Wednesday, July 24, 2002

Last night at dinner at my neighbor�s house (the contractor), his wife was telling us about a little boy who drowned in a water reserve pool.

It seems that Esh Albert�s son, Esh Edo, took his son (Esh Albert�s grandson) to work with him to pick potatoes. During lunch, Esh Edo took his son swimming in a 3 meter deep reserve pool used for irrigation. Esh Edo�s son, who was 12 years old, didn�t know how to swim, so he held on to his father as he swam. According to Esh Edo, his son must have swallowed some water and while he was choking, he tightened his hold around his father�s neck, who then started to choke himself and to save himself, released the boy into the water. I guess Esh Edo�s lack of ability to swim and the panic was a bad combination, as his son drowned and went to the bottom of the pool. Esh Edo called for help and the people that came couldn�t swim, so they drained the pool and after an hour were able to recover the body.

For those of you that don�t know what �Esh� means, it means �jackass� and is a name that Albert and Edo have somehow earned years ago here in Martuni. I always thought it was just the locals being mean, but I guess something must have happened years ago to start all that talk. Well this generation will continue the habit of calling them Esh, but sadly it will stop with Edo, as his only son is now dead.

My contactor�s wife was really upset about this whole thing and said the boy was with his father to work to help out with the families living expenses. My contactor added that the boy was probably making 200 dram (less than 40 cents) a day. The wife said that 12 years ago, all children of that age were off on vacation this time of year and this would have never happened. I guess if the father had a decent paying job, maybe the need for that extra 200 dram a day would not have existed and the boy would be alive today. I guess these things do happen and we all have to go sometime. It�s just that this way is very hard to deal with.

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