment there, you can check out the post I wrote about my visit with Sarah (plus you’ll get some good, random bonus material).

That’s the hole where St. Gregory’s bread loaves got dropped in

Here’s the hole from the outside. It’s really not accessible, so I don’t know if God also granted wings to the women who fed St. Gregory or what. Or maybe just a ladder.

After Khor Virap, the rest of the day was new experiences for me! We kept going south and headed to Areni, home of the cave where the oldest leather shoe and the oldest winery were found. Do you remember when we talked about Armenian inventions and I said that Armenians invented shoes AND wine? This cave is the reason for that claim to fame. I think there are a few different names for the cave, but we’ll call it by the official archaeological name, Areni-1. Creative, right?

Right inside the entrance. This is where the shoe was found.

Like I said, I had never been before, so I had no idea how it worked. Luckily, our driver, Arthur, knew where to go. After paying the 1000 dram admission fee ($2 whole dollars to see the birthplace of shoes. What a bargain!), we headed in. I was expecting, well, a cave, but it was actually quite nice. There were stairs up to the entrance, light fixtures throughout, and informative signs talking about what was found in each area and what you can still see.

Dad made friends with this stone carver who works outside the cave, and he let us try our hands at carving… needless to say, we’re all so naturally talented that we’re quitting our jobs to start a family khatchkar business.

My mom’s main question about the whole thing was: why the heck was someone digging around in the cave in the first place? It’s not like it was easily accessible before they put the stairs in. Did someone wake up one day and have a crazy epiphany that maybe they should dig in that random cave above that one random cliff and beneath that other random cliff in that random town in Armenia? However it happened, the whole thing is pretty impressive. The dig is very orderly, and it’s even cool just to see how they roped off the different areas and kept things organized.

We also did the classic Areni activity and visited Areni Winery. I mean, how can you not go to a winery that’s next to the birthplace of wine?? You would think that means it’s the best wine in the universe, but based on Mike’s and my dad’s reports, that’s maybe not quite true. Either way, good wine or not, it seems like the kind of thing that you have to do. We got a tour of the winery by the son of the founders, Tigran. He showed us around the different rooms and explained the wine-making process. I’m no wine expert (or even wine amateur), but I always think it’s fun to see how things are made. Though it smelled strongly of wine through the whole tour which was kind of gross, but I guess that’s an unavoidable side effect of making wine…

These are the fermentation vats where the wine starts out… it stays in these for 10 days before moving on to the next phase, 1 month in metal barrels.

After the metal barrels, the wine comes into these oak barrels for 1-5 years more. Finally, it’s bottled.
Check out all of those wine bottles! Mike wanted to ask how many bottles they can stack without the glass shattering. You’d think it would be a lot, right? Who knows. Well, someone I’m sure, but not me.

They make a bunch of different fruit wines which is interesting. There were options like apricot (the most Armenian of all wines) and pomegranate. They also have these massive barrels to hold the wine during part of the fermentation process, and they get the oak for those from Artsakh. I kind of wanted one to live in… some of them were definitely big enough for a tiny house. The other claim to fame of Areni wine is that some of their wines use Areni grapes which are ONLY grown there. I’m sure there’s some reason like the soil or something science-y to explain that, but I amused myself by pretending that it’s just because grapes grown in Areni are Areni grapes, so duh, you obviously couldn’t grow them somewhere else because then they’d be Yerevan grapes or Gyumri grapes.

View from the parking lot with the fortress walls.

Our last stop before heading back to Yerevan was Noravank Monastery. Noravank is a medieval monastery with construction starting in 1205. There are two things that people usually go to Noravank expecting – an amazing view and a fun picture on the steep steps of the main, 2-story Surb Astvatsatsin Church (apparently a very popular church name… that’s the same name as the church at Khor Virap. It means “Church of the Holy Mother”). It’s located in the Amaghu River gorge and is surrounded by cliffs. Definitely not an ugly spot! Surb Astvatsatsin was completed in 1339 and was the final work of the designer and sculptor Momik. The church is intricately carved and has a first-floor burial chamber and second-floor chapel. To get to the second floor, you have to climb stairs that cantilever out from the side of the building. Besides Surb Astvatsatsin, there’s another intact church (Surb Karapet), a chapel, fortress walls surrounding the complex, and some ruins.

Totally not posed or anything… Mike, and I just love each other so much that this is how we normally stand.

I’m not sure why I look so nervous… I’m sure there aren’t any snakes in that hole or anything…

From the beginning, Mike and I were enthusiastic about climbing and exploring every nook and cranny of the complex. Mom was slightly more hesitant and insisted that she wasn’t going to climb up the stairs, but there was no chance I was going to let her leave there without doing it. There was a tour group there when we arrived, so we decided to do some exploring of the other buildings before checking out the main event.

