Uncle Garabed’s Notebook (April 11, 2015)

Testimony

 

Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne and I myself have founded empires; but upon what do these creations of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded his empire upon love; and to this very day millions would die for him.

 

Cynicism

 

Some go to church to see and be seen,

Some go there to say they have been,

Some go there to sleep and nod

But few go there to worship God.

 

By the Eternal

 

Nothing on earth can satisfy man’s aspiration. Heaven and earth may pass away, but that which thinks within us can never cease to be.

…Canto ix from The Pelican Island, a poem by James Montgomery (1827)

 

Family Mis-relations

 

Having heard about an unusual computer that stored personal archives, a man decided to put it to the test. He arranged to place an inquiry with it, and asked “Where is my father?”

The machine answered, “Your father is in a Turkish prison.” Delighted at having caught the computer in a mistake, he responded, “Wrong. He is in Los Angeles, working in a bank.” The computer came right back with a rebuttal, stating, “Your mother’s husband is in Los Angeles. Your father is in a Turkish prison.”

 

Armenian Proverb

 

Because the cat was given no meat, he said it was Friday.

 

Restoration of the Fedayi Ethic

 

Act alone, yet in concert.

Identical goals.

Mutual respect.

Self-sacrifice.

 

What’s in a Name?

 

Farhadian: Arabic in derivation, identified as a descriptive term, farhad is defined as happy, merry, cheerful.

 

CK Garabed

CK Garabed

Weekly Columnist
C.K. Garabed (a.k.a. Charles Kasbarian) has been active in the Armenian Church and Armenian community organizations all his life. As a writer and editor, he has been a keen observer of, and outspoken commentator on, political and social matters affecting Armenian Americans. He has been a regular contributor to the Armenian Reporter and the AGBU Literary Quarterly, “ARARAT.” For the last 30 years, Garabed has been a regular contributor to the Armenian Weekly. He produces a weekly column called “Uncle Garabed's Notebook,” in which he presents an assortment of tales, anecdotes, poems, riddles, and trivia; for the past 10 years, each column has contained a deconstruction of an Armenian surname. He believes his greatest accomplishment in life, and his contribution to the Armenian nation, has been the espousing of Aghavni, and the begetting of Antranig and Lucine.
CK Garabed

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1 Comment

  1. Farhadian is from the Pahlavi name Farhad, which ultimately derives from the Avestan Thraetaona. The ancient church Father Aphrahat/Aphraates had a different form of the same name, as did Fraotes, whom Apollonius of Tyana visited in India.

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