neko

Though, apart from Garni, most pre-Christian sites are never going to attract mass-market tourism. But there should still be active steps taken for their investigation and preservation. Ironically, there are probably more excavations going on at early Armenian sites in Turkey than in Armenia. Last year, the foundations of what appeared (to me) to be a very early church was discovered built on top of the remains of the Urartian temple-fortress of Altintepe, near Erzincan. Given the context, an actual connection with St. Gregory the Illuminator seems plausable. The site also has extensive fortified walls which postdate the Urartian period. Also on the site was discovered an audience hall with mosaics from the early Byzantine period that (according to the excavators) seems to have been converted into a church at a later date. But, given that it is Turkey, I think that the Turkish excavators are going to have big problems in presenting their results.

You said it. I don't see anywhere in the rules "only Armenians may post". If you want that, then go set up your own little forum elsewhere, and restrict it to only the purest Armenians (a category that, of course, you must belong to).

Want to go to the only place in the world that still has real racism, real genocide, as an everyday reality, then go to Africa. But who cares - every African in sub-Sahara Africa could drop dead tomorrow and it wouldn't do the World the slightest harm (and probably do it a great deal of good). Nigeria, btw, is a hotbed of Islamic fundamentalism - that will be the "intellectual" origin of that article.

Don't feed trolls or bears.

There is a US base on top of a mountain just east of Erzurum. Has various listening devices, radar, early warning equipment, etc. Might technically be under NATO control, but it is manned by US soldiers.

False. The visa lasts for only 3 weeks. And it is only a single entry. Take a day trip into Georgia and return to Armenia - and that's another $25 to pay (plus another run-in with possibly corrupt customs officials). Turkey's $15 visa lasts for 3 months and is multiple entry: go from Turkey to one of the Greek Islands, or to Bulgaria, and then return and there is no extra cost. Almost nobody except diaspora-Armenians go to Armenia as their sole destination. Almost all independent travellers woud wish to go there as part of a bigger travelling experience and will not fly there directly (unless it is short-haul from Turkey / Russia / Syria, etc). Armenia's restrictive and expensive tourist visas seriously discourages casual visits to Armenia. Visas give uncertainty and trepidation to potentual visitors - they are probably the biggest disincentive to entering a country (look at any message-board for travellers - the type of questions that always recur are about visas). In 2005, in NE Turkey, just after Georgia abolished its visa fee I happened to mentioned it on separate occassions to two people - both of them subsequently decided to visit Georgia for no other reason than it was now free to enter. Neither planned to visit Armenia because it still had a visa fee. Then why do most people who visit Georgia not continue on to Armenia? Mid-range Armenian hotels are about 300% more expensive than the equivalent in neighbouring countries. There are NO inexpensive hotels anywhere in Armenia. $40 a day is not an inexpensive hotel, when in Turkey or Iran you can get a perfectly acceptable room for $15.

Unlucky Armenia - to be wedged so tightly between bears (Russians), wolves (Turks), sloths (Georgians) and .... now what animal would characterise an Azeri?

"History buffs" generally do not travel to Armenia: there are too many other destinations around that would be of more interest to them. "Backpackers" (as you call them) or "independent travellers" (as the tourist industry calls them) tend to avoid Armenia for five main reasons. 1/ It is expensive to get to. 2/ Because of closed borders it is a cul-de-sac for travel: generally you have to leave by the same route as you arrived. 3/ Armenian hotels all have extortionately high prices compared to neighbouring countries. 4/ Outside of Yerevan, there are very few hotels. 5/ Armenian visas are completely overpriced and highly restrictive compared to neighbouring countries (eg. Georgia is free; Turkey is only $15, is multiple entry, and lasts for 3 months). Independent travellers generally contribute the most to a country's economy: they stay longer, they stay in smaller and locally-owned hotels, they use public transport, they take a more active interest in the country and attempt to engage with the local population, etc. Other tourists, including those from the Armenian diaspora, tend to stay in expensive foreign-owned hotels or with relatives, and pay for their holidays using travel agents in their home countries.

