A CENTURY ON: AGBU CELEBRATES ITS CENTENARY

Al-Ahram Weekly, Egypt
April 13 2006

The Armenian General Benevolent Union celebrates its centenary this
week. Inas Mazhar consults with the institution’s Egypt President.
Berdj Terzian, finding out about history, culture and lifestyle

Photo: Clockwise from top right: the daily Arev; three Egyptian
Armenian actresses have left their mark on the Egyptian cultural scene:
Nelly, Mimi Gamal and Lebleba; Nunu Yesyan; Egyptian singer Anoushka
of Armenian origin

The centennial celebrations of the AGBU kicked off yesterday at the
Armenian Embassy in Cairo. With over 300 Armenians from all over the
world invited, according to Berdj Terzian, president of the Armenian
General Benevolent Union (AGBU-Egypt), the occasion provides for
social, cultural and educational events. Before all else, perhaps,
it is an opportunity to reconfirm Egypt’s long history of support
for Armenians and the Armenian diaspora; Egypt was in fact the first
Arab country to embrace the Armenian state, instituting full-scale
diplomatic relations with Yerevan and even sponsoring training
programmes for young Armenian officials.

Highlights of the centennial programme include a seminar on Armenian
Education and Language Teaching, focussing on the role of language
in the survival of identity and discussing issues like the status of
Western Armenian, and the use of Armenian in education, conversation
and entertainment — an aim for which the relevant organisations are
mobilising by, among other means, instituting training programmes
for teachers. The celebrations also feature an exhibition of over
60 books on display, which are all Satenig Chaker fund-supported
AGBU publications.

Real fun won’t start until Sunday evening, however, with such Armenian
stars as the Vienna-based soprano Hasmik Papain and the Paris-based
pianist Vardan Mamikonian performing at the Gomhuriya Theatre. “The
famous Armenian singer Nune Yesayan and her band,” Terzian explained,
“have come all the way from Armenia to entertain the guests; and they
will perform too. All over the world, Nune Yessayan’s concerts are
always sold out weeks in advance…” Among the programme’s better known
venues is the Hmen Nubar Club in Heliopolis, a relaxing space with
plenty of greenery. “The club dates back to 1933,” Terzian revealed,
“when the AGBU, the better to serve young Armenians in the Egyptian
capital, had built the Nubar club in the neighbourhood of Shoubra.” Led
by Hayg Djizmedjian, a founding member of the Istanbul Hmen Club,
the venue united with the AGBU to become the Hmen Nubar in the late
1940s, the AGBU bought the land from Boghos Nubar’s heirs in 1956,
after which it became the principal AGBU base. It remains among the
Armenian community’s favourite institutions. Besides the illustrious
Hmen Nubar, centennial celebrations will also take place in Alexandria,
the home of many Armenians at the start of the 18th century, thanks in
large part to the work of such community leaders as Boghos Bey Yusufian
(1768-1844), Nubar Pasha (1825-1899), the aforementioned Boghos’s
father, and Kevork Topalian (1850-1923). As Terzian puts it, “For over
a century the church-school combination has provided the necessary
manpower to sustain cultural and social clubs and their affiliated
political organisations. The infrastructure of the Armenian community
in Alexandria, even though it was relatively small, remains intact.”

htm