ARMENIANS SHARE CHRISTMAS CHEER
By David Laurell

Burbank Leader
Jan 20 2010
CA

Members of the Burbank Chapter of the Armenian National Committee
recently joined Armenians worldwide to celebrate their traditional
January observance of Christmas and stage their annual holiday
reception and dinner.

"Within the Armenian community, we always kid one another about being
on Armenian time," laughed Michael Kiaman, who emceed last week’s
event at the organization’s downtown Burbank facility. "Armenian
time just means you’ll be late, so I guess it’s fitting that we also
celebrate Christmas later than everyone else."

While most Christians celebrate Christmas in late December, Armenians
do so in early January. The reason for this stems back to the end of
the 3rd Century when Roman Christians decided to recognize the birth
of Christ on Dec. 25, to coincide with a pagan holiday. This decision
was not accepted by the Armenian Church, and Armenian Christians
continued to maintain the ancient tradition of celebrating the birth
and baptism of Christ on Jan. 6.

Welcomed by the organization’s chairman, Hrant Dostounian, the
committee’s members were joined at last week’s reception by local
elected and appointed officials and representatives of the Burbank
business community.

Among the special guests in attendance were the Rev. Komitas Torosian,
Western Diocese Very Rev. Father Dajad Yardemian, Rabbi Richard Flom
and his wife, Lynn Kronzek, Mayor Gary Bric, council members Dave
Golonski, David Gordon and Jess Talamantes; school board members
Ted Bunch, Dave Kemp and Roberta Reynolds; City Manager Mike Flad,
Assistant City Manager Joy Forbes, former Mayor Mary Lou Howard,
Burbank Fire Battalion Chief Ron Barone, Police Commissioners Hagop
Hergelian and Elise Stearns-Niesen, park board members Garen Yegparian
and Steven Ferguson.

Also enjoying the evening were Glendale school board members Greg
Krikorian and Nayiri Nahabedian, interim Community Development
Director Greg Hermann, Ania Alexandrian, Annette Kargodorian, Shoushan
Boyadjian, Haig Hartounian, Greg Krikorian, Silva Kechichian, Gaidzag
Shahbazian, Todd Neisen, Ara Boyadjian, Vahe Shahinian and Talin
Mangioglu, who represented Sen. Carol Liu.

The Burbank Chapter of the Armenian National Committee is a grass-roots
public affairs organization established to inform, educate and act on a
wide range of issues concerning Armenian Americans throughout the area.

The Burbank committee has a long and growing tradition of serving
the local Armenian American community and has drawn its strength from
its dedicated members who have been successful in unifying Burbank’s
Armenian Americans behind a common and positive agenda.