Another Day in Yerevan

We did a little shifting of our schedule today and stayed one more day in Yerevan to better explore the city. Originally, we had thought of heading north to D'segh, the small village where our friend from the Peace Corps works. We felt that may be pushing a little too hard and fast for Dad, so we slept in a little longer (yes, my jet-lag transition day), enjoyed breakfast for for a few extra minutes, then headed to the Green Bean, a local coffee shop that is trying to cater to the slowly westernizing populous of Yerevan.

We then caught a cab to the moving Armenia Genocide monument situated at the top of a hill just outside of the main ring road that surrounds Yerevan. The Genocide Museum commemorates the horrific events of 1915, unfortunately was closed for the holiday weekend. We headed for central part of the city and decided to hit the main Armenia history museum in the Republic Square where the previous night we witnessed the throngs of locals gathering to celebrate their Constitution Day. The museum, we were warned, could be pretty weak. We were very pleasantly surprised at how good it was.

Since Armenia has been linked to not only early Christianity, but to the dawn of early man (with many archeological sites emerging from the late Soviet era who apparently suppressed much of the research that was done)there was much to see. Much of the exhibits were in English, too. I remember teaching about Sumer and the fertile crescent of Mesopotamia back when I taught middle school humanities, but much of what's been unearthed here in Armenia has been recent enough, and older than that of the Sumerian civilization.

Been also reading "The Chalice and the Blade", by Riane Eisler, a book from a more feminist perspective, or as my sister would say, a balanced version of pre-history and recorded history as it pertains to the prevailing idea of a patriarchal or "dominance" view of human history. Being here in Armenia, and learning about how ancient civilizations here in this part of the world lived in a shared male/female balance and how power was shared and didn't war against each other. Margaret and I have had some good conversations about this topic, and being here in Yerevan just highlights these issues more.

With Dad resting back at the hotel, Margaret and I did a little exploring later in the day, stopped in a great local restaurant and each ordered a schwarma and a bottle of mineral water. Then we hit the carpet shops and had a great time! I think Margaret will be taking at least one home!

Tomorrow we'll head to the Saturday market which is touted to be very good with varied goods including more carpets! Most likely we'll hit one more Christian site/monastery just outside Yerevan, then head up north a couple of hours to D'segh where Mary is located and spend the balance of our time there until Wednesday when we'll return to Yerevan and fly out early Thursday. We're also considering a quick day trip to Tblisi in the republic of Georgia, which is a much more developed country and will be interesting to compare the two countries.