Inability to Meet in Time and Space: A Diaspora Experience
When it comes to the Armenian diaspora, there is a common perception both in Turkey and abroad: A monolithic and powerful diaspora network. Depending on from where you look, this imagination can be interpreted either demonizing way or as wishful thinking. Nonetheless, whichever way one looks at it, the imagination of a monolithic and powerful diaspora network has very little to say about the reality. Whether used in an antagonizing or idealized context, these two opposing positions on the Armenian diaspora merge in their non-contemporaneity. In other words, people/communities who consider themselves part of the Armenian diaspora cannot meet each other even if they are in the same time and space.
This year I was in Athens during the Great Lent, and the Armenians in Greece celebrated the Great Fast and Easter according to the Greek church calendar. It was probably done to avoid confusion during the working days, but it was still a case of being subject to the time of the dominant one.
As such, I had followed the Latsi Kisher service in Istanbul online, and a week later I had planned to go to the Armenian church in Athens and attend the service there live. During those days, Sesil Artuç and I met in Athens and we decided to spend Thursday traveling around, visiting the important places in Athens all day and then going to Latsi Kisher in the evening according to the Armenian-Greek common calendar. In fact, early in the morning when we were walking around to find the location of the church, we caught the morning service and admired the pastor's relationship with his congregation. The pastor told us that there was going to be a Latsi Kisher service in the evening, but everyone was asking him "what time does the church end?" and he said "when you go to the coffee shop, do you ask at what time it ends, just come, it will end whenever it ends". He addressed everyone by name, one by one, and took a close interest in the flock he was shepherding.
In the evening we arrived at the church around 9:30 p.m. The congregation, made up of mostly the elderly and women, filled the church. We listened to a long reading from all the Gospels about the betrayal of Jesus, which is Latsi Kisher's specialty. By this time, it was already 23:00 and we were exhausted. One of Latsi Kisher's most beautiful hymns, Der Vogormya, which is sung 40 times in a row, would not start. On this night when God's mercy was asked for, listening to this hymn was very important as it involved asking both for God's mercy and consenting to God's will.
And finally the lights went down, our tired and aching bodies shook, we said, now it will begin, and suddenly from the altar, from behind the curtain, we heard the song "Ur es mayr im." We had heard this song but had no idea why it was being performed here and now. Sesil and I looked at each other, trying to understand what was going on, and then the lights came on and we realized with great surprise that the Der Vogormya, which describes the meaning and importance of the whole day, was not to be shared at the Latsi Kisher service. When we shared this incident with the members of the Parrhesia group, our friend Araz from Beirut told us with great excitement that they had been waiting for “Ur es Mayr Im” for the whole year, that this was the hymn that best reflected the meaning and importance of Latsi Kisher, and that a Latsi Kisher without “Mayr Im” would cause social outrage. So what “Der Vogormya” is to us, “Ur es Mayr im” is to Araz. "Can there be a Latsi Kisher without Mayr Im?" she was saying. To put an end to this state of mutual bewilderment and to clarify the situation, Araz broached the subject with one of the high-ranking priests serving at the Catholicosate of Cilicia. According to the explanation, the Der Voghormya at Latsi Kisher had been replaced by the popular song "Ur es Mayr im" and Der Voghormya had been removed from the service.
Armenian churches, both in the diaspora and in Armenia, are places where Armenian communities that have little or nothing to do with each other come together, regardless of the fact that one is a believer or not. Many people who identify themselves as atheists attend Armenian church services sometimes out of a sense of belonging from childhood, sometimes so as not to offend their family, sometimes because the music appeals to their taste, and sometimes because of the community they actively serve. Armenians from Turkey who migrated to the USA, Canada or Australia in the 1980s witnessed the fragility of this bond in the countries they went to.
We took our share from the same phenomena, as well. What we experienced was an experience of non-contemporaneity. When we shared our experience in Athens with the Parrhesia team, we were suddenly separated from our fellow comrades. We were able to come together in the face of the difficulty of telling the truth, but we never realized that there were other factors that separated our emotions and worlds without us even realizing it.Being exposed to this non-contemporaneity in this way was like hitting a wall. Understanding why we had hit this wall suddenly made it invisible and allowed us to move on, one step closer to each other.
