Nadine Premo

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Transcription

00:00 - 00:38
Gregory Jundanian (GJ): This is Nadine Premo, Greg Jundanian. Nadine, thanks for– you know–spending some time with us today to do this oral history project for the Armenians of Whitinsville and for the University of Southern California. I think we could start anywhere, but the main purpose of the interview is trying to get a sense, two things: one, historical about Whitinsville, but also trying to get a sense of how your being Armenian has shaped your identity, who you are today as a person.
00:39 - 00:56
GJ: It might be easier to start with going back to what you know of your grandparents or great-grandparents and I know there are some interesting stories there. Perhaps you can start on one side or the other and just let the conversation flow. 
00:57 - 01:50
Nadine Premo (NP): Sure. I appreciate the chance to do this. So unfortunately I don't know that much about, past my great grandmother on my father's side. So I can start there because it was my grandmother Rose Bagdasarian (great grandmother)--I don't know exactly when she arrived– but she arrived on Ellis Island with my grandfather who was Kapriel Bagdasarian. We called them–the Americans here called him “Harry”--so there was Kapriel. So he and my great-grandmother were the survivors, the only survivors of the genocide, on my father's side, to the best of my knowledge. When they came and settled here– I'm not sure where my grandfather met my grandmother–who was Eva. Her maiden name was Jamgoshian.
01:51 - 03:14
NP: But they settled here in Whitinsville. When my father was, my father was one of ten siblings–actually 12 because two had passed away–but he was the oldest of the ten–lived on Quaker Street in Northbridge which is where I grew up, in the house across the street from my grandparents’ home, but I'm most familiar with my great-grandmother from that time because she watched me. When I was little and my mom was working, I used to go across the street every day and spend time with my great-grandmother whom I loved, I absolutely loved her. I think I was six or seven when she passed away. So my grand, my father's family, we were all very close. The sisters–my great grandmother owned the property and she gave her grandchildren like parcels of land–so my Uncle Ray and Aunt Ghani lived next door to us, very close. We used to have summers, in the summers, we would have -- my father and mother would host family picnics every Sunday after church so all the cousins -- everybody like we all kind of grew up very close together. So those are really my earliest memories and the fact that I knew my grandmother and grandfather here the best, my great-grandmother unfortunately just for a very short time, but she made a pretty lasting impression on me.
03:15
GJ:  I think you had told me once a story about how they took the name Bagdasarian? 
03:21 - 03:53
NP: Presumably, this is again family folklore, I have no idea whether or not it's true, but presumably when she arrived on Ellis Island–of course not speaking any English–she said that when she got there, they asked the name and she kept saying “baba, baba” for like you know “father, father” and they assigned her the name “Baghdasarian”. The family folklore is the last name is really Kadonian, so I have no idea: Are we Kadonians? Are we Baghdasarians? I just don't know. But it's possible, I suppose, right?
03:53
GJ:  Right. And then on your mother's side?
03:56 - 04:59
NP: My mother's side is a little bit more challenging for us because my mother–she was born in Greece but her family took her to France when she was nine months old and then  -- but she married my father during World War II so–came here as a war bride in 1945, at the age of 19 years old. So my mother's maiden name is Dertlian, and I know that her mother's maiden name was Nigogossian.  Her family remained in France until after World War II and then my grandfather took my grandmother and three of my mother's sisters back to Armenia. He wanted to live in Armenia, so I think it must have been 19- maybe 1945-46 somewhere around there, he moved them all back to Armenia and I know that my mother worked for years to get them out of Armenia. But I cannot go any farther back right now than my grandmother and grandfather on my mother's side. 
05:00
GJ: So your mother did not go back to Armenia? 
