Posted by Jeremy Kriewaldt on February 12, 2002 at 18:24:20 from 210.49.20.38:
While reading Taqui Altounyan's IN ALEPPO ONCE (Amazon Publications p50), I was struck by the word for "fork" in Armenian ("Badarakakh") which was learned and parrotted by a governess in the Altounyan household and its closeness in sound to the last element of the Eels' greeting. I wonder whether the rest of the greeting has an Armenian basis (or at least may be also some sounds that AR picked up while in Syria in 1932 visiting the Altounyans and writing PD.