{"id":817,"date":"2012-07-05T13:13:21","date_gmt":"2012-07-05T13:13:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/haysanta.am\/?p=817"},"modified":"2018-07-05T13:15:00","modified_gmt":"2018-07-05T13:15:00","slug":"im-a-happy-man-i-raise-8-soldiers-for-the-motherland-says-the-father-of-9-children-armen-from-goris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/haysanta.am\/en\/im-a-happy-man-i-raise-8-soldiers-for-the-motherland-says-the-father-of-9-children-armen-from-goris\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I\u2019M A HAPPY MAN. I RAISE 8 SOLDIERS FOR THE MOTHERLAND,\u2019 says the father of 9 children Armen from Goris."},"content":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/lenahovsepyan.com<\/a>
\nBy Lena HOVSEPYAN\u00a0<\/strong>
\n\u2018May you sit for dinner with seven children\u2019 the folk says when blessing a newly married couple. In this family they gather for dinner with 9 children \u2013 eight sons and a daughter. The girl helps the mother to set the table\u2026 That\u2019s all about the romanticism in our story.
\nThe reality is that the only wish of the well-brought up children of this modest, if not to say poor, house is peace to the world. Only after our insistent questioning they confessed they dream of a bicycle, but most of all of a ball to play football. The brothers would divide into 2 teams. One of the boys dreams of sous (a meat and potato soup) and khorovats (barbeque), while their father dreams of obtaining cattle and feeding his children with dairy products.
\n\u2018Two years ago I earned some money and bought several ewes. We got inspired, but one night a wolf attacked and killed them all. You can see our house is close to the wood.\u2019
\nElik, the mother, dreams of a permanent job (she is sure she can combine it with the house work, and you believe it seeing how vigorous she is and the way she takes care of the house and her children) and the minimum of living and sanitary conditions. 11 people live in a house without gasification and a washing machine. Having their own house is an unrealizable wish for them \u2013 Armen says the tumbledown house was his parents\u2019 and he must share it with his siblings. Yet, the atmosphere in this dilapidated house is surprisingly reserved.
\nThe eldest son of the family is 18, the youngest \u2013 about 2. Armen\u2019s, 38, and Elik\u2019s, 36, firstborn Gevorg has been working since 13 years old, at a car wash service in the daytime and at a bakery at night.
\n\u2018We wouldn\u2019t do without his work,\u2019 says Elik. \u2018Sometimes they call me to do some housecleaning. My husband has no permanent job. With children he cultivates our small ground area which is not even irrigated. Collect some firewood.\u2019 The family receives only 70.000 drams ($ 181) allowance monthly. They have about 400.000 drams ($ 1036) debts at shops.
\n\u2018I feel very uneasy, but what can I do? We are always short of money. I\u2019m grateful to them, they don\u2019t pressure us, understand our position, believe when we promise we\u2019ll pay,\u2019 says Elik. \u2018What we take? Only essential things \u2013 bread, vegetable oil, sugar, soap, shoes, stationary\u2026 It\u2019s good my 4 sons study at the town\u2019s boarding school No 1 and 5 days a week they eat and sleep there. They don\u2019t need much to put on, but Iskuhi and Sevak go to ordinary school.\u2019 The girl does the housework together with her mother and due to that does not regularly go to school. Sevak is a second year school boy, and the mother feels guilty for not being able to follow his study, too. But what can she do? The housework takes all her time.
\n\u2018My children miss the classes also because they don\u2019t have clothes and shoes\u2019. Director of school No 2 S. Aklunts shares his concerns about the children: \u2018You know, having many children, a great deal of social problems, being much occupied with the hardships is not a justification for being so much careless in the issues of education of the children and their future. May God protect them, now all 9 of them live under one shelter, but one day they will have to leave their house, to earn their own living, while the secondary education of these children is seriously endangered. I speak of only 2 of their children. It is pity, since they are capable and interesting students. The parents never have time to come to school and take an interest in their children\u2019s study.\u2019
\n\u2018They are good boys. I wouldn\u2019t even compare them with some other problematic adolescents of our school. They study as much as they can, they are reserved, diligent children,\u2019 tells about Harutyunyan brothers director V. Shalunts of the boarding school No 1 in his turn.
\nAren\u2019t the social reasons at the intersection of these two varying opinions? Little and pretty Iskuhi, is surely eager to appear among her peer with more or less decent clothes. And this social Gordian knot is only this family\u2019s. It is only their mother that knows well what they need and how much.
\n\u2018The governor\u2019s office lends us a hand when we apply. Sometimes, on the eve of the new academic year I have no other choice but to go to there. Since 2005 they promise to help us with the house renovation, but\u2026,\u2019 Elik says.
\n\u2018Why did they bear so many children, if they were not able to keep them?\u2019 many will say. And many do. But thanks Heaven, despite what others say, in a far corner of our motherland with decreasing population, there is a family that has 9 children \u2013 Gevorg, Iskuhi, twins Ara and Artur, Alain, Gor, Sevak, Hrant and Vahe!
\nArmen, the father of the family while saying goodbye, either upset, or with unshakeable dignity of a Syunik man \u2013 one cannot make out \u2013 briefs his life: \u2018My father was a forester and was well known in the town. Our family nickname\u2019s also connected with the forest. My childhood wasn\u2019t any better. I became an orphan when I was 13. We grew up somehow\u2026 There are four of us and none of us has an easy life. One of my brothers was a freedom fighter. He perished in Horadiz when the war was about to end\u2026\u2019 says Armen after a long pause. \u2018What can we do? Everybody has his lot\u2026 But I am a happy man. I raise 8 soldiers for the motherland\u2026\u2019
\nEach Monday, 6 schoolchildren go out with their laborer brother Gevorg and on each week-end 11 people gather at the dinner table. So, Elik, come on, invent something!
\n\u2026 After Armen threatens it, the snow white Gabar accompanies us silently from the old and empty looking house at the brink of the forest.
\nWe were very much concerned, touched and sad, but we left the house with 9 children and a great deal of hardships there at the brink of the forest and came back\u2026 We left a house where children sleep at least two in one bed (there are 4 beds in the house) and dream of a bicycle, a ball, sous and khorovats, where the mother washes for 11 people by hands, carrying the water from the yard and where the father dreams of keeping a cow to feed his children with dairy products. Yet, we were carrying with us the dignity of the children with clever eyes and the warmth of their hearth\u2026
\nTranslated by\u00a0Narine Aghabekyan<\/em><\/p>\n