Jason Harris '08
Lake Sevan, Armenia 2008
"Standing at the medieval Khor Virap monastery in Armenia, underneath the towering snow-capped peak of the biblical Mt Ararat, stretching my imagination to pick out Noah’s Ark-shaped outlines in the mountain, it occurred to me that I was there because of my Hornstein fieldwork, and that seemed like quite an odd journey indeed.
It was during my Hornstein fieldwork at the San Francisco Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) that I was asked, in the summer of 2007, to write a quick summary of the Armenian Genocide. This summary was used to help prepare the JCRC's agency’s consideration of a resolution in the U.S. Congress recognizing the Genocide. My interest grew as I exploried the issues of the Genocide, Armenian and Jewish history, contemporary international politics, and the American Jewish community, resulting in the adoption of the subject for my Master’s Thesis. After completing the paper and graduating from Hornstein, I decided to travel overseas for a month – and why not go to Armenia?!
It always amazes me to find Jewish communities in seemingly far-flung places, and in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, 5,500 miles from Boston, it turns out there is an active community of roughly 700 Jews. I met briefly with the head of Armenia’s Jewish community and learned, through an interpreter, that they have not only Chabad providing religious services and other ritual needs, but the community also supports informal Jewish education, youth activities, holiday celebrations, and so many other familiar Jewish activities. They are even looking for some overseas donors to help build a community center (apparently Americans are not the only ones into development these days!).
Armenia is an incredible country, and after ten days there it was clear to me that I needed at least another ten just to feel like I covered all the bases in this small, sparsely populated nation (slightly larger than Israel, but with less than half the population). Although Jewish and Armenian histories have only rarely intersected, both peoples have a similar historical outlook, and a heritage rooted in traditions, stories, legends and heroes dating back thousand of years, as well as the modern experiences of genocide, diaspora, and the longing for their historic, sacred, homelands.
I had always expected Hornstein to take me to the boardrooms and classrooms of the American Jewish community in Boston, New York, San Francisco, and elsewhere. But all the way to the heart of the Caucasus, east even of the Black Sea, to a small landlocked country squished between Turkey and Iran? It just goes to show that nothing in life is linear, and that within Hornstein, unexpected, amazing, and life-affirming experiences are a distinct possibility.
Jason can be contacted at jasonharris2@hotmail.com