By the time we made our way to Surb Astvatsatsin, there was no one else left in the complex. Perfect timing! We did have to loiter a bit, waiting for someone to come to take a full family picture, but we also had plenty of time to check out the church without hordes surrounding us. Mom climbed the stairs about halfway for a picture, and at that point, why not just go all the way up? It’s definitely worth the climb to see the inside of the church. There are more windows that most other churches, plus an open dome at the top, making it feel light and airy inside rather than dark and heavy.

Inside the top level of Surp Astvatsatsin

Carvings around the upper door of Surp Astvatsatsin

That was our last stop of the day, so after we had our fill, we made our way back to Yerevan and took a trip up Cascade to visit Mother Armenia. Mom and I were normal humans and opted to take the escalators. Mike and Dad were overachievers and not only took the stairs but also counted them. They’re clearly a couple of engineers.

Posing with the eternal Cascade construction

Havuts Tar Monastery

Posted on October 18, 2017November 10, 2020 by Lark

Victoria and I decided that we wanted to go on a Saturday adventure, so we planned a mini-excursion to visit Havuts Tar Monastery. It was on my list of places to go because I read that the view is great and it’s worth a visit even though it’s in ruins. The location was also very convenient… It’s just a short hike away from the town of Garni, and the marshrutka ride from Yerevan to Garni takes less than an hour.

Azat River! Along our walk to the reserve from Garni

I wasn’t so sure about the logistics of hiking there because it’s located inside of Khosrov Forest State Reserve. It’s one of the oldest protected areas in the world, supposedly established by King Khosrov in the 330s. I think he just wanted something to name after himself. It was re-established in its current form in 1958. There are four different landscapes within the park, ranging from desert to alpine meadow, and a ton of different plant and animal species. There are 41 mammal species!

The Khosrov website makes it seem like coordinating a visit to the park is a huge pain. It says that you have to hire a guide and get a permit if you want to hike in the park, and it’s a bit expensive. In all of the reviews I read about Havuts Tar, no one said anything about a guide. Who the heck knows which one is right? The best way to figure anything out is to just show up, so that’s what we planned. We figured we would go, try to visit, and be prepared for a last-minute change of plans if we weren’t allowed into the park.

You can see a little speck on top of the mountain in the background, right side… that’s Amenaprkich Church

Our marshrutka dropped us in the center of Garni, and from there, we started walking in the general direction of the park. Oh yeah, we also weren’t exactly sure about how to get there… but hey, it’s all part of the adventure, right? It took a few near-wrong turns and some helpful directions from locals, but we eventually found what looked like a trail and started hiking. Thank goodness for GPS because otherwise, who knows where we would have ended up? It seemed for a while like we weren’t going to encounter anyone… until we turned a corner and saw a huge gate with a Khosrov seal on it. Okay, showtime. Worst case, we’d get turned away and have to find something else to do. No big deal.

There was a park ranger sitting at the gate, and we said hello and told him that we wanted to see Havuts Tar. (We had practiced saying this in Armenian on the walk so that we would sound like we knew what we were talking about.) He didn’t seem thrown off by our presence or our request and asked where we were from. We said Yerevan, and he told us that it’s 1000 dram to hike there if you’re from Yerevan and 2000 dram if you’re a foreigner, so lucky for us that we’re not foreigners because we get a better price. I think he winked at us when he said that, but I have no idea why because we definitely were passing as locals.

We went into the little visitor’s center to pay, and they had a sign with pricing for all of the different sites within the park. To me, that seems to mean you don’t need a guide… Oh, who knows. Maybe it’s like some local secret that you can just walk in, but they try to trick the internet users into getting a guide? Anyway, I was surprised by how nice the visitor’s center was. They had posters about the different sites in the park, information about environmental preservation, a creepily impressive beetle collection, and best of all, a bathroom.

Khatchkar along the path to the monastery

Victoria and I paid our 1000 dram each and headed up the trail to the monastery. The hike wasn’t bad at all. There were some steep parts, but we were following a dirt car road, making it impossible to get lost. There were even a few shade trees along the way! That’s a rare sight on a hike here.

Imagine if it wasn’t all brown… I guess we could have picked a better time of year (aka spring). Amenaprkich Church is up on the hill, and in the low area to the right, you can see the grey walls of the monastic complex.

The path. Not much room for wrong turns!

View of the monastery complex from the hiking trail

Havuts Tar Monastic Complex was built between the 11^th and 13^th centuries, so in Armenia time, it’s new! There was an earthquake in 1679 that destroyed much of the complex, and after that, it was basically abandoned, aside from some minor restoration efforts in the 18^th and 20^th centuries. There’s another church there as well, Amenaprkich Church, which is just outside of the walled complex and was originally built in the 10^th century.

I so wish that I could have seen it in all of its glory. Just imagine! That building on the right is a church within the complex, and there are other auxiliary buildings along the perimeter walls (you can just see the edge of one on the left side of the picture).

