She Can Write About Food...And Wine. And She Gets It. Ani Duzdabanyan.

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I think that people like me, we have a job here to do. We have

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to tell the stories of these wineries. We have to make the

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statement along with the wineries about us, about Armenian

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wineries. We have to put the word out there

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and we need to tell everyone about this wine

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region. Sit back and grab a glass. It's

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Wine Talks with Paul Kay.

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Hey, welcome to Wine Talks with Paul K. And we are in studio today, beautiful

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Southern California on World Series Day. Actually looking forward to that this

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evening after yesterday's walk off Grand Slam, which is

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incredible. Hey, have a listen to a couple of shows. One of them

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is Rachel Martin. She was just in here from Oceano Wines and she has

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experienced an amazing renaissance in her brand through a non

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alcoholic and low alcoholic brands. And she explains why and

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it's the first time in my career after 35 years

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because non alcoholic wines are not new. They've been around for a long

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time. But she. I've never tasted the same

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wine from the same plot from the same vineyard made

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both regular style and then non alcoholic. So I was able to

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taste those side by side. A really interesting concept. And another show you should listen

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to is Randy Duor. He is represents

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Iniskillen, which is Canadian dessert

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wine grown near Niagara Falls. And

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I've never tasted pairings with

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food like these wines did not like admit after 10

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courses or eight courses we had there was a lot of dessert wine but the

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pairing with Thai food and the spice component was incredible. And the

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wine in a skill in particularly their Cabernet franc

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late harvest is really quite incredible.

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We're here today though to have a conversation with Ani and I'm going to screw

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this up because I just wrote it down Duzbadanyan.

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And she is a journalist turned wine journalist.

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And we met the other night at a wine

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tasting that was exclusively Armenian wines. And

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she introduced herself and I thought, wow, this is really interesting. I wanted to get

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her on the show. So welcome to the show. Thank. Thank you so much. Thank

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you for having me. I know we had a little trouble scheduling and all that,

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but glad we're here on a Saturday afternoon and a chance to catch up on

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wine and all things Armenian. And we were just talking a

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little bit offhand, you know, I thought let's just talk about Guinea Fest. I

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thought it was really good. Yes, they've expanded into like

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artifacts, clothes, you know, Nazuk. The whole booth on

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Nazuk. Yes, you can't go wrong with Nazuk.

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I thought that was pretty fun. But I Did taste all the wines. I went

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through the whole thing, and I was very

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impressed. Now, last time I went was two years ago, I think, when it was

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at. In Burbank. A year

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ago. Last year when it was at the Castaways. Oh, in Castaway. Yeah.

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It was before COVID Oh, that was before. It was the second Guinea

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Festival. That's how long it's been since it's been. Yes. And

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I think there was a substantial increase in. I say the quality

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because the quality has always been fairly solid. But I mean, just the stability of

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the wines. True, I agree. This is my, what,

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sixth Guinea Fest. I'm. I missed the first one, but since the

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second one, I was constantly going and covering Guinea

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Fest for various publications. Really? Yeah. Did you write about it yet? I

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did. Last year I wrote about Guinea Fest for the LA

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Times and before that for the Armenian Mirror Spectator.

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And also, if I'm not mistaken, one time I wrote for an

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Armenian newspaper in Armenia. What did you say about this last one?

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Have you written that article? This last one? Actually, this one was the only

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one that I wasn't working for. Oh, you weren't working? I was

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just playing. Yes. I was just enjoying all the wines,

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meeting with new producers and just old

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friends. It was great. And actually, Guinea

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Fest was the event,

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and Anush was the person who got me into wine

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writing. Anush was? Yes. Let's go back to that a little bit.

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You're born in Yerevan. You're born in Armenia. Yes.

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Correct. And you came here about, like, 18 years ago.

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Eighteen years ago. Eighteen Years ago. And you were writing then, when you did that?

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When I moved to the. Well, before moving to the United States, I was a

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journalist. I was working in the news programs in Armenia

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even when I was a student at the university. And what. What outlets

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were available to you in Armenia being. We'll see, 17

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years. So I was. I started when I was 17.

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Wow. I was. My first job was in French

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Armenian Magaz magazine. That is no longer available, unfortunately.

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But I applied. They. They wanted a translator, so

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I applied. But then when they learned

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that I am a student, they were like, can't you

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write? You're a journalist. I was like, but I'm just starting. They said, okay, if

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you can write, let's do it. And I started to write about

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different things for this magazine. And one year later,

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they threw a big party and closed down the magazine. Okay,

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I'm going to stop you there for a second, because

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I'm a Francophile. My dad spoke French, from

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French, and I Find it really interesting because so many Arab

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countries is common language. In Cairo, where my dad was

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born, it was the third language. You had to know French prior to the English

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protectorate, but I don't see a lot of that in Armenia.

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They had a French Armenian magazine. Yes. Actually,

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Armenians are pretty francophone, I would say. The

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school that I was going, like elementary school and the high

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school, so it was francophone kind of

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a school. Never sensed that they had two

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officially francophone schools in Armenia.

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Wow. Are they still there? Yes, they're still there.

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Last time I checked. I don't know how many. I'm gonna have to

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push a little harder if speak French in

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Armenia. Yes, it's kind of fun, you know. Anyway,

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so you. So you were writing for them and then. Because I,

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you know, now that I don't even know what the local papers are. We were

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there last month. I don't know why I wouldn't be able to read them anyway.

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But you were writing for the general

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journalism. Yes, just doing interviews, writing about

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profiles of famous people, etc. But

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I was just a student. Yeah. And then. And then

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I. We had a class in investigative journalism,

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and I loved it. I got involved and

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we did a couple of projects in investigative journalism.

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And later on I moved into a TV journalism, which I

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wanted to do initially. So I got into news programs, and

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that was that. And later on, I moved here to the United States with my

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husband, had my kids

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foreign. That tends to slow things down. Yes, obviously it

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did. But during that time, I still continued to write

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for the Armenian newspapers back there in Armenia.

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And then with Tigram Paskovichan, he's a journalist

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in Armenia, actually, veteran journalist. And with

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him we did a project so

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interviewing old people, Armenian

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people who repatriated to armenia in the 1930s and

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1940s from the United States,

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from other European countries. And

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when Soviet collapsed, or even before that, when they had a

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chance, they moved back to either Europe or to the United

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States. So with all my other

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colleagues who were involved in this project, we interviewed all these people.

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And at the end, the project became

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a documentary. 3 documentary. Never heard that one.

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They did a presentation here years ago in Abdiel

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Bookstore. Indigenous Armenians who had

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left, then repatriated to the

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homeland and then left again. Yes, because of the genocide. So because of the

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genocide, they moved to other countries. They leave. Then they came

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back. They came back to the Soviet Union, to the Soviet

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Armenia, and they saw all the horrible

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conditions that Soviet Armenia was

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in and people. But they couldn't leave, obviously,

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a lot of them were exiled into Siberia.

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And those stories are just horrible, horrible

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to learn. And when I was doing these interviews, I

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was actually eight months pregnant with my daughter. And the

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emotional, emotional thing was very

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big, but I loved it. So that

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was the biggest project that I did during

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the whole time that I was raising my kids. After that, when they were off

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to school and kindergarten, preschool, I

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all grown. Up by then, right? No, no, they're not

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still in the process. Right. So I started to

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write about Armenian community for the Armenian

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Mirror Spectator. This is the oldest English Armenian

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newspaper in the United States. They're based in Watertown,

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Massachusetts. So I wrote a lot of

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stories of the Armenians here. Individuals,

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businesses, organization in California.

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And later I just realized that we

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know everything about ourselves as a community, but others don't.

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Because as a community we were very

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inclusive. We didn't like the others

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to interfere, to learn. Kind of our. That's a really good

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way to put it. So. And I understand it's still that way. It is still

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that way. And I understand that it's. It's a way to survive.

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At least it was a way to survive for our ancestors. Yes.

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You had to keep your cards close to your chest. Exactly. But I think it's

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time to invite everybody in because that's going to be the other

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way to survive for the next generations. Well, I mean,

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I think that's most obvious when you introduce

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yourself to a non Armenian in America and they

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all say, oh, I know another Armenian. They all know.

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But that's the end of the road. That's the end of the conversation. Do you

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know so and so. And it's like. Yeah, well, you know, I think we. Know

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everybody and most of the times it's not a person that you want to be

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associated with. Yeah, right. So I.

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Some medical fraudster or something. Right. Or some famous

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people who are not really representing our culture. So I wanted

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to change that as much as I could and I wanted to

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break down the stereotypes for my community. Yes.

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My first, My first work was for Eater

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la. So really that was during the pretty big

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thing. It was. I couldn't believe my eyes when I. When

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I saw the email. Did they approach you?

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No, I approached them. So there was during.

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During the COVID The COVID was kind of ending and. No,

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no, I'm sorry. It was during the war. There was this Armenian

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farmers market. It was Covid. It was war. Everything was together in 2000 and

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20s. Where's that Armenian farmers

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market? It was in Glendale, next to the central library.

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Guess that. So I learned about that

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event. So. And I thought to myself, I don't want

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to write about this for the Armenian newspaper because we know

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we are all going to be there. And I pitched the story to Iter

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and immediately I got a response that, yes, let's do this. Wow. I

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was very excited. That's great. So it turned out that they knew about

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Armenian cuisine, especially the food, for

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example, of Huds that was going to be there at the market

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and other stuff too. And that's how I started to write for

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Eater. And then I moved to

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other publications. But when

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I. So I. And then I got into wine. So this is

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a different story because my other big publication that I pitched

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and started to write about, write for was the

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Wine Enthusiast. Well, wow. So. And

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that was the article about orange wine made in

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Armenia. Not in Georgia, in Armenia. That's

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had one the other night. Yeah. Yes. So you weren't. You

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didn't know anything about wine really, or you just knew what you liked. Does your

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husband drink wine? He does. He does. And luckily he shares the

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passion with me. We do yearly visits to the

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wine country, any wine country, so we love going to

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Paso. So we go there, we stay there, we taste

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the wines, we meet people. So. And I

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meet the Bezions the other night at the Guinea Fest. They

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had their Paso Robles winemakers. They were in just last week. Which one?

