To Know Your Own Language Better, You Need To Learn Another

My name is Anahit. When I was 9 months old, my family was forced to leave Armenia and, like most post-Soviet citizens, decided to settle in Moscow, Russia.

HOW TO KEEP YOUR NATIONAL IDENTITY?

Living in a foreign country you are forced to constantly preserve and protect your Armenian identity, especially when you live in a multinational country teeming with people of different ethnicities and religions. As they say, you need "to know your mother tongue better you should learn a foreign language".

I remember in my school years I went to Russian folk dances, because they were the only extracurricular dances taught at our school.

Once before a performance we tried on a Slavic headdress, which looked horrible on me. Because of these things, I sometimes felt like an ugly duckling. When looking at my school curriculum, my mother got upset every time at the sight of the "Mother Tongue" class, which meant Russian, not Armenian.

Jokes aside, there were a lot of similar situations, which made be draw back to my roots, my native land, language and everyday life.

Birthright Armenia was the starting point of my decision to repatriate.

It was a long ride towards this dream (7 years, if not more).

WHAT KIND OF INFLUENCE DID BEING ARMENIAN HAVE ON MY PERSONALITY?

The thought of becoming a worthy daughter of my Motherland inspired me to choose the profession of a lawyer. I studied private law in the best law school in Russia today, taking into consideration the fact that this is one of the fields that can be useful to my Armenia.

My love and devotion to my homeland has fostered my persistence, diligence, determination and, most importantly, it has shaped my plans for the future.

And now, I have been in my homeland for two months!

VOLUNTEERING FOR BIRTHRIGHT ARMENIA

I interned for a month at the ELL Partnership law firm, which I really enjoyed. As it turned out, even the working environment in legal consulting in Armenia can be hospitable, well-paced, and as welcoming as possible!

At the moment, my volunteer work is related to the protection of the copyrights of performers, whose recordings are kept in the archive of Public Radio of Armenia. To my surprise, recordings of Russian romances from 1903 and a whole treasure trove of rare works were found!

This is just the beginning of a long journey! There is still a lot of work to be done which would scare me in the daily routine of Moscow, but not this time, because in Armenia, despite the immeasurable number of issues, one never looses heart. Nothing can drag you down or anger you in Armenia.