old friends, some great news!

Old friends? Avag and Niko of course. we met at taekwondo group and did a whole lot of crazy things together. our "residence" was tsitsernakaberd park, where we trained, decided to build our base and just what not. we would skateboard in the city center, go play some PC games, make our plans of creating our own game... troublemakers is a good description. however when i entered the prep. course at university i practically stopped spending time with them. then entering university, work... common story i guess how some people's ways part. Avag entered polytechnique uni, but as soon as he was the best in the group he lost his interest and stopped attending and soon was left out. then he entered again with the same result. then he decided to serve in the army before deciding what to do with his life. later on Niko entered university. we 3 lived our lives, but we always knew that there somewhere are the other two. When i got engaged i somehow managed to find Niko's number and gave him a call. we talked for hours and in a moment i found out that he hadn't changed at all. then i took Avag's # from him and called him. we both were ashamed of our not keeping contact. now Avag is back from the army. changes? yeah he is as tall as Niko and his voice is low. when we 3 met up, where did we go? where else? to tsitsernakaberd. just walked our old route and talked and goofed about. it was such a strange feeling, it seemed that there were no years between our last visit and between us. absolutely nothing about our friendship changed no matter how very much we ourselves changed.
and now Avag and Niko will meet Michael soon.

how? that's the great news. he has already got tickets and will come here again on 20th of july for 6 days. no need to say how excited we are. just this loooong process of me going there will hopefully be done in september and well the longest we have been apart in physical sense was 6 months. so yes someday he just said "hey you know i'm thinking i'll come see you in july". i jumped up risking to hit the head against the ceiling.
yes and by the way i'm going to make a tattoo. ask Michael for details :D he is very "happy" about it :D:D:D

happiness

how many times in our lives are we happy? really happy, without any "buts" or other thoughts? not as many as you think I guess. the other thing is when you are happy to that extent you don't realize it, you just are happy. Now i was just playing back Michael's second visit in mind. I thought of how we went to Sevan on my birthday and stayed at Aram's hotel.

...How we sat by the lake and talked about days to come, about what we would do, once we are together. And we were sitting on a piece of wood, all alone at the shore and could hear the sound of waves only, and the sounds of he hotel sometimes but they were very far. The wind was blowing but it was warm in his arms as he held me close... and yes we were very very happy then. Every second was a lifetime, time was frozen and it was a moment of forever.

Then Aram told his men to light a fire (a bonfire should I say) and we sat by it along with other people. Then went back to the hotel to get some sleep :)

*then* on the next morning (it's when that photo was taken), I went out of the hotel and found mommy reading by the lake. Michael was still asleep in his room so I was waiting for him to wake up. And I sat down right on the wooden moorage dangling my legs. I was enjoying that very moment of my life, the place, the fact Michael was there in his room just several steps away, the morning sun, the freshness of the morning, previous evening, anticipation of *today* and the several days remaining from his visit, and just in general my life. I was happy, in the very sense of that word, it was just written on my face and I couldn't help smiling and closing the eyes to play back things over and over. I had no worries, no bad thoughts crossed my mind, and I just felt like the whole world is happy with me, and felt happy to be a part of that big bright world...

Yes I know this all may sound like the babble of a terribly romantic girl and some nonsense a girl in love will say... but I do mean what I say and I wish just everybody in the world to experience this kind of happiness, this feeling of fullness and completeness.

graduated!

HOORAY! we are not students any more!! the university is left behind and crossed out from our lives! what can be better? mm well a few certain things i guess ;)

anyway. all of us have got the best marks! that's nice too, especially taking into consideration all the stress caused by the university... it was at least smth comforting :D.

several words about the defense itself. of course, it was awful. we stayed at uni from 10 am till 8 pm. for 2 hours we were just helping at the chairs of informatics to sort things out, to find necessary papers and have professors sign them. as usual it speaks of great lack of organization. we had our interest in it.. the sooner they'd finish sorting things out the sooner the defense would start. so yes if we didn't help them probably we would go home on the next day :D

the terrible part for me was that i had to defend in armenian.. when i said the name of my project, i actually forgot how to start in armenian :D and i was terrified :D then slowly-slowly i pulled words out of me, constantly thinking what to say in the next sentence. however it all was good and they asked me to show the program (!!!). then my supervisor, mrs. Alaverdyan, had to say several words about me. somewhere in the middle she said ".. i'm surprised that in such a small-bodied person there's so much energy .." and i hardly managed not to laugh out loud. this is very amusing for some zzvanq people like Michael :D.

in the end Anya said "why didn't she say 'humble' about me? she said it about you and about Alex" that made us laugh a lot too. 'Anya' and 'humble' can't even be used in one sentence :D.