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Bezgin. It's called Kini. Oh, yes, it was next

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to. Yes, yes, I met them before. Yeah. Yes. Really sweet. Yes.

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Very nice people. So, you know, it's kind of interesting because

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journalism, we were talking about this before we started about, you know,

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writer's block and, you know, and I've, you know, even

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though I was a businessman for 35 years and, you know, I bought and sold

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17 million bottles of wine. The creative.

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I'm just. I'm a creative person in my mind. I'm not the. My wife's a

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numbers person, cpa, but I'm the guy that's spatial and I don't really pay attention

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to the details. And, you know, I just respect that so much and

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I. I'm jealous of it, but I respect it and I. And I'm in

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it now. I get to do this and that and. And do some writing. But

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it sounds like based on your career here, if

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you know how to write, if you know how to communicate with people, even

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subjects that you might not be, you know, intimately familiar with, you

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certainly you're not going to know as much as Anush knows all the studies she's

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Done, of course. And. But you can still write

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and communicate thoughts. And regardless of

234
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the overall knowledge base of the subject, you, you study it,

235
00:14:20,208 --> 00:14:23,672
you research it and you write enough to communicate with

236
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people. Of course, of course. I mean, so here you are,

237
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journalists of French. I mean, we come to America,

238
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all of a sudden you're writing for Eater, which is a huge,

239
00:14:34,880 --> 00:14:38,712
you know, food foodie site. And then. And

240
00:14:38,736 --> 00:14:41,912
that moves into the Wine enthusiasts, which is one of the great periodicals of our

241
00:14:41,936 --> 00:14:45,758
time in wine. Yes, true. Do you like it? Oh, I love it.

242
00:14:45,894 --> 00:14:49,678
I love writing. Yeah. And about wine. Is the wine subject interesting?

243
00:14:49,774 --> 00:14:53,582
Yes. Actually I realized that this is. Well, I was

244
00:14:53,606 --> 00:14:57,262
always thinking what's going to be my, like my subject, something that

245
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I really love to do, to write about. And turns

246
00:15:00,974 --> 00:15:04,398
out it's wine. At least for now. I don't know. Yeah, I know, but it's

247
00:15:04,414 --> 00:15:07,998
really competitive, isn't it? It is, it is competitive. But

248
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when it comes to the Armenian wine, it's not because there are not

249
00:15:11,814 --> 00:15:15,470
many people who write about Armenian wine, which is unfortun. Because

250
00:15:15,510 --> 00:15:19,294
all the, all of this revolution that is happening in the Armenia. In Armenia, in

251
00:15:19,302 --> 00:15:22,730
the Armenian wine industry. That's an interesting thought because we do get.

252
00:15:23,110 --> 00:15:26,894
And maybe this goes back to what you're saying earlier about we don't tend to

253
00:15:26,902 --> 00:15:29,730
want to break out of our mold or out of our communities

254
00:15:30,230 --> 00:15:33,934
and there's a lot of support within the community. But. And so we

255
00:15:33,942 --> 00:15:37,790
get these accolade articles once in a while and

256
00:15:37,830 --> 00:15:41,432
it's. They're usually one off articles. They're not

257
00:15:41,456 --> 00:15:45,080
written about as much as Napa or, or as Bordeaux or Burgundy, those

258
00:15:45,120 --> 00:15:48,936
places. It's, it's just. Oh, by the way, there's Armenia.

259
00:15:49,048 --> 00:15:52,280
Yes. You want to change that? I, I'm planning to.

260
00:15:52,320 --> 00:15:56,120
That's, that's my plan. And actually I see all

261
00:15:56,160 --> 00:15:59,928
the articles that I see about Armenian wine that others are writing,

262
00:16:00,024 --> 00:16:03,800
they're mostly about the same producers. So. Yeah. In

263
00:16:03,840 --> 00:16:07,580
my career in, in my profession, I always

264
00:16:07,700 --> 00:16:11,068
tend to write about people who are not

265
00:16:11,124 --> 00:16:14,972
popular, but they're doing great job. Yeah. So

266
00:16:15,076 --> 00:16:18,668
that's what I'm trying to do for the last, I don't know how many years.

267
00:16:18,724 --> 00:16:22,492
And I mean, this industry, you know, building a brand is the hardest thing

268
00:16:22,516 --> 00:16:25,404
in the world in any industry. My niece is trying to build a brand in

269
00:16:25,412 --> 00:16:29,004
the salad dressing industry, which is, you know, competing with Wishbone

270
00:16:29,052 --> 00:16:32,412
and Paul Newman and all that stuff. And wine's. Wine's even

271
00:16:32,436 --> 00:16:36,130
tougher because there's a lot of huge companies that make

272
00:16:36,170 --> 00:16:39,682
wines and you're never going to get shelf space, you know, on your own. So

273
00:16:39,706 --> 00:16:43,298
without your type of skills and communication level

274
00:16:43,354 --> 00:16:47,122
with people, it's, it's a hard. It's a hard deal. But one

275
00:16:47,146 --> 00:16:50,738
thing, when you said that, the one thing that

276
00:16:50,794 --> 00:16:54,370
struck me and I. It was amazing at Guinea Fest.

277
00:16:54,530 --> 00:16:57,586
There are a couple of the old school guys there, but there was a whole,

278
00:16:57,618 --> 00:17:01,226
that whole row where I met you, both of those tables,

279
00:17:01,338 --> 00:17:05,050
one of them was cork and bottle. As a distributor, I think

280
00:17:05,090 --> 00:17:08,698
that guy, you know, should have his head examined. Armin,

281
00:17:08,794 --> 00:17:12,570
wonderful conversation. And I'm just saying this tongue in cheek as a joke, but

282
00:17:12,610 --> 00:17:16,378
I mean, to, to start a distributor in Los Angeles at this

283
00:17:16,434 --> 00:17:19,770
time on wines that no one's ever heard of. Yeah. Is

284
00:17:19,810 --> 00:17:22,986
a. Has to be a labor of love and

285
00:17:23,058 --> 00:17:26,831
passion. Okay, but here's the point I want to make. When I

286
00:17:26,855 --> 00:17:29,871
sat here on Tuesdays, every Tuesday morning, and I looked at the list of who

287
00:17:29,895 --> 00:17:33,711
was coming in, they made an appointment. I already knew the level of

288
00:17:33,735 --> 00:17:37,439
quality that was coming in that day. And I knew, and I won't mention any

289
00:17:37,479 --> 00:17:41,199
names, the stuff that was going to be mostly crap. I'm going to say 90%

290
00:17:41,239 --> 00:17:45,007
of the stuff that I tasted with certain vendors was crap. Other vendors are

291
00:17:45,063 --> 00:17:48,079
very good at curating and making sure the ones that most of them are good,

292
00:17:48,119 --> 00:17:51,701
you know, at least solid. I thought that whole table,

293
00:17:51,895 --> 00:17:55,290
there's like 20 wines, maybe more, had a solid

294
00:17:55,370 --> 00:17:58,938
base, solid level of quality. And I told

295
00:17:59,074 --> 00:18:02,362
his wife, I said, you know, I just told her the same story. Did you

296
00:18:02,386 --> 00:18:06,218
feel that? Did you like, did you sense this? I had never heard

297
00:18:06,234 --> 00:18:09,786
of any of those wines. And I thought the whole lineup was really good.

298
00:18:09,938 --> 00:18:12,150
Yes, the wines are good. I mean,

299
00:18:14,690 --> 00:18:18,120
we don't. We used to be a wine drinking

300
00:18:18,290 --> 00:18:21,980
come. Yes, well, of course, 6,100 years ago. But we

301
00:18:22,020 --> 00:18:25,484
forgot about that because of the 70 years of Soviet ruling.

302
00:18:25,532 --> 00:18:29,164
Yes. That artificially made us drink vodka. Yes. Sweet

303
00:18:29,212 --> 00:18:32,764
wine who. Nobody drunk. And then brandy,

304
00:18:32,892 --> 00:18:36,396
who. That wasn't really that good. No. So.

305
00:18:36,468 --> 00:18:40,316
And now. Whatever. But don't tell Winston Churchill that. Because he loved Noyak.

306
00:18:40,348 --> 00:18:44,092
But whatever. Is it true, though? I don't know. I've read

307
00:18:44,116 --> 00:18:47,852
articles. Yes, I've read other journalists wrote about it.

308
00:18:48,036 --> 00:18:51,300
I hope it's true. But still, I want us to

309
00:18:51,600 --> 00:18:53,580
return to the wine

310
00:18:55,040 --> 00:18:58,360
traditions, wine drinking traditions. And that's what

311
00:18:58,400 --> 00:19:02,152
this, all these winemakers are doing in Armenia. And the

312
00:19:02,176 --> 00:19:05,944
wines are really good. Of course, there are bad wines. They're

313
00:19:06,072 --> 00:19:09,512
everywhere. Not only in Armenia, in France too. You

314
00:19:09,536 --> 00:19:12,904
can occasionally Get a bottle of horrible

315
00:19:12,952 --> 00:19:16,712
wine. And just because it's made in France, it doesn't mean that

316
00:19:16,736 --> 00:19:20,440
it's good or in Italy or anywhere else. But these people are

317
00:19:20,480 --> 00:19:23,540
really trying and making wine in a

318
00:19:23,580 --> 00:19:26,760
politically and regional instability

319
00:19:27,740 --> 00:19:31,476
is a very hard thing. And you really

320
00:19:31,548 --> 00:19:35,172
have to have a passion for that. It's not about money.

