Between the Two Rivers: A Story of the Armenian Genocide
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Armenians begot Armenians, perpetuating a conquered people. United, they failed to liberate themselves; independently, they menaced the conqueror. A people without a leader, they safeguarded themselves from falling like wheat at the edge of a scythe, by having recourse to weapons. If asked, what makes an Armenian? The answer would be, “Individuality.”
Armenians became dispersed throughout their lands. Robbed of an unalienable land by the invading forces of the Mongols, Persians, Kurds, and the Ottoman Turks, they were determined to survive as a nation. Obsessed with education, they developed a talent for commerce, evolving into an elite Christian minority that catered to a needy Muslim majority. If asked, what makes an Armenian? The answer would be, “Capacity.”
One and a half to 2 million Armenians perished in the first Genocide of the Twentieth Century, perpetrated by the Ottoman Turks during WWI in 1914-1918. The survivors were consumed into the Soviet Republic and endured Communism for seven decades. Unlike sheep being goaded into the slaughterhouse, they proclaimed independence and sovereignty in 1991. If asked, what makes an Armenian? The answer would be, “Fidelity.”
Armenians established a Christian kingdom at the foot of Mt. Ararat. They have defended their ethnicity from mountains; they have sought refuge in the mountains; and having stood rugged like mountains, they have survived religious, political, and economic persecutions. If asked, what makes an Armenian? The answer would be, “Mt. Ararat.”
REFERENCES
1. The Bastard of Istanbul, by Elif Shafak, Viking 2007
2. The Burning Tigris, by Peter Balakian, Harper Collins Publishers, 2003
3. Black Dog of Fate, by Peter Balakian, Broadway Books, 1998
4. Rise the Euphrates, by Carol Edgarian, Random House Publishers, 1994
5. Armenian-Americans, by Anny Bakalian, Transaction Publishers, 1994
6. The Armenians, by John M. Douglas, J.J. Winthrop Corp. Publisher, 1992
7. Hitler and the Armenian Genocide, by K. B. Bardakjian, Zoryan Institute, 1985
8. Armenian Review, Essays and Douments on Genocide, published by the Armenian Review, Inc., Boston 1984
9. Brother of the Bride, by Donita Dyer, Tyndale House, 1982
10. The Armenians—A People in Exile, by David Marshall Lang, George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1981
11. The Road from Home, by David Kherdian, Greenwillow Books, 1979
12. Some of us Survived, by Kerop Bedoukian, Farrar, Straus Giroux 1978
13. Passage to Ararat, by Michael J. Arlen, Hungry Mind Press, 1975
14. The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, by Franz Werfel, The Modern Library, New York, 1933
Aida Kouyoumjian was born in Felloujah, Iraq. When she and her sister were old enough to attend school, her family moved sixty miles east to Baghdad.
In 1952 Aida won a year-long Fulbright Scholarship to the University of Washington in Seattle. As the eldest daughter, she was the first in her family to leave Baghdad. The Iraqi government, a monarchy at the time, gave her its blessing. After the year was up, Aida reapplied and stayed another four years. At the end of that period, her father warned her of unrest in Iraq and advised her to extend her stay. Aida married an American—a fellow student—but she still received deportation notices. Her politically savvy in-laws appealed her case to Senator Warren G. Magnuson, who introduced a special bill in congress allowing her to stay in the U.S.
Aida’s path to citizenship was further delayed by her engineer husband’s frequent moves. Finally his work allowed them to stay in Warrensburg, Missouri, for the requisite two years, thus allowing her to study and pass the citizenship exam in 1962. Her family, which now included three sons, eventually settled in Mercer Island.
After Aida’s father died in 1965, she was finally able to bring her mother Mannig to this country. A year later, Aida’s brother joined them. Her sister had left Baghdad in 1953, a year after Aida, and settled in South Carolina.
At the age of 69, Mannig was hired by the UW to tutor graduate students in Turkish, Armenian, and Arabic. She remained on the UW staff for seven years before retiring. Not long before her death in 1985 at the age of 79, Mannig was one of ninety survivors who attended the 70th commemoration of the Armenian Genocide in Washington, D.C.
After thirty years of teaching in public schools, Aida currently offers a course on Iraq at Bellevue College and is a popular speaker at schools and public service organizations. She is a former winner of the Pacific Northwest Writers’ Association Prize for Non-fiction. She was also awarded first place by the Washington Association of Press Women for an editorial that appeared in the Seattle P-I.
Aida has been active in Seattle’s Armenian community since her University days. After Armenia’s great earthquake of 1988, she helped organize Seattle’s relief effort. In 1989 she spearheaded the formation of the Armenian Cultural Association of Washington (ACA) and was elected first president of its board of directors.
Aida has three sons, eight grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
You can find Aida online at
armenianstory.coffeetownpress.com.
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