Follow that thinking, and you will next be saying that Iraq was responsible for 9/11, or that the Armenian defenders of Van were responsible for the Armenan genocide. Austria and Germany started World War 1 for their own expansionist interests, and used the assassination in Sarajevo as an excuse for and a route to that war. If it hadn't happened then they would have found some other excuse, or invented one.

As an alternative to doing that and making Hyforum look ridiculous, how about replacing the highly offensive Hellektor posts with blank spaces?

Dardanella Words by Fred Fisher. Music by Felix Bernard & Johnny S. Black. From 1919. "Down beside the Dardanella Bay where oriental breezes play There lives a lonesome maid Armenian By the Dardanelles with glowing eyes She looks across the seas and sighs And weaves her lovespell so sirenian Soon I shall return to Turkestan I will ask her for her heart and hand They don't write them like that anymore - which is a good thing!

But that photo - it's a bookflap dustcover photo, not a pin-up shot from a model agency. The photo was taken for a purpose - to perpetuate whatever image the author or his publishers wanted the book-buying public to think Saroyan was. So it is worth exploring what that image was.

Write it again, with some additions to give it the correct emphasis. "There is little scientific research on monuments from the end of the Urartian period to the start of the Middle Ages. Why? The influence of the Armenian Church maybe? Most of it is not a Christian period so it is not seen as important. Contrast that with the much greater value the Greeks place on the same pariod of their history, bacause in their self-image the most important Greek accomplishments took place before the Christian era.

Sheep? Whatever takes your fancy, I suppose. As Nairi said, "tastes differ".

There will be a specific message that that 3/4 face view is meant to convey, particularly through the angle of the camera, and the direction of the sitter's eyes. For example, if the author wanted to be seen as being particularly visionary or futuristic in his thoughts and writings then perhaps his eyes might be looking upward slightly, and ahead. If he is a political leader then the camera might be looking up at him, emphasising physical stature to reflect his greater intellectual stature than mere mortals. Having no eye contact sugests remoteness and superiority and inscrutability. In that photo Saroyan is looking straight ahead but at something out of sight, and the camera is level with him but set at a lower height than would be usual for a face level portrait. So I suppose that is meant to suggest that the author examines and writes about contemporary things and lives, from the standpoint of the ordinary person, but that Saroyan is still of greater stature than those ordinary lives he writes about. Since I've never read any of his books, I don't know if that does reflect his work.

Is that him posing for his myspace profile? See "Internet disease".

You are going to be very busy.

Due to the ill-treatment of its non-Muslim inhabitants, and the big non-Turkish non-Muslim element in its population, and its historical Greek identity, it was proposed that the city was removed from Turkish dominion and incorporated into Armenian territory (giving it to Greece would have been impractical due to the geographical distance). This would both protect the Christian population from further Muslim attrocities and give Armenia access to the sea. Obviously there were more Turks than Armenians because almost no Armenians survived the genocide! The Greek population was probably the largest single ethnic group. Even today, the majority is probably not Turkish. (Read back to my post, posted before the origin of Dink's assassin was known, in which I had actually mentioned Trabzon, and had pointed out that the most fanatical Young Turks had come from areas where Turks were minority populations).

Live happily ever after? Many countries dream of getting rid of US "support".

I find that hard to believe. Treating people like shit is your trademark. How kind of you, you patronising **** without the smallest potential of ever being civilized. Given that you like to insult everyone in vast areas of the World, insulting individuals personally probably isn't something you would notice doing. You seem to be very fond of "Iranian" sayings which are about as exclusively Iranian as bread and cheese are. Zurderer has already said, and said on several occasions, that the genocide is a fact and he has also gone as far as accepting a reasonable accurate figure for the numbers killed.

True, true, true, and true. Can you believe that these neo-con Yankee turds are still writing this sort of stuff? "On the eve of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Turkey stabbed the United States - its only dependable ally - in the back, denying passage to our troops in the fateful illusion that Ankara could save Saddam. " They really have no shame (though maybe a lack of it is what defines their "character"). God help us all from their "Freedom" operations.

Error404 = intelligence requested but not found.

When I said "some people" I was specifically thinking of people like you. Alas, having a "relaxed" attitude to the property of others is the least of your problems.

Unusually for Wikipedia, they are saying it because it is true.

They are marked so that people can't steal them and use them for their own purposes.