Uncle Garabed’s Notebook (Sept. 11, 2010)

From the Word Lab

The word “good” has many meanings. For example, if a man were to shoot his mother at a range of 500 yards, I should call him a good shot, but not necessarily a good man.

     … G.K. Chesterton

In and Out

Madame M.’s sister came to her house one evening. She asked, “Is my sister at home?” The servant said she was not at home. Madame M. was at home, but the number of people who called was so great that she had ordered her servant to say that she was out. In the evening the servant said to Madame M. that he had told her sister that she was out. Madame M. replied that, whatever order she gave, he must say to her sister that she was at home to her. The next day, Madame M. not being at home, her sister came back. She knocked and the servant answered that her sister was there. She went upstairs and came down again. She said that her sister could not be at home. The servant answered: “She is out, but she is always at home for you.”

A Whole Different Perspective

Edo: When you were a young man, what was the first thing you noticed about a girl?

Bedo: That depended on whether she was coming or going.

What’s in a Name?

Kalsahakian: Turkish and Armenian in derivation, a combination of a descriptive term and a proper noun, kal, a variant of kel, is defined as “bald-headed,” and Sahak, a truncation of Isahak, borrowed from Hebrew, Yitzchak (Isaac) is defined as “he will laugh.”

Hrach Kalsahakian, among other callings, is the editor of Azad-Hye Middle East Armenian website and a journalist and member of Dubai Press Club. In response to my inquiry, here is what he had to say about the history of his surname: “I am originally from the Ekizoluk village in Kessab area in north-eastern Lattakia in present-day Syria. My village is still inhabited by Armenians and I do visit them at least once every year or second year. My family is named after Sahag my great-grandfather. Most probably he was bald so in Turkish he was called kal. In Arabic it was reproduced sometimes as kul and in Armenian it was written as kel (in Kessab we have Kel-Yaghoubian, Kel-Boghossian, etc). I preferred to change the kul to kal and combined it with “Sahak,” and came out with Kalsahakian (which is unique when you Google it).”

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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.

Latest posts by CK Garabed (see all)

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