St. Stephen's Armenian School

May 28, is the day of establishing of the First Republic of Armenia after three battles in 1918 in Sardarabad, Garakilisa and Pashabaran. The significance of the battle of Sardarapat is great, because if the Armenian forces did not defeat the Ottomans there, they would have proceeded to Echmiadzin and Yerevan and nothing would have remained of Armenia, nothing would have been saved. We all know, that If the Armenian First Republic did not exist neither the second nor the third republics of Armenia would have existed.

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We can’t believe how fast this trip has gone by, but we have to make the most of it. Today we went to the Avedisian School with the Hovnanian School for our joint project. There, we each had a partner to get to know a little bit about. We asked questions like, “Whats your name”, “How old are you”, “How many people are in your family”, and other questions to get to know them. After everyone got to introduce themselves to their partner, we split up into two groups and went on a tour of the school. When we were done, we got into the bus and headed to ATP.

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This morning we ate breakfast and headed to Dzizernagapert. Dzizernagapert means Citadel of Swallows, a name for a bird that always returns to its nest. Each of us received two flowers to place around the fire. The fire represents, Armenia’s spirit. A unique portion of the monument is tall, needle-shaped shaft which represents the rebirth of the Armenian people. The twelve imposing pylons represent the twelve provinces where Armenians were massacred. They surround the eternal memorial flame inside the fortress. Later on we went into the Armenian genocide museum and saw so many pictures of the Armenians that had been tortured in the genocide. I got very emotional, I thought I would cry. We saw thousands of Armenian orphans, and so many Armenians walking in the deserts of Der El Zor. After that we came back to the bus.

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Today we are going to be seeing many statues and monuments such as Sassountzi David, Vartan Mamigonian, Gomidas Vartabed’s museum, and many more. So far we have been to Sasountzi Davit’s statue, it was beautiful. The statue was made in 1967 by Yervant Kochar. He had placed the statue on water therefore it looked as if Sassountzi and his horse, Koorgig Jalaly were floating in the small body of water.

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This morning we started walking to the metro to the Մեսրոպ Մաշտոցի անուան Մատենադարան without the parents. First we stopped at a huge statue of Aram Manougian, who was the first leader of the first Republic of Armenia. Then we moved forward to metro, the worker gave us little coins that we had to put in the machine so it would grant us entrance. They were orange and the size of nickels. We rode a fast escalator down to the waiting place. The sound of the metro approaching was so loud that we had to close our ears. The second the doors closed, the metro zoomed past the tunnel and onto the next station in 10 seconds. We got off and went up to the main building of the station and then went outside. It was a long uphill walk to the Մատենադարան so we bought water to take with us.

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Today we went to the 13th century monastery of Ghandzazar. It was a very big church. The complex is protected by high walls. Within the complex is the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist. As we were looking around, we found Armenian prince Hasan Jalal’s grave (who built the church) buried in the church. Outside of the church their was an old rusty RPG that didn’t work anymore. The church had stairs that lead up to a V.I.P room for people, to watch the service. While we were in the church we saw crosses carved on the wall.

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Today we woke up in the Stepanagerd hotel and headed down to breakfast. After that we got into the bus and went towards Shushi. After we got to Shushi we went to the school. Once we got to the school we walked in and met the Principal. After that we went to the classrooms to visit the kids. It was so cool to see the way the kids there had school compared to our way. Some of the kids put on a show for us. And a boy sang so nice. Also, we sang and recited poems.

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This morning we woke up at 8:00. We ate breakfast and we walked to some waterfalls. Our surroundings were very beautiful and heavenly.


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This morning we left early. On the road to Khor Virap we saw so many beautiful sceneries, Ararat mountain and green hills. When we arrived we all formed a line and prepared to go down into the pit. Everybody started getting so scared and worried. We went down and it was so cool! There were crosses on the walls. Later most of us gathered together and sang Hayr Mer. We finally had to go back up the ladder. It was so steep people almost fell down the ladder.

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On the way to Gyumri and the alphabet park, we saw Ararat, Aragats and Ara Ler very clearly. They were so beautiful it looked like they were fake. We also saw a cross made out of 1700 tiny crosses to commemorate the 1700th anniversary of our christianity. We also saw many sheep and one donkey blocking the road. It was crazy! They were forcing us to go around them into the opposite lane. We saw the trees that the graduating class 2 years ago planted for ATP. When we got to the alphabet park, all of us took pictures near our letters.
With 1 1/2 hours still remaining, we stopped at Abaran. We went to the bathrooms and bought refreshments from the restaurant next to it. They were making fresh bread when we walked in. It was so good. Everyone LOVED it. Then we walked back into the bus and got ready to continue the journey.

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Today was an amazing day! When we arrived at Keghartavank, it was huge. We went in a church that was dark. We sang Giligia and lite some candles too. We also put some holy water on our foreheads and took lots of pictures. I tried some Jarnoo too, it was really good. Lastly, we took some pictures in front of a pretty waterfall. We went up some rocky stares. It was really rocky, but we managed.

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Hello St Stephens. Today we finally got to go and see our beautiful and amazing homeland, but when we where flying there. The person on the intercom was not speaking English or French it was our beautiful language, Armenian!

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