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Executive Director's Corner

Bay Area Friends of Armenia just completed its ninth year in helping the people of the Republic of Armenia in the areas of health, education and welfare. In this issue of ARIT, BAFA's Board of Directors presents a comprehensive nine-year account of how your donations have supported projects in health, education and welfare. We thank you for continuing to be a faithful "Friend of Armenia."

Also in this issue, BAFA Board members report on three new projects: Levon Der Bedrossian reports on the trailblazing medical work of Dr. Ashley Minas(ian) in Meghri. Francois Antounian introduces the new school breakfast program for children. And Joseph Babanezhad reports on the eyeglass project for children.

Ann Touryan Neumann, my niece, who joined us during our last trip to Armenia, reflects upon her visit to Ojantag Boarding School Number 8 and its children.

As Executive Director of BAFA, I thank each and every one of you for your past support to BAFA programs, and encourage and urge you to continue to help us assist our less privileged and very needy 'hairenagitz's.

John Haleblian

Nine -Year Report of Bay Area Friends of Armenia - Activities within the Republic of Armenia

You have been a faithful sup-porter of the Bay Area Friends of Armenia (BAFA). As in previous years, we would like to give you a comprehensive report on how your donations have been used in advancing the health, education and welfare within the Republic of Armenia.

I. Welfare Projects

The issue of welfare of the elderly has been the primary concern of BAFA since its inception. As Table I indicates, BAFA has raised and transmitted $503,900.00 for its Soup Kitchens program during the past nine years of operation. Presently, the program serves almost 1,000 retirees and orphans one meal a day, five days a week, in four Soup Kitchens located in Norky Massif and Erebuni areas, Yerevan, Nor Hadjn, Ashtarak, and in two auxiliary locations of Yerevan Polytechnic and Charbach. The staff of "Fund for Armenian Relief" manages the Soup Kitchens. A twenty-two-member kitchen staff cooks and serves food at the various locations.

Today, according to Ministry of Statistics of Armenia, 23 percent of the population is extremely poor. The amount of Social Security checks received by the elderly buys only half a loaf of bread per day. So you can see how our Soup Kitchens go a long way in filling the critical need in the basic survival of the elderly.

II. Support to Schools

The educational system continues to be in real crisis. As the March 2001 Republic of Armenia - Interim Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper prepared by the Ministry of Statistics of Armenia reports the annual government expenditure per student is equivalent to $40.00. The monthly salaries of teachers range from $10.00-20.00, and in most cases, are paid within a two to six-month lag-time. No funds are allocated for the infrastructure upkeep of deteriorating schools. Additionally, there are no funds for school supplies including books, paper and pencils.

Through your support we have been helping "Michnagarg" schools by contributing approximately $1,000.00 to each. This sum amounts to about 15% of the annual budget of many village schools. During the last several years, we have visited 35 schools, and as Table II indicates, transferred to their principals the sum of $69,675.00. We have requested that the funds be allocated to supplement teachers' salaries and to purchase school supplies. Additionally, we have contributed $14,400.00 to ASIF for the reconstruction of Norashen as described below.

In collaboration with the Armenian Social Investment Fund (ASIF), we have completed detailed engineering plans of our reconstruction micro-project of the Norashen 'Michnagarg' school which was destroyed during the Spitak earthquake. We have already contributed our share of $14,400.00 of the $144,000.00 planned expenses. We hope that during year 2002 the reconstruction will be completed and the children of Norashen will have warm and safe classrooms.

This year, we were pleased to initiate two pilot programs: 1., a breakfast program for children to help them concentrate on learning rather than on their hunger, and 2., an eyesight screening and eyeglass program for children.

III. Medical Projects

Dr. Hayk Avagian completed his training at San Francisco General and University of California, San Francisco Hospitals, and returned to Armenia in mid June of 2001. He is busy practicing his specialty and has quickly established a reputation for himself as an experienced physician.

