Seely enn log world. ided and eee Ore fale a Saas should live. The Englishman and thi cece ences Soest eee ee ooo ooo pe re ee oe oe oo God said, “As a matter of fact, I do erm Dee aass foe oe arene oer fo ee one ee > countries But You the winner shall have it.” So’ they threw, and the Armenian won, God Armenia and he went off Only the Georgian was told the Georgian to go away The God became and stop bothering Him Geor- jan still argued. Finally, angry and told the Georgian to go. 10 Hell. But the Georgian. said, “You don’t get rid of me so casily. I'can see that You are hiding something under Your apron. I think ie is a country that You are hiding, and it rightfully belongs to me.” God said, “AML right, T may as well admit it. This was a little country T was keeping to live in Myself, But since you are such a pest, I sup- pose T have to give it to you.” The Georgian re- ceived Georgia, and God in peace “This story is a piece of Anmenian folklore, told to generations of Arme- ian children. Tt explains to them why they live in a land that is bleak and barren while their northern neigh bors, the Georgians, live in fertile val- Caucasus Moun- leys sheltered by the ers erat errant EREVAN, capital of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, where T recently went to attend a’ scientific , a metropolis in a land of Tr houses a third of the two and a half million inhabitants of the LETTER FROM ARMENIA republic, and is still growing rapidly Great expanses of gray houses stretch out to the dusty hills around it. And above the «i vering up from the horizon when the air i clear and float= ing in the sky when it is hazy, stand the huge, snoweapped dome of Ararat m of Armenia which had ten times the area of the present republic, extended far soutl into what & now Turkey and Tran, n in the middle of menia, and became a holy place and a symbol of Armenian national identity Now the inhabitants of Soviet Armenia can sce Ararat every day but ean never set foot on it, for it stands in Turkey Lest they forget, the dome of Ara flag of the Armeni- an Republic. Armenians like to tell the story of Chicherin’s reply to a Turkish diplomat who complained Chicherin was Lenin’s Affairs, and Pe Turk ex plained at length how offensive it was to Turkish feeling piece of ‘Turkish territory upon an alien fag. “If that is the way you feel about replied Chicherin, “then why docs the moon appear upon the lag of Tur ey?” ‘After he wonder of Armenia is Lake Sevan, Ararat was th r also appears on about th c Ararat, the second natural five-hundred-square-mile expanse « blue water lying six thousand feet above sea level, surrounded by windswept and treeless hills. The lake presents to the Armenians a se- vere conflict between, stheties utility: he water in the Tak in be economic value if it is used for irrigation. Be ing at such a high alti tude, it can easily be channelled to the places where it is needed, Te can convert thousands of square miles of arid plains into thriv- ing farms and vineyards. But he lake in its natural and of enormous fate cannot be so. used Tes area i so great and the air over it so dry that ninety-two per cent of all the water that flows into it evap- orates. An additional four per cent disappears into underground streams, and four per cent flows out into the Hrazdan River. So the natural lake wastes ninety-six per cent of its inflow and offers only a variable and unre- liable four per cent for irrigation. TfMatte jersey turtleneck top in black, brown, purple, red or wine, $28, Long skirt of matte jersey with matching ‘cummerbund in black, brown, purple or wine, $47. Both in Trevird* Polyester, sizes 6-16. Designed by Melba Hobson. TANNERWAY 530 Seventh Ave,, New York 10018 the I had been an artificial reservoir thinking ecologist would have con= demned it as a wasteful monstrosity from 1930 to 1960 were intent on rapid economic development and had no hesitation in using drastic methods to put the water to productive use. The ‘only way w reduce the evaporation of the water and increase the outflow is to reduce the area of the lake's sur~ face. So a fifty-year plan was drawn up, at the end of which the lake would be reduced to a seventh of its original size, The water level wou ered 2 hundred and fifty feet by deep- ening the channel of the Hrazdan Riv- cer, The result of this would he that sixty per cent instead of four per cent of the inflow would exit through the Hrazdan. In addition to irrigation, large-scale hydroclectrie-power gener= ation in the Hrazdan gorge was a part of the plan. During. the fifties, many of the power stations were built, and