Events
Location: Storm Books & Candy, Brooklyn, NY
We would like to begin by acknowledging the land on which we gather is the occupied territory of the Lenape who were violently displaced by European settler colonialism. We also want to remember the indigenous Armenians who were violently displaced from Artsakh, their ancestral home. And we want to acknowledge the ongoing Genocide of the Palestinians in Gaza by their oppressor. More than 30 thousand Palestinians have died as a result of U.S. supplied bombs dropped by “Isr*el.” This is for all victims of imperialism. Lastly, we’d like to thank Storm Books & Candy and Nour for letting us host this event. We cannot underestimate the beautiful need to have a bookstore that focuses on SWANA books.
Trndez is a Zoroastrian holiday in Armenia that commemorates the arrival of spring and new beginnings through sun/ fire worship. We wanted to celebrate Trndez in a new way and also show how it can be integrated into our lives.
Cleo Abramian and I were asked by the Armenian Creatives collective to work on a collaboration. Since both of our families are Armenian-Iranian, we originally thought to do something connected to Nowruz, the Persian new year. But later we decided to focus on the Armenian holiday Trndez, since it’s similar to Nowruz but lesser known.
As with a lot of older traditions, a lot of what we know about them is passed down from our families through stories. Cleo’s aunt in Iran celebrated Trndez with friends and family by writing the names of their crushes on a piece of paper and then burning the paper in a fire. We wanted to honor that tradition by recreating it tonight. I’m going to pass out pieces of paper so you can write the name of your crush. And we have this projected fire on the floor. Once you write the name of your crush, jump over the fire and place the paper in the bowl. The burning of the paper is going to be imagined, as we don’t want smoke inside the building.
The tradition then goes that each attendee takes home a candle lit from the original fire and doesn’t blow the candle out until they get home. With that in mind, please take a candle with you on your way out and light it when you get home.
While we’re thinking about fire tonight, we want to acknowledge Aaron Bushnell and the extreme act of protest he engaged in.
Aghandz is the traditional food dish for Tryndez. It’s a combination of roasted wheat, peas, raisins, and other dried fruits. Thank you so much to Thea for making this dish for us.
We will be taking donations for https://allforarmenia.org/donate/, which sends aid to refugee families from Artsakh.
Here are the names for the readers: Christopher Atamian, Alina Gregorian, Christopher Kazar Janigian, Lola Koundakjian, Anahit Pogosian.