05:01 - 05:35
NP: No, because she had married my dad and she came over here. So she left her family and then my grandfather–presumably from what my mother told me– My grandfather was very disillusioned with the French after/during World War II. He was a member of the French underground trying to fight the Germans, and he was very unhappy with the part of the French government that supported the Germans, so he wanted, he wanted out. And then I guess my mother said that once they went back to Armenia, they realized pretty quickly their mistake but they were stuck.
05:37
GJ: And do you have any relatives there still?
05:38 - 06:47
NP: Not in Armenia. My mother, in 1967, she was finally able to get the family out of Armenia. So she brought my grandmother, my grandfather, and one of my aunts–my Aunt Esther and her husband Dikran with their two kids–they came here and they settled in Whitinsville. And my other two aunts, Jacqueline and Ojig Azniv, stayed in France with their families. And shortly after my family came, my Uncle Dikran was -- he died within months of coming here at 44 years old. And my uncle, my grandfather passed away shortly thereafter. So within a year my poor relatives who survived all the trauma of Armenia coming here, and the two men were dead within a year. So my grandmother and my aunt went back to France. It was very tragic but we just don't know. Like my uncle was only 44. We think he had like a very bad viral pneumonia and was just not diagnosed properly and he unfortunately passed away. My grandfather had lung cancer.
06:49
GJ: Wow. So what are some of your earliest memories of growing up on Quaker in the family?
06:51 - 08:20
NP: Quaker Street was great because–at the time that I was growing up– literally it was my grandparents’ house across the street which was a two-family. My grandmother  -- great-grandmother lived upstairs;  my grandmother and grandfather lived downstairs. It was an old tavern that was built in the 1700s. So as a kid, we had a blast playing in the cellar which was of course dirt and there was a big cave in the backyard. It must have been like an old oven or something and we used to play in that. So growing up there was wonderful because Quaker Street was pretty deserted. There were no other houses on the street, very little traffic on Quaker Street, like you could play in the middle of the road and barely see a car. And it was really -- my sister Linda's only three years older than I am, my sister Jackie's eight, so it was really Linda and I were the two like we were very close in age and we had to be friendly because there were no other kids on the street. So I think most of my memories of growing up were just one of like a lot of freedom we were out we were in the woods playing, we were in the backyard, we were on our bikes, like we were just gone all the time really just living life and just enjoying it but I think it was the closeness of the family. So between my by the time you know I came along, most of my father's sisters and brothers were married and they were you know off living someplace else but everybody gathered like I said, every Sunday pretty much they would gather at my father's house for a cookout in the, in the summers. My grandfather was the cook.
08:21 - 09:05
NP: He made the paklava, he made the pilaf, the kheyma, after the kheyma, he'd roll it into little meatballs and make the meatball soup for us because he knew that I loved that. He made keshkeg all the time. So my grandfather was a very important figure in our life and I think he spent more time with us in our house than he did across the street at his house, probably because my grandmother kicked him out by that time after having so many, so many kids. I didn't really get to know her that well and I think it was partly because I was very close with my great-grandmother and I think she was the dominant one in the family. I loved her dearly but I think she kind of cut out my grandmother, oh yes my great-grandmother.
09:06
GJ: She cut out your grandmother?
09:08 - 09:35
NP: I think so. I think it was the kind of relationship where she was like the head of the household and my grandfather would not stand up to his mother basically and I think my poor grandmother–now that I look back–I say she wasn't really that prominent in my life and I think that was partly because I was mostly with my great-grandmother. I think there might have been a little tension between the two of them.
09:37
GJ: Probably an old story?
09:36 - 10:02
NP: I think so because I think that's the way it was, right, the matriarch of the family and you just did like my grandfather probably just did whatever it was that my great-grandmother said instead of you know saying “I'm married now and this is my wife and you know you need to support her, too.” So that's just my feeling like been talking with my aunts and my cousins, I kind of get that sense that my great-grandmother was very domineering.
10:03
GJ: Did they have an actual working farm?