321
00:19:35,276 --> 00:19:38,720
I mean almost all the producers that I know,

322
00:19:39,020 --> 00:19:42,804
we're not talking about the big, big producers who are just investing

323
00:19:42,852 --> 00:19:46,644
and they're making money. It's a different story. But the other boutique

324
00:19:46,692 --> 00:19:49,800
wineries who are making wine in Armenia,

325
00:19:50,580 --> 00:19:54,172
it's not about profit, it's about just doing what they love.

326
00:19:54,276 --> 00:19:57,852
Passion. It's passion. I mean, if you don't have it, forget it. Yeah, and

327
00:19:57,876 --> 00:20:01,580
continuing the tradition. You mentioned that table, but next

328
00:20:01,620 --> 00:20:05,436
to that distributor was Malahi

329
00:20:05,468 --> 00:20:09,244
wine. I mean Maran Winery, this winery.

330
00:20:09,372 --> 00:20:13,004
The story of this winery goes back to two to 300 years.

331
00:20:13,172 --> 00:20:16,860
They were the first one who had a wine press in the region like

332
00:20:16,900 --> 00:20:20,524
300 years ago. And now the Hares are

333
00:20:20,612 --> 00:20:24,008
continuing the tradition making wine. And that was the first

334
00:20:24,144 --> 00:20:27,260
winery in post Soviet era

335
00:20:28,160 --> 00:20:31,672
who introduced the terroir based wine

336
00:20:31,736 --> 00:20:35,048
making to the Armenian to, to, to the Armenian

337
00:20:35,064 --> 00:20:38,584
winemaking industry. And they still continue

338
00:20:38,672 --> 00:20:41,940
making great wines. I had their Voska hot the other night.

339
00:20:42,480 --> 00:20:46,312
There's a blend I think Alotes. It's great. I

340
00:20:46,336 --> 00:20:50,072
thought it was absolutely world class. Yeah, it is. And, and not only world

341
00:20:50,096 --> 00:20:53,766
class because this is an important part of, of the wine industry. Wine is

342
00:20:53,838 --> 00:20:57,622
consumer driven and so as much as romantic as I would

343
00:20:57,646 --> 00:21:00,854
want it to be, and I'm already looking forward to the Bordeaux I'm going to

344
00:21:00,862 --> 00:21:03,330
drink tonight that

345
00:21:04,510 --> 00:21:07,398
consumers still drive the marketplace. And I thought that was a

346
00:21:07,454 --> 00:21:10,950
contemporary style wine with all the

347
00:21:10,990 --> 00:21:14,822
fruit, but still good structure and still good acid in

348
00:21:14,846 --> 00:21:18,422
the nose. I mean it just jumped out of the glass. Oh yeah, I

349
00:21:18,446 --> 00:21:21,250
agree. Fabulous wine. True. You know,

350
00:21:22,430 --> 00:21:25,430
you said something interesting. I had a winemaker sitting where you're sitting the other day,

351
00:21:25,470 --> 00:21:28,134
a French winemaker. And we were discussing the same problem. Yeah, you can go to

352
00:21:28,142 --> 00:21:31,734
the market in France and get a €2 wine in the supermarket and it's going

353
00:21:31,742 --> 00:21:34,886
to be awful. And, and I brought this up the other night at the Armenian

354
00:21:34,918 --> 00:21:38,742
assembly event and I almost. There were,

355
00:21:38,766 --> 00:21:42,570
it was, it was the Maran wineries and the Yakubian Hobbs Winery.

356
00:21:43,880 --> 00:21:47,664
You got to choose at some point what side of

357
00:21:47,672 --> 00:21:49,840
the line you're going to be on. Are you going to try and be that

358
00:21:49,880 --> 00:21:53,552
supermarket $15 wine? Because that's a whole different type of

359
00:21:53,576 --> 00:21:56,432
marketing and structure or you're going to be on the other side where you're trying

360
00:21:56,456 --> 00:21:59,984
to attract the boutique drinkers, the people that are interested in the. In the

361
00:21:59,992 --> 00:22:03,520
terroir and they want to understand wine. And that's where we have to be.

362
00:22:03,640 --> 00:22:07,104
I mean the Katas wines, because they had the backing or naked as money, all

363
00:22:07,112 --> 00:22:10,816
the things that go behind that they can go compete in total wine

364
00:22:10,848 --> 00:22:14,464
and bevmo and all that on a 15 bottle of wine. And

365
00:22:14,472 --> 00:22:17,880
they' bad, you know, they're. They're solid wines. But

366
00:22:18,180 --> 00:22:21,560
you brought something up. I want to push a little further.

367
00:22:24,100 --> 00:22:27,916
I've decided that not. It's

368
00:22:27,948 --> 00:22:31,692
not even me. If you were to pick, let's say five elements of a

369
00:22:31,716 --> 00:22:35,436
culture, just say the Armenian culture, the, the American culture, the French

370
00:22:35,468 --> 00:22:39,228
culture, the Spanish culture, the Italian culture, you would have to say that

371
00:22:39,284 --> 00:22:43,072
cuisine is a representative true land, if you

372
00:22:43,096 --> 00:22:45,220
have it right. Yes.

373
00:22:46,520 --> 00:22:50,240
Wine. Yeah. Wine should be

374
00:22:50,280 --> 00:22:53,920
that expression of a culture. I would definitely put it there. Yeah. If you could,

375
00:22:53,960 --> 00:22:57,616
if you. If your culture. Other cultures like Colombia, they don't

376
00:22:57,648 --> 00:23:01,152
have wine, but they have distilled spirits that are represent. You

377
00:23:01,176 --> 00:23:04,992
know, Chileans have pisco sours and there's this licorice thing

378
00:23:05,016 --> 00:23:08,130
from other parts of the world, but wine.

379
00:23:08,630 --> 00:23:12,250
And Juliana Ernakian said it the best.

380
00:23:12,870 --> 00:23:16,574
What other product can you take halfway across the world, put on the desk

381
00:23:16,622 --> 00:23:19,326
and say this is who we are and this is when we were. If it's

382
00:23:19,358 --> 00:23:22,958
a proper honest wine that represents where it's from, I

383
00:23:23,014 --> 00:23:26,574
agree. And you think that that's where we need to be? Oh yes,

384
00:23:26,622 --> 00:23:30,398
definitely, definitely. And I think that people like me,

385
00:23:30,454 --> 00:23:34,010
we have a job here to do. We have to tell the stories of this

386
00:23:34,320 --> 00:23:37,960
wineries. We have to make the statement along with the

387
00:23:38,000 --> 00:23:40,500
wineries because I mean,

388
00:23:41,680 --> 00:23:45,496
couple of weeks ago I was sitting down and trying

389
00:23:45,568 --> 00:23:49,192
wine with the representative from of chat

390
00:23:49,256 --> 00:23:53,080
Angelus. So I mean it's that you

391
00:23:53,120 --> 00:23:56,728
cannot be better than that. It's there. It's like eight, seven,

392
00:23:56,784 --> 00:24:00,340
eight generation old winery. And

393
00:24:01,280 --> 00:24:04,420
there is so much to tell about them, but there isn't really.

394
00:24:05,120 --> 00:24:08,600
But about us about Armenian wineries.

395
00:24:08,760 --> 00:24:12,440
We have to put the word out there and we need

396
00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:15,700
to tell everyone about this wine region

397
00:24:16,320 --> 00:24:19,992
who is constantly under the

398
00:24:20,016 --> 00:24:23,736
danger of being attacked or being, I don't

399
00:24:23,768 --> 00:24:27,496
know, eliminated from that place. Like it happened

400
00:24:27,528 --> 00:24:31,136
with Artsakh wines. All the wine region, the entire wine

401
00:24:31,168 --> 00:24:34,928
region just disappeared because. Because of the war,

402
00:24:34,984 --> 00:24:38,528
because of the poor calculation and politics and

403
00:24:38,584 --> 00:24:42,416
everything else that I just really don't want to. Go into you know, it's funny

404
00:24:42,448 --> 00:24:46,240
because you said Angelus. And we were just there. And on the way back from

405
00:24:46,280 --> 00:24:50,048
the France, there was a show on.

406
00:24:50,104 --> 00:24:53,872
On the. On the TV station, on. On the airplane, you

407
00:24:53,896 --> 00:24:57,552
know, on the channels, and it was about Bordeaux. And it was. And Angelou's was

408
00:24:57,576 --> 00:25:01,288
highlighted in that. It was this. That, you know, the owner. The current owner.

409
00:25:01,384 --> 00:25:05,224
Yes. And she was trying to dig into this thing and. And, you know, it

410
00:25:05,232 --> 00:25:08,856
was sort of politically driven, and their position in the world of wine

411
00:25:09,048 --> 00:25:12,744
kind of is politically placed there. And my dad used to say in that

412
00:25:12,752 --> 00:25:16,504
picture that you're looking at 1975. He used to say, back then, you know,

413
00:25:16,512 --> 00:25:20,312
the French had this amazing way of romanticizing what they are. And the more

414
00:25:20,336 --> 00:25:24,152
you think about that, the more it's really story driven that, that.

415
00:25:24,256 --> 00:25:27,826
That history and that I want to drink that Bordeaux.

