St. Stephen's Armenian School

June 1, 2011

Today we started the day with a delicious breakfast. We all loved it! Then we hit the road.

We were going to the Madenataran. It’s a place where we preserve books from the 9th to 19th century . We saw bibles, medicine books, and alchemy books. One of the books showed how to make glue out of the juice you get from onions and rice. They received red paint from the vortan karmir, blue paint from minerals, yellow paint from gold dust, green paint from copper oxide, and black paint from the dust on the macadamia nut. There were also Persian, Byzantine, Ottoman, Greek, and Arab manuscripts alongside the Armenian ones.
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May 31, 2011

Today we woke up early in the morning and had breakfast. We ate eggs, pancakes, waffles, and cupcakes. We drank apple juice, hot chocolate, orange juice, and tea. It was so good. Now we are heading to Lori region. It is about 3 hours away.

On the way to Lori region we passed through earth quake areas (Spitak ). Spitak was constructed but there was still some buildings that needed to be rebuilt.

At Lori region we went to see Hovanhess Toumanians museum. His house was turned into a museum. When we first got into his house we smelled smoke, throughout the year, five to six times they make lavash bread. This was the only house in the village that made lavash. The first room that we went in did not have any windows. It was a storage room where they kept flour. Hovanness Toumanian had a big family. He had seven siblings, four brothers and three sisters.
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May 30, 2011

Today we had a nice morning breakfast. We were ready to depart at 9:30.We hopped on the bus and we traveled for about 35 minutes to the Monastery of Geghard. Geghard is a church that is built in the mountain. It was built around the fourth century. It took 10 years to be made. The name Geghard means the point of the spear that was used to stab Christ. There is running water coming though the walls and running though the church. They say that the water is like holy water. People used to come to drink the water if they needed healing or if they wanted eternal life. The church was very big. I thought that the church was very beautiful. When were leaving, in the parking lot there were women selling Geghard bread. It’s a round sweet bread that is very tasty. Everyone bought a loaf or two and ate it on the bus. They were also selling fruit rollups which they call lavash.

The next place we went was the Temple of Garni. The Temple of Garni was built in the first century (70 BC). They call it the house of coolness because it is always cool outside. It was built on top of a ledge on a mountain top. Mountains surround Garni and the view is awesome. In the middle of the temple there is a big hole in the ground. Most of us were able to get into the hole. This hole was used as storage for the king that lived there for the summer. It held water or wheat depending on what needed to be stored.
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May 29, 2011

Yerevan Metro was built in 1978 over 4km (2.5 miles) of tunnels, when the plans were redesigned so that the system would be opened as a full underground metro.
On 7 March 1981 the system was opened, becoming the eighth Soviet Metro system, with a first four station stage of 7.6 kilometers. Since then, the system has grown to a 12.1km (7.56 miles), 10 stations.
The engineering work was of such high quality that during the 1988 earthquake, which paralyzed the whole republic, although suffering some minor damage, the Metro managed to withstand the earthquake and continued to operate on the next day.
On 28 December 1999, the Metro was named after Karen Demirchyan, the man who was responsible for changing the status of the Rapid Tram system into becoming a Metro system.
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May 28, 2011

This morning started off great. When I woke up, I went out on the porch of my room and felt the warm Yerevan air. We had breakfast in the restaurant located in the hotel. For breakfast, I had waffles and pancakes with nutella. It was delicious. Then we set off to Sardarabad.

Today we are going to celebrate the first Republic of Armenia in 1918 at Sardarabad. Also, we are wearing our orange school shirts. Tonight we are going to a concert, so that will be fun! I am so excited about today, and so is everyone else. We are singing, and enjoying Yerevan right now. I can’t wait.

We just came back from Sardarabad. It was amazing! We got to see the President of Armenia. We took lots of pictures in front of the statue, and we got to see people dance and sing in front of a wall. That wall was shaped like a semi-circle, and had drawings that symbolized strength and victory.

I had a great time watching the people sing and dance.
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May 27, 2011

There is another beautiful sunny day to start of the great day. My parents and I went to the hotel’s restaurant, Cucina an Italian restaurant where I saw my friends. During our breakfast we ate a lot of things like orange juice, apple juice, strawberries, waffles, cucumbers, bread, chocolate crasaunt, and fruit. Then we went to lobby to wait for everyone. We went on the bus with the teachers.