Dr. Avagian plans to establish a "Learning Center" to train other physicians in Armenia and the region, and is preparing for the groundwork. As part of his networking efforts while in the Bay Area, he has also secured a visit by 'Operation Rainbow Physicians.' This team of physicians generally performs surgery on children in impoverished areas. BAFA will support this team in meeting its objectives in Armenia.

Finally, this year BAFA supported the efforts of Dr. Ashley Minas(ian) in Meghri who, for the last 7 years, has been serving the medical needs of the people of Meghri.

Your unwavering support has made our continued progress in the health care arena feasible. We look forward to expanding our collaboration with the medical community in Armenia. Your continued support will make this possible.

Table I shows that since BAFA's inception, you have contributed a total of $730,400.00 of which $674,300.00 'dollar for dollar,' have been used to support health, education and welfare-related projects in Armenia.

Table I - Distribution of BAFA Funds for Health, Education & Welfare In Republic of Armenia 1993 - 2001 (x $1,000)

Table II - Bay Area Friends of Armenia Support to Schools In Armenia (M.S. = Michnagarg School)

Understandably, you have often asked: "How can you manage to transmit 'dollar for dollar' all of the donations to Armenia? Don't you have operational expenses in the U.S.?" The answer is yes. BAFA employs a part time secretary. Operational expenses (personnel and office-related) incurred in the U.S. are covered by the BAFA Board members who have donated $113,800.00 during the past nine years The board members regularly pay their own travel expenses to Armenia to supervise the BAFA sponsored projects.

None of the achievements of BAFA would have been possible without your generosity. BAFA Board members sincerely appreciate you for serving as a dedicated 'Friend of Armenia' over the past nine years. Your support at this juncture in the life of the Republic of Armenia has profound impact. We thank you for your continued support.

BAFA Board of Directors
December 31, 2001

School Breakfast Program for Children

Dear supporters and friends of Armenia,

As you know from our past work, through your financial support we have been creative in initiating various projects in Armenia that have enhanced the lives of many young, and old alike. One of our most rewarding endeavors, beyond helping people survive the most difficult post earthquake and blockade years, has been our involvement with educational projects.

Through the generous donation of $4,000 from a long-time and consistent supporter of BAFA, we decided to consider the possibility of implementing a school breakfast program for children who came to school hungry due to their parents' economic situation. After some thought, planning and investigation conducted by BAFA Board members, it became apparent that feeding children was not only feasible for a small cost/meal, but also desirable. This program would meet numerous important objectives namely, helping youngsters at a very basic level while improving their attention span and learning potential. It would also contribute to decreasing absenteeism; and enhance the chances of success of our overall educational mission.

The cost for one month in one school, feeding 80 children, is only $450. At this nominal cost, educating a child whose mind is on learning rather than his growling stomach is a worthwhile project. And thus, I appeal to you to give your support to this pilot project and help make it part of our permanent education program.

Thank you for standing by our side as we try to help educate the children, the future of modern Armenia.

Francois Antounian

Eyeglass Project for School Children

BAFA's primary objectives are to help Armenia with its educational, social and health-care issues. The needs are immense, and the resources, few. BAFA targets very specific programs and allocates its limited resources to secure maximum impact.

During visits to public schools in the Tavoush region, several BAFA board members noticed that none of the students were wearing eyeglasses. They became curious and decided to further look into the matter. As a result, BAFA launched and funded (at a cost of approximately $ 1,000) an eye-examination campaign. Over the course of several weekends, local ophthalmologists examined the eyesight of about 1,000 students. It turned out that 40 students were in dire need of eyeglasses. At the cost of an additional $600, BAFA provided them with proper eyeglasses.

Poor eyesight is debilitating especially for young students who learn and understand the world through their precious eyes. Poor eyesight can cause scholastic underachievement it can also permanently damage a child's self-confidence. We, at BAFA, firmly believe that modern Armenia's biggest asset is its people, especially its young. Low cost, and strategically targeted assistance programs such the Eyeglass Project can significantly improve the lives of our young generation.

Encouraged by the results of the eye-examination in the Tavoush region, BAFA is expanding this program to yet another region of Armenia. In recent weeks ophthalmologists have been busy conducting examinations in the Aragatsotn region.

