The ACOM Book Club held its first meeting of the fall on Thursday, September 17, 2020. It was a virtual meeting using Zoom. Attendees this month were Azad, Andrea, Tom, Francis, Margaret & Jim and me. Azad was able to attend even though he was visiting family in Michigan. Margaret and Jim also connected in from a "non-home" location.

Ararat Beckons

Ararat Beckons (1995, 49 mins, Dir. J. Michael Hagopian, Narrator Mike Connors; in Armenian & English) Documentary of the 1st Armenian Expedition to Mt. Ararat.

A film of striking beauty and mystery on the first Armenian Expedition to reach the summit of Mount Ararat. Where many have failed and some even lost their lives, Masis and Gregory Parseghian and Hamlet Nersesian succeeded. Overcoming the hardships of incarceration, altitudes, they accompanied their goal through sheer will and perseverance. The film became a reality after four shipments of film were smuggled out of Turkey over a 2-year period. Ararat Beckons is more than a film of adventure.
It is a poetic statement of the historic bond between a mountain and a people, a father and son.

ACOM Book Club Meeting on May 21, 2020 by Zoom

The ACOM Book Club held its second Zoom meeting on May 21st, 2020. The book under discussion this month was "Armenian Crisis of Identity" by Ruth Charchian. In attendance this month were Tom, Kass, Jim, Margaret, Cynthia, Tashina, Peter, Azad & me, plus Ruth and Aram. If you include the brief appearances by Agni, Mitchell, Sarah & Bradley, that easily makes it the best attended book club meeting yet.

The Armenian Cultural Organization of Minnesota commemorates the 105th Anniversary of the Armenian Genocide in a virtual meeting.

Click HERE to go to the Article

The ACOM Book Club met on Thursday, April 16, 2020, ... well, kind of. We held a virtual meeting using the Zoom meeting software. Since nobody had to leave their homes, we had the largest group attendance in a long time, if not ever. Thirteen members joined in using their computers or cell phones. Attendees were Tom, Joan, Jim and Margaret, Andrea, Joe, Kass, Cynthia, Azad, Francis, Peter, Tashina and me. While most of us were at our homes, one attendee connected in from San Francisco and actually had a fourteenth attendee, 2-year old Agni, sit in for awhile.

What was it like growing up Armenian in ...  13th in the series

ACOM's popular series "Growing up Armenian in.." returned for a 13th session on Sunday March 8, 2020. Panelists were Alarica Hassett and Martin Azarian. The discussion was moderated by John Parker-Der Boghossian.

The ACOM Book Club met on Thursday, February 20, 2020, at Mim's Cafe in St. Paul next to the U of M St. Paul campus. In attendance were Andrea, Jim, Margaret, Francis, Joe, Azad, Peter and me. Some of us ordered supper (schwarma, falafel), others ordered snacks (pita & hummus) or dessert (paklava). Margaret also passed around some nuts to share.

The ACOM Book Club met on Thursday, January 16, 2020, at the Bulbulian house. In attendance were Francis, Jim, Margaret, Kass, Tom, Andrea, Lowell and me. (Barb was around, too, but didn't take part in the discussion.) This month's book was "Mr Five Per Cent" by Jonathan Conlin, a biography of Calouste Gulbenkian.

This month's discussion was a little bit different than normal because the book by Conlin was difficult to get a copy of other than by buying the kindle edition. Because of this a couple of members read a previous biography of Gulbenkian by Ralph Hewins, also called "Mr. Five Per Cent." Kass got copies of both books from the library (distant libraries) and had a short time to compare them. He said that the Hewins book was much easier to read but that the Conlin book had a lot more detail.