TimeForChange

Hi everyone - I'm going to move to Miami soon (from Canada), and I wanted to know if there are any young Armenians (20 to 30) in the Miami - Fort Lauderdale area. Hot and intelligent girls would be a plus hahaha.

Hey Armin, First of all, if you are going to live in Lebanon, chances are that you will need to speak Western Armenian (not Eastern), so start with Western before learning Eastern... I guess the best place for you to learn would be in Lebanon, because you will have more people to talk with. I might be able to help you. I rarely speak Armenian (unfortunately) , but I can teach you whatever I know, because I understand what you're going through...Let me know if you're interested...

To read one of the letters, just click on one of them (fill in the bubble). If you can't see the first one, try the second one, and then go back to the first one to see it.

Dear Armenian, In these coming weeks the Canadian Parliament is going to vote on Bill M-380(the vote will most probably take place on April 28th). As most of you know by now, Bill M-380 deals with the recognition of the Armenian Genocide. As Canadian-Armenians, we are at the closet point of seeing the country we live in recognize the tragedy that struck our forefathers nearly 90 years ago. Every Armenian has the opportunity and the duty to contribute to this recognition. The ANC-Canada has set up a website in order to send emails to Members of Parliament. Please visit the website and send a message to the MPs in order to get their support on Bill M-380. Be advised that the Turkish community has been organizing massive anti-recognition campaigns; therefore it is crucial for Armenians to send these emails to the MPs. The Parliament will resume on the 19th of April, after its Easter break. Please send your email before April 19th, after that deadline, anything sent is meaningless. Furthermore, since the vote will be held a couple of days after April 24, it is essential that Armenians show up in great numbers in Ottawa on April 24th and hopefully influence the vote. These coming days can be historical for the Armenian community of Canada and for all Armenians around the world. Please visit the website below to send your email. http://hdtshop.com/hay/send.asp Thank you for your support,

Mr. Worden, You really are a smart man. I'm glad to see that other people are as worried as I am about the fate of the economy. I am also convinced that the Mother of all Depressions is coming up, probably around 2008. The question is: is it going to happen sooner, now that more and more people become aware of this threat? By the way, I am not familiar with your writings. Do you have a website or a list of them? I am currently reading a book "Conquer the Crash'' by Robert R Prechter Jr. He basically convinces the reader that a major depression is coming up. Regards.

Nice indeed, except for the fact that it's all written in Turkish.

Have you guys considered the power that the Jewish lobby has in Washington? I've heard several times that the USA is Israel's puppet. Why can't Diaspora and Armenia work together, as the Jews have successfully done? You guys seem to think that it can only be one or the other. Sasun, I think what you are referring to is a quote from Horace: "Many shall be restored that are now fallen, and many shall fall that now are in honor". The same can be said about the stock market, by the way (off topic, I know).

Vava, I don't get it, I'm wrong about what? You guys can go ahead and start a new thread - why should I care? You're all grow-ups (though I'm starting to doubt that).

I reiterate what I said above: you guys are weird, really. Let's just hope that few people will read this thread, or people will think we're all weirdos like you.

I forgot to say that the guy who complained was what we call a ''Quebecer", or a local French-Canadian. I think our reputation is largely thanks to Charles Aznavour who goes around saying good things about us in the francophone world. I heard one of his friends say that Armenians, like all other people who have faced "extermination", are hardworkers and good entrepreneurs. They tend to be first in class, having very good grades in school. By the way, the story about IBM is true. You'd be surprised, but when the problem becomes so complex (the guys who make the bank's website can't solve it), the problem is handed over to IBM. IBM is also responsible for coding every banking transaction that a client makes as a transaction that generates fees or not for the customer. They screwed up once, so customers were paying fees for some types of banking transactions when they shouldn't have.

You guys are weird. I think you're just reinforcing Vava's argument that we shouldn't take our reputation for granted. Vava, I agree with you. I told this story to one of my relatives who lives in Germany. She told me that Armenians there are renowned as being corrupted, and that they smuggle Russians illegally into Germany.

I just want to share an interesting (I think) event that happened to me the other day. I am a manager in the mutual funds department of a Canadian bank. An employee transferred me a call of a customer who was furious because he couldn't see his account on the internet. He basically wanted to complain, and it's part of my job to handle complaints. He was so mad, that he didn't even let me speak. He kept interrupting me. At the end, I told him that I would see with IBM what they could do and then call him back. He then asked for my name. When he heard it, he suddenly calmed himself. ''Ah", he said, "you're Armenian!". "Yes", I said "not a lot of people know that names that end in IAN are Armenian". To which he replied: "That reassures me, because I know that you people work hard". "Yes", I replied, "we are renowned for that".