10:06 - 10:34
NP: Well, I think they did because the house on Quaker Street was not their first home in Northbridge. I heard they had–I'm not sure what number Quaker Street it was but–I think it became the Cleary Farm, afterwards, so Douglas Cleary–I don't know if you know Doug from school but–I think that's where they lived first before they bought this house, but that was before my time, so the only house that I knew was the one across the street from growing up.
10:34
GJ: But they had cows?
10:35 - 10:57
NP: I think so. I think my aunt said they had, you know, chickens. They, you know, had eggs. They, obviously, they all had big gardens. They grew their own food. My grandmother, my great-grandmother (actually) still did the garden when she lived across the street and she had the chickens because I clearly remember the little red hatchet that used to come out when it was time for the chickens to go. But yeah, they were very self-sufficient.
10:59
GJ: What do you remember about your grandmother?
11:00 - 11:39
NP: I remember my grandmother mostly downstairs in her kitchen. She was just not that present and again I think because I spent all of my time upstairs with my great-grandmother. So I would see my grandmother walking around–they had a big yard, big garden–and I would see her walking around a lot outside by herself. And I think when I look back on it now, I feel like she was very alone, even though she had a big family, but I just I feel now like I really missed an opportunity to know my grandmother just because I spent so much time with my great-grandmother.
11:41
GJ: Did she lose people in Armenia or Turkey?
11:44 - 11:55
NP: That I can't tell you. The only…I don't really know that much about my my grandmother and her family. I hope to find out, but I don't really know that much about them. 
11:57
GJ: And your grandfather's side? He, so he was born there or he was born here?
12:03
NP: No, he was born in, I, I think, he was born in Armenia, I'm not sure.
12:09
GJ: Do you know where? 
12:10 - 13:01
NP: No, that I don't know, yet. I don't know if Shirley knows, but I need to find that out, too. I know that my, Shirley, my Aunt Shirley did tell me that my Uncle Pete–my father's brother–took my grandmother to Turkey in, I don't remember, I think she was 80-something years old when he took her there and my Aunt Shirley just told me that my grandmother said she was very sad when she went back there because the whole town was just gone. So it was like her birthplace was just no longer. So I, I think, I believe she came from Turkey. I think my grandfather and great-grandmother came from Armenia. I think they escaped the Holocaust, I mean, I'm sorry, the genocide at that, at that time, and settled here. But that's just, it's very, it's sad to me that I don't know more of their history.
13:03
GJ: If you could ask them anything, who would you ask and what would you ask?
13:08 - 13:23
NP: I would love to just really know like where are we from? Like, what's the story? Where did we, you know, who came before us? I know very little about my mother's mother and father and it's the same kind of a thing, like I just feel I should know like where where did my ancestors come from.
13:24
GJ: You feel like there's an absence in your life because of that or do you feel there’s a….
13:28 - 14:28
NP: I think so and I think as you get older it becomes more important. It's like you want to know your family's story and be able to preserve it in a way that, you know, people who come after us will have an understanding. It's like anything else, you know, the farther away you are from events, you don't understand it anymore. So you know you asked me about you know what does Armenia, yeah being Armenian mean to me, and I think so much of, of at least our own feeling comes from the fact that we know that our ancestors were killed. They were, you know, whatever family we have left, it's like, where did they come from? What, what happened? And I think that identity as Armenian became just really central to who we were growing up. You know, we lived in a community, thankfully, of a lot of Armenians. You know I had the -- at the time, I didn't think it was such a great thing, but you know we went to Armenian school we learned how to read and write and it was very important. You know, the food, the music, the language, all very important, I think, to all of us.
14:29
GJ: Do you still participate a lot in Armenian-type events?
14:34 - 15:08
NP:  I did more when I was younger. You know, my sister and I would go to Armenian dances all the time. In fact, we both belonged to an Armenian dance troupe in Worcester and we loved it. You know, learning all the folk dances, you know, just the music, like everything, was just so crucial. So that was a very, it was a fun time to do that. And most of the people that we danced with were literally from Armenia, they were from Iraq, they were from, you know, they were from overseas so they to us were always much more Armenian than, than we were.
