But this church has a popular tradition that not to many other churches participate. Mostly because they are Armenian, partly because no one does it like them.
Every year in October the church, St. Johns, puts on a bazaar.
Now, most people have no clue where Armenia is, or that it even existed, let alone they have no idea what a bazaar (pronounced "bizarre") is.
The country Armenia is located right next to Turkey and is quite small. The country used to be very large, but after the Turkish nationalist movements in the 1940s, a large chunk of the land was taken and there was a mass genocide. This unfortunately has happened two or three times since then, mostly because Armenia is the only Christian country in the Middle East. Outside of St. Johns there is a memorial for all those who died in the latest genocide in the early 1990s.
A bazaar is a Middle Eastern market where merchants come to sell goods on the street, a lot like the mock markets seen in Indiana Jones and Aladdin.
The bazaar at St. Johns isn't a whole lot like those markets, but more so just an assembly line of food. The food is paid for per item.
Traditional Armenian food is like that of Greek or Moroccan food. Lamb is the common meat of choice, and everything seems to have a deep, supple and sweet taste to it. A lot of food in the Middle East and the Mediterranean region tends to overlap and blend together. Most Middle Eastern deserts almost always include the popular baklava which is, depending on the region, some sort of nut chopped up very fine and put in between layers of very thin sheets of dough.
The most popular of all the Armenian food is a dish called kufta (pronounced "koophta"). This is essentially large ground lamb meatballs. It contains two layers. The outer layer is just pure ground lamb and the filling is ground lamb mixed with spices, such as parsley, and pine nuts.
The church, in preparation for the bazaar which has picked up speed in the past couple of years, starts making kufta three months early. They made a batch of 5,000 kufta and ended up having to make more for the event. The church also put an industrial freezer in the back of the church kitchen.
They also have dolmades which are grape leaf rolls that are baked. Dolmade is the Arab word meaning something stuffed. They also have cheese berugs, which are basically apple turnovers, but instead of apple filling, they have a cheese and spice filling. I know, it doesn't sound that great, but take my word for it, it's delicious.
My dad has taken my brother and I every year as far back into my childhood as I can remember, and my grandparents have taken my dad and his three siblings there for as long as he can remember. Since I've been away at college, it's been a reason for me to go home and see the whole family.
And so, the tradition continues.
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