Thanks MJ, I understand. I'm not going to pretend that I am an expert on the matter, because I'm not. I do not have the time to read more about it. I have other priorities right now, and it's certainly not me who's going to solve Armenia's problems, although I'd really like to. For the record, my grandparents did speak Armenian, not Turkish (unless you call the Armenian that is spoken in Montreal Turkish, in which case you have serious issues). And they were certainly not a minority.

I agree somewhat with Thoth and Domino. What is a supposedly Worldwide Armenian Organization based in Moscow (of all places) going to do for Diasporans? I want an Armenia where I can speak and listen to the Armenian that my grandparents spoke: Western Armenian. I don't see why I should forget it and do as if it never existed and adapt to Eastern Armenian, as some have strongly suggested in this forum. So far, I am not convinced that either this Moscow-based organization or the Republic of Armenia wants Western Armenian to survive. It is up to them to do what's necessary to earn my trust. MY greatgrandparents got slaughtered in the genocide, not theirs! Their greatgrandparents or grandparents were probably on the Russian side of the border. They haven't suffered as much (which explains why Armenians in Armenia don't realize as much as I do the importance of marrying an Armenian). Ironically, my greatgrandparents suffered, and now I'm considered by some in Armenia as an "odar" because my parents don't come from Soviet Armenia. Sure, I could get the Armenian passport, thanks largely to my last name, but no right to vote, because deep down I'm not really considered an Armenian by the Republic. One way to earn my trust would be to put this organization in a country where Western Armenians are a majority (e.g. France). Another would be to give more importance to the concerns of Western Armenians (e.g. language), instead of just accusing them of not giving enough money to Armenia. When the Armenian government will have understood that, only then would I agree that they negotiate for land claims.

For those of you living in Canada, there will be a theater play about the life of an Armenian who has survived the genocide. Wanting to prolong his Armenian heritage, he plans to establish a strong Armenian family to ensure the survival of the Armenians. But, to his surprise, he finds out that his wife can't have kids... Where: on ARTV When: Mon Nov 10 @ 8PM Thu Nov 13 @ 1PM Fri Nov 14 @ 1 AM Sun Nov 16 @ 2:30 AM For more info: www.artv.ca Title: "Une Bete sur la lune'' (A beast on the moon), by Simon Abkarian and Corinne Jaber. I have never seen it myself, so don't start complaining if it's not good.

You guys seem to know each other so well that one would swear that you played "Kentig" together when you were kids. Would you care to tell the rest of us what this childish post is all about? We don't all have a copy of the Armenian Reporter, you know. Maybe you should create a separate section entitled "Personal conflicts" instead of posting this in the "international" section!

I've been with Yahoo for 6 years, and I've NEVER received a single spam. I used to receive 3-4 per day when I was with hotmail. Conclusion: maybe you should change your e-mail address, instead of wasting money on another software. And, don't write that you live in the USA, or you'll increase your chances of getting spam...

I have never met any Armenian girl (aside from my sisters), so I don't know, but I think that it's got more to do with how the girls you met were raised and the kinds of people they spend time with. Obviously, if you live in the States, you have much more chance of meeting this kind of (low-class) girl. But I say you're wrong to generalize. There MUST be decent well-educated Armenian girls somewhere. (and if you meet one, introduce her to me, 'cause I'm also interested ) Don't give up. If there are good Armenian guys like you and me, then there must be good Armenian girls as well!

My parents have always told me "Do whatever you want to do, and don't worry about what others might say about you, because whatever you do, they will always find domething to say about you!". Work? Do what you want! You'll be the one living with your job. Marriage? Do what you want, have any girlfriend you want, you'll be the one living with her if you marry her. Speak Armenian? Again, do what you want, we won't force you to speak if you don't want to, but we will continue to speak to you in Armenian about 80% of the time, just so you at least know the basics. Ironically, all this reverse psychology has worked pretty well! By not imposing anything on me, they have managed to make me want to do the things that they would have forced me to do, had they been old fashioned. So, now, I actually WANT to improve my Armenian, I actually recognize that I should marry an Armenian, etc...Some way or another, the pressure has never been there, but the results are! And, if they ask me to kill someone tomorrow morning, I would do it! That's how much I owe them.