The ruins were a pleasant surprise. Everything I read basically said that the monastery is unimpressive, but the view makes the trip worth it. I completely disagree with the first statement. It was beautiful!! The ruins were way more extensive than I expected. There were fortified walls, hidden underground rooms, and some of the best stone reliefs I’ve seen in Armenia. As we wandered around, Victoria and I couldn’t help but express our disbelief at the fact that anyone would say that the monastery was anything less than awesome.

One of the church ruins with lettering on the wall that probably didn’t take one eternity to carve

Looking out at the ruins from the wall. The ruins of the two churches inside the complex are in the foreground, and Amenaprkich Church is on the hill in the background.

I love these khatchkars. Look at how intricate! And I also love how they integrated different decorative stones into the walls. It gives them a lot of personality.

Entrance to one of the monastery complex churches. I also love how they used two different colors of tuff stone to create accents.

That view! And also I really like that wall. I think it’s pretty.

I’m sure this isn’t going to fall anytime soon… but that doesn’t mean that we didn’t sprint under it just in case

It’s not an adventure without some pictures of me in random holes. These little vaulted rooms are up against the perimeter walls, possibly used as guest chambers for the monastery.

Some of the carvings were the most intricate I’ve seen

This looks like an alien on a space horse capturing another alien, but the captured alien is smiling because he knows that there are twenty of his alien soldier friends on their way to save him.

The view certainly wasn’t anything to complain about either. It overlooks the Azat River Valley, the same one that runs behind Garni Temple, and the whole thing is pretty spectacular. From Amenaprkich, you can see Garni Temple too! We found a shady spot to eat our snacks (some bread, cheese, and cookies, courtesy of Victoria), chatted, and enjoyed the scenery.

Me and Victoria! You can kind of see Garni Temple in the background, but it’s not super easy. Maybe about 1/3 of the way into the picture from the right, there’s a little grey box on top of one of the ridges sticking out into the gorge. That’s the temple.

Amenaprkich Church is the one with the orange/black tuff checkerboard front. On the right side, there’s another church that was added later, but as you can see, it’s mostly collapsed as well.

The last remaining arch inside the church. Again, I have no idea how this is still intact. And you can see part of the ring where the dome would have been.

This room is underground… they think it used to be the monastery’s manuscript library

It’s always nice when a day turns out even better than you expect. I was worried that we wouldn’t even be able to enter the park and I would have dragged Victoria out there for no reason. Far from that, we had a great time! Havuts Tar is pretty close to the top of my list of favorite places to visit in Armenia, along with Dilijan, Levon’s Divine Underground, and Smbataberd. I think my list of favorite places is slightly more obscure than most people’s…

Biking to Etchmiadzin

Posted on September 27, 2017April 27, 2020 by Lark

There was another cool Birthright excursion a couple weeks ago, so I made another exception to my usual “avoid large groups” rule and signed up. That rule exists for a reason, and I knew that I would be subjecting myself to inevitable irritation by going… but bikes were involved, and I love bikes more than I hate large groups.

Talene and me during an unnecessary break at the airport

Side note: If you’re wondering about why I have that rule, it’s for a lot of reasons. When it comes to traveling, large groups are always late and can never make decisions and there’s always someone who’s unhappy for some reason or who is out of sync with the rest of the group. It’s better, in my opinion, to limit your group sizes and save yourself the stress. Plus, in general, I’m not really the type of person who thrives in large groups. I’m much better one-on-one or in settings where I can talk to each person and actually get to know them. Too many new people or things going on at the same time completely stresses me out.

Anyway, the excursion was biking to Etchmiadzin. I was almost convinced at “biking” until I thought about the fact that it would be 50 people on bikes, and so many people are terrible at biking. I wasn’t exactly interested in having someone who hadn’t ridden a bike in 10 years swerving into me and knocking me over. Somehow, I was convinced to go anyway, and my game plan was to stick to the front of the pack.

For the most part, it worked. There was one dicey second when a girl next to me swerved into a (parked) car and then swerved back out into the street, towards me. Thankfully, there was no collision, but I got away from her as quickly as possible and sped my way to the front.

I forget that a lot of other people don’t really bike that often or that far. The ride was 20 km (about 12.5 miles) on almost completely flat ground, and for me, that was nothing. I used to bike 8.5 miles one way to get to work every day. Especially considering the speed we were going for most of the ride, I probably could have gone for 100 miles. At least. We were moving at about 6.5 miles per hour which is less than half the speed that I’d ride to work. Anyway, afterward, people were talking about how far and difficult the ride was, and I was baffled. I wanted so badly to ride back so that I could do the ride at a normal speed, but I wasn’t allowed, even though two of the BR staff members said they would go with me. Bummer.

