Uncle Garabed’s Notebook (March 26, 2016)

Armenian Proverb

In every man’s heart there is a sleeping lion.

 

Reunion Toast

Here’s to all of us!

For there’s so much good in the worst of us

And so much bad in the best of us,

That it hardly behooves any of us,

To talk about the rest of us.

 

A Cynical View

Love is only a dirty trick played on us to achieve the continuation of the species.

… W. Somerset Maugham

 

Persian Wit & Humor

A king was embarked along with a Persian boy slave on board a ship. The boy had never been at sea nor experienced the inconvenience of a ship. He set up a weeping and wailing, and all his limbs were in a state of trepidation; and however much they soothed him, he was not to be pacified. The king’s pleasure-party was disconcerted by him; but there was no help for it. On board that ship there was a physician. He said to the king, “If you will order it, I can manage to silence him.” The king replied, “It will be an act of great favor.”

The physician so directed that they threw the boy into the sea, and after he had plunged repeatedly, they seized him by the hair of the head and drew him close to the ship, when he clung with both hands to the rudder, and, scrambling upon the deck, slunk into a corner and sat down quiet. The king, pleased with what he saw, said, “What art is there in this?” The boy replied that originally he had not experienced the danger of being drowned, and undervalued the safety of being in a ship.

In like manner, a person is aware of the preciousness of health when he is overtaken with the calamity of sickness.

… Sadi, The Rose Garden

 

What’s in a Name?

Chitjian: Turkish in derivation, identified as an occupation, chit is defined as chintz, and chitji, a dealer in such.

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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