15:08
GJ: Exotic. 
15:09
NP: Exactly. And they looked it, you know, they looked different, they, they sounded different, they danced beautifully. I mean there was just something to each of them.
15:18
GJ: Did you hang, were you part of the AYF or any other organization?
15:22 - 15:51
NP: No, I never was. We–as little kids–we used to go to the club all the time–the Armenian Club–because we always wanted to go get soda out of that you know Coca-Cola machine in the back with all the men were playing tavloo and all of that, but no, I was never a member of AYF. We did go to the Armenian picnics all the time in Franklin. That was always a big part of growing up. And I think especially once Linda and I got mobile with our licenses, you know, we were always looking for Armenian dances to go to. So that was just fun.
15:51
GJ: Like what do you remember about the Armenian dances?
15:55 - 16:38
NP: I think that there's obviously a lot of beauty to them and my best memory of all of that is, I'm I know you know Linda Malkasian Faltaous and Linda was always, it was Linda, my sister Linda, and I–the three of us–were always off and running and going to Cambridge, Watertown, like wherever the dances were and we would, we would go there. And Linda Faltaous always had to be our leader. She had to lead the dances because Linda my sister and I were good at following, but we didn't want to be the leader. But I think that was the best, it was just like there was just something, like you heard the music and you knew that you had to get up and you had to dance. It's just like inside [gestures to her heart.]
16:41
GJ: Did you have , did you find that you hung around more with Armenian kids when you were a kid? But probably on Quaker Street it was really not…
16:49 - 17:48
NP: Well yeah because we didn't have any. But when I went to school, I would say “no.”  I mean obviously Armenians were in my classroom all the time so but in, you know, kindergarten through fifth grade, my good friend was a girl that actually lived on Quaker Street and then her parents bought some of my grandfather's land and built a house so Priscilla became my neighbor, so she was my good friend. And then when I got into the fifth grade, I met my next best friend who was Armenian -- Cheryl Bedigian, the Bedigians of Maple Street. So Cheryl and I were very close. Her sister Alice who lives in Sutton we don't see each other often, but we're still close. So I I think it was more, you know, how school is like we were involved in either sports or academics or whatever it was and whoever was in your group was, was in your group. So, yes, there were Armenian kids that I was friendly with but I can't say that it was like my sole…. We were mixed.
17:49
GJ: So do you have like, did your parents or grandparents have, sayings or things they tried to impress upon you as a young person that you should do or pay attention to?
18:06
NP: I think my, you knew my dad and my dad was…
18:10
GJ: Very eclectic
18:11 - 19:48
NP: And very, very liberal and also very provocative. He liked to make people think and I think when I think about my father that's what I think about the most. Like he never insisted that we do certain things. I think his was just, “you try it, you see if you know if you like it.” My mom, the same way. I don't recall ever–of course I was number three, so I think by the time I came along they were just sort of like go, go do what you want to do. I was very independent, but I think that it was just the same, the same thinking all the way around. It was, you know, a feeling of compassion, doing what you could to do to help, you know, each other,  help other people,  whatever that may happen to be and just that quality of critical thinking like,  you know,” be your own person,” ” be independent,” ” don't do what everybody else is doing.” You know you kind of know right from wrong, I mean, I think that was the thing that they all tried to instill in all of us, you know, that sense of, of right and wrong. But no, I think, I I really look back and I say my parents were very they were always there, they were always caring and loving, but they just kind of let like if I wanted to do something, I would just ask or say,”This is what I want to do” and it was like “Okay, you know, go do it.” So I felt a lot of freedom, I guess, freedom to make my own decisions, freedom to make my own mistakes, and, you know, hopefully learn from that. But I say even to this day, I will say it over and over again, very fortunate to have had the parents that I had.
