Three Apples: Three Sons of the Diaspora Meet Again
a column by Paul Chaderjian for the Asbarez newspaper Once there were and there were not … .. three Armenian boys climbing the jungle gym in an Armenian kindergarten in Antelias, Lebanon. They were five-years-old, maybe six, donning their requisite red school uniforms, playing under the watchful eye of their teacher, Miss Jacqueline. The threesome were students at Mardikian Elementary, a school named after its American benefactor and located in the walled compound of the seat of the Holy See of Cilicia, a stone’s throw from the Mediterranean Sea. There, in the shadow of the St. Gregory the Illuminator Cathedral, under the windows of the residence of the Catholicos, across the yard of the Cilician Seminary, and next door to the Holy See’s publishing house, the threesome would play at lunchtime. In their classes, in their short walks to the Cathedral, during the visits by the Cilician priests, these young minds would be impressed with the importance of their Armenian identity...