Fireworks Of Our Own

As requested, this post will be mostly pictures from our 4th of July adventures in Armenia. After the heat of the day cooled to 93 degrees, we headed out for dinner at the delicious Wine Republic where we enjoyed some of Armenia's finest red wine, Karas, and a youthful hospitality.   

Arev was offered a glass of wine. Chaghig said, "She's only 12." and the hostess looked at her like "And your point is...?"

The drinks here have yet to disappoint.  If you follow me on Instagram, you've noticed our love for the refreshing beer, the juicy wine, and the flavorful coffee.

 Wine Republic is around the corner from The Cascade, a giant stairway that houses an art center and leads to a large monument that you can see from all over Armenia.  572 stairs will take you to a view of Yerevan that is breathtaking.  Kids climbed over 1000 feet to take a look at all the pavement we've been pounding for the past few days. The sky from up top was lit like the fourth of July and the sparkles in the kids' smiles were like our own fireworks' show.

View from the bottom. We climbed to the base of that lit tower at the top. That's our crew at the bottom left of the photo

Halfway up...

The top! It's always a good time for a selfie!

The after picture...not bad for climbing over 1000 stairs at 10:00 at night!

 We continued from there for our evening ice cream (averaging two a day) and the walk back to the Metro. Along the way, we were distracted by this plaza/park/square/lake that seemed to be hoppin', so we turned right to check it out.  Within minutes, the three older kids were trapped in these gerbil balls flipping and flopping across the water. 

This was by far more entertaining for the parents than the kids...although they had a blast!

We finally made it back to the Metro stop at 11:08 at night only to be met with chain link lock on the doors.  Rookie mistake, they close at 11.  We hailed two cabs and were across town and home for 1000 dram ($2) about 10 minutes later.

Quote of the Day goes to Karek who, bless his soul, has been earnestly using his Armenian to say his pleases and thank yous. To express a general gratitude in Armenian the hard (but more appropriate) way, it's "Sh'nor a gal-ou-chyoon".  You can also say "Sh'nor a gal-em" meaning "I thank you".  Upon receiving his ice cream cone from the assistant at the stand, Karek said "Sh'nor a galem, Chyoon" mixing the two strains of thank you.  Unfortunately, the word "chyoon" sounds a lot like "shoon" which means dog.  Translation:  "Thank you, dog".  We laughed through our delirium and sweet Karek was such a good sport to let us.  Keep up the good work, Karek!