Posted by Adam Quinan on April 09, 2002 at 14:21:46 from 192.75.48.2:
In Reply to: Re: Casual Elitism posted by Peter H on April 08, 2002 at 21:53:33:
Wasn't Vicky's nurse present but invisible during one event on the island.
She may have been silent because she only spoke Armenian?
Now I will demonstrate my own casual elitism. I was born and brought up for a while in various parts of the Middle East so I can relate somewhat to the Altounyan family's experiences of life, albeit a generation later.
My parents employed an Armenian nanny/maid for a while when they first lived in Baghdad, but that was more to help my mother with my two younger brothers, I was just old enough to be going to school during the morning and she did not work in the evenings. I am afraid I have very little recollection of her.
Later we had a male servant who was Christian Assyrian. Aziz lived in a small one room brick structure at the back of the house. He worked five and half days/week, mostly cleaning and some shopping and cooking our lunch which we ate at about 2.00 pm after my father returned from work. He was then free for the rest of the day.