Once we made it to Vagharshapat, the town where Etchmiadzin is, we went to 4 out of the 5 churches in town. This is the same place where Sarah and I went on our “day of a million churches”. There were weddings in progress at 3 of the 4 churches (that’s Armenia on a Saturday for you). It was cool going back to Etchmiadzin because I still love the ceiling there. Even though there are these weird 3D baby heads randomly on the ceiling that I think are supposed to be angel heads but are mostly just creepy.

They should have just hired me as the tour guide for this trip because telling that story about Saint Gayane and Saint Hripsime is one of my most favorite things. Maybe I can have a career in Armenian folklore storytelling? I hear there’s a big demand for that. Anyway, I won’t tell it again because we’ve already been there and done that, but in case you missed it, you can check out my post about visiting Etchmiadzin with Sarah HERE.

Supposedly the rocks that killed Saint Hripsime. True or not, it’s kind of eerie.

Lastiver and Marmashen

Posted on September 8, 2017March 14, 2019 by Lark

In general, my friends and I aren’t very big on going to the planned Birthright excursions. They happen every weekend, but since I’ve been here, I’ve only been on two… make that three with the one I’m going to talk about now. In general, the excursions never run on schedule, there are too many people, and we usually want to do something more adventurous than whatever they have planned. We made an exception this weekend because the excursion description mentioned hiking and because we had heard that the destination, Lastiver, was super cool.

Views from the drive to Lastiver. My face was glued to the window in the car. I think everyone else was sleeping.

Lastiver part of a wildlife preserve, Ijevan State Reserve, in the north-ish eastern part of the country. There’s a river with a bunch of little waterfalls, caves, and best of all, trees. We have gone on so many hikes since I’ve been here, and every time, it’s like we’re wandering through the desert. Zero trees, zero shade, zero shelter from the meltingly hot sun. I’m a forest kind of person… forests and mountains, and even better, forested mountains.

Well, I was in luck with this hike. Almost the entire thing was through the trees and nice and shady. It felt a little bit like I was back at home which was comforting because sometimes it’s just nice to see something familiar. The end point was a campground by the river, and by “campground” I mean that they have these little cabins that you can stay in overnight and it’s really not very rustic at all.

When we got there, the announcement was made that we had an hour to swim or hang out until lunch was ready. I, of course, wanted to spend my time exploring. The water was FRIGID which means I wasn’t too interested in swimming, so I started walking upstream. Clearly, my friends and I are all on the same page because Shant and Carineh were right there with me, doing the same thing even though we hadn’t talked about it. We got a little farther upstream and found some of our other friends, Karen, Gagik, and his cousin, Anjela. I thought it was pretty funny how all of my favorite people ended up in the same place without any plans. I guess that’s how you know that you have things in common!

The upstream “hike” we ended up doing is probably one of my favorite things I’ve done so far in Armenia. It was another one of those fun, brain challenge hikes because there was a river and a bunch of rocks, and I wasn’t interested in getting wet. That meant that we had to be creative and do a lot of jumping from rock to rock. Our group got split up as Karen, Carineh, Gagik, and Anjela gave up on staying dry and started wading through the river, and Shant and I kept hopping from place to place. Ahh it was so fun.

One of my favorite feelings is when I’ve been consistently exercising and I feel like I have good control of my body, like balance and coordination-wise, and I get to do something that puts those to the test. This experience was definitely a balance and coordination challenge, but I felt like I was in control and could trust my legs to do what they were supposed to do. I was jumping from rock to rock without getting tired or worrying for a second that I was misjudging the distances or that I wasn’t capable of making it. I don’t know how else to describe that feeling besides just saying that it’s awesome, and you feel like your body is doing what it was made to do.

As you can see, Shant and I are trying not to get wet, and everyone else doesn’t care. The result? The worlds most awkward group photo. From left to right there’s Karen, Carineh, Anjela, Gagik, Shant, and me

Gagik won the caption contest with this picture. “When you discover new land and the locals are friendly.” I’m still laughing.

Anyway, by the time we decided to turn around and go back, lunch was long over. We made it back to the group, and I felt like we were castaways making it back to civilization. Who knows what everyone else spent their day doing, but I’m convinced that ours was the best.

The next day, Shant and I decided to make the trek out to see the Marmashen, a group of churches about 10 kilometers from where we live in Gyumri. There were originally five churches, only three are still standing, and they haven’t even found the foundations of the last one. I successfully called a taxi to take us there, and we spent some time wandering around, checking out the sights, and eating snacks (obviously, because we never go anywhere without snacks). It seemed like a cool place for locals because there was a picnic area, and people were going hard with their barbecue. After we were finished wandering, Shant really wanted to walk back to Gyumri, so off we went.

I think that the lettering on these churches is amazing. Can you imagine if your job was to write all of this?