We went to the YEREVAN SCHOOL. We met the fifth grade students in the school and we said our names what grade we were and what we like to do. We also told about our school and the subjects we learn. Then we played basketball in their gym. There were two teams and we played basketball in a different way. When we finished playing basketball, we went to wash our hands and we went to eat lunch. We wrote our e-mails at the end of the lunch time and we got a picture in the school and in the front of the school.
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May 26, 2011

Mmm…Mmm… everybody likes the fresh food. They also like the drinks. Some people drink juice others Hot Chocolate. I drank both today. I loved it! Eggs are also popular and tasty. Soon we will go on the bus. Since we are leaving Stepanagert no one is left empty handed. They either have a backpack or luggage in their hands to bring to Yerevan. We are on the bus. Mary, George, and I were the first on the bus so we got the first choice on seats. Soon everyone piled on the bus. The bus then started to move. We prayed to have a safe trip.
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May 25, 2011

This morning we woke up and ate an amazing breakfast in the hotel. We got into the bus and departed from the hotel. On the way we saw Dadeeg Babeeg. We arrived at Ghandzasar. We got into the church and lit some candles. The church has more than 250 inscriptions in it. We went outside and we saw bullet holes in the walls. Then we saw lizards we chased them around. The church was built in 1216. John the Baptist’s head is buried under the alter. The monastery Ghandzasar got its name by “Ghanz” meaning treasure and sar meaning mountain. These mountains had gold and silver mines.

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May 24, 2011

This morning we had breakfast in the hotel. Then we boarded the bus and were off to Shushi. On our way to see the students at the Shushi School we stopped to see the first tank that entered Shushi. After a few minutes of taking pictures we continued our drive. Before we could go to the school though, we had to go o the church of Shushi. It was really cool. First we lit candles, than we went in a little room under the church.

It was a special size so that when we stepped right in the center of the room and said a word really quietly you would hear it hit back into your ear and it sounded really cool but no one else could hear it the way you could because they weren’t standing in the middle of the room. Then, we did another experiment. First, we picked a partner. Then, we stood across from each other in the room. Next one of the partners would whisper into the wall and the other partner would listen to the wall and they would here what the other partner said. I wish you all could have been there.
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May 23, 2011

We drove for hours to get to Karabagh. To spend time we, sang, told jokes, and our tour guide told us informational facts. We also saw at least eighteen to twenty one stray dogs.

Our first stop was to go to “Komidas’s Ayki” for ten minutes. There we saw, many graves of famous writers, poets, composers, and singers such as, Komidas Varatabed, Silva Gabodigian, William Saroyan, Aram khachadourian, Vahan Derian and Ohan Tourian and many others. We prayed for Silva Gabodigian as well as Ohan Tourian. We sang for Komidas Vartabed. We had lots of fun seeing all the sights we learned about.

Our second stop was Khor Virab. We took lots of pictures, and went down steep steps into a dungeon where Krikor Lousavorich was kept as a prisoner for thirteen years. It was very scary going up and down the steps. Going back up was worse. When we got down into the dungeon we were all fine and took pictures. Then we went back up the steep steps.
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May 22, 2011

We are finally in Armenia. Today was the day that we saw everything that represents us as Armenians.
Our first trip was to Echmiadzin. We were lucky to experience a badarak at this very special church Echmiadzin, which means the coming down of God to tell Krikor Lucavuriech where he wanted a church for his one and only Son. “Ech” means to come down and “miadzin” stands for one and only.

After the church we guided into the Etchmiadzin Madarataran. An interesting fact about Echmiadzin is that here is the only place that the meron used for Christenings used by every one of our churches is made and blessed once every seven years. There we learned that the church was build 2 years after the Armenians accepted to Christianity which was in 301.

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May 21, 2011

After our flight to France we had six and a half hours for our connecting flight. While we were in the airport we spent the time by playing friendly card games, singing enjoyable songs and tossing a ball around to each other. On the airplane we went to each others seats and sat together. When it was time to sleep we were all hyper from the candy all of us ate. We had a party going on with everyone sharing candy, watching movies, and making each other laugh.
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