After a wonderful trip up from the south seeing lots of interesting sights on the way, we arrived in Yerevan at our Airbnb booking. We had booked a private room in a flat with a lovely woman Narine and her 19 year old son Pavel. When we arrived Narine had prepared dinner for us, on the house, which was so kind of her! Afterwards Pavel offered to take us into town and show us some of Yerevan by night.
Pavel & Antony in front of the Alexander Tamanyan statue which looks like he’s a DJ rather than an architect!
In the Soviet years, Yerevan underwent massive reconstruction, following the new plans of architect Alexander Tamanyan (statue above) to make a perfect city. His vision was a neo-Classical town with wide avenues to resembe Paris, Vienna and Saint Petersburg. We were pleasantly surprised by how nice Yerevan was and definitely felt the classy European atmosphere here.
After having a good wander around the city centre, Pavel left to meet friends and we explored a bit more on our own. At his recommendation we went to a rooftop bar/ cafe (Mosaic) and had a dessert and enjoyed the views of the city.
Yerevan at night
More than most cities Yerevan seemed to have a lot of statues and sculptures, which made wandering the streets really interesting. The Arts, and music in particular, seems quite big here and it was a shame we didn’t go to a concert or even hear Pavel play the piano – he was hoping to get into the Moscow Conservatory later in the year.
Music related sculptures, Yerevan
One of the main areas we went to with Pavel and again several times on our own during the day was the Cascade area, home to a sculpture garden, many restaurants and cafes surrounding the garden, a large stairway going up the hill and to the left of the stairway the Cafesjian Centre for the Arts.
Sculptures, Cascade Area, Yerevan.
The most surprising sculpture was the large blue kiwi that was at the bottom of the stairway. Alongside this my other favourite was the leaping horse made of horseshoes.
My favourite sculptures, Yerevan.
We enjoyed our walks around the Cascade area, admiring the sculptures in the sculpture garden and the views as we went up and up the stairway. You could see across the city and see the towering Mt Ararat in the background. There were sculptures and fountains on the way up too. As we got near the top however it became apparent that the otherwise impressive Cascade stairway was not quite finished! You go around the unfinished bit and up some more stairs to get to the monuments at the very top.
Top: abandoned construction zone in foreground is the unfinished part of the Cascade stairway Bottom: Me halfway up the stairway, Yerevan.
At the top there is a towering monument to soviet victory in WW2… a kind of concrete column with a gold leaf on top. Beyond this is Victory Park with its enormous Mother Armenia statue . The 23m tall statue of a female warrior armed with a sword rests on a 50m tall pedestal and overlooks the city. Stalin used to be here too but his statue was removed after his death.
Left: Mother Armenia, Victory Park. Right: Soviet victory statue at the top of the Cascade.
Victory Park was a pretty cool place to hang out. Plenty of locals as well as tourists were enjoying the views of the enormous Mother Armenia statue and the city below, teenagers were climbing on the military equipment having a photo shoot, others were taking photos of the grave of the unknown soldier and kids on bikes were zooming around. The park was full of various old school themepark attractions for kids too.
Sun setting on the Grave of the Unknown Soldier & teenage girls having a photo shoot on a tank, Victory Park, Yerevan.
Around the city we saw billboards over the roads that cleverly reminded people of the Armenian Genocide, also known as the Armenian Holocaust- hence the comparison in the sign below of the Turkish/ Ottomans of 1915 with Hitler in 1939.
I won’t delve into all the details but I was blown away with what I learnt at the Armenian Genocide Museum. Together with the memorial beside it, the museum is a sober but important place to visit for anyone coming to Yerevan.
The Ottoman government systematically exterminated 1.5 million Armenians, most of whom were Ottoman citizens living in what is now Turkey. This largely occured during the first world war when eyes were busy looking elsewhere, but was planned years before according to the ‘Young Turks’ policy documents.
April 24 is Remembrance Day for the genocide in Armenia, as this date in 1915 marked its official beginning. If, like me before this year, you know very little about this significant event, have a read of the grim details or just the basic overview of the genocide in this wikipdia article.