I know, I know this all sounds ridiculous. I’m convinced that we’re (“we” being my friend group here) literally incapable as a group of doing anything in a normal way. At Lastiver, literally no one else from the Birthright group walked so far upstream. All of us were just naturally drawn to it. Here, who in their right mind decides to walk 10 km home when you could just call a taxi? I guess that means we aren’t quite in our right minds.

To make things more ridiculous, we decided to ignore all of the roads. Instead, we took random paths through the fields that looked like they were leading in the right direction. I wish I had some sort of fitness tracker or something because I promise you that we walked FAR more than 10 kilometers while trying to take “the most direct route”. Ha.

Our wanderings took us through some cow pastures and old ruins that looked like one of our archaeology sites, over a river, into the village of Marmashen (where people looked at us like we were actual space aliens), and out into some fields. There, we were summoned by a random farmer named Hamlet. He spoke no English, of course, and so we entered into the usual conversation of hand motions and sporadic Armenian words. He wanted us to come back to his house to eat dinner and spend the night. When we told him that we were walking to Gyumri and had come from Marmashen the church (it’s not that close to the town), he looked at us like we were literally insane and offered to call his friend who has a car to take us home. People usually don’t understand walking somewhere just for the sake of walking. We finally managed to pull ourselves away, and off we went, back into the fields.

Random green oasis area on our epic voyage home

Random cemetery that we encountered along the road to Marmashen… and when I say road, I mean cow path

The rest of the walk was interesting. There are a bunch of abandoned, half-collapsed buildings outside of Gyumri. I thought that they were from the earthquake, but apparently maybe they’re from after? I don’t know, either way, they’re super eerie. Then, there are buildings that seem like they should be abandoned, but upon closer inspection, there are people living in them. We walked briskly by those. Then, there are the massive craters in the ground where there used to be a building and now there’s just a foundation. I don’t know what everything out there is from, but it was certainly an interesting walk.

This building was pretty eerie. This is one that Shant said was built after the earthquake, but who knows?

We made it back to our neighborhood just as it was getting too dark to see anything. Thank goodness because I was starting to panic a little bit. Since we didn’t follow any roads, if it got dark before we made it home, we would have taken forever. We got ice cream to celebrate our survival, and ice cream fixes all problems, so now I have nothing but happy memories of the day. No, but actually, it was really fun, and I think that I can safely say that no one has EVER had a Marmashen experience like ours (because seriously… who walks??).

Saghmosavank to Hovhannavank

Posted on August 14, 2017March 14, 2019 by Lark

Last weekend, a few friends and I decided to make our own excursion rather than going on the Birthright one because it was just a swimming day at Lake Sevan. We wanted to do something a little more adventurous, you know, because hiking Aragats the weekend before wasn’t enough for us. Carineh found an easy hike between two churches, Saghmosavank and Hovhannavank, and she and I planned to go with one of our other Gyumri friends, Shant.

We met “early” in the morning on Saturday… 10AM… to catch a taxi out to Saghmosavank. It was about a 45-minute ride, and when we got there, it looked like they were setting up outside for a post-baptism party. Good timing for us because we made it there before it started and could explore the whole church. Somehow, no matter how many churches we see, there’s always something a little different in each one. This was the church of nooks. Seriously, there were nooks everywhere. Some were high, some were low, some had floating stairs leading up to them, some had no visible means of access. Maybe they used to have a lot of things to store? I don’t know, but as a lover of nooks, I thought it was awesome.

Floating stairs to a nook with another nook underneath

So pretty! You might even say… gorges… I know, the joke has been made before, but I’m still entertained by it and that’s all that matters

It is also situated in a pretty cool spot. It’s right on the edge of a gorge, and the hike we were planning to do basically just runs along the top of the gorge until you make it to the second church, Hovhannavank, which we could see in the distance. While we were admiring the gorge, we noticed that there was what looked like a decent road at the bottom, and we could hear a river. Then, someone pointed out a vaguely defined path that looked like it led to the bottom from where we were. That was all it took for us to completely ditch our plans and decide to hike down into the gorge instead. Brilliant, except for the fact that none of us were planning for a serious hike and weren’t completely prepared.

See Saghmosavank peeking out from above the rocks?

We’re all a little bit crazy, so silly little details like that weren’t enough to stop us. I think it ended up taking about 2-1/2 hours to make it down. The “path” that we saw was not quite as helpful or defined as we originally thought. After about the first 10 minutes, any indication of the best way down vanished, and we were left to plot our route as we went. I wasn’t even completely confident that there WAS a way down, but I had no interest in going back up so that only left one option. It took some gravel sliding, rock climbing, and scrambling, but we made it! And as luck would have it, there was a leak in a water pipe right at the bottom, so we frolicked in the freezing cold water spray before continuing down the road.