So, dear reader, I thank you very much for your continued support of BAFA's humanitarian programs in Armenia. More than nine years ago when we started helping our compatriots, our goal and hope was that the need would be short-term. Unfortunately, due to the combination of complex problems, some outside the control of Armenia, the need for assistance lingers. If our new Eyeglass Program speaks to your heart, please send your monetary contributions today!

God bless you,

Joseph N. Babanezhad

The Children of Ojantag Boarding School Number 8

In Against the window pounds the first winter storm of northern California, pelting rain, the rush of wind, a sharp crack. Tomorrow's news will tell of downed power lines, toppled trees, a crumpled radio tower. But tonight, I sit curled in robe and slippers, my children asleep in their beds, unaware of the storm that rages. I too am warm and safe, as though a child again, although I have left childhood decades ago. And I am grateful that childhood is more a place than a time.

For the many children in Ojantag Boarding School Number 8 in Yerevan, supported by the Bay Area Friends of Armenia, childhood is less a place and more a time, a difficult time, a time that must be endured, a precarious time when food is scarce and comfort thin. For them, childhood arrives in letters and packages from across the seas and is fashioned into a safer, kinder place by those who run the school.

Last April, a chartered red bus took us through the streets of Yerevan-my aunts, uncles, cousins, mother, and daughter, and me-through alleys, past marketplaces, across potholed intersections to finally stop at a mottled gray building with concrete pillars at the entry and rows of rectangular windows three stories high. Peering from the bus, we caught our first glimpse of the drab building that housed the Ojantag Boarding School Number 8. The gloom of the overcast sky seemed heavy.

At the doorway, my uncle introduced us to the director of the school. She welcomed us with gusto and in rapid Armenia told us of the government's attempts to wrest the school from the children. While she was alive, she assured us, the children would always have a school, a home. I suddenly felt grateful for the dismal building.

She led us down wide, gray corridors to a small auditorium. Taking our seats below the stage, we watched the room crowd with children, teachers, relatives, many sitting on the floors or leaning against the walls, eager, expectant. Somehow in this room, the walls did not seem so gray.

From behind the curtain, a row of children skipped across the stage, an arc of boys and girls in crisp white shirts and scrubbed faces. A hush fell over the room. I did not need to understand Armenian to hear the passion in their recitations, the bravery in their songs, the sincerity in their prayers.

One small boy, charged with reciting dozens of lines, eyes flashing, voice booming, stumbled over the last few lines, lost his words, swallowed hard, began to cry. A girl and then another, a boy, many boys, the children on the stage patted him, soothed him, spoke for him, rescued his pride. They finished together, in unison, proud, happy.

After the applause, lively music brought out the girls in dance steps, skipping, turning, stamping. They had sewn their colorful skirts from donated scraps, had learned their dance steps from a professional ballerina. Again the applause, and then more. The children bowed and glowed. After the performance, we took their photos, patted their heads, congratulated them in broken Armenian. And then we heard their stories.

A girl whose father was in prison for killing her baby brother. A boy whose mother had killed herself. Several whose minds were slow but smiles wide. Many without either parent. But all, children reclaiming in Ojantag Boarding School Number 8 that place called childhood.

The school director led us down the gray corridors into the classrooms. As we crowded in through the narrow doorways, the children stood up from their desks in a show of respect, wide-eyed and curious. We welcomed the fresh flowers they offered us, sampled the apricot candies they made us, admired the crafts their small hands had fashioned: paintings of daisies and blue skies, calendars, richly dressed dolls, baskets. We took more photos, spoke simple English with the older children, and hugged the littlest ones.

We followed the school director up two flights of stairs into large, pale green rooms spread with a sea of narrow beds, metal frame against metal frame, each draped with an army blanket and thin towel, drafty rooms with cracked windows and broken wall furnaces. More metal beds lined the hallway to the bathroom, some with two pillows for brother and sister to sleep side by side, some pushed up against window ledges three floors above weeds and concrete.

