Our 12th Garden Chat featured Thomas de Waal, a veteran journalist and writer specializing on South Caucasus and Eastern Europe. In the interview with our volunteer Marat Grigoryan, de Waal talked about his work and the developments in Nagorno-Karabakh and between Armenia and Azerbaijan in the fall of 2023.

Our tenth Garden Chat featured Mirkamran Huseynli, a PhD fellow at Vytautas Magnus University. In the interview with our co-director Arnold Alahverdian, Huseynli talked about Azerbaijani history textbooks and nationalism, the common notions of alterity (otherness) in the Azerbaijani society and how Armenians fit into that picture.

Oğul Tuna joined Andrea for a chat about his research and views on history and politics regarding Armenians and Azerbaijanis, Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Our third Tət-à-Tեt #3 Raffi Chilingirian is a talented duduk player residing in Beirut, who joined Uli Nasibova in Los Angeles for a conversation about the duduk and about similar and shared musical styles, instruments, and traditions among Armenians, Azerbaijanis, and other peoples in the region. Raffi started the conversation with a masterful and touching performance of Sari Aghjik / Sarı Gəlin.

Our second Roundtable was an engaging discussion with Javid Agha, who answered the questions of our audience about society, politics, identity, history and minorities, with a few questions on Udis and Caucasian Albanians as well.

Garo Paylan is a former Turkish-Armenian MP and a founding member of HDP (People’s Democratic Party) in Turkey. He is an outspoken voice about politics, human rights and civil society in regards to Turkey, Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Paylan joined us for our first Roundtable, a virtual space dedicated to audience interaction special guests.

Our second Tət-à-Tեt features Collectif Medz Bazar, a band with musicians of Armenian, Turkish, American and French descent based in Paris. With their multicultural background, their music not only expresses a lot of these different influences but also spreads a message of fraternity between peoples. In this interview, our collaborator Deniz Aslan interviewed them to ask them about their history, goals, backstages and the messages of Vodki, and what's next in store for them.

Our meeting #15, "LGBTQ+ people and the war", featured queer activists from Azerbaijan and Armenia, Aykhan Osmanli and Kelly Hovhannisyan. They discussed the pressing issues LGBTQ+ people face in both countries, the impact of the armed conflict on queer people and the possibility of cross-border solidarity.

The illustration in the photo was made by Lili Nazarov for feministpeacecollective.com

In Part 2 of the meeting between Ülviyyə Nasibova and Arnold Alahverdian, Uli first describes her experiences having taken part in Imagine Dialogue, a dialogue initiative which includes programs involving Azerbaijanis and Armenians and recounts her time studying Caucasian Albanians back in 2004, when this was not yet a popular topic among Azerbaijanis.

Our first Tәt-à-Tեt, featuring Uli Nasibova and Arnold Alahverdian, took place on October 2021.

Originally from Azerbaijan, Uli is the owner of Uli's Gelato in LA. In Part 1 of this interview, she shares her families' experiences through the first war, her daily life with Armenians in LA, and views on the conflict.