19:49
GJ: You had  great parents.
19:50 - 20:13
NP: Yes, I miss them every day, But I think they just really, I don't know, it was a special kind of, it was care and concern, but yet not overly, like not hovering, not and I was , It was a good kid.  I mean I didn't get in trouble. I didn't really do anything, you know, bad or anything. I was a good student and I think they just kind of felt like “Okay, she's, she's all right.”
20:14
GJ: That’s funny. Thinking back on my own childhood…
20:18 - 20:33
NP: Yeah, no, we were honestly, I mean with, you know, three girls, I mean, what did we do, right? We didn't really do anything. I mean, we couldn't do anything until we started driving and then at best, what did we do? We went to dances. I mean we weren't out there, you know, like going crazy.
20:34
GJ:  And your dad had hobbies, what were some of his hobbies
20:37 - 21:02
NP: His best one, the one that he did the most besides photography which was his number one love and hobby, but it was building those model airplanes. I mean that–If ever I think about my dad–it's always with an airplane. And he used to always line them up in the driveway, you know, he could have three or four airplanes out in the driveway and what he loved the most was that people would stop because they wanted to talk about his airplanes and that's what he loved. So that was my father.
21:02
GJ: A pretty social guy.
21:04 - 21:46
NP: Very much so and I think I shared this with you, too, I mean one of the things that was always fun for us is, of course, Saturday morning everybody from town drove to the dump which was a few houses down past our house. So Saturday morning, our house was always like the Dew Drop Inn. People would just stop, you know, stop have a cup of coffee, you know, sit down have a chat and I honestly think I have such fond, fond memories of the mostly Armenian people in Whitinsville who were just like a part of my family. I always felt that way especially with the older women in town. They were like second grandmas, you know, so that was wonderful. I mean it was such a good community to grow up in.
21:47 - 21:59
GJ: It really was and I, back to what you were saying, I just remember stopping in at your house all the time when  I was a little kid. My dad would see your dad out in the garage working on the model airplanes and stop and,  after we dumped out the trash.
21:59 - 22:18
NP: Yep, that's exactly what happened. Every, every Saturday was like that. In fact, when I met my husband and he saw you know the people coming and going at my parents’ house all the time, he thought that was so odd because his house wasn't like that. They'd never had people that just stopped over. And I said, “Oh I like that,” like you know, “People come on over, like you see my door, you see the car stop in.
22:12 - 22:36
GJ: Yeah, yeah, I just remember my Dad when we were kids, he would always look up Armenians in the Yellow Pages and just stop in and embarrass the hell out of us when we were on vacation, but it was kind of that mentality.
22:37 - 23:19
NP: It was. Well, I will say this, because my husband says this to me all the time…My mother would be in a line in the grocery store, as an example, and she'd just start talking to the person you know in front of her, behind her, whatever, and she always led with “I'm Armenian. My husband says, he goes, you know you do the same thing. And I said, I think it's just because like when we see somebody who we think looks Armenian, right, like what do you do? You start talking about them and it's just a natural, to us, it's like a natural question. And I think maybe it's because again we were so like, you know, torn from our country, spread out, you know, all this stuff and it's like when you see somebody who's Armenian there's like a, a normal, natural affinity because we believe that we share something.
23:20
GJ: And that we want to build community.
23:22
NP: Yup. 
23:23
GJ: I think the building community is very important. Now your mother was famous for a lot of things: her smile, obviously, but she was a great cook.
23:32
NP: Yes, she was.
23:33
GJ: What were some of the things that she cooked that maybe she taught you?
