Harry Terhanian.com

Being born into an Armenian immigrant family, I inherited the typical Armenian diet. My mother and great auntie would make “Malatyaee yergiri jahsher” (dishes in the old country style of Malatya) especially on Sundays after church. Sometimes my mother and auntie (Morkor) would toil late into Saturday night preparing what they would cook on Sunday. Some of the dishes were: boulgur pilaf, dolma with grape leaves, lahana dolma with cabbage leaves, choreg or bread with Armenian cheese filling, lahmajoun or a thin pizza like prep with a minced meat topping, baklava or a sweet prep made with filo dough and crushed walnut filling and sugar cinnamon syrup, soup with eggplant and balls made of boulgur with a fried onion filling, roasted chicken with rice pilaf, lamb chops, fried liver, gaht nabur or thick sweet rice with cinnamon and nuts, chee kuhfteh or a raw meat ball with onions, garlic and other spices, toursou or homemade pickles made with carrots, cauliflower, cabbage, and other veggies aged in either a brine or vinegar, hahtz our havgeet or french toast covered on honey or maple syrup, tarkhana abour or soup made with balls of boulgur with a type of cheese made with whey solids cooked in butter and yogurt with spices and olive oil and aged for one or more days to develop the taste, mahnur yapragh of small dolma-like wraps with grape leaves in a yogurt soup with butter and spices (the mahnur yapragh was a tedious prep because the grape leaves were wrapped around a small amount of spiced boulgur and each was the size of a tootsie roll candy), media dolma or stuffed mussels, and many more preps that have faded from my memory. Meat was usually mixed in with almost all the preps.

The meal was accompanied by strong whiskey used to toast the guests or the occasion and strong coffee was served after the meal.

The meals were made with a lot of love and dedication to please the family and guests. After dinner the guests would talk or my father would ask Morkor (my great aunt) to play the oud and sing. When I grew older, I would sometimes play the oud and sing and my mother or her friends would dance.

If it became late (after 11 PM) my dad would say out loud “oglan yatajak” or time for the little boy to go to bed or sleep. (oglan yatajak is Turkish for the boy should go to bed). Although I didn’t understand Turkish at that time, I did know what oglan yatajak meant and I would cry when I heard it. I was taken reluctantly to bed by my Morkor. I would say my prayers in Armenian that Morkor taught me which consisted of a repertoire of prayers beginning with the Lord’s Prayer in Armenian and followed by “havadov khosdovanim” or “I confess with faith.” The latter was composed by Nerses Shenorhali, one of the greatest Armenian Catholicos or supreme leader of the Armenian Apostalic Church during the 12th century. “havadov khosdovanim yev yergir bakanem, hayr yev vortee yev sourp hokeen,” “I confess with faith and bow down to the ground to worship the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit uncreate and immortal Nature, Creator of angels, men and all beings. Have mercy upon Thy creatures and upon me, a manifold sinner.” After saying my prayers, Morkor would tuck me into bed and give me a hug and kiss. But I couldn’t sleep on those nights when the house was filled with so many relatives. I would sneak to the upstairs balustrade and put my little head between the balusters or the vertical shafts of the handrail and listen intently. Often the elders would talk about the “yergir”, old country or Malatya in the Turkish part of Anatolia where they were forced to leave.
They talked about the fond remembrances or family and relatives and also of the massacres and the brutality of the Turks. I remember feeling very resentful that my family and relatives had to suffer such atrocities. Of course, the people present in our house were survivors who either left before the massacres or were miraculously saved after enduring untold horrors. I noticed that the ones that suffered the worst never spoke much. Their stories were muted and only became revealed slowly and after much prompting. I wondered why Morkor, my great aunt, never spoke much. Later, I learned that she suffered more than anyone else that was present in the assembly. My mother was only seven or eight years old when she and the remains of her side of the family were forced to deport from Malatya to Del el Zor. It was a journey of about 1000 miles on foot and without any provisions. It was actually a death march with marauding Kurds and criminal Turks and Arabs who defiled, kidnapped or murdered the women.
My Auntie was kidnapped by Arabs and forced to marry one who gave her a child. Morkor escaped from her Arab captor but was captured and stabbed and left for dead with the child. She somehow survived but suffered for months until she was able to work. But by that time, her baby son died of malnutrition. It is a sad story.

My mother walked all the way to Del el Zor. Right before reaching that desolate desert town in Syria, her mother died of exhaustion. My mother was left a lonely orphan. By some divine intervention she was picked up off the road by a Turkish family who kept her for four years and raised as a Muslim. After the war ended (1919) my mother was forcefully taken away from the Turkish family and put into an Armenian orphanage.

