Vardavar

I’ve got about two and a half weeks left of pre-service training, and I’m in pretty deadly good spirits. Also, today is August first, which means I left America exactly two months ago. I’m writing to The Kinks.

Yesterday was a pretty special Armenian holiday, called Vardavar. The once pagan holiday was adopted into Armenia’s Apostolic Christian cannon a long time ago, and apparently corresponds to the Transfiguration in Western Christian calendars. On this day, and this one only, it becomes perfectly acceptable to douse your friends, neighbors, and most importantly your family with cold water. There is no set time, and the more random the moment the better. So from the moment you wake up until the sun goes down, you need to be on guard, unless like me you are melting from the heat (it was over 100 degrees in the capital this Vardavar) and are just waiting excitedly to get a blast of cold water when you least expect it.

In the morning we ate a breakfast of Dolma leftover from the night before, which are rice and ground beef and greens wrapped up in grape leaves and cabbage. I ate an innumerable amount of them. We also had a half shot of vodka during breakfast, which is extremely rare here, and my host mother, after struggling for a good reason for the toast, simply muttered “bolorin,” or to everyone. Satisfactory.

It hit my Armenian studies for the remainder of the morning, and then hung out while family started showing up for the holiday. Andranik’s sister, Anahit, arrived from Hoktmberyan with her son. Andranik’s son-in law’s family also showed up from Bueregavan, and then finally another of Andranik’s sisters, Rosana, showed up with her husband, daughter, daughter’s husband and their two children. Tanya’s sister-in-law and her three children, who have been staying here for most of the summer, were also present. I’m pretty sure I’m getting all of this straight, but it’s disorienting. It also doesn’t help that there’s special possessive cases in the Armenian language for most family-related words (i.e. sister’s daughter) instead of the perfectly consistent apostrophe followed by “s” that we have in English. There are also special words for specific family members, such as “hars” for son-in-law, and different sets of words are used depending on which side of the family—mother’s or father’s—that you are talking about as well. It’s complicated, probably way more so than it needs to be, but I also I think it’s indicative of just how important family is in this culture. So anyway, if there is a holiday like Vardavar, any family who lives nearby—no matter how far the ties—will come out to celebrate as one.

By mid-afternoon, we were quite the crowd, and I figured the moment I had been waiting for was near. Sure enough, within minutes of everyone having finally arrived, the kids started filling up buckets and plastic bottles from the garden hose and bathroom sink. I’m not sure who hit me first exactly, but I think it was a combination of my host sister and Tanya’s nephews, George and Mikol. A battle royale ensued, with aunts and uncles joining in the fray. I got my host mother pretty good at one point, and minutes later she had snuck up behind me and gotten her revenge with a huge cooking pot filled with ice cold water. I don’t know how long it lasted exactly, and all we were doing was repeatedly filling up buckets and bottles with water and picking out new people to soak, but I don’t think I’ve laughed so hard since I arrived in country. When you’re in such a foreign place, and are still struggling to communicate basic ideas in the language of those you live with, an event like this is incredibly refreshing. No language is needed to participate. One of the family members, my friend Vruyr, explained to me that the water on Vardavar is seen as a symbolic cleansing of the spirit, a way to break from any evil and transgressions of the past. It certainly felt rejuvenating.

After all were thoroughly soaked, we headed inside to eat together. The standard Armenian village feast was laid out on the table, with fresh cheese, cucumbers and tomatoes, pickles, something a lot like coleslaw, lamb, boiled potatoes, and more dolma. Three shots were taken at the meal: the first to the blessings of the family and that good things will continue to happen, the second as a measure to prevent evil from happening in the future, and the third in acknowledgment of all the parents in the family and of God. From what I’ve gathered so far, the number and order of these toasts is consistent and an important tradition. Also, after eating such a huge amount of food and having the requisite post-meal cup of coffee, you feel not even remotely drunk.

I spent the rest of the afternoon chatting with Andranik, Vruyr (who speaks perfect English and translates for me when he’s around) and other men in the family at the patio table in the shade. Finally people started shuffling out around five. I took my cue as well, headed up to my room to get some dry clothes and notepaper, and headed over to Ben’s, another American and friend in my village with whom I’ve been team-teaching our practice classes for TEFL training.

Just as I rounded the corner of the road his house lies on, I heard the familiar voices of some of the village kids playing.

“Tom is coming!” they called out to one another, their eyes getting huge, full buckets in their arms. Their attention now turned fully away from splashing one-another and entirely to me. Resistance was futile. Also, water—if you weren’t already aware, as I wasn’t—is super hard to dodge. They swarmed on me and in seconds I was totally soaked again. Pretty cute, I thought. The day wouldn’t have been complete without it. I thanked them for the bath and entered Ben’s house soaking. His host mother, Gayane, first laughed at me and then helped me hang my clothes out to dry. I threw on some of Ben’s threads, and then we got to planning our lesson on idioms, which I was truly pumped about. They are a creative way to work with language, come with built in visuals and mental images, and after having taught this group of kids the day before, we were pretty confident they’d be able to understand it just fine.

I got home, ate a quick dinner of leftovers from the afternoon with my Tateek, showered, finished making a handout for the lesson, and hit the sack hard.

On Monday, which for Armenians is mostly a day of rest and recovery from Vardavar, we had the now familiar routine of learning Armenian in the morning and then practicing teaching English in the afternoon. The idioms were a hit with our kids, many I’m pretty sure walking away with a full understanding of all 18 that we taught, and for the first time I felt like an actual teacher, or close to it.