And yes, a big thank you to Michael for his help and patience and for just being there all the time :) i love you zzvanq :D(L)

yesterday we went out to celebrate. after thinking where to go we decided to check out if we could sit at Jazzve. and there was practically nobody there! then we walked some, sat at a park, then walked to the Republic Square. The view of the fountains awed me! they were really beautiful! and the evening was beautiful, and it felt so right and easy to be standing there with friends with that great weight off our shoulders! we are FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

Photos

diploma defense

22

from Alex

diploma defense celebration

Also, Alex's post about diploma defense is here

hectic

1. I've got a new pet, a male budgerigar for my old virgin Lyuki. the new guy's name is Rikky. I hope that he will fix the .. hm-hm .. situation ..with Lyuki :D He's sweet and nice and doesn't scream at the top of his voice all day long like the previous parrot did. So even if nothing turns out of my plans, at least there still will be something good :D
For more photos go here:
http://photo-blog-121.blogspot.com/2008/05/new-pet.html

2. "pet sematary" by Stephen King
i have a lot going on as anybody else. translating the diploma, some other issues. the defense is on 21st and i can't say i have much spare time. however for several days i've been doing nothing but reading this book. it was the first thing i'd do in the morning (well after talking to Michael) and the last thing before i went to bed. it was absolutely crazy and insane for me to be reading it all day long, hour after hour, page after page... but i just couldn't stop as if i had to know the secret, the mystery..... but oh the book shows that there are some secrets that are to be left secrets.
there was a strange effect of this book. at first it seemed scary, especially when people went to that pet sematary, were in the dark woods, heard voices and such. but oh it wasn't creepy or scary later on. it was really terrible not because of going to pet sematary at night.. but because of how something could destroy the family, how wrong it all was, how very not fair.
analyzing the book, i noticed smth peculiar.. Stephen King has used little children in almost all stories i have read. that's part of what gets you. such things should never never never happen to kids. to anyone, but especially to kids. the other thing is that somewhere in the story, when things seem so very bad Stephen Kind will write a chapter that it all was a dream that things were good. too good. and then it would turn out that that good reality was a dream.
i can't say whether i liked the book or not. maybe if at least its end was some different i would like it more. when i read the last word i just shut the book and threw it on the shelf, feeling that i can get back to my activities, free of that book. maybe it was just wrong to me and against my nature.

anyway, enough of this.

3. Mary's defense took place today. she has got "A+" (the best) and is very happy (of course she should be :D) Finally she has graduated from this wonderful circus called university, has a BA degree and is just waiting for their certificate.. oops diploma i mean :D. and yes she is being mean to us, saying that we are still students and that she's already a graduate (not certified just yet). She can be mean until 21st. then we will be uncertified graduates too. really the diploma should also give us medals for the patience and endurance we showed during 4 years, that during the 4 years (why.. 5 really. forgot the prep. course) we have been able to stand them, their dumbness and unlawfulness.

4. oh i don't want to speak about this. this is really another pain in my ass. the Tamanyan website. The guy who worked on it before me (Mika) for some reason moved the site from one domain to the other. so i had to fix things. that was bad but i survived it. BUT. now there is a new problem. the old webmail doesn't exist anymore and its address book is lost. what's my fault? that i didn't back it up. but oh wtf, i had to work on their site and i did back up that. why would i interfere with their mails? i've already done way too much for them and i know it. just it was my first site (order) and i wanted things to be nice.. at the beginning. now me and Mika talked on gmail chat and oh yes it was gossiping but we understood each other from just a word. so now what Hayk Tamanyan wants is that Mika has no access to anything. but the site is on Mika's domain :D from many funny things Hayk believes that creating a webmail is as easy as opening a yahoo account, even he could do that (but he won't of course). and oh the only reason that stops him about buzzing me to be their webmaster is that i'm leaving for IDAHO soon :D:D:D looks a lot like OHIO no? it's stressful... but oh it's getting really funny, as funny as it has never been. i really hope with all of my heart that they will find a webmaster somewhere who will be the whipping boy for them... and i will run away to Ohio :D:D. let them think to IDAHO, they will never find me :D

photos

Whatever is going on in my life and no matter what problems i have it doesn't mean i'm not going to have fun.