Everyone of the survivors had a story to tell and the more I heard the more I became upset with the Turks for their savagery and merciless treatment of the Armenians. However, I was not specifically taught to hate the Turks by my parents or relatives. As I gradually understood what happened to the Armenians, I felt they were violated, brutalized and mercilessly kicked out of their ancestral homeland. I will discuss this subject much more in detail because there are many aspects to understand

The subject of my father is very interesting because he was saved from the horrors and certain death by his mother. In 1912, his mother sacrificed everything she had to pay for my father and Uncle Kevork to immigrate to the USA. This selfless act on her part saved their lives. They would have been forcibly conscripted into the Turkish Army and then gradually murdered or, at least, very badly treated and demoralized. It was the policy of the Turkish government to enlist Armenians and other non-Muslim minority young men and place them in far off areas of the empire to keep them away from their ancestral lands so that the Turks could later perpetrate their atrocities on the elderly, women and children. My grandmother could see the handwriting on the wall and wisely chose to send her boys to the USA. When the massacres did occur, my father and uncle were safe in the USA, but they suffered the anguish of gradually understanding that all their family and relatives in Malatya were either massacred or forced to walk to Del el Zor. It took them years before they could find out if anyone survived. Their mother was slaughtered as was most of the family. This horror had a profound effect on my father who never recovered from its devastating psychological effect.

As a child I didn’t understand why my Dad was addicted to cigarettes, drinking coffee and often toasting with hard liquor. He would force me sometimes to drink a quarter shot of whiskey with him.
When I was about nine years old, Pop was diagnosed with lung cancer. He walked to the hospital and, after the operation, he was carried back home to die. He slowly and painfully died after about nine months. During that time he had a stoke. One day I was watching television with him in his room. I felt a heavy weight on my shoulder. I looked and saw that my Dad was slumped over against me. I was shocked. I tried to hold him and break his fall to the ground. He was paralyzed on one side. Sometimes, at night, I would hear him scream, “Tueen dor inzee, togh mehrneem.” “Give me poison, let me die.” I suffered with him by not knowing what I could do to alleviate his suffering and deterioration. He finally died. I was not sure what that meant. I was only ten years old and had never experienced a member of my family dying.

It took me years to understand what happened to my father. He was 56 when he passed away. He looked like he was much older. I want to analyze what happened to him and my realizations about his life. My Uncle Kevork would become very emotional and cry on those rare occasions when he remembered his mother’s sacrifice to save her sons from the Turkish brutality. He could understand her foresight, love and self sacrifice. I am sure my Dad had the same feelings. They both had to look on helplessly as the Turks slaughtered their family. The psychological effect on them was never something they could heal. Especially in my father’s case, he had a certain melancholy that pushed him to activities that dissipated his health and well-being. All his teeth were pulled out at 46. After which, he ate mostly soft food. His routine soon became drinking up to twelve cups of coffee a day and smoking two packs of Chesterfield cigarettes. He also stayed out late at night playing cards at Beno’s “Caiffeh,” the Armenian Coffee house where he often played cards all night, drank coffee and sometimes hard liquor. Beno (or Benyamin Gostikyan) was one of Dad’s best friends. He was a World War I Veteran. He used his veteran status to wrest out some privileges with the Philadelphia Police so that he could keep open an illegal gambling and small time prostitution joint near the University of Pennsylvania.
My Dad led an unhealthy life characterized by irregular hours, massive coffee intake, poor diet, smoking and drinking. By the time he was in his fifties his body was riddled with cancer and he died miserably being burned and poisoned by addictive cigarettes and later by chemo and radiation therapies of the 1950s.

The Turkish massacres of the Armenians and the extreme brutality by which it was perpetrated marked the entire generation of survivors. One consequence of the abrupt dislocation of almost the entire population of Armenians was the break down of transfer of culture and “savvy” knowledge from the older generation to the younger. My father was not educated either in technical knowledge or “how to live” knowledge. He acquired “bad habits” from a lack of cultural heritage and a life of constantly struggling to make ends meet. The excessive drinking, smoking, coffee, irregular hours, meat eating and, in general, the unhealthy life style were hallmarks of a cultural breakdown and a lack of self worth.