"These children are fortunate," the school director told us. "They have beds with mattresses. They have blankets. Yes, we need more. Always. But our children have much more than many others."

I suddenly felt grateful for the narrow metal beds these children had.

"Look how dreary these corridors are," an aunt said, as we filed slowly back downstairs and out of the building. "Wouldn't it be wonderful to come back and paint beautiful murals on the walls? Fields of sunflowers, apples trees, a rainbow?"

A rainbow. The promise of God to Noah on Mount Ararat. An arc of colors, a spectrum in the sky, the refraction, reflection, and dispersion of light emerging through rain or fog. Just like the children. Rainbows emerging through the rain and fog of broken homes, poverty, and disease, children with childhoods nearly lost but for the dispersion of love from those in the school and from those across the seas.

As we boarded the red bus to wind our way back through the streets of Yerevan to our hotel, I glanced back at the mottled gray building with the concrete columns, a ray of sunshine breaking through the clouds. Pressed against the rectangular windows, tender and wistful, were the faces of the children, the promise of God.

Ann Touryan Neumann

The Minasian Medical Center in Meghri

If you happen to be in the rural region of Meghri in southern Arme-nia and if you should need any kind of medical help, you will, undoubtedly, be directed to "The Minasian Medical Center," an oasis-like medical institution in this neglected part of Armenia.

Dr. Ashley Minasian, born in India, had been working in the city of Benin, Nigeria since the 1980's in his private practice as a surgeon, obstetrician and Gynecologist. In 1994, along with his family, he visited Armenia for the first time. That visit was to be the turning point is his life. As he put it, after witnessing the unbearable condition of his "fatherland" and the suffering of "his people, he responded to his heart's calling, and decided to use his God-given power to make a difference in a small way. This decision led Dr. Minasian to settle down in Meghri along with his wife, Flora, ten-year old daughter, Siroon, and eight year-old son, Vanic. Since then a boy, Tigran, was born in Meghri.

Upon the advice of the region's minister of health and through his own resources, Dr. Minasian built a private hospital, and hired local staff thus creating employment opportunities in the region. The medical center is a self-financed entity and operates on nominal payment/fee basis. "Medical charges are some of the cheapest in the country. A patient is only responsible for a basic fee the rest is covered," says Dr. Minasian.

Dr. Minasian provided BAFA with statistics reflecting activities from 1995 to date: Number of out-patients: 2,967 males, 1,742 females, 849 children, 409 deliveries, 206 major surgeries, 606 minor surgeries, and 1,850 inpatients treatments.

We do not have to be medical experts to recognize the importance of this hospital. Unfortunately however, this region has remained isolated and has not benefited from the humanitarian or economic aid, as have other regions of the country. Today, unemployment in the Meghri region is severe, and many people cannot even afford to pay the nominal fee for medical treatment. Despite all, Dr. Minasian can't turn a single patient away.

Consequently, for the past six years, Dr. Minasian has exhausted his resources. Today, his hospital is in financial crisis. "Shutting the doors of our hospital is NOT an option," he says. "For the past six years our institution has become an essential part of the community, and has made tremendous difference to the health care delivery system in Meghri and its surrounding villages," he continues.

The hospital has taken all possible cost cutting measures such as economizing on utilities (water, electric consumption, etc.) and unfortunately has had to let-go workers. "Laying off our staff was really one of the saddest days since coming here," Dr. Minasian admits.

Four months ago BAFA forwarded $3,000.00 to encourage this humble and remarkable man's efforts and support his hospital, an institution that shines like a beacon in Meghri. Please support BAFA's medical programs, and help us wish him good luck and continued success in his quest to serve his community.

Sincerely,

Levon Der Bedrossian

Meghri town with St. Virgin Church

Minasian Medical Center in Meghri

Hospital's outpatient department

Dr. Ashley Minasian's office

WE COULD NOT HAVE DONE IT WITHOUT YOU!

The board of Directors of Bay Area Friends of Armenia thanks the following individuals and organizations for helping BAFA raise $117,100.00 in 2001. Contributions were used to support health, education and Soup Kitchen projects in the Republic of Armenia.