Archbishop Ateşyan: We are ready to be cultural bridge between people of Turkey, US

Archbishop Aram Ateşyan, deputy patriarch of the Armenian Patriarchate, based in İstanbul, told Sunday’s Zaman after returning from the Los Angeles Anatolian Cultures and Food Festival that Armenians are ready to be a bridge between the people of Turkey and the United States.

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An Armenian from Turkey in Los Angeles...

Markar Esayan

Last week I visited Los Angeles to attend the fourth Anatolian Cultures and Food Festival, held between May 16 and 19. I wanted to write about my impressions before the effects of jet lag took hold and while my memories were still fresh. I was enthusiastic as this was my first visit to Los Angeles. I wasn't enthusiastic just because I was making my first visit to a place or because I would see all the major historic or religious landmarks of Anatolia within a 60,000-square-meter area in Orange County. I also have many relatives and friends living in this city and across the state, most of whom I hadn't seen for years. Perhaps it would be possible to catch up with some of them on everything during my tight schedule.

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An Armenian lady, Hrant and April 24

Orhan Kemal Cengiz

There is a story that Hrant Dink used to tell on many different occasions that I would like to share with you. Let us listen to the story from Hrant:

"An old Turkish man called me from a village in the region of Sivas and said: 'Son, we searched everywhere until we found you. There is an old woman here. I guess she is one of your people. She has passed away. Can you find any relative of hers, or we will bury her with a Muslim service.'

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Across the Armenian-Turkish divide

Michael Krikorian

For years, the genocide fueled my anger at all things Turkish. Then I met Murat Kayali.

In 2001, I wrote a story for the Los Angeles Times about April 24, the annual Armenian Day of Remembrance, that had this lead: "The Armenian genocide."

That was it, the entire first paragraph.

I was proud of it because it didn't say "the alleged genocide" or "what the Armenians consider a genocide." It just called the 1915 massacre of a million Armenians what it was, even though the U.S. government — in deference to official Turkish denials and our air bases in Turkey — won't use the word.

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Turkish, Armenian students foster coexistence with exemplary project

Putting aside all their prejudices and what their course books taught them, a group of students from a Turkish high school and an Armenian high school have joined hands to get to know each other and develop bonds of brotherhood among different religious and ethnic groups in the country with a joint project, which has resulted in a prominent award from the Journalists and Writers Foundation (GYV).

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Turks, Armenians and Ottomans

Mustafa Akyol

Akdamar Church, Van/Turkey

I really was not expecting to eat the best lahmacun of my life on the western coast of the United States. (Lahmacun, a sort of thin pizza with minced meat, is prominent in Turkish cuisine.) However Jack’s Bakery, a small family restaurant in the greater Los Angeles area, went beyond all my expectations. Not only its lahmacun, but everything I tasted here were both very delicious and very “Turkish.”

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Bells at Diyarbakır Armenian church to toll after 97 years

The bell-tower of Diyarbakır’s Surp Giragos Armenian Church, a very important church for the Armenian community in the Middle East, is set to return to use after a 97-year interval, with a new bell made in Russia.

As part of repair and restoration work at the Surp Giragos Church a new bell was made in Moscow, and has been delivered to Diyarbakır. The bronze bell weighs 100 kilograms, and will ring from the bell-tower beginning at its reopening ceremony on Nov. 4.

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Armenian-Turkish youth orchestra brings harmony to divided cultures

The lights dimmed and excited chatter subsided as the audience took their seats in the modern, wood-paneled, 400-person Garanti Kültür Merkezi concert hall at Boğaziçi University in trendy Bebek on Wednesday night.

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