23:37 - 25:26
NP: My mom–and I think this is also probably another very important part of my being, like who I am– my mother worked all the time. Now I'm talking back in the, you know, I was, I was born in ’56 so late ‘50s/early ‘60s, but my mother worked outside of the home. So it was normal for me to see women going off to work. It was more abnormal when my friends said their mothers stayed home. So that was just different. But my mom worked, but she, this was her routine: On Saturdays and Sundays, for the most part, she was in the kitchen cooking and she was making food for the whole week and it would go into the freezer and then she'd take it out when she came home from work and so we'd have a hot meal every single night on the table with the family all around the table together. And I think–as a working mother myself–I realize how challenging it can be to make sure that your family has a home-cooked meal every single night. You know, it’s so much easier to run out and grab something you know for takeout or whatever it may happen to be, but we didn't have that stuff when I was growing up. You know there was no McDonald's, there was nothing like that, so everything was fresh. Everything was made, you know, that way and that's how she spent her, her weekend preparing for the coming week. And my mother was very good, I mean, and she made everything from, you know, she made gananch fasoulia, she made sarma, she made, she made the best pilaf ever. I mean even my kids will say that it's like nobody makes pilaf like Grandma. So, you know, just the usual and she was excellent at the pastries. She did the kurabia which was delicious and everybody loved it. She made bourma. She made pretty much everything.
25:26
GJ: Is there anything that, you know, smells in the kitchen or particular food it just brings you back?
25:33 - 26:18
NP: Sends you back? Yeah, for sure, and, you know what's interesting? I actually have a lot of those memories more about my grandfather because he was the one that would do it all the time. He'd come to our house and he would do it. But my mom was, she was just like my grandfather. She made excellent kheyma, so anytime, like even she had a bowl, a particular yellow bowl so it was yellow on the outside, white on the inside, and that was the bowl to make the kheyma. No other bowl would do. Same thing with her pilaf pan.  It was like you know seasoned properly and that was the thing. My grandfather had his tapsi for the paklava and that was it. Like you just had to use these same tools all the time. And I think that's where like–when I see something like that or I smell something like that–that's what it reminds me of.
26:18
GJ: What is tapsi ? What do you mean by that?
26:20
NP: It's the pan to make the paklava in.
26:22
GJ: Did he roll the dough himself?
26:24
NP:  I think he did because I don't think you could go out and buy phyllo dough.
26:28
GJ: Yeah.
26:29 - 28:04
NP: You can do it now, but I don't think you could do it then. He was excellent and I will tell you like that's where I got because I think my father was my grandmother's first grandchild and he was a male so in the Armenian eyes, like my father, he was hands down in my other my–I won't say this to my the rest of the family–but I'm sure my great-grandmother had a special place in her heart for my father, number one grandchild and a male. And I think that's it, it's just like part of the thing, right? It's like a big deal and I think my grandmother my, I had such affinity for her, I think was because I was even though I was daughter number three because she was so close to me, I don't know, I think because she loved my father so much, that love translated down to me. And my grandfather who spent you know so much time at our house, he was the, he was awesome. Like he was the cook, he made anything and everything. As kids, he used to make us kites out of brown paper bags and they were like the trapezoids or you know whatever they were and I just remember being out in the field with him, flying those kites. I mean, you know, thankfully I have those, those memories of, of him. But all of those foods… he knew that I loved the meatball soup, so after the kheyma, and that's what he would do. He would roll the meatballs like really, really little for me because he knew I absolutely loved that soup. So that's where I have my, you know, fondest memories of all of them. It's always around food, right, with the Armenian people? So…
28:05
GJ: So when you, when did you get married?
28:09
NP:  I got married in 1982.
28:10
GJ: And so how old were you, like 22?
28:13
NP: I was 26 when I was married, yup. Der Vache did the wedding in the little Armenian Church which was awesome. 
28:23
GJ: Yeah, that's nice.
28:24
NP: Standing room only, nobody could sit. It was too many people.
28:27
GJ: So your husband comes to Whitinsville. He's not from here, right?
28:32
NP: He grew up in Worcester.
28:34
GJ: Okay, I'm mixing up with Shirley's husband who is from Michigan, I think.