416
00:25:27,938 --> 00:25:31,730
I want to feel like I'm back there, like I was. And so that

417
00:25:31,770 --> 00:25:34,930
leads to the experience of

418
00:25:34,970 --> 00:25:38,754
wine being such an emotional part. You

419
00:25:38,762 --> 00:25:42,402
know, wine is an emotional purchase. It is, right? It is in so many

420
00:25:42,426 --> 00:25:46,274
ways, starting with the label. There are wines that I would never drink

421
00:25:46,322 --> 00:25:48,670
because of the label. I know it's not right.

422
00:25:49,850 --> 00:25:53,666
Anush knows this. I suppose that's accurate. I mean, you look at the label, you're

423
00:25:53,698 --> 00:25:57,426
not buying it. Yeah. And there is. There are wines that, honestly,

424
00:25:57,458 --> 00:26:00,722
I cannot even drink. I don't know what's happening with me. But when I look

425
00:26:00,746 --> 00:26:04,114
at the labor, I was like, no, it cannot be right. I tell you a

426
00:26:04,122 --> 00:26:07,922
funny story. There's two stories that come from

427
00:26:07,946 --> 00:26:11,682
that. One of them is about Barefoot Sellers, the famous, biggest brand in

428
00:26:11,706 --> 00:26:15,042
America. And the guy who started that was named Mike Houlihan. He was in my

429
00:26:15,066 --> 00:26:18,802
office in 1989, and I thought it was the dumbest idea you could

430
00:26:18,826 --> 00:26:22,354
ever think of to put a foot on the label and call it barefoot. And

431
00:26:22,362 --> 00:26:26,122
he would say, I'm Chateau Lafitte la f E T of. Of.

432
00:26:26,146 --> 00:26:29,642
Of America. And I got. I called my father. I said, dad, you won't believe

433
00:26:29,666 --> 00:26:33,082
the guy came in, how stupid this is. Becomes the biggest brand in America. Yeah.

434
00:26:33,146 --> 00:26:36,202
And you want to know why that foot's on there? And you talk about the

435
00:26:36,226 --> 00:26:39,610
label. He was told by one of the biggest chains of

436
00:26:39,650 --> 00:26:42,906
wine sales back then called Thrifty

437
00:26:42,938 --> 00:26:46,394
Drugs. The guy told him, I want to see that label

438
00:26:46,442 --> 00:26:50,154
from 40 paces away. So when you're walking down the

439
00:26:50,162 --> 00:26:52,426
aisle, I want to be able to see your label. I want it to stick

440
00:26:52,458 --> 00:26:56,220
out. And that's what he came up with. He was right. Yes. He was right.

441
00:26:56,340 --> 00:27:00,124
So. But the other story was I bought a wine here just before we

442
00:27:00,212 --> 00:27:03,788
sold the company, maybe about a few months before. And it was really

443
00:27:03,844 --> 00:27:07,644
good. And I didn't pay attention to anything on the label. It

444
00:27:07,652 --> 00:27:10,924
was a hand sketch, you know, it was like this drawing, and it was a

445
00:27:10,932 --> 00:27:14,412
man. I didn't really pay attention. I just poured it, tasted it, made my

446
00:27:14,436 --> 00:27:17,320
notes, called him back and said, I'll make a deal with you.

447
00:27:17,700 --> 00:27:21,466
Well, then when I give it, hand it off to my staff to

448
00:27:21,538 --> 00:27:24,762
write about it, you know, to at least get the information, she goes, are you

449
00:27:24,786 --> 00:27:28,122
sure you want to feature this wine? I'm like, why? And she shows me the

450
00:27:28,146 --> 00:27:31,930
website. It was this whole S M, mail driven thing.

451
00:27:31,970 --> 00:27:35,690
Guys with jock straps. I mean, it's gross for me. And it.

452
00:27:35,730 --> 00:27:39,226
And the label was the same. I didn't notice

453
00:27:39,258 --> 00:27:42,794
it. It was a hand drawing of this guy with a hat and like chains

454
00:27:42,842 --> 00:27:46,522
on his arms and stuff. I go, I'm in

455
00:27:46,546 --> 00:27:50,282
big trouble. If I put this on the street. They call the

456
00:27:50,306 --> 00:27:53,686
guy, I'm sorry, man, I gotta cancel the. I've never canceled pos,

457
00:27:53,838 --> 00:27:57,078
maybe two in my career. And I had to do this really, just because that's

458
00:27:57,094 --> 00:28:00,710
how important it is. But, you know, going back to the main point, which

459
00:28:00,750 --> 00:28:04,486
is the experiential part of wine. And so now,

460
00:28:04,558 --> 00:28:07,894
even for me, if I open a bottle of

461
00:28:07,902 --> 00:28:11,734
Huskavaz, I was there. And I have this image of being there. How

462
00:28:11,742 --> 00:28:15,350
do we do that in Los Angeles with these wines from

463
00:28:15,390 --> 00:28:19,232
Armenia, The Guinea Festival. Maybe this is to your

464
00:28:19,256 --> 00:28:22,832
point. It was all Armenians. Yes, but it wasn't like

465
00:28:22,856 --> 00:28:25,980
that before. So this, this year it was different.

466
00:28:26,600 --> 00:28:30,420
They had a lot of non Armenian guests and consumers

467
00:28:30,760 --> 00:28:34,368
before too. And Armenian wines are getting

468
00:28:34,424 --> 00:28:38,048
into big markets. For example, Karas is

469
00:28:38,104 --> 00:28:41,776
in Costco. That's right. Armas is in Total

470
00:28:41,848 --> 00:28:45,440
Wine and more. Starting this year. A couple of months ago,

471
00:28:45,480 --> 00:28:48,660
they. Oh, Victoria. Nobody works harder than Victoria. Yeah,

472
00:28:50,040 --> 00:28:53,600
and other wines too. I mean, I think we just have to continue

473
00:28:53,720 --> 00:28:56,960
what we're all doing and just introduce the wines. And

474
00:28:57,080 --> 00:28:59,420
articles are important because

475
00:29:00,520 --> 00:29:03,140
people are still, thank God, reading

476
00:29:04,040 --> 00:29:07,760
most of them, at least. Yeah.

477
00:29:07,840 --> 00:29:11,104
So we'll see. And we have to. I mean, the wine community

478
00:29:11,192 --> 00:29:14,960
obviously have. Has to be more active, do more

479
00:29:15,000 --> 00:29:17,640
wine tastings, just introduce wine to

480
00:29:18,660 --> 00:29:21,772
larger audiences. So how often are you

481
00:29:21,796 --> 00:29:25,292
pitching wine articles to the periodicals,

482
00:29:25,436 --> 00:29:28,748
Spectator, Enthusiast, and there's a whole bunch of smaller ones. Yeah, not

483
00:29:28,804 --> 00:29:32,108
as much as you want. Yeah, not as much as I

484
00:29:32,164 --> 00:29:35,932
want because I'm busy with. Well, this is a Passion to me. For

485
00:29:35,956 --> 00:29:39,600
me, too. So this is not where I make my living. Yes,

486
00:29:40,100 --> 00:29:43,804
but. But I have another job. I have a day job, so. Which is a

487
00:29:43,812 --> 00:29:47,532
pr. Doing PR for a nonprofit organization here in

488
00:29:47,556 --> 00:29:51,352
Glend. So. Yes, but when

489
00:29:51,456 --> 00:29:55,064
there is a very interesting story, and I love to dig deep

490
00:29:55,112 --> 00:29:58,904
and write about the history, the histor, especially the historical

491
00:29:58,952 --> 00:30:02,616
aspect of the winery and the wine that I'm

492
00:30:02,648 --> 00:30:06,392
writing about, if there is a story. For example, right now I

493
00:30:06,416 --> 00:30:10,152
have four stories in making. They're gonna be out

494
00:30:10,256 --> 00:30:13,880
sometimes in, I don't know, in November, in December, they told me.

495
00:30:14,000 --> 00:30:17,404
And how long from your inception to that first letter

496
00:30:17,592 --> 00:30:21,380
of an article to when you think it's done, does it take

497
00:30:21,420 --> 00:30:25,060
you. The. The newspaper?

498
00:30:25,140 --> 00:30:28,500
Yeah. Any article listening to the right article about the amber wines in

499
00:30:28,620 --> 00:30:32,100
Armenia, when you thought of it and you sat down to your

500
00:30:32,140 --> 00:30:35,972
computer the first time? Yes. And then whatever. Take however long it took

501
00:30:35,996 --> 00:30:38,580
you to write it till you thought you were done and then rewrite it and

502
00:30:38,620 --> 00:30:41,572
then read it again and go away. You know, I missed that point. And how

503
00:30:41,596 --> 00:30:45,216
long does that usually take you? Oh, it's a constant. Constant process. It's a process.

504
00:30:45,368 --> 00:30:49,040
It depends. They give me a period

505
00:30:49,080 --> 00:30:52,832
of time to write, for example, like two weeks, three weeks, a month. It

506
00:30:52,856 --> 00:30:56,656
depends on the. Yes. And then I send

507
00:30:56,688 --> 00:31:00,480
it back to them. They send me the edits or the questions that they

508
00:31:00,600 --> 00:31:04,144
want to learn more about, and I can't. Either

509
00:31:04,192 --> 00:31:07,792
I send them the edits or I contact the wine producers and

510
00:31:07,816 --> 00:31:11,498
then I talk to them. And. Well, it's a process. But it's a good process.

511
00:31:11,554 --> 00:31:15,338
I love that there's a lot of. Armenians in the domestic wine business.

512
00:31:15,394 --> 00:31:19,034
Have you written about them before? Domestic wine? Yeah, like the Bezions.