I remember when I was about eight years old, I asked my Dad what was the meaning of life. I was thinking one day that I wake up, go to the toilet, wash, put on my clothes, eat breakfast, go to school, come back, eat, work in the family store, do homework, watch television, go to sleep and start over again the next day. I began to wonder what was the purpose of this routine. When I asked my Dad, he slapped me really hard on my backside and said, “ayit bes aboush hartzoumner mee hartzur,” “don’t ask such stupid questions.” That was the end of my inquiry into the nature and purpose of life for the next twelve years. I guess the best answer my Dad could have given was that the purpose of life is to take care of your family so that your kids have a better chance in life than the parents. He did that as best as he could.

In my travels around the world I have seen that many Armenian men seem to be addicted to the same foibles as my father: drinking liquor and coffee, smoking, meat eating, gambling, irregular hours and sexual dalliance. My brother Dan even told me that Dad on rare occasions played around with other women. These activities are sometimes considered to be a sign of male virility and abstinence from such activities is considered as some kind of weakness.The truth is that such habits subvert the male potency and hold men back from reaching their potential as successful human beings.

The habits of our ancestors have been replaced by substandard habits that undermine the health and well being of the Armenian people. I want to summarize the healthy habits of our ancestors so that new generations of Armenians and all people can benefit from such information which should be part of the cultural heritage.

ANCIENT WISDOM FOR A MODERN DIET
Secrets of youthful and energetic life from our Armenian ancestors

Our wise ancestors did not smoke or use tobacco in any form. They did not drink coffee. Their beverages were natural herbal teas sweetened with raw honey. In fact, masour or rosehip tea was a favorite because it is rich in natural rutin (which strengthens the arteries and veins), vitamin C, and many other natural phyto-nutrients for good health. Add aloj or Armenian hawthorn berries (with optional hibiscus flowers, sea buckthorn berries, bayberries) and you have a fabulous elixir for health and long life. Hawthorn berries strengthen the heart, lower blood pressure and maintain good vitality for the whole body because of increased oxygenation. All these herbs grow in Armenia which has a mountainous elevation that increases the potency of the herbs due to the added power of the sunshine in summer, mountain glacier water, and mountain minerals in the soil.

Meat was eliminated entirely from the diet or only sparingly taken. It should be noted that our ancestors did not buy meat in a store. They ate only what they hunted in the wild or slaughtered their own domesticated animals which were mostly sheep and chickens. They rarely if ever ate beef. The cow and bull were essential for their livelihood as the cow supplied milk and the bull tilled the land. They were considered like members of the family and were given special respect. Dairy products such as homemade “maddzoun,” yogurt, homemade fresh cheese (bahneer), buttermilk (tahn) which remains from battering fresh butter from cream, and raw, whole milk. Butter was often slowly heated until the solids were separated and removed and one obtains pure butter oil which was used for cooking. It is the best oil for cooking because it resists breaking down into trans-fatty acids which block the arteries and cause heart disease and strokes. Using hydrogenated oils and rancid oils causes heart disease, strokes, and high blood pressure.

Raw, unpasturized milk, which is the greatest miracle substance for healthy life, comes from cows that are raised without hormones or antibiotics in their feed or pesticide residues in their feed. Such milk supplies natural lactic acid which has an anti-putrefactive and natural detoxifying effect on the digestive tract and intestinal tracts. Natural lactic acid from milk is necessary for metabolizing foods and oxygen and removing waste products from the body.

All food was eaten slowly with no rush. Food was cut into small pieces. Our ancestors took small bites and chewed slowly. I remember my Uncle Kevork, who, in later life, became very cautious about his diet. He would wake up at four thirty every morning and make himself a salad that he would eat throughout the day at meals. He spent at least one hour cutting the lettuce, carrots, celery, spinach, cucumbers, tomatoes, radishes in very small pieces. I asked him once why he did that. He replied, “Mahnur guh guhdrem vor turoun marshem - I cut everything small and fine so that I digest the food easier.” It is also a fact that slow and careful chewing stimulates the enzymatic flow of ptyalin and maltase, creating a healthful digestion of carbohydrates.

All food was eaten at the mealtime and no left overs were ever used. The excess food was given away to the more needy or fed to the animals. Leftover foods become quickly depleted of valuable nutrients and are of very little nutritional value.

Bread was baked fresh in a tohndeer or clay oven buried in the ground and wood fired. Wheat or corn was freshly ground from whole wheat berries or corn kernals and baked into fresh flatbread. Wheat is a rich source of protein, fiber, and iron. Corn contains precious B-Vitamins, youth maintaining Vitamin E and many minerals and enzymes. It is an excellent source of potassium which helps to promote a healthy heart.

