When I arrived in Hayastan the summer of 2018, it had been 17 years since I had seen my family. I held my grandmother’s hands, our eyes searched, souls meeting once again. 

“Gayane, what do you like to do?” she had asked me in 2001 as we crossed the overgrown grass, taking over the tsli ardzan (“King Trdat Defeats the Bull”), steadily making our way over to the bazaar/shuka. We stepped through the opening ripped into the side of the chain-link fence that surrounded the statue. “I like to play and scream,” I replied giddily as we rounded the corner hand-in-hand, navigating the broken sidewalk. She laughed out loud as we passed a papik selling fresh, warm semushka (sunflower seeds) wrapped in newspapers.

“King Trdat Defeats the Bull,” located in Abovyan, Armenia (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

17 years later, when I arrived home once again, my hand nestled into the warmth of hers. Every moment together felt like the sweetest gift — I knew time was fleeting. Over the next few years, I lived between Hayastan and Los Angeles, staying for months-long stretches in Armenia, indulging in being close to my family. 

My grandmother and I picked apples from our family garden, collected walnuts hidden among autumn leaves. We held onto each other, navigating the icy sidewalks the day after heavy snow, laughing nervously as our feet slipped. In spring, we picked wild oorts (thyme) in the villages of Kotayk and traveled to my great-grandparents’ village, where my great-great-grandmother had fled to after surviving the genocide. In the summer heat at Lake Sevan, I applied sunscreen to her sweet face. “Thank you, Gayane jan,” she said softly as my hands ran over the apples of her cheeks. 

In 2023, when I visited, I arrived four months too late. The hogh on her grave had yet to settle — flowers and dandelions grew on the raised soil. I sat at the small stone bench my Keri had installed next to the graves of my great-grandparents and grandparents. In 2018, when I visited the graveyard, my family’s plot was at the end of the cemetery, which was built on a hill. Now, the cemetery extended far beyond, flags marking the graves of our martyrs. 

I would visit often. Arrange the flowers, light the xunk (frankincense), sit in silence. Every day, at the same time, a car would pull up and park. A couple would exit, visiting the grave of their 18-year-old son, martyred in 2020. His mother would gaze upon his face engraved in the dark stone, tears rolling down her cheeks.

The author’s grandmother collecting apples from their family garden, 2018

Years before, while collecting fruit with my grandmother in our garden, there was a stubborn apple that refused to be coaxed down by the long piece of metal my grandmother had fashioned to collect fruit. “Tati, leave it, it’s okay,” I said, anxiously holding the rickety ladder while my grandmother wrestled the apple. She was determined — she moved her arms, contorting her small frame. “Why?” she responded, sweat on her brow. “Why should I let it rot, when my children can enjoy its sweetness?” The apple fell to the floor — my little cousin rushed to grab it, adding it to our overflowing bucket as we celebrated. 

As a child, my mother would tuck us into bed and tell us stories — tales of Hayastan, Armenian heroes and history. She would always finish: “Three apples fell from the sky. One for the storyteller, one for the listener and one for whoever wrote this story.” 

All photos courtesy of the author unless otherwise noted.