513
00:31:19,162 --> 00:31:22,826
There's, you know, Kiami Cellars in Paso. There's, like here

514
00:31:22,898 --> 00:31:26,522
in. Yes. So I didn't write about them yet, but I

515
00:31:26,546 --> 00:31:29,030
pitched the article for two different

516
00:31:29,650 --> 00:31:33,290
magazines and I. Well, I

517
00:31:33,410 --> 00:31:37,050
just don't want to say it now, but I

518
00:31:37,090 --> 00:31:40,842
am planning to write about it next year. We'll see. Fingers crossed. One

519
00:31:40,866 --> 00:31:44,598
guy just passed away, Sam Balik. He makes a lot of wine in Paso.

520
00:31:44,694 --> 00:31:48,214
His wife still does. I forgot all that. Her name starts with a

521
00:31:48,222 --> 00:31:51,974
V. But it's interesting because I don't. As

522
00:31:52,062 --> 00:31:55,606
my travels throughout the wine world, all of a sudden you show up. There's

523
00:31:55,638 --> 00:31:59,270
one woman in Napa, Suzanne Sharon

524
00:31:59,350 --> 00:32:02,854
Kazanjan. Kazan Harris. And she

525
00:32:02,942 --> 00:32:06,422
has the audacity to pour Bordeaux in a

526
00:32:06,446 --> 00:32:10,224
downtown Napa tasting restaurant room. Her wines are gorgeous.

527
00:32:10,352 --> 00:32:14,160
She's. Does she's. The wine maker. They make them at one of the co

528
00:32:14,200 --> 00:32:18,032
ops. But she's very talented and

529
00:32:18,056 --> 00:32:21,696
I found her on LinkedIn. Interesting. We became very good friends

530
00:32:21,848 --> 00:32:25,424
and she'll never nap on. She's. Her house is right on Highway 29. It's a

531
00:32:25,432 --> 00:32:29,152
beautiful. It's a really cool facility to taste wine in. But she and

532
00:32:29,176 --> 00:32:32,192
I are going to get together next time we're up and I'm bringing a host

533
00:32:32,216 --> 00:32:35,824
of Armenian wines and annoying vahes. Iranian

534
00:32:35,872 --> 00:32:39,568
wine. She wants to taste that because she went to the movie. Yeah,

535
00:32:39,664 --> 00:32:43,060
right. I always forget the name. What's it called? Molana. Yeah, Moana.

536
00:32:43,400 --> 00:32:46,864
So. So this one. You want to pursue this. You want to

537
00:32:46,872 --> 00:32:50,448
continue exposing now you already think you'll get into writing about

538
00:32:50,504 --> 00:32:54,112
French wines or. No, no, I mean I. There. There are no

539
00:32:54,136 --> 00:32:57,696
limits. I can write about any wine. It's just when I write about Armenian wine,

540
00:32:57,728 --> 00:33:01,258
it's like going home. Yes, it's very easy for me

541
00:33:01,424 --> 00:33:04,694
because I know everything. I know what I'm writing about. There is no. There are

542
00:33:04,702 --> 00:33:08,278
no secrets. How often do you go back to Armenia? Oh,

543
00:33:08,374 --> 00:33:12,182
the last time I was there was this summer. I took my

544
00:33:12,206 --> 00:33:15,510
kids because they're old enough now to see and understand

545
00:33:15,630 --> 00:33:19,302
their culture, their homeland. Yeah, they were

546
00:33:19,326 --> 00:33:22,982
there before two times. But now that it

547
00:33:23,006 --> 00:33:26,742
was, it was. Think of the changes in downtown and the rest of the

548
00:33:26,766 --> 00:33:30,140
country. Well, there were good changes and

549
00:33:30,440 --> 00:33:33,420
obviously bad changes. So good changes were

550
00:33:34,280 --> 00:33:37,472
in like casual living of

551
00:33:37,656 --> 00:33:40,900
people. But I. But unfortunately

552
00:33:42,440 --> 00:33:45,660
we do know changes are present and

553
00:33:46,440 --> 00:33:50,288
we're losing a lot and I don't know, it's

554
00:33:50,304 --> 00:33:54,032
just, just sad. I mean society there. When we were there in 2007 is the

555
00:33:54,056 --> 00:33:56,816
first time I ever went. My mother in law owned a hotel there. The Ani

556
00:33:56,848 --> 00:34:00,652
hotel was hers. And you. They were. The corruption

557
00:34:00,716 --> 00:34:04,108
is still there. And it was very thick then, probably even more.

558
00:34:04,244 --> 00:34:07,948
But at that time you can only get kebab

559
00:34:08,044 --> 00:34:11,740
and tomatoes and you didn't really drink the

560
00:34:11,780 --> 00:34:14,828
water. And now it's like Paris

561
00:34:14,924 --> 00:34:18,444
downtown, except for the architecture, but the food and the

562
00:34:18,532 --> 00:34:22,332
safety of it that we're able to walk around is pretty amazing. But the

563
00:34:22,356 --> 00:34:25,980
part that disturbs me a little bit that you got 100 meters outside of town

564
00:34:26,020 --> 00:34:29,770
and you're back to a pretty rural, rustic part of town.

565
00:34:29,810 --> 00:34:33,658
And most people that work in Armenia can't afford to even be in Yerevan. Right,

566
00:34:33,714 --> 00:34:37,482
that's. That's the saddest part. And it was always like that, unfortunately. But

567
00:34:37,506 --> 00:34:41,190
now it's. I think now it's more for us

568
00:34:41,490 --> 00:34:45,322
going back from the United States, it was accessible. But when

569
00:34:45,346 --> 00:34:48,842
I asked my friends and when I took them to. When I

570
00:34:48,866 --> 00:34:52,362
met with them at the restaurants that I thought were.

571
00:34:52,546 --> 00:34:56,314
Okay. Yeah. Were just regular restaurants, turned out they couldn't

572
00:34:56,362 --> 00:34:59,862
even afford that. Yeah. And it's not. I mean, it's not

573
00:34:59,886 --> 00:35:03,382
right. No, no. It's. Well, I think that's, you know,

574
00:35:03,406 --> 00:35:07,158
byproduct of socialism. And it'll take many generations to

575
00:35:07,214 --> 00:35:10,918
flatten that out. And. And, you know, where is all the money

576
00:35:10,974 --> 00:35:13,798
coming from? We're not. This is not a political show, though it looks like it's

577
00:35:13,814 --> 00:35:17,590
turning into one. But let's not do that. So my

578
00:35:17,630 --> 00:35:21,142
interest in it, and I was sort of agnostic to all of

579
00:35:21,166 --> 00:35:24,934
it until God and Bagdasarian from

580
00:35:24,942 --> 00:35:28,512
Abrish was sitting where you're sitting, and I forgot how I even got a hold

581
00:35:28,536 --> 00:35:32,112
of him. And then when we were in New York for an event in soho,

582
00:35:32,256 --> 00:35:35,792
my wife remembered that the Capralians had a jewelry business in

583
00:35:35,816 --> 00:35:39,600
soho. So I got ahold of the daughter and she sat down with us. Alexandra.

584
00:35:39,680 --> 00:35:42,620
Yeah. And we all of a sudden had this whole idea of.

585
00:35:43,240 --> 00:35:46,752
It goes further. It's really interesting to me, and maybe it's part of an

586
00:35:46,856 --> 00:35:50,288
article for you. My question in my mind was, why

587
00:35:50,424 --> 00:35:52,860
are wineries the spoils of war?

588
00:35:54,320 --> 00:35:58,072
And clearly the Azerbaijans wanted the wineries. And when

589
00:35:58,096 --> 00:36:01,672
you listen to God and, you know the end of this teaser reel I

590
00:36:01,696 --> 00:36:05,256
did, he's like, they took everything. They took the bottles, the corks and everything. And

591
00:36:05,328 --> 00:36:09,000
we were afraid to leave. We were afraid to take stuff in our

592
00:36:09,040 --> 00:36:12,792
trucks because we would be targeted having this stuff in

593
00:36:12,816 --> 00:36:16,328
the car. So we left everything. Yes. And they got taken.

594
00:36:16,464 --> 00:36:20,250
And so it led me into World War II, which was

595
00:36:20,290 --> 00:36:24,042
the first war where the invading armies realized that

596
00:36:24,066 --> 00:36:27,114
there's something really cool here and we shouldn't destroy it. We should probably just embrace

597
00:36:27,162 --> 00:36:30,110
it. And the Nazis had an amazing

598
00:36:30,690 --> 00:36:34,522
channel for Bordeaux, Burgundy,

599
00:36:34,586 --> 00:36:38,378
Champagne. Champagne and Alsace. But before that, it wasn't

600
00:36:38,394 --> 00:36:42,186
like that. World War I. They destroyed everything. So I just thought,

601
00:36:42,258 --> 00:36:45,760
wow, now it's come to rooster in our own

602
00:36:45,800 --> 00:36:49,344
backyard. And it was

603
00:36:49,432 --> 00:36:53,152
very sad stuff to listen to. It opened the doors for me

604
00:36:53,176 --> 00:36:57,020
into a huge subject of thing. Have you written about that,

605
00:36:58,040 --> 00:37:01,504
or is it too painful to do? No, I wrote an article about all these

606
00:37:01,592 --> 00:37:05,408
wineries who were left in Artakh,

607
00:37:05,504 --> 00:37:08,784
about Karen's operas, about Raj and

608
00:37:08,792 --> 00:37:12,498
Alexandra, Takri and

609
00:37:12,554 --> 00:37:15,950
Aran. And what was the fourth one?

610
00:37:16,970 --> 00:37:19,922
I don't remember. There's four, though, right? Yeah. There was a fourth one that I

611
00:37:19,946 --> 00:37:23,070
wrote about for Men's Journal, and

612
00:37:23,610 --> 00:37:27,090
unfortunately, no other publication wanted that

613
00:37:27,130 --> 00:37:30,850
article. And I pitched for over a year, really, to

614
00:37:30,890 --> 00:37:34,578
different publications. They. They just. What was the general reason

615
00:37:34,634 --> 00:37:38,466
that they would. They didn't give me a reason. They just. Yeah, they weren't

616
00:37:38,498 --> 00:37:41,958
interested. And wine enthusiasts wrote an article.