It really saddens me that despite the recognition of the genocidal character of the massacre in legitimate scholarship and in civil society, so many countries at the government level (including New Zealand!!) have not even officially acknowledged the Armenian genocide. It’s a frightful thing that happened and a huge influence on the subsequent future of Armenians and Armenia, and their identity today. To not even have it acknowledged by many nations must just rub salt in the wounds. Turkey and Azerbaijan are the only countries who actually deny it, and they threaten economic and diplomatic consequences for those nations who officially recognise it. 🙁
Beside the genocide museum there was a garden with trees and plaques from groups and nations that do acknowledge what happened. The desire to acknowledge the past and work for peace in the future was really clear.
Interestingly just after our visit here an excellent article was published in a NZ paper about the witness and links of Anzac soldiers to the genocide. (They were in Turkey at the time fighting in WW1). It was inspiring to read about New Zealand soldiers doing what they could to save Armenians (even one from my little town of Mosgiel was mentioned!). Also reading of the generosity of New Zealanders to help Armenians during/ after the war was really encouraging. I had no idea NZ had strong links to the Armenian genocide. I’d never even heard of it until I was in Iran!
Top: Entrance to the Genocide Museum (steps going down). Bottom: Great views of Mt Ararat from the Armenian Genocide Memorial complex.
The museum is under ground and above it is a large area featuring two memorials. This Armenian Genocide Memorial Complex was built to acknowledge the memory of the 1.5 million Armenians who lost their lives during the genocide. It was created during the soviet era, after large demonstrations around the 50th anniversary of the genocide in 1965 called for it to be officially acknowledged. The memorial opened in 1967 but the museum was a later addition, opening in 1995.
The memorial consists of a tall slender stele (44m high), symbolising Armenians’ survival and national rebirth, and an eternal flame in the memory of the 1.5 million victims. This flame is surrounded by twelve large slabs positioned in a circle, representing the twelve Armenian provinces in present-day Turkey.
Top: Antony reflecting by the eternal flame. Bottom: The memorial from a distance.
Now after that sombre reflection here are some happy sunny pictures from downtown Yerevan which capture some of the beauty of the city.
Republic Square, Yerevan
Matenadaran, the manuscript library.
While in Yerevan we went to a nice restaurant that had both Armenian and Georgian food, as well as dancers who performed traditional dances, all very good so we went back a second time.
The final place worth a mention was on the outskirts of Yerevan, the Erebuni Historical and Archaeological Museum Reserve. There is a soviet style museum with artefacts found at the archaeological site which is behind the museum on the hill. Particularly interesting in the museum was the over 2000 year old stone pipeline for water. To see how they had carved the stone with joints that fit into each other and also carved rectangular openings along some parts of the pipes to control waterflow and to allow cleaning, it was all so ingenious!
Erebuni Museum & the stone pipes from the citadel.
The archaeological site dates from 782BC when Argishti I was king of Urartu (also known as the biblical kingdom of Ararat). The area was discovered in 1950 after a farmer unearthed an inscribed stone tablet and then archaeologists dug in revealing a citadel with courtyards, halls, temples, palace rooms, mural fragments, huge storerooms for wheat, oven pits and gigantic vessels for oil and wine. There’s also a place for animal sacrifices and workshops for making tools. This is all from an era three decades before Rome was built. Really interesting insight this find has given historians about the period.
Erebuni was one of Urartu’s most important political, economic and cultural centres. Its location on top of the hill, protecting the kingdom’s northern border meant it was a strategic military centre. Attacks into the northeastern part of the country and military conquests into the north were also launched from here. Erebuni fell to the Persian Achaemenid Empire and then over the years experienced numerous foreign invasions. But the city continued to be inhabited and eventually branched out to become the city of Yerevan. The views of the city and the ever present Ararat were awesome from up here. In 2018 Erebuni will celebrate its 2800th birthday as the birthplace of Yerevan!
That’s it from Yerevan… we stayed here a few more days making two great day trips to beautiful sights nearby… you can look forward to the next blog post for the details…