Confused by this random cave that basically looked like someone just glued rocks to the wall and ceiling

From there, the path was easy. We walked for a bit before spotting a good swimming spot in the river and taking a break to cool down. None of us were prepared for swimming (obviously, considering we weren’t prepared for anything that day), but I don’t even know that I would have wanted to go completely in because the water was frigid. It was enough to just wade up to our shorts and put some cold water on our necks. We also floated our water bottles in the river so that we could leave with some ice-cold water. Genius, I know. One thing we were prepared for was lunch, and after a classic Armenian hiking lunch of lavash (flat bread… kind of like a tortilla), salami, and cheese, we set out again.

Taking a minute to cool off on this metal pipe… which I realize doesn’t seem to make sense, but there was super cold water running through, so the pipe was nice and cool rather than super hot from the sun.

The rest of the walk to Hovhannavank was uneventful. I was worried that we were going to have to hike out in a similar fashion to the hike in, but the road we were on started slowly ascending until we were out of the gorge with barely any effort. I’m glad that we started at Saghmosavank rather than going the other direction! I felt a little bit like an alien when we emerged from the gorge and entered into Ohanavan, the town where Hovhannavank is located. We were weary travelers who felt like we had just trekked across the universe, and it’s always weird entering back into civilization.

The farther we went, the more we found these random swimming holes (with water just as cold as the river)

Selfie that I forced everyone to participate in

So, there’s the story of how our planned 3-hour hike transformed into a 10-hour adventure. Sometimes though, the unplanned ends up being even better than the planned. I don’t think any of us would go back and do it differently… except maybe for bringing more water and wearing more appropriate shoes. It’s fun to know that I have friends here who are as willing as I am to take the road less traveled (or sometimes completely untraveled) just to see where it leads.

Bells. There’s a pulley system so that they can be rung from the ground

The sunset! The clouds around it looked super cool

The Road to Artsakh

Posted on July 20, 2017March 14, 2019 by Lark

Breakfast views of Ararat… it’s there, I promise. You just have to look closely.

I’m exhausted. The weekend was a whirlwind, and I spent most of it wanting to take a nap. Each day was so ambitiously scheduled that it was literally impossible to get enough sleep, but I survived it and didn’t even get sick! That’s pretty good. I do want to go to sleep ASAP tonight though, and I know I’m going to spend the rest of the week trying to catch up on the hours I should have gotten over the weekend.

The sleep deprivation started on Friday morning when we had to meet at 5:30AM to go to Yerevan. I somehow managed to drag myself out of bed on time and scored a prime seat in the taxi (we had one packed van and one taxi) where I logged another hour of semi-restful sleep.

In Yerevan, we joined up with the other volunteers who are living in Yerevan and Vanadzor. Again, I lucked out with the seating and got a spot in one of the two vans rather than in the big bus with most of the volunteers. Perks of the van: no microphone for people to yell into, functional air conditioning, (slightly) less vomit-inducing movements, faster, and fewer people. It was basically paradise.

I love driving through the mountains because of the great views. I hate driving through the mountains because mountain roads are always windy and always make everyone want to throw up.

In Halidzor before getting on the cable car to Tatev

After multiple snack/bathroom stops and about four more hours of driving, we made it to Tatev Monastery. Well, to be accurate, we made it to the town of Halidzor where the end of the cableway that takes you to Tatev is located. The big claim to fame of the cableway is that it’s the longest non-stop double track aerial tramway in the world. It’s 3.5 miles (5.7 km) long, and the ride takes about 10 minutes. It’s in the mountains, so the views along the way to the monastery are incredible. It’s probably the most expensive thing to do in Armenia, with round trip tickets costing 5000 dram for tourists (about USD$11).

PUSH! I thought these signs were hilarious… they’re on the doors into the bathrooms to tell you to push vs. pull, but they’re very exaggerated examples of what that looks like.

The cableway would have been awesome even if it didn’t lead anywhere, but it’s even better because it gets you to the town of Tatev and the monastery. The complex is pretty extensive. There are multiple churches, residential areas, a library, a dining hall, school buildings, an olive mill, and more. The olive mill is from the Middle Ages, and we visited that first. I can’t tell you any real information about it because I zoned out when the guide was talking. Then, instead of getting facts, I asked people to tell me made up explanations about what the different things there were used for. I definitely had more fun on my made-up tour, but I also definitely left with zero accurate information.

I was too busy crawling around in random holes in the olive mill to pay attention

Probably some sort of olive press, but I’ll forever know it as the world’s first liposuction machine because the Armenians invented everything, didn’t you know?

The monastery was built originally in the 9^th century on the former site of a pagan temple. There was also an important university there in the 14^th and 15^th centuries that was a leading cultural and scientific center and trained teachers who then taught across Armenia. After that, the complex was attacked, damaged, and looted multiple times throughout history by different groups as they invaded Armenia. In 1931, there was an earthquake that damaged it even more, and there’s still restoration work going on now.