617
00:37:42,154 --> 00:37:45,790
They asked someone else to write. Non Armenian, I don't even

618
00:37:45,830 --> 00:37:48,974
remember his name. He wrote an article about,

619
00:37:49,142 --> 00:37:52,542
supposedly Artsakh wines, but it was mostly about the Armenian

620
00:37:52,606 --> 00:37:56,050
wines being affected by this situation.

621
00:37:56,550 --> 00:37:59,290
So I decided to write about

622
00:38:00,710 --> 00:38:04,478
Cataro. Cataro was the fourth wine. So I decided to write about

623
00:38:04,534 --> 00:38:07,726
these people because especially people from the United States

624
00:38:07,798 --> 00:38:11,576
who basically moved there, made investments.

625
00:38:11,688 --> 00:38:14,340
Million dollars investments. Not only

626
00:38:15,200 --> 00:38:19,016
growing grapes and making wines, but also building

627
00:38:19,168 --> 00:38:22,920
factories, building hotels, restaurants, and so many other things.

628
00:38:23,040 --> 00:38:26,140
And then they just were left with nothing.

629
00:38:26,720 --> 00:38:30,424
So I wrote that article for Men's Journal, and then Jason Weiss

630
00:38:30,472 --> 00:38:34,216
from somtv, he invited me to his podcast and we talked

631
00:38:34,248 --> 00:38:37,994
about the article and not this whole situation at Artsakh. So. So

632
00:38:38,082 --> 00:38:41,706
we were just trying to. When was that? Recently? Yes, very recently.

633
00:38:41,778 --> 00:38:45,242
Oh, yeah, like a month ago. Is he in la? Jason? Jason,

634
00:38:45,306 --> 00:38:49,098
yes. Yeah. He's a talented guy and he tells some good

635
00:38:49,154 --> 00:38:52,778
stories. He is. He is. I met him because of

636
00:38:52,834 --> 00:38:56,506
the Molana.

637
00:38:56,618 --> 00:39:00,330
So Moana. They were screening Moana here in Glendale. In la Male theater,

638
00:39:00,410 --> 00:39:04,250
and. That's right. Yes. So I went there, and then LA Times asked

639
00:39:04,290 --> 00:39:07,434
me to write about the movie. Oh, that's great. That was your article. I think

640
00:39:07,442 --> 00:39:10,874
I read that. That probably if it was in LA Times, it was my. Well,

641
00:39:10,882 --> 00:39:14,442
I don't subscribe to it anymore, but I think I got a hold of

642
00:39:14,466 --> 00:39:18,250
that. Yeah. So, yes, that was another thing.

643
00:39:18,290 --> 00:39:21,706
And actually I had a friend who was always

644
00:39:21,778 --> 00:39:25,530
very skeptical about me talking about wine. Just

645
00:39:25,570 --> 00:39:29,130
winemaking, all these traditions and everything. And she was like, come

646
00:39:29,170 --> 00:39:32,858
on, wine is also. It's the same thing as vodka as,

647
00:39:32,914 --> 00:39:36,592
I don't know, tequila or. Or any other beverage. I was like,

648
00:39:36,616 --> 00:39:40,320
no, you don't understand. It's different. I invited her to come

649
00:39:40,360 --> 00:39:44,032
with me to see the movie. She came in the end of the

650
00:39:44,056 --> 00:39:47,744
movie, she was all tears, and she was like, ani,

651
00:39:47,792 --> 00:39:49,780
now I understand what you meant.

652
00:39:51,320 --> 00:39:54,300
Well, sometimes you just got to show them. Yeah. Take them to the

653
00:39:55,160 --> 00:39:58,928
drink, you know? Yes. Well, I. I had this funny

654
00:39:58,944 --> 00:40:02,140
story, and I was with Vahe at. When we were there last,

655
00:40:03,380 --> 00:40:06,040
he. He came in this building, actually,

656
00:40:06,980 --> 00:40:10,812
years ago, and he walked in and we both recognized each

657
00:40:10,836 --> 00:40:14,508
other. The first podcast we did together, and he goes, you don't

658
00:40:14,524 --> 00:40:18,044
remember Me? Do you? I said, well, I. You look familiar because I bought wine

659
00:40:18,092 --> 00:40:20,720
from you. Oh. So when he was in Berkeley

660
00:40:22,260 --> 00:40:25,580
with his restaurant, it's before the Armenian stuff,

661
00:40:25,660 --> 00:40:29,356
but either before or after the Italian. I think he did the Italian

662
00:40:29,388 --> 00:40:31,680
wineries, then came to Berkeley, then went to Armenia.

663
00:40:32,890 --> 00:40:35,670
He needed Gallo Chardonnay

664
00:40:36,330 --> 00:40:39,874
for. He says, I think it was my niece's wedding and it was in la,

665
00:40:39,962 --> 00:40:43,810
and he didn't know anybody in LA to buy it from. And we

666
00:40:43,850 --> 00:40:47,070
had done business together. But when he left that day,

667
00:40:47,370 --> 00:40:50,370
I came home, told my wife, and this is probably five or seven years ago.

668
00:40:50,410 --> 00:40:54,114
I said, I just met probably one of the most brilliant winemakers

669
00:40:54,162 --> 00:40:57,590
I've met, period. Forget Armenia

670
00:40:58,660 --> 00:41:02,124
for a complete understanding of what this industry is

671
00:41:02,132 --> 00:41:05,724
about. Because he's a balance between.

672
00:41:05,812 --> 00:41:09,068
And I think this is where almost all

673
00:41:09,124 --> 00:41:12,956
winemakers need to be. The ones with more capital don't

674
00:41:12,988 --> 00:41:15,240
have to be, but a balance between

675
00:41:16,180 --> 00:41:19,900
consumerism and selling stuff and

676
00:41:19,940 --> 00:41:23,582
manufacturing things that. The passion side of manufacturing something.

677
00:41:23,686 --> 00:41:27,022
Yeah. That represents something. And it's a very difficult

678
00:41:27,086 --> 00:41:30,846
teeter. It's a very difficult balancing act. It is.

679
00:41:30,918 --> 00:41:34,542
And to make money is almost impossible. Yeah. And it's like art. When you

680
00:41:34,566 --> 00:41:38,350
make art, you cannot sell it. It's kind of hard to sell it. Right.

681
00:41:38,390 --> 00:41:41,790
Because you're the artist there. I think it's the same with

682
00:41:41,830 --> 00:41:45,090
wine. They have to have strong marketing

683
00:41:46,310 --> 00:41:49,918
arm to just market and sell whatever they're making. The

684
00:41:49,974 --> 00:41:53,726
winemaker, the artist is making, and most are farmers. I mean, think about wine

685
00:41:53,758 --> 00:41:55,540
makers are really farmers. It

686
00:41:56,800 --> 00:42:00,584
true. One, the guy sitting there the other day, a French

687
00:42:00,632 --> 00:42:04,152
wine maker, he said, and I. I never heard it put this way, was very

688
00:42:04,176 --> 00:42:07,720
eloquent. It was great.

689
00:42:07,760 --> 00:42:11,480
Wines are born in the vineyard. They're not born. They're not.

690
00:42:11,520 --> 00:42:15,256
They don't grow into. In the bottle. In other words, unless you're

691
00:42:15,288 --> 00:42:18,104
pulling out of that vineyard the right stuff and do it right, you're not going

692
00:42:18,112 --> 00:42:21,776
to develop a great wine sitting in the cellar. Yes. Right.

693
00:42:21,848 --> 00:42:25,420
Yes. That's what happens. I think it's the entire process.

694
00:42:26,040 --> 00:42:28,980
They're farmers. The winemaker

695
00:42:31,400 --> 00:42:34,704
Trinity, Kanye Vineyards in Armenia. He was telling

696
00:42:34,752 --> 00:42:38,528
me when I was interviewing him for the

697
00:42:38,664 --> 00:42:41,760
Orange Wine article, he was telling me that they're

698
00:42:41,920 --> 00:42:45,344
singing songs, Armenian

699
00:42:45,392 --> 00:42:48,790
traditional songs to their wines that were

700
00:42:48,830 --> 00:42:52,454
aging in goddesses in the. On for us.

701
00:42:52,542 --> 00:42:56,022
Well, that's not an unusual thing. There's a winery in

702
00:42:56,126 --> 00:42:59,910
Sardinia or one of the islands there. And they did an

703
00:42:59,950 --> 00:43:03,702
experiment where they took two grapevines, they put them in rooms, they

704
00:43:03,726 --> 00:43:07,398
planted and watered them, and One of them, they played rock and roll

705
00:43:07,574 --> 00:43:11,286
and the other one, they played classical music. And according

706
00:43:11,358 --> 00:43:14,614
to this study, it was Bose, you know, the famous audio

707
00:43:14,662 --> 00:43:18,414
company. The grapes vine with the classical

708
00:43:18,462 --> 00:43:22,286
music grew closer to the speaker and the rock and roll

709
00:43:22,318 --> 00:43:26,094
one, blue, grew away from the speaker. And so this winery in I

710
00:43:26,102 --> 00:43:29,886
think it's Sardinia, has giant speakers in the vineyard

711
00:43:29,918 --> 00:43:33,742
that they play this music through. Do

712
00:43:33,766 --> 00:43:36,410
you think that the risk

713
00:43:37,670 --> 00:43:39,530
to embark in

714
00:43:41,360 --> 00:43:44,744
an appellation like Armenia and entire country is an

715
00:43:44,752 --> 00:43:48,280
appellation, let's call it, is greater than

716
00:43:48,400 --> 00:43:52,184
most places in the world to try and start something like this? Yes,

717
00:43:52,312 --> 00:43:55,192
I think so. Because. Because of the

718
00:43:55,216 --> 00:43:58,888
regional developments. Yes, because it's

719
00:43:58,984 --> 00:44:02,456
constantly. There is a constant, like something more,

720
00:44:02,528 --> 00:44:06,184
something happening, like something in the back here. Yes, there's always some backstory

721
00:44:06,232 --> 00:44:10,056
going on. There is. And the region of viad store

722
00:44:10,088 --> 00:44:13,898
that is the most. The main region when they grow grapes and

723
00:44:14,034 --> 00:44:17,590
make wine is very close to

724
00:44:18,210 --> 00:44:21,962
where this is all happening. I don't want to go into

725
00:44:22,066 --> 00:44:25,866
politics. Yeah, I understand that, but I. But that's an added

726
00:44:25,938 --> 00:44:29,162
risk to all the other headwinds of wine.