Here you go: www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0781801508?v=glance It's an Eastern Armenian/English dictionnary by Hippocrene. They print a good number of books about Armenian. I encourage you 100% in your crusade. It looks like you're not Armenian but want to learn the language. People like you should be applauded. I won't be able to help you with Eastern Armenian (I've actually been forgetting my Western Armenian during the past few years, so I better look into that before learning Eastern, which is apparently very similar, or else I might start mixing the two), but I'm sure that if you have any questions, other Armenians will be more than happy to help. As for the ''kh'', it's pronounced a lot like the ''j'' in Spanish (as in ''juego'' or ''Jose'') Good luck (though determination will probably get you there, not luck)

Very interesting article indeed, but foreign investors are still needed if any country wants its economy to grow more than it could on its own. It's pure economic theory. Example: The USA has been enjoying a strong economy and a strong dollar largely thanks to foreign capital. Take that capital out of the USA, and you can bet that there would be an economic depression. Why? More foreign capital = more money available to lend to companies = cheaper borrowing = companies invest, become more efficient vs other countries = prices go up, profits go up, stock market goes up = people get richer = spend more, etc... If foreign investors leave the scene, than some entity has to replace all this money that is leaving with them. One (temporary) solution is that the government will spend more to stimulate the economy (which abush, sorry Bush, has been doing with the war in Irak, giving reconstruction contracts to US companies). Another way to remediate to this is to introduce more advantageous fiscal policies (which again, abush Bush has been doing) to encourage people to spend more money. The Central Bank (the Federal Reserve) lowers interest rates to encourage spending as well (cheaper borrowing = more spending). That being said, what you said is also true. The strengths of Armenia's economy must come from within if it doesn't want to be vulnerable to foreign investors' moods. But Diasporans must also assist Armenia, because decades of soviet reign can make you forget sound business practices...and Diasporan money won't fly out of Armenia if there's a catastrophe, because there is more solidarity involved (unlike foreign investors who are there just for the money).

I find it somewhat ridiculous because, from what I heard (relatives living there), the rabbi only talked about the Jewish Genocide, as if we didn't hear enough about it. There's not one single person who hasn't heard about the Jewish Genocide in industrialised countries, while few know about the Armenian one. Movies are made every year in Hollywood about the Jewish Genocide, yet when a movie is made about the Armenian Genocide (Ararat), only a few movie theatres actually bother to play it. The irony in all of this is that the Jewish genocide would probably never had happened if the world had done something while the Armenian one was going on (we can quote Hitler on this). Basically, we were the first ones to suffer, never got any recognition or apology, few people know about what happened to us, and then this rabbi (whose people enjoys total recognition and even monetary compensation from the German government and Swiss banks) comes in to talk about genocide? Maybe he should start by pressuring his country to recognise officially the Armenian Genocide beforehand...no, wait, his government can`t because that would not make Turkey happy and Turkey is part of NATO. Plus, if you look in terms of percentage of total population, there were pobably more Armenians killed than there were Jews killed (percentage-wise, of course, not numbers), though I might be wrong on this one (I have no data). I also have distant relatives in California (which Armenian doesn`t anyway?!), and I heard that when they just got there in the 1980s, the jews were more helpful to them than the Armenians...They`re now successful lawyers there, but it`s a bit thanks to their jewish friends...

Granted, heryas in general are not to be trusted, but don`t exaggerate. You can`t blame them for everything. How come there is an Armenian section in Old Jerusalem? How come Armenian studies are offered in some Jewish universities? What I find ridiculous, is that one Armenian church in Miami brought a Rabbi to talk about the Jewish genocide on April 24th...

Also, try searching in French. You`d be surprised of the number of websites made by Armenians in France. If you don`t speak French, tell me, I`ll look it up for you. (P.S., I guessed rightly that you live in Canada because of the ''eh'' that you wrote at the end of your second post...Canadians tend to speak with ''eh'' at the end)

Yes, it is true that the Montreal Armenian community appears to be very much "closed" to anyone who is a ''passive'' Armenian like me. Maybe it's because there are a lot of Armenians in Montreal, so people take for granted that it's easy to meet someone. if you don`t speak properly, people tend to think that you don`t understand well either, which is totally wrong. Also, it is true that the core of the action is in Laval or St-Laurent (''Kurine dépénin métch''). I've moved from a big house in Côte-St-Luc (when parents lived in Montreal) to a very modest (that`s not to say shitty) place in the East of the city (since I`m now on my own), so that certainly doesn`t help. I`ll let you guys know, since you seem to actually care.