Armenians have traditionally eaten fresh fruits and vegetables grown organically especially fruits like grapes that are tree ripened and picked fresh and eaten raw with meals. Armenians enjoy tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbages, fresh mint, tarragon, thyme, radishes, mild and hot peppers and other green herbs and leaves with their meals. These raw, fresh foods are the best source of Vitamin C which keeps the blood healthy and flowing unobstructed. Raw foods replenish the body with anti-oxidants. They eliminate waste products or by-products of oxidation that can destroy cells and impede the action of vital enzymes. Vitamin and enzyme rich raw foods energize the body and help to keep it young.

Our Armenian ancestors used herbal medicines, fasting and pure mountain water and teas for healing sickness. They relied on prayer and believed in the power of saints and holy men for blessings. They
used the healing powers of Armenian Bol or healing clay found in the Armenian Highlands. They also sought out hot springs in the Armenian mountains and their healing mineral hot waters. The four elements of earth, water, fire and air are the healing agents when used properly. For healing and health one needs non-toxic organic minerals, pure water, heat and oxygen-rich pure air.

The modern Armenians have lost much of their cultural heritage. We can see this when we compare the “national customs” of our people today and what they practiced previously. Drinking wine and liquor, eating barbecued meats, smoking, prostitution and gambling are far removed from our ancestors life style.

We need an awakening today based on the first principle of life, which is “Self Preservation.” How can smoking, gambling, barbecued meats. prostitutes and liquor sustain self preservation either for adults or for new generations. Better the Armenians return to the wisdom of their ancestors and maintain healthy minds and bodies for a morally sound and productive new society.

Please read the following which is a Cancer update from the John Hopkins Hospital in the USA.

I agree with most of the following statements. I think that the best way to maintain health is to become a complete vegetarian and avoid all meat, fish and eggs. The strongest animal in the world, the elephant, is a vegetarian. The myth that vegetarians don’t get good protein is a hoax. They get primary protein from organic wheat, dairy (which comes from milk which is the blood of the cow transformed into a palatable substance), beans and lentils, etc. These are primary sources of protein and do not require unnecessary killing (such as the slaughter of animals) to obtain.

To return to the Malaytiahtzee diet I grew up on, my observations are that it could have been much healthier if all the dishes were vegetarian. The meat actually ruined everything with blood and carcass. Dolma made with rice, pine nuts, some vegetables like red bell peppers, and appropriate spices with good olive oil and fresh lemon juice is more delicious than you can imagine. All the preps that my Morkor and Mom made could have been vegetarian without any loss of flavor and with the tremendous bonus of good health and life sustaining energy.

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AFTER YEARS OF TELLING PEOPLE CHEMOTHERAPY IS THE ONLY WAY TO TRY (TRY THE KEY WORD) AND ELIMINATE CANCER JOHN HOPKINS IS FINALLY STARTING TO TELL YOU THERE IS AN ALTERNATIVE WAY

1. Every person has cancer cells in the body. These cancer cells do not show up in the standard tests until they have multiplied to a few billion. When doctors tell cancer patients that there are no more cancer cells in their bodies after treatment, it just means the tests are unable to detect the cancer cells because they have not reached the detectable size.

2. Cancer cells occur between 6 to more than 10 times in a person’s lifetime

3. When the person’s immune system is strong the cancer cells will be destroyed and prevented from multiplying and forming tumors.

4. When a person has cancer it indicates the person has multiple nutritional deficiencies. These could be due to genetic, environmental, food and lifestyle factors.

5. To overcome the multiple nutritional deficiencies, changing diet and including supplements will strengthen the immune system.

6. Chemotherapy involves poisoning the rapidly-growing cancer cells and also destroys rapidly-growing healthy cells in the bone marrow, gastro-intestinal tract etc, and can cause organ damage, like liver, kidneys, heart, lungs etc.

7. Radiation while destroying cancer cells also burns, scars and damages healthy cells, tissues and organs.

8. Initial treatment with chemotherapy and radiation will often reduce tumor size. However prolonged use of chemotherapy and radiation do not result in more tumor destruction.

9 When the body has too much toxic burden from chemotherapy and radiation the immune system is either compromised or destroyed, hence the person can succumb to various kinds of infections and complications.

10. Chemotherapy and radiation can cause cancer cells to mutate and become resistant and difficult to destroy. Surgery can also cause cancer cells to spread to other sites.

11. An effective way to battle cancer is to starve the cancer cells by not feeding it with the foods it needs to multiply.