One of the other rooms around the monastery complex

On the road to Artsakh… “Free Artsakh Welcomes You”

After leaving Tatev and taking another scenic ride through the mountains, we continued our trek to Artsakh. We had a few more hours of driving, and by the time we got to Shushi, the city where we were staying, I was ready to pass out. We were in homestays, and the process of getting everyone where they needed to go was just as much of a mess as you would expect. I fell asleep in the van as we were driving around and then completely ate it on my way out because I was still 95% asleep and my leg collapsed instead of holding me up when I stepped down. Oops. I was fine and too tired to even be embarrassed about it. I think the total drive time for the day was something like 10 hours, though I didn’t keep track so who knows. Whether that’s right or not, it wasn’t a short amount of time. I don’t blame my leg for collapsing because that’s really what my entire body wanted to do!

View of the mountains from the Artsakh sign. If you like mountains, Artsakh might be the place for you!

Waiting at the border for the bus to catch up. Check out the tiny church at the bottom of the picture!

Weekend Adventures

Posted on July 12, 2017March 14, 2019 by Lark

The excursion for the weekend was to Garni Temple and Geghard Monastery, and I decided not to go because Sarah and I were JUST there. That left me with the challenge of deciding what to do instead, and after a whole long deliberation process, I opted to stay in Gyumri for the weekend. Everyone else was either in Yerevan for the weekend or going on the excursion, so that meant I had a day all to myself. That might sound horrible to some people, but the more I thought about it, the more excited I got! I hadn’t gotten a chance to really explore Gyumri, and I don’t want to leave at the end of August after living here for two whole months and not even feel like I saw any of the city. The solo part was great too because I got to pick and choose exactly what I wanted to do and then went at my own speed.

View of the square where the Birthright office is. How have I never noticed how cool the buildings around the square are??

I made a map of Gyumri with a bunch of tourist destinations on it, and I just hit up as many as I could stand. I started with a bus ride to the same stop where I get off to get to the Birthright office, but this time I was seeing it with different eyes. Isn’t it interesting how that can completely change your perspective? In daily life, how often do you look around to see what cool things surround you? I know that I have a habit of putting on my blinders and rushing through my day. I need to start making a conscious effort to stop doing that.

Random findings in the park in the circle…

Anyway, I took some time to appreciate the architecture of the square before making my way to my next destinations. I walked around a park in the middle of a traffic circle that I walk past regularly without a second thought and was amazed by how much they packed in there. See what happens when you open your eyes? Also, I know I’ve said this before, but I’m going to say it again. I have never seen a city with so many parks. Everywhere you turn, there’s another place for people to spend time outside, and it makes city life so much better! There are ALWAYS kids playing in them too.

It’s like the wilderness in the middle of the city.

My first go-inside destination was Surp Nishan Church. I was pleasantly surprised by how pretty it was, and the door was open, so I went in for a bit and sat. There was no one else there for most of the time that I was there, so it was perfectly distraction free and a good place to do some thinking. There’s something about a church that helps the thoughts and prayers flow too. I really enjoyed it. It’s much better than just going into a church for a second and then leaving. Why not use it?

From there, I headed to the main square where the City Hall building is and sat for a couple of hours sketching one of the churches there, Holy Saviour’s Church. The church was mostly destroyed in the earthquake, and they’ve been rebuilding it (rather slowly, I think). The outside looks like it’s mostly restored, but you still can’t go inside. I sat on a bench and made friends with some random men who spoke basically no English.

My sketch attempt and also a failed picture where I tried to focus my phone on the sketch and take the picture with one hand while the other held my sketchbook. If that makes any sense…

The outside of the Cathedral of the Holy Martyrs. Looks like every other Armenian church, right?

After I finished, I looped around the square, stopping in another church, Yot Verk (there was a wedding going on!), and walking past City Hall to one of the market streets. I bought what I think is shampoo, conditioner, and body wash, but I guess I won’t really know until I try them out. I feel confident though because “shampoo” is basically the same in Armenian, and the thing that I think is conditioner is the same as the shampoo bottle except upside down. I then put on a fabulous charades performance to convey “shower gel”, and I think the shopkeeper and I were on the same page at the end.

I also went to another store and spent a solid 15 minutes trying to identify lotion. Everything was written in Russian, so I was that goober in the toiletries aisle using my phone to take google translate pictures of the labels. A woman came over to help me, and after I told her that I don’t speak Armenian, she just nodded knowingly, gave me a pitying look, and left me to my struggles. I bought something that is hopefully lotion.

I made one last church stop in the Cathedral of the Holy Martyrs after that. It’s a little Catholic church that was completed in 2015, and the ceiling was architecturally awesome. I love how they made it fit in with the traditional style of Armenian churches, but the inside is modern at the same time.