so there are 2 new posts on the other blog. the first is about the visit to the zoo. after the visit i found out that Mary wanted to go too. so probably we will go there all together soon.

the second one is... yes. glamour. i was just playing with my hair. suddenly an idea appeared. then another one! and wooooh a whole lot of ideas of how to seduce Michael. i wonder which of the characters he liked most :D:D that photo on the left is the very first one, so be ready for something shocking.

http://photo-blog-121.blogspot.com/2008/05/glamour.html

things happening at ERIICTA

i'm feeling very numb right now. so it all has been true and we have to hand in the armenian version of diploma project by 15th.

Instead of going to work for a full day today i spent half of it at university and when i finally got to work i was so pissed off that didn't even manage to right a normal "good-bye" letter as it was my last day at work.

i can say that this has been one of the worst days in my life. the thing is there was a law adopted by the country that the diploma project can be in any language but you will have to present the armenian copy or you can bring only the armenian one. i'm not sure when this law came out but definitely long ago. last year some people defended their projects in english, this year we were told that it's great to have it in english. then a new rector comes to our university, and last week a new vice-rector is elected. The vice-rector says that there is this law and all projects have to be in armenian. it was signed yesterday.

we talked to everybody at the university except for the rector who was 'too busy'. when we went to the vice-rector he said that he doesn't want any problems with the government and that whatever took place before him doesn't touch him in any way. Now he is the vice-rector and everything has to be legal. in other words he is just covering his ass.

even the professors are mad but nobody can do anything. they just played one of the meanest tricks on us. as usual the side for who things turn out the worst are the students.

i just still can't take it in... i can't believe they can do this (in fact already did) and that nothing absolutely nothing can be done. they think they can do everything and that they have the power. Now it is so. but tomorrow things will change. once (actually if..) i graduate, i will write open letters to some newspapers letting everybody know how things really were at this university and what we went through during these years. it won't affect anything but at least the university will gain some bad fame.

i will do my best to cause them as much stress as they caused for us.

they won this battle.. but not the war.

there are many good things about Armenia, but sometimes some bad things outweigh. One of those things is that the country never protects the citizen and that the only thing that can give you a green light in any situation is money.

ERIICTA is not an exception of course. and yes "E" in ERIICTA stands for "European" but it's only the name - long and promising - the european regional institute of information and communication technologies. what stands behind the name? nothing... imagine a balloon with ERIICTA written on it. what will be inside of the balloon? some good stuff? no just old smelling air from somebody's lungs. That's exactly what are university is.

P.S. visit these links:
http://517design.livejournal.com/84920.html
http://517design.blogspot.com/2006/05/eriicta-european-regional-institute-of.html

Photo-blog

Yes, taking photos has always been there with me for years. When I was a child it was a 'khaki' cam (in both meanings..) and I'd still have it with me constantly and would have to run to the photo-services to develop the negatives and to get the photos printed. Then it was the cam on my mobile phone... which was I guess better than the old one however crazy it may sound. Then it was the good old Sony DSC-S600 which everybody was used to see in my hands. And even though I couldn't set a lot of important things manually I still feel that I learned *a lot* using it. and it's when mom made one of the greatest gifts - the huge photography book which is my desk book at all times. Then I felt like I really want a better cam and that the old one will 'die' soon anyway (when i zoomed in and out it made some strange noise). So yes now i have my Sony DSC H7 and am happy about it. Whatever they say about Sony's cams I will say that the cam is an instrument and you can take great shots even with a bad cam. what matters is how you see things. I like Sony and that's what matters :) and I am used to it, I know how it will behave. it's smth like an old friend.

anyway. lately i felt like i'm kind of turning this blog into a photo-blog so i have decided to create a separate new blog and to upload photos there. here i will upload photos of friends and such, but not a whole bunch of say blossoming trees ;)

http://photo-blog-121.blogspot.com/2008/04/welcome.html
Here's the link.