CANCER CELLS FEED ON:

a. Sugar is a cancer-feeder. By cutting off sugar it cuts off one important food supply to the cancer cells. Sugar substitutes like NutraSweet, Equal, Spoonful, etc are made with Aspartame and it is harmful. A better natural substitute would be Manuka honey or molasses but only in very small amounts. Table salt has a chemical added to make it white in color. Better alternative is Bragg’s aminos or sea salt.

b. Milk causes the body to produce mucus, especially in the gastro-intestinal tract. Cancer feeds on mucus. By cutting off milk and substituting with unsweetened soya milk cancer cells are being starved.

c. Cancer cells thrive in an acid environment. A meat-based diet is acidic and it is best to eat fish, and a little chicken rather than beef or pork. Meat also contains livestock antibiotics, growth hormones and parasites, which are all harmful, especially to people with cancer.

d. A diet made of 80% fresh vegetables and juice, whole grains, seeds, nuts and a little fruits help put the body into an alkaline environment. About 20% can be from cooked food including beans. Fresh vegetable juices provide live enzymes that are easily absorbed and reach down to cellular levels within 15 minutes to nourish and enhance growth of healthy cells. To obtain live enzymes for building healthy cells try and drink fresh vegetable juice (most vegetables including bean sprouts) and eat some raw vegetables 2 or 3 times a day. Enzymes are destroyed at temperatures of 104 degrees F (40 degrees C).

e. Avoid coffee, tea, and chocolate, which have high caffeine. Green tea is a better alternative and has cancer-fighting properties. Water-best to drink purified water, or filtered, to avoid known toxins and heavy metals in tap water. Distilled water is acidic, avoid it.

12. Meat protein is difficult to digest and requires a lot of digestive enzymes. Undigested meat remaining in the intestines become putrefied and leads to more toxic buildup.

13. Cancer cell walls have a tough protein covering. By refraining from or eating less meat it frees more enzymes to attack the protein walls of cancer cells and allows the body’s killer cells to destroy the cancer cells.

14. Some supplements build up the immune system (IP6, Florescence, Essie, antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, EFAs etc.) to enable the body’s own killer cells to destroy cancer cells. Other supplements like vitamin E are known to cause apoptosis, or programmed cell death, the body’s normal method of disposing of damaged, unwanted, or unneeded cells.

15. Cancer is a disease of the mind, body, and spirit. A proactive and positive spirit will help the cancer warrior be a survivor. Anger, unforgiveness and bitterness put the body into a stressful and acidic environment. Learn to have a loving and forgiving spirit. Learn to relax and enjoy life.

16. Cancer cells cannot thrive in an oxygenated environment. Exercising daily, and deep breathing help to get more oxygen down to the cellular level. Oxygen therapy is another means employed to destroy cancer cells.

(PLEASE FORWARD IT TO PEOPLE YOU CARE ABOUT)

CANCER UPDATE FROM JOHN HOPKINS HOSPITAL , U S - PLEASE READ

1. No plastic containers in micro.

2. No water bottles in freezer.

3. No plastic wrap in microwave.

Johns Hopkins has recently sent this out in its newsletters. This information is being circulated at Walter Reed Army Medical Center as well.

Dioxin chemicals causes cancer, especially breast cancer. Dioxins are highly poisonous to the cells of our bodies.

Don’t freeze your plastic bottles with water in them as this releases dioxins from the plastic. Recently, Dr. Edward Fujimoto, Wellness Program Manager at Castle Hospital , was on a TV program to explain this health hazard. He talked about dioxins and how bad they are for us. He said that we should not be heating our food in the microwave using plastic containers. This especially applies to foods that contain fat. He said that the combination of fat, high heat, and plastics releases dioxin into the food and ultimately into the cells of the body. Instead, he recommends using glass, such as Corning Ware, Pyrex or ceramic containers for heating food. You get the same results, on
without the dioxin. Such things as TV dinners, instant ramen and soups, etc., should be removed from the container and heated in something else. Paper isn’t bad but you don’t know what is in the paper. It is safer to use tempered glass, Corning Ware, etc. He reminded us that a while ago some of the fast food restaurants moved away from the foam containers to paper. The dioxin problem is one of the reasons.

Also, plastic wrap, such as Saran, is just as dangerous when placed over foods to be cooked in the microwave. As the food is nuked, the high heat causes poisonous toxins to actually melt out of the plastic wrap and drip into the food. Cover food with a paper towel instead.

This is an article that should be sent to anyone important in your life.

I want to make some comments about these sixteen points. But, first I like to say that such a letter of information coming from a reputed hospital is refreshing because for over seventy years the medical profession has suppressed such information calling it folklore or unscientific. It has directed unwitting people (like my father) to very toxic and dangerous treatments that are mostly unproductive. Such treatments result in a miserable death by impairing the immune system of the patient.