The museum of architecture and urban life

There’s a random bridge with the names/logos of a bunch of bands painted on it. Random…

Sunday was unexpectedly awesome! I didn’t have any plans for the day until another volunteer, Lexi, texted me at around 10 and asked if I wanted to go for a walk. I figured why not? So we met at 11 and walked towards the mountains. That’s vague, I know, but she said that she wanted to get a good view of the mountains, and I had been thinking that same thing recently. We wandered through fields in search of a good view and eventually spotted a church in the distance that we decided was going to be our destination. The walk was way more of a trek than I was expecting, so I was also hoping that there would be water but didn’t want to get my hopes up.

Our first glimpse of the church that wasn’t from a mile away.

Luckily, we made it and there was water! And a cherry tree. I wasn’t a huge fan of them, but Lexi ate a bunch and then grabbed a handful for the road. From there, it was an easy walk back to Gyumri. We definitely took the long way there haha.

Note the water fountain in the front. I almost cried happy tears when I saw it.

We wandered around town for a couple more hours, just talking and doing a little shopping. It was nice having some time to hang out with her one-on-one because so much that we do here is in a group. That can get overwhelming, and I really enjoy getting to spend time with individuals or small groups. Much better for building good friendships! I know that if I’m going to be here for 4 months like I’m planning, I’m going to need some solid friends so that I don’t lose my mind.

Sarnaghpyur and Ponchiks

Posted on July 11, 2017March 14, 2019 by Lark

Each week, there are other activities planned besides just going to work and language class. They’re supposed to expose us to different things and teach us about Armenian culture, history, etc. We had a couple of extra activities last week, and they were both awesome.

Inside some really old church. I obviously forget how old, but it’s somewhere in the single-digit centuries. No, the metal roofing is not original.

One day, we took a trip to the village where one of the Gyumri Birthright coordinators, Karen (pronounced KAH-ren, or Garen in Western Armenian), grew up, Sarnaghpyur. He took us to check out an NGO that he started and manages there, and it’s actually a really interesting idea.

The basic concept is that whatever kids are interested show up, and they teach each other different skills. The organization renovated three rooms in an abandoned building, and kids can go there whenever they want to meet. It’s the summer now, so there were about 16 kids. During the school year, they said they can get up to like 70 kids.

There’s a kid who’s good at painting, and he teaches a class on painting. Some of the girls teach English, dance, and singing. There are other kids who teach sports or chess. One girl went to a piano school outside of the village, and when she came back, she taught the other kids some of what she learned. It seems like such a “duh” kind of concept. Why shouldn’t the kids share their skills? It makes sense, but I don’t think I ever would have thought of it. All the organization has to do is provide a space to meet and the resources the kids need for their different classes. Karen’s also trying to get a grant to organize some leadership training with the kids. The whole thing is kind of awesome.

He said that the idea started with a group of his friends when he was in high school. When it got to the point where it needed to become an official thing or else be left to die out, the NGO was started and he secured funding to renovate the building so that they could have their own space. Before that, the group was meeting in one of the community buildings, and they didn’t have as much flexibility because they could only access the space at certain times.

After that, we went around and saw some of the sights in the village. Of course, we had a few churches to visit, and there’s also a “cold spring” (that’s what the name of the village means) that supposedly has some special powers. I don’t know about that, but it was definitely cold! On top of the cave with the spring, you can get an awesome view over the village. We stayed there for a bit and then went to the “forest” (aka maybe like 25 trees) to eat snacks and hang out. I somehow got wrapped up in making flower crowns for a couple of the guys (no, I had never made a flower crown before, but I figured it couldn’t be that hard) and then we had the weirdest photo shoot. It’s good that there are some people here that are just as weird as I am, and I’ve already managed to find them. What a relief!

The cave in all of its cluttered, eclectic glory.

Have I mentioned how much I love wildflowers?

I made the flower crowns of the two guys. This is just one in a series of odd fruit pictures.

Some monastery we visited on the way back from town. It looks like literally every other monastery.

A couple of nights later, we had a baking night at one of the host houses and made ponchiks (I’m sure that is the wrong way to pluralize that word, but we’re going to go with it) and peroshki. They. Were. So. Good. Omg. There are no words to fully convey how incredible they were. They both use the same dough, and ponchiks are fried and filled with either like a condensed milk filling or a whipped cream-ish filling. Peroshki (peroshkis?) have mashed potatoes mixed with some herbs inside and are also fried. And delicious. And both of those names are definitely Russian, in case you were thinking that they don’t sound very Armenian.

I ate WAY more than I should have and felt a little bit like I was going to throw up, but my brain was still telling me that I should eat another one. And another one. And another one. I do have SOME self-control, luckily, because while my brain was saying yes, my stomach was screaming, “NO!!!!”

I wouldn’t exactly say that I learned how to make them, but honestly, that’s probably for the best. I’m not trying to gain 600 pounds. Only 300. Kidding.

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