Language keeps minorities united

Dubai: "I'm Iraqi, Armenian Iraqi," says Gulizar Jonian, an architect in Abu Dhabi who also heads a weekly Armenian school there. "I am attached to Iraq. The Iraqis treated my grandparents very well when they moved there from Turkey, but Canada has also been very hospitable to me," said the Iraqi-Canadian citizen.

"What unites Armenian minorities around the world is the Armenian Apostolic Church, and the Armenian genocide," she said, referring to the mass killing of Armenians in First World War. "We remember the dates and stories very well. They have been passed on through the generations."

Although Jonian's family adopted the Iraqi identity and learned the Arabic language, her parents and grandparents found it important to instill the family's Armenian identity in her. "If you loose the language, you loose a whole generation. It's important to keep the torch lit." Similarly, Jonian finds it important to teach her own children their language, as well as the children of many other Armenians living in Abu Dhabi as principal of the Armenian school.

Since it was difficult to travel to Armenia during the Soviet era, Jonian says independence for the state in 1991 was a breath of fresh air for those who wanted to visit their ancestral homeland. "Soviet stamps on our passports could cause trouble before. But that's not the case any more. I love Armenia. We often go there on holiday."