September 13th, 2007

---

Before we started work today, Gohar, Meri, and Maliek took our team to visit some of the families who are in their homes, including 2 families that were supported by Habitat Detroit and Masco. It was an absolutely amazing experience.

One of the homes we saw that was sponsored by HFHD and Masco was a beautiful home and an experience I will never forget. The family has 3 children- 2 girls and a boy. The 2 girls had drawn a picture of their house that read "thank you Detroit", they gave this to us as a gift and I will be sure to bring it to the HFHD office to hang. The mom brought out a great spread of fruits and juices, it was such a welcoming and lovely gesture. Although we thought we were invasive by visiting their homes, the family was beyond grateful we were there, and it was truly an honor to meet such wonderful people. The homes were very modest, 2 bedrooms with a main living area, a kitchen and a nice size bathroom. The family also showed us where they used to live- the very small basement, it could not have been bigger than a 10'x15' room. It was extremely hot and humid, and to think it housed 5 people for over 7 years before they partnered with Habitat.

After visiting a couple of the families, we took a short drive to visit the ancient Khor Virap church, which is atop of a hill with Mt. Ararat as a gorgeous background. After we visited the church and were back in the parking lot, we were asked if we wanted to make a wish by holding a pigeon and letting it go. Majority of the team, as well as Gohar and Meri took part in this tradition.

We headed back to the worksite just in time for lunch, where we ate yet another delicious Armenian meal. Once we started to work, the team painted both bedrooms, touch-up sanding and plastering the kitchen. Sometime the night before or in the morning, the window sills were installed-very nice marble granite.

As we are working, Maliek has been able to hook up a speaker to the minivan so we are able to listen to music as we work. During the coffee break, Maliek had turned on some Armenian music- Meri and Gohar taught a couple of us how to do a traditional Armenian dancing. It was very fun, although we are not very good!

We stayed at the worksite until about 6:30pm since we spent most of the morning visiting the Habitat homes. We did have dinner at 'Our Village' restaurant- with very traditional Armenian cuisine with a live band playing Armenian folk music. The band was very good, with one of the member playing the dudak- a traditional Armenian instrument this is vertical and is played similar to the flute. It was a wonderful atmosphere and by the end of our dinner, the restaurant was full of people clapping, singing and sincerely enjoying the music.

---