the shoreline of Lake Sevan began to recede. But then, about 1960, the Armenians, like people in other pans of the world, became acutch aware that the price of economic devi ‘opment could be too high. They did not enjoy watching their magnificent flake disappear. Heated arguments be- gan between these who wished to re- store the lake to its natural state and those who were committed to the ful fillment of the fifty-year plan. Com- plete restoration was hardly a practical possibilty, since it would mean aban- donment of much land already under ‘irrigation, But complete fulfillment of the plan seemed less and less attractive to.a people no longer preoccupied with the bare necessities of life. By the end of the ninctecn-sistics, a compromise hhad been reached. Tt’ was agreed to hale the emptying of the lake at the 1970 level. The lake will lie perma nently fifty fect below its original level and will have eighty-seven per cent of its original arca. After a few years, the muddy “hathtub-rim” effect produced by lowering the water level will have disappeared, andthe lake will look al- ‘mest as beautiful as it did before man laid his hand on it, The compromise ‘means that wastage of water by evapo- ration will remain extremely high. To save the existing irrigation and hyd electric. works, the inflow to Lake van will be inercased by an expensive be low: diversion of a river through a tunnel underneath an intervening mountain. After this is done, the end result will be thae sixty-six per cent of the inflow will evaporate and thirty per cent will The Soviet authorities of the period \Tannerway. Matte jersey wraparound top of Trevird® Polyester in black, brown, purple or wine, $33. Ankle-length skirt of cotton velvet striped in shades of red and brown with front pockets, $50. Both in sizes 6-16. Designed by Melba Hobson. TANNERWAY 530 Sevemsh Ave., New York 10018 127128 How long is a year...? This one, a vertical hanging calendar printed on felt, is 5¥e feet from top to bottom. White numerals on gold beck- ground with blue fleur-dedis border ard the months in French; god sitk cord with brass knobs. A delight to look at all year long. 7" wide, gift-boxed. $5.50, ppt. CASUAL LIVING, ROUTE 6, BETHEL, CT. 06601 ble for power and irrigation. Barely half of the original objectives of the fifty-year plan will be achieved. All in all, the compromise represents a considerable victory of sentiment over expedicney. Another victory of sentiment was achieved in 1965, in an event the Ar- menians call“ revelution.” ‘That vear was the fiftieth anniversary of the great massacre of the Turkish Armenians, About half of all Armeni- fans alive in 1915 were in that part of the original homeland which lay in east= fern Turkey near the Russian border. On the pretext of disloyalty in the war then raging between Russia and “Ture key, the Turks massacred more than 2 nillion of these Armenians and drove the few survivors into exile, The 1915 massacre is as deeply rooted in the folk memory of Armenia as Auschwitz in the memory of Istacl. However, the Soviet government, which gained ‘control of Russian Armenia in 1920, did its best to discourage public recognition of the massacre. From the point of view of the government in Moscow, Armenia was 2 military liability that might have been hard to defend against a ‘Turkish attack at times when the Sovict Union was preoccupied ele= where, particularly during the inital phases’ of the Second World War. So the Moscow government consistently maintained correct relations with Tur= key and tried to convince the Armeni ‘ns that it would be best to pretend that the massacre had never happened. In 1965, there was no official commem- oration of the anniversary. To the 2s tonishment of the older generation of Armenians, who had learned under Stalin to Keep their feclings to them sclves, there was 2 large demonstration of young people in the main square of Yerevan, The demonstrators demand ed that the authorities finally put an end to their policy of disowning. the million of their people who had died, The authorities sent in the local Ar- menian police, who dispersed the deme onstration, bashed a few heads, but did not kill anybody. The authorities did not call in the Soviet Army, which was no doubt readily. available in its post tions along the Turkish frontir, a few miles away. A short time Tater, cone struction began on the brow of a hill where a public park overlooks the city of Yerevan. A monument to the view the massacre went up, austere and abstract in style, beautiful in its proportions. 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