A Month in Review or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Armenia

A month? It's been a month???

Khachkar (stone cross). Noratus.

The past few days I've been struggling a lot with how to put into words the past four weeks; the juxtaposition between the mornings in bed staring teary-eyed at the ceiling with the afternoons and nights of joy and excitement; the transition from Tourist to Resident, from Former-Exchange-Student-to-Japan to Present-Exchange-Something-to-Armenia. I don't know if it's really possible to capture those feelings in words. All I know is that on the plane to Yerevan, I wrote this sentence in my travel diary: "I want to laugh, I want to cry, I want to feel all those emotions that are at the height of intensity when you're living abroad." While that's the type of thing easier said than done, at least I knew what I was getting into.

Old Armenian inscription on a stone pillar. Geghard Monastery.

The first two weeks in Armenia were kind of, like, tough!! I felt excited and very eager, but the intense pressure I put on myself to constantly be out and about, "getting out of my comfort zone!!1," meeting people, and learning Armenian got compounded with exhaustion, not knowing anyone, and being in a big loud dusty mind-jabbering city after spending a month secluded in semi-monasticism at home in Tennessee.

Of course, there was a lot to get used to. I'd never experienced the "aesthetic" of a former Soviet region (let alone spent any time in a developing country), and it was hard to shake off the constant stares and the lack of smiles; Armenians are really friendly, but they're also not American, which means smiling at strangers isn't kosher.

Soviet-era pedestrian tunnel. Yerevan.

Like I said, I felt excited and eager. But I also felt a little lost. Where was the euphoria I felt when I arrived in Japan as an exchange student in high school? Where was my "honeymoon period?" Where was my happiness? Any time I had a moment alone to my thoughts, I kept wondering how I was going to find it.

Why buy a fancy plaque when you can just write the floor number on the walls? My apartment, Yerevan.

One night, still feeling unsteady and unsure, I was doing some lesson planning and decided to flip through a book of quotes I brought from home, thinking I'd find a good passage to start off my conversation class and get the students talking. As I skimmed through the book, a quote at the bottom of one page caught my eye: Happiness is a conscious choice.

Hayastanə du es - 'You Are Armenia.' Yerevan.

 "Happiness is a conscious choice"!!!??? DUH! I read that, and it clicked: that euphoria, that joy, that insistence on living in the present, that happiness I was looking for--I wasn't going to just "find" it. No amount of new activities, new hobbies, new friends, or new places would make me happy in Armenia. I realized if I wanted to be comfortable and happy in my new home, it was as simple as that: I just had to be happy. As cliche and crunchy and touchy-feely as it sounds, it started a big shift in my experience.

Doorway looking out over Lake Sevan. Hayravank Monastery.

The first two weeks I had spent so much time worrying about being happy that I, uh, NEWSFLASH!, wasn't really happy. I was constantly comparing everything I experienced to my past trips abroad; I was stressed about figuring out work, finding new activities to fill my schedule, making friends, and learning Armenian. I didn't let myself take a chill pill and recognize that the first two weeks in a new place (for me, at least) are always kind of tough.

Now? Now everything is awesome!! After hitting the two week mark, I found my stride. School is amazing, Yerevan is amazing, and every morning I wake up excited, eager, and happy. In the past two weeks I hiked to the top of Mt. Aragats (Armenian's highest peak!), drank grape vodka with village honeymakers, celebrated Armenian Independence Day, learned enough Armenian to order food and talk to my host mom, watched hundreds of people dance Armenian traditional dances in downtown Yerevan under the full moon, taught all my own classes, met amazing new foreign and local friends, and laughed my butt off at all those hilarious and bizarre things you can only experience if you're a 'stranger in a strange land.'

Here's to nine more months of happiness!!