Raffi: “You Cannot Change the Life of the Nation Without Women”

You cannot change the lives of the people without the participation of women. If our people are stagnant in ignorance, then this is partly because women are not playing any role in society. This force, this vital energy wedged into the narrow circle of family life would be lost for nothing.

The cause of education in our people must begin with women. On this trip, I traveled all over Armenia and I saw the Armenian woman everywhere. The information I received was comforting.

As much as an Armenian man would lose his nationality and originality under the influence of the Turks, an Armenian woman would preserve her perfection and moral unpretentiousness.

A blessing in disguise. A woman may be restricted in four walls and not become a social person, but she, in the end, would be able to preserve the spirit of the nation.

This is a great thing. Thus, a constant balance is maintained: what a man loses is compensated for by a woman. You could observe it on the smallest detail.

The hatred of an Armenian woman towards Mohammedanism reaches fanaticism: everything that comes from the hands of a Mohammedan is disgusting. She does not eat the meat of an animal slaughtered by a Turk, as well as does not eat cheese and bread made by a Muslim.

Men do not know such disgust. I was told about many cases when Armenian women kidnapped by the Mohammedans tried to escape. If unsuccessful, they committed suicide.

There is another very important circumstance: in many places, especially in cities, the Turkish language has become commonplace for Armenian men, but I have not seen a single Armenian woman who spoke Turkish or knew this language well.

Women retained our native language and planted it in the mouth of their children. This is reflected in the Kurds serving in Armenian houses: they all speak Armenian.

Women gave us a language, nationality, and preserved the foundations of our family. An Armenian woman is a pure, uncorrupted material in our hands from which miracles can be created.