727
00:44:29,226 --> 00:44:32,986
Yes. And we're halfway across the world where, you know, even Georgian

728
00:44:33,018 --> 00:44:35,482
wines that have been around forever and they've been in America for a long time,

729
00:44:35,506 --> 00:44:38,042
they don't have this. They don't have a. A great foothold, they don't have a

730
00:44:38,066 --> 00:44:41,898
stronghold here. I've tasted very few, I've tasted almost

731
00:44:41,954 --> 00:44:45,770
zero Croatian wines, which are gorgeous while here in

732
00:44:45,810 --> 00:44:49,226
America. And so this is a long haul that we're

733
00:44:49,258 --> 00:44:53,066
into. It is. But Georgia, for example, they're

734
00:44:53,098 --> 00:44:56,630
doing a great job in marketing their wines. And because.

735
00:44:57,330 --> 00:45:00,874
Because the government is involved. That's right. They have the government

736
00:45:00,962 --> 00:45:04,580
support. Unfortunately, Armenian wines don't. Why?

737
00:45:04,700 --> 00:45:07,908
I don't know. It's a good question. Yeah. No one's ever told you the answer

738
00:45:07,924 --> 00:45:11,280
to that or no one's ever asked the question? I don't know. But as

739
00:45:11,740 --> 00:45:15,588
for me, it has to be one of the priorities for the government because

740
00:45:15,644 --> 00:45:19,444
it's something that represents the country. One of the

741
00:45:19,452 --> 00:45:22,772
things that represents the. Country, it's only a 50 million dollar industry. I mean

742
00:45:22,796 --> 00:45:26,372
that's some winers. One winery in California is much

743
00:45:26,476 --> 00:45:29,988
Opus is larger than that. Yeah. And there's only 17,000

744
00:45:30,044 --> 00:45:33,802
hectares, what about 40,000 acres? And that's. Oregon has more

745
00:45:33,826 --> 00:45:37,030
than that. California is 11 times that.

746
00:45:37,810 --> 00:45:41,114
But it's an interesting problem and I had a gentleman in, Mr.

747
00:45:41,162 --> 00:45:44,890
Booker, and he's part of the Washington State Commission,

748
00:45:45,010 --> 00:45:48,842
which is a government commission on wine and what

749
00:45:48,866 --> 00:45:52,218
the commission does. And I want your opinion of applying this

750
00:45:52,274 --> 00:45:55,882
methodology to Armenia. The commission, the government commission

751
00:45:55,986 --> 00:45:59,824
taxes the farmers 2 tons, whatever the

752
00:45:59,832 --> 00:46:03,520
price is per ton. You pick 10 tons, you're going to pay this tax.

753
00:46:03,640 --> 00:46:07,232
They take that tax, they put it in a pool of money and

754
00:46:07,256 --> 00:46:10,260
then there's a consortium of vintners,

755
00:46:10,920 --> 00:46:14,656
all Washington vintners that get together and decide

756
00:46:14,688 --> 00:46:18,080
what to do with the money, how to market the region, how to get

757
00:46:18,120 --> 00:46:21,900
people other parts of the country to learn about what they do.

758
00:46:23,240 --> 00:46:26,970
You think there's any chance that an Armenian wine

759
00:46:27,050 --> 00:46:29,630
group would allow themselves to be taxed?

760
00:46:31,570 --> 00:46:35,322
It's. It's a hard question. That's a tough question, right? It is. There is a

761
00:46:35,346 --> 00:46:38,602
foundation. There is a Armenian vine and wine

762
00:46:38,666 --> 00:46:42,410
foundation that is. I think it's a government organization.

763
00:46:42,490 --> 00:46:46,202
Yeah, it is. Who does overseas some parts of

764
00:46:46,226 --> 00:46:50,010
the operation. I know they're doing stuff, but I mean, I don't see

765
00:46:50,050 --> 00:46:53,884
that big support that the other countries like Georgia has.

766
00:46:54,042 --> 00:46:57,352
And then also all these wines that are left in

767
00:46:57,456 --> 00:47:01,064
Artsakh and now are considered Azerbaijani wines.

768
00:47:01,192 --> 00:47:03,500
I am constantly seeing

769
00:47:04,400 --> 00:47:07,864
advertisements on my social media talking

770
00:47:07,912 --> 00:47:11,368
about Azerbaijani wines. Those are not

771
00:47:11,424 --> 00:47:14,776
really. Yes. So they started already. They're doing

772
00:47:14,928 --> 00:47:18,472
things with it. They're marketing it as their own. Obviously it's not

773
00:47:18,496 --> 00:47:22,312
theirs. No. Right. Yeah, yeah. It's all the wineries that we left there. But

774
00:47:22,496 --> 00:47:26,300
so this is. Again, I didn't know that. That's really sad. Yeah. And also

775
00:47:26,340 --> 00:47:29,532
we have Turkish wine going on too,

776
00:47:29,636 --> 00:47:33,340
and they're pretty big. And only once

777
00:47:33,380 --> 00:47:35,160
I read in an article

778
00:47:37,300 --> 00:47:40,600
where a winemaker is admitting that

779
00:47:40,900 --> 00:47:44,748
before the genocide. Well, obviously he's not saying the word, but he's

780
00:47:44,764 --> 00:47:48,460
saying that before there were Armenians and Greeks who were

781
00:47:48,500 --> 00:47:52,298
growing grapes and making wine there. I was like, okay, at least. Thank

782
00:47:52,314 --> 00:47:55,994
you for being honest. Some recognition there. Some recognition,

783
00:47:56,042 --> 00:47:59,834
yes. I'd never known about. I mean certainly everybody knows about the Persian wines

784
00:47:59,882 --> 00:48:03,642
and Chateau Musar and stuff like that. Yeah. But. But I never. We went

785
00:48:03,666 --> 00:48:07,418
to our Armenian restaurant in, in San Francisco that was only a short lived

786
00:48:07,434 --> 00:48:11,034
restaurant, but they had an incredible list and I didn't recognize anything. And there were

787
00:48:11,042 --> 00:48:14,186
a lot of Turkish wines on that list. This is probably 10 years ago.

788
00:48:14,338 --> 00:48:15,670
Restaurant's gone now.

789
00:48:17,730 --> 00:48:21,338
The had a question. I forgot what it was. This happens

790
00:48:21,354 --> 00:48:24,630
quite frequently in my, my tenure here.

791
00:48:26,130 --> 00:48:29,754
The wine, the wine process. You know, one of the things too that's important in

792
00:48:29,762 --> 00:48:33,290
the wine world is when

793
00:48:33,330 --> 00:48:36,890
Vaya was telling me about the price and drums.

794
00:48:36,970 --> 00:48:40,746
Yes. Of grapes. And I was, it was a. I was Having a panic

795
00:48:40,778 --> 00:48:44,398
attack because it was not even a tenth of what. What

796
00:48:44,454 --> 00:48:47,870
grapes cost in America. And so you kind of

797
00:48:47,910 --> 00:48:51,742
think that, you know, those wines should be inexpensive. You know,

798
00:48:51,766 --> 00:48:55,582
they. If it costs. The grapes are so little, you know, price wise, but

799
00:48:55,606 --> 00:48:59,422
all the other costs to get them to America, it's huge now. Yeah.

800
00:48:59,486 --> 00:49:03,086
It becomes a big, big number. And so to get an armenian wine

801
00:49:03,118 --> 00:49:06,750
that's 30 or $40 retail, and this is the general problem in

802
00:49:06,790 --> 00:49:10,616
wine, even the wines in that painting. If I already

803
00:49:10,688 --> 00:49:14,488
know that I can buy a Duckhorn Merlot for 60 bucks or 40

804
00:49:14,544 --> 00:49:18,072
bucks, why am I going to risk buying an

805
00:49:18,096 --> 00:49:21,752
Armenian wine in that price range? And if you don't

806
00:49:21,896 --> 00:49:25,464
have any idea about. No one tells you about it. Yeah. You have to

807
00:49:25,552 --> 00:49:29,400
try and see what it is. And you cannot really go and buy a

808
00:49:29,440 --> 00:49:32,840
wine that is even more like 60 or 80 bucks

809
00:49:33,000 --> 00:49:36,632
and just try it. Not this consumer,

810
00:49:36,696 --> 00:49:40,472
not this age, not. Not right now. I will say there's two things

811
00:49:40,496 --> 00:49:44,232
that have happened that I thought were very encouraging. One is particularly here

812
00:49:44,256 --> 00:49:48,072
in Los Angeles where the wholesale brands. Consolidation of the

813
00:49:48,096 --> 00:49:51,832
wholesalers has been very difficult on most brands. And, you know, in

814
00:49:51,856 --> 00:49:55,544
order to get a wine, for instance, if Voskavas was here and they wanted to

815
00:49:55,552 --> 00:49:58,824
be in the Southern wines and spirits book, it'd be almost impossible. And even if

816
00:49:58,832 --> 00:50:02,520
they were in it, they wouldn't sell any because it's up to the

817
00:50:02,560 --> 00:50:06,410
supplier, the winery to go out and shop these things. That they're basically just

818
00:50:06,450 --> 00:50:10,282
become trucking companies for these. For these brands. But there are two

819
00:50:10,306 --> 00:50:14,058
or three smaller distributors in Los Angeles that are not Armenian, they're

820
00:50:14,074 --> 00:50:17,434
not Middle Eastern distributors that carry Armenian

821
00:50:17,482 --> 00:50:21,146
brands. And that's very encouraging. Yes, because that means that

822
00:50:21,218 --> 00:50:24,346
made them pass the. The tasting panels of these companies.

