Books

Every evening the two families would get togather, either in our place or at uncle Armenag’s. We discussed more or less everything, but one thing we never stopped doing was to have a laugh. My cousin Diran had the unfortunate habit to always laughing louder than anyone else, which frightened his mother to death because she thought the neighbours would hear and assume we were making fun of the regime. That by the way was often the case. Each time this happened my aunt Araxi would say in a feeble voice: “Gamats, dghas, gamats!” (quietly my son, quietly). But this only made us laugh more. During the summer months when it was very hot we used to sleep outside, on our large balcony, as was the local custom. It was very pleasant and gave us a chance to tell jokes and laugh a bit more until late into the night.