28:39
NP: Yeah, Uncle Tom.
28:40
GJ: Yeah, so what was his impression of the community and Whitinsville?
28:46 - 30:25
NP: My husband–unfortunately–his parents divorced when he was 11. and his upbringing was very, it was difficult. It was hard for his mom. Gary went to work at 14. so he could help his mom take care of the house and everything. So when he met my–he met my parents two times before we told them we were engaged–they didn't really know him and I was like that. I was like pretty, pretty private. I didn't say too much. So when we went home to tell them that we were engaged it was actually quite funny. My poor mother and father–I think I gave him a heart attack–but my dad was pretty, you know, cool about the whole thing. He just said, “You want her, you take her. It's your turn to take care of her.” So, but, I think when Gary first met the family, he was a little bit, I'm gonna say” taken aback,” but not in a bad way. it was just that he wasn't used to so much affection. And that was the difference. It was like our family–from the moment he met my parents–like he knew that they were just very warm and welcoming and embracing and everybody that he met, it was like the same way. So he laughs about it all the time. He says, “First time I went over to your house was like everybody's kissing me and you know I don't know what's what's going on”  so, but I think he because he's like that now, like he appreciates the warmth of the household, like the welcoming, like we want people to come in here and feel very comfortable, well-fed, you know it's always want to make sure that people are just happy. So he has come to really embrace it and I think he feels very comfortable with it, but I know in the beginning it was like”What's going on here? Like this is really different from the way that I was raised” but, but I think he's happy.
30:26
GJ: Great, and you had how many children?
30:28 - 31:11
NP: We have two. Yeah. Two adult children. So my daughter Brandis is–oh my goodness–I think she's, I have to, I'm losing track of their ages right now, but she's a, she's a young woman, let's put it that way. She's great, she lives in Framingham. She works for a major food service company.. She's the light of our lives, very joyful. And our son Jonathan is 33. He's in the Navy, lives in San Diego. He's been out there for a number of years now, so thankfully he's safe where he is and we have an eight-year-old grandson who's out there. I know. I feel badly, we don't, we, we Facetime and you know we get to see him a couple times a year, but it's not nearly enough.
31:00
GJ: Do they, do they have any affinity to being Armenian at all?31:17 - 32:31
NP: Not, I think, not as much to be honest with you. I mean we did not bring the kids up in the Armenian Church. Culturally, they know, like my daughter, she tells me she makes pilaf like my mother. So she's, you know, picked up the baton exactly like she's done, she's a very good cook, too. So but that's Brandis’ thing. She has a lot of wonderful memories because when I was working, my mother and father used to watch my kids for me sometimes over the summers. So Brandis spent a lot of time with my mother and she actually told me that was one of the reasons why she wanted to become a chef. Because she would make things with my mother at home. My mother would have her up on the stool and doing whatever it was that she was doing. My son spent some time–he was older when we adopted him, he was nine and  he spent time with my parents helping out over there, too, but he so he was doing a lot of the yard stuff working, you know, mowing the lawn, you know, doing all of that kind of stuff. But he didn't have as much time with my mother and father as a young boy because he was a little bit older but, but they both did. They were very lucky to know my parents.
32:32
GJ: Have you ever thought of going to Armenia with them?
32:35
NP: Hmm, I haven't actually asked them that yet. I know my cousins in France, you know, they've all been many, many times and that's
32:45
GJ: Not as far
32:45 - 33:30
NP: It is, but it's on my bucket list. I mean, we've talked about it and they said I would just love to go. I mean my mom was, when she went in, the first time she went was 1962 and I I know I was only six years old and I didn't appreciate the challenge that she was going to have. But my father told us years later, he was so afraid that when he dropped her off at the airport, he was never going to see her again. He was afraid that once she got there, she wouldn't be allowed to return home again and that left a big impression on me. But she brought back pictures and I remember seeing pictures of like Echmiadzin and you know all these other beautiful places and I'm saying “Wow, it's got to be,” I mean, it was sad looking at that time in, in ‘62 but I don't know, it's some place where we should go for sure. 
