խորոված (The Barbeque)

I was sitting with some friends one afternoon in Yerevan when I got a call from my host mom. In my head, I quickly practiced how I would say “I will be home by 7” in Armenian. To my surprise, instead of asking when I would be home, she told me that when I did get back to our village I should walk to her brother-in-law’s house to join a family barbecue. In Armenian, barbecues are called խորոված “khorovats” and are held often for birthdays, holidays, or just to catch up with extended family. I thought about the many shopping bags I had in my possession, and how exhausted I was after having an early morning language class. But the promise of fresh smoked pork and warm lavash outweighed my desire to rest.

At the barbecue, we sat outside in the front yard despite the imminent threat of rain. Smoke from the roasting kebabs intermingled with the smoke from cigarettes, creating a familiar aroma that I can already tell I will miss someday. There was toast after toast after toast from the men’s side of the table. After each toast, they would look down the table at where I was sitting and a member of the family would attempt to translate, “That one was for the army”, “that one was for God”, “That one was for you.” I’d raise my glass and make eye contact to try and convey that I had understood what I was drinking to. Someone asked me if families gathered like this in America. “Yes,” I replied on instinct. But then I thought about it a little harder and qualified my answer. “Yes, but not quite like this.”

Toward the end of the meal, I felt a drop of rain splash on my wrist. Within minutes, the sky that had previously been only vaguely foreboding erupted into cracks of thunder. I watched intently as bolts of lightning shot through the air. The other young women my age ushered me inside with them to take refuge from the downpour in a spare bedroom. As we waited out the storm, I tried to pick up bits and pieces of their gossip. One of the women was the fiancé of my host family’s cousin. She graciously invited me to join my host family at their wedding in June. She told me that once she was married, she wanted to become a lawyer. Eventually, the topic of conversation turned to me and we talked about my career goals, if I ever wanted to get married, and what I thought my life might look like after the Peace Corps. As we talked, I could hear laughter from outside overlapping with the thunder. When the rain let up we rejoined the festivities which had migrated to a covered section of the yard.

Later that night, my host sisters invited me to watch the Eurovision finals with them. We murmured approval or confusion to one another after each act. I was excited to utilize my newfound knowledge of the present perfect tense in Armenian to explain which of the competing countries I had visited before. The day’s events began catching up to me and by the time it was Armenia’s turn to perform, I could barely keep my eyes open. But I told myself that I wouldn’t sleep until after Armenia’s song so I powered through. I felt proud that I could root for the hometown hero.

When I finally laid my head down to sleep and anticipated the lazy Sunday that awaited me in the morning, I thought about how I might look back on this day in the future. The majority of it was normal, language class, spending time with my host family, exploring Armenia with the other volunteers. That normalcy was what stood out to me most though. Everything that felt so unfamiliar and foreign a few months ago has slowly begun to lose its strangeness. I thought that maybe I would have some kind of lightbulb moment when things clicked and I felt acclimated to this new life. But it has happened gradually and almost unnoticeably. With each seemingly normal day, this life, this culture, and this country have seeped deeper into me. Of course, sometimes the newness of it all hits me hard and I don’t expect that to stop anytime soon. When that happens though, I’ll try and remember days like this to remind myself that nothing stays unfamiliar for long and that soon I am going to yearn for another typical or maybe not-so-typical day in Armenia.