823
00:50:24,418 --> 00:50:28,058
Massanoise is one of them. Garber is another one. That

824
00:50:28,114 --> 00:50:31,594
these are independent small distributors out there shaking the

825
00:50:31,602 --> 00:50:35,046
tree that have. Have French, Italians,

826
00:50:35,238 --> 00:50:38,854
Biodynamic, you know, all the things in their book. And that's a very encouraging

827
00:50:38,902 --> 00:50:41,890
thing to happen. Sure.

828
00:50:43,070 --> 00:50:46,902
A couple of weeks ago, I was talking to someone

829
00:50:47,006 --> 00:50:50,790
from Wyoming and she was telling me that she

830
00:50:50,830 --> 00:50:54,598
was representing a chef that. Who couldn't be at the meeting because

831
00:50:54,654 --> 00:50:58,374
of some things that happened. So she was telling

832
00:50:58,422 --> 00:51:02,262
me that they have a wine store there next to their restaurants.

833
00:51:02,406 --> 00:51:06,210
And she was asking me what was the. What is the good

834
00:51:06,250 --> 00:51:09,986
Armenian wine to have? Because they have all these wines from different

835
00:51:10,058 --> 00:51:13,762
parts of the world that are not very common in

836
00:51:13,786 --> 00:51:17,202
the market. So that was interesting. That's in Wyoming. In

837
00:51:17,226 --> 00:51:20,834
Wyoming, yeah. I Want to, because everybody's leaving California and going to

838
00:51:20,842 --> 00:51:23,954
Wyoming, so they have to have better wines. I don't know. But it's going to

839
00:51:23,962 --> 00:51:27,762
be cool. Pretty cool, actually. I think Ven Yakubian brought that up the

840
00:51:27,786 --> 00:51:31,586
other night, that Yakuban Hobbs is in. In Wyoming somewhere. Really?

841
00:51:31,658 --> 00:51:35,418
Yeah. That's cool. But that would be because of Hobbes. Part,

842
00:51:35,474 --> 00:51:39,290
I think I actually made a joke about that, which I said this

843
00:51:39,330 --> 00:51:43,130
Jacobian Hobbes. And actually, that's another very important point. And we're almost

844
00:51:43,170 --> 00:51:46,666
out of time. Actually, we're out of time, but. Oh, we are that,

845
00:51:46,818 --> 00:51:50,202
you know, Paul Hobbs, one of the famed enologists in the world. And

846
00:51:50,226 --> 00:51:53,594
typically a guy like him, you know, he goes out and helps for a fee

847
00:51:53,642 --> 00:51:56,714
and gets you on your feet. But in this case, he put his name on

848
00:51:56,722 --> 00:51:59,994
the bottle and that was a very encouraging and very important thing. I mean, make.

849
00:52:00,082 --> 00:52:03,882
I go, I said something like, but he's dealing with Armenian, so

850
00:52:03,906 --> 00:52:07,194
he's the second name. It's not Hobson Yakubian, it's

851
00:52:07,242 --> 00:52:11,082
Yakubian and Hobs. No, it's. It's very cool. But the

852
00:52:11,106 --> 00:52:14,522
other enologist, I mean, probably better known, is

853
00:52:14,626 --> 00:52:18,202
Michelle Ron. And he was in there with Theirans. Yes.

854
00:52:18,266 --> 00:52:22,106
And this is an important part of. Of the Armenian wine

855
00:52:22,138 --> 00:52:25,630
culture as well. Michelle Rolant tells Juliana,

856
00:52:26,240 --> 00:52:30,040
you can grow grapes here, it's the right conditions, but

857
00:52:30,080 --> 00:52:33,380
we won't know for a hundred years. And

858
00:52:33,760 --> 00:52:37,352
this will be our final thought. The reason that that is is because

859
00:52:37,456 --> 00:52:41,176
it takes 100 years of all the different emaciations of terroir and picking

860
00:52:41,208 --> 00:52:43,624
conditions and all the things that go on in the world of wine and the

861
00:52:43,712 --> 00:52:47,464
soil nutrients, to understand what is what, what's going to

862
00:52:47,472 --> 00:52:51,266
be developed from those vineyards. And

863
00:52:51,338 --> 00:52:54,710
that's where the world has a head start on us. I mean, the Russians,

864
00:52:55,210 --> 00:52:59,042
the USSR stagnated all of that. There was no

865
00:52:59,066 --> 00:53:02,910
technology, there was no vineyard management, there was. Nobody cared. And so.

866
00:53:03,210 --> 00:53:06,642
And my point the other night was, wow, we did really well in the short

867
00:53:06,666 --> 00:53:10,290
amount of time we've done to describe what can

868
00:53:10,330 --> 00:53:13,874
happen and produce wines. And Mariam Sagathalian, in a

869
00:53:13,882 --> 00:53:17,644
conversation, you know who she is, said an interesting

870
00:53:17,692 --> 00:53:21,516
thing. And I. And I think the other night the wine sort of

871
00:53:21,668 --> 00:53:25,404
focused on this subject, that is, we really don't know what Odeny

872
00:53:25,452 --> 00:53:28,716
is. We haven't grown it enough in enough different

873
00:53:28,788 --> 00:53:32,188
conditions and play with enough, because you only get one chance a year to figure

874
00:53:32,204 --> 00:53:36,044
it out, to understand what this grape is, until

875
00:53:36,132 --> 00:53:39,916
the Milani Oni Stainless steel otany

876
00:53:39,948 --> 00:53:43,286
I had the other night, and until it. It reeked

877
00:53:43,318 --> 00:53:46,838
of something other than all the other grapes I've ever tasted.

878
00:53:47,014 --> 00:53:50,326
So we have. Which is great gold vines, important deep

879
00:53:50,358 --> 00:53:54,182
roots, very expressive of where they're grown. You know, we

880
00:53:54,206 --> 00:53:57,610
get the full nutrients of deeper roots.

881
00:53:58,110 --> 00:54:01,558
But, you know, vinification techniques, all the things that go behind

882
00:54:01,694 --> 00:54:05,446
producing that bottle of wine that represents what it's

883
00:54:05,478 --> 00:54:09,302
supposed to represent. So the opposite case. And this is why this

884
00:54:09,326 --> 00:54:13,026
sort of the. Where we're at with the Armenian wines. There's a guy in. In

885
00:54:13,178 --> 00:54:16,834
Missouri who's been trying to propagate what American

886
00:54:16,922 --> 00:54:20,242
varietals there were. There were no vinnis vinifera varietals, but there

887
00:54:20,266 --> 00:54:24,002
were Venus Lambrusca varietals. And I told him, I

888
00:54:24,026 --> 00:54:27,602
said, this is almost an impossible task for you because you're dealing with

889
00:54:27,626 --> 00:54:31,330
grapes that no one's ever heard of, that they haven't been grown for 100 years.

890
00:54:31,370 --> 00:54:34,274
They're just. You've got remnants of them, and you're putting them in an area that

891
00:54:34,282 --> 00:54:37,510
no one's ever grown grapes in before. And so there's so many variables. I don't.

892
00:54:37,620 --> 00:54:41,282
You may never figure it out. So here you've got a 100-year-old

893
00:54:41,306 --> 00:54:45,154
vine. So at least we know that the vine is producing grapes. That's

894
00:54:45,202 --> 00:54:48,786
going to be good. Yes. Good for what it is and

895
00:54:48,938 --> 00:54:52,210
expressive for where it is. And now we have to learn the

896
00:54:52,250 --> 00:54:55,714
vinification techniques, which could take 20 vintages.

897
00:54:55,842 --> 00:54:59,602
Yes. And that's not cheap. It's not. It's. Especially for a

898
00:54:59,626 --> 00:55:02,590
country like Armenia that has no

899
00:55:03,510 --> 00:55:07,214
ways, not many ways, to get connected with the

900
00:55:07,222 --> 00:55:10,782
world because of its regional situation. Yeah. They say it takes eight

901
00:55:10,806 --> 00:55:13,742
hours, just at least from artsock, it took eight hours just to get to the

902
00:55:13,766 --> 00:55:17,246
port. True. Yeah. I mean, that's a long bus ride.

903
00:55:17,358 --> 00:55:20,990
You never afford that in California. Yes. You know, you would just

904
00:55:21,030 --> 00:55:24,590
add too much to the price. Thank you for stopping me at

905
00:55:24,630 --> 00:55:28,446
Guinea Fest and saying hi and I got a chance to chat with you about

906
00:55:28,598 --> 00:55:32,110
all these things. I'm sure we'll have more to talk about in the next coming

907
00:55:32,150 --> 00:55:35,878
months and we'll talk again. Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure.

908
00:55:35,974 --> 00:55:38,630
Thank you for having me. Cheers. Cheers.