33:32 - 33:44
GJ: I think, you know, I remember going in 1981 and what really impressed me was that there was a whole country that thought like my grandmother. I was like “Wow!” I just, I was so not used to this.
33:45
NP: Yeah, I'm sure I would love it. I would enjoy it, yeah, so maybe I'll someday I'll grab my cousins and we'll yeah, we'll head over.
33:53
GJ: Do it, do a week. What other topics would you like to cover that we haven't covered? Are there any special memories or anecdotes or funny stories that…?
34:04 - 34:40
NP: Yeah, I think there are a lot. I guess, the -- probably the thing that comes to mind, I've been thinking a lot about this since you first asked me, but I think it's just–and maybe all nationalities feel this way, I just don't know–but there's just something, I think, so special about being a member of the Armenian community. And maybe it's because there are, I don't know, in my mind like so few of us left. I I told you that my sisters and I are the only 100% Armenians in our family.
34:41 - 36:08
NP: And out of my father's very large family, out of my mother's family of five girls, they have more on my mother's side, but there's something about that. Like I, you know, never really, I didn't start out saying “Oh, I must marry an Armenian man, like you know, I must have Armenian children.” I didn't, I never thought about it in that way, but there's a, there is just an, I don't know there's just like an emotion that's attached to the whole thing that makes me feel sad. And I think it's maybe because it feels like there aren't that many of us left anymore. So that's all, but I do know that even though I am not a like a regular church-going person, but every time I step foot into that little Armenian Church in Whitinsville, it takes me back to a time when I was much younger. I miss all of the people who are no longer here. They were such a big influence on our lives. I mean the women who were our Sunday school teachers, you know, I mean I think most of them except for Alice, I think, most of them are are gone now, but they were just so important. There was just something about, you know, we all went to Armenian school, we went to Sunday school, and then at 11 o'clock or usually was like closer to 11:30 I think they'd march us upstairs to go and spend the rest of the time in, in the church on Sunday and, I don't know, just a feeling of just warmth and community, just wonderful people.
36:08
GJ: You remember any of the older characters that you mentioned?
36:11 - 37:36
NP: My, the people I remember the most–because they were, my mother was always with them but it was Uncle Sam and Auntie Altoon Altoonian (Nadine misspoke – Elmasian is their last name).  Uncle Sam was the shoemaker in town and we all laugh about the fact that he had hoards of shoes on his wall, but if you went there he could go and pick out your shoes exactly, even though I don't think he had a tag on any one of them, but he just knew. And you'd sit in his chair, you'd put your feet up on the shoe shine thing, and he had candy for everybody, always. That was Uncle Sam, and Auntie Altoon, his wife, was just such a warm and wonderful person. She had her little yellow canaries all the time in the little bird cage. She was awesome and then we spent a lot of time with the Tiberians. So, Mr. and Mrs. Tiberian, we were in there because Mr Tiberian was always in his garden, always gardening, with that little straw hat on. So those were the people that we knew the most and I think it was because my mom used to take me when I was little.She used to just take me visiting when, when they used to go. But there were so many of them, I mean, and there so many of them are gone, like you know, Nay Garabedian Avakian and she was one of my Sunday school teachers. Of course Alice I always loved; she was one of my teachers. Bizar Hagopian was my kindergarten Sunday school teacher. So just a lot of wonderful, wonderful people.
37:38
GJ: Well, I guess we're, we're all set. Thank you.
37:40
NP: I hope you got some good stuff out of there!
37:42
GJ:  Yeah, yeah, a nice interview.
37:45
NP: Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to do it. I, I love the thought that we're going to have a chance to have some of our, you know, histories preserved. It's very important so you're doing good work.
37:56
GJ: Thank you.

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