On February 24, 2018, the aesthetics club adjunct to the Alexander Mantashev Educational Cultural Youth Center of the Armenian Diocese in Georgia (teacher Marietta Apetyan) organized a festive event dedicated to International Mother Language Day. The Center’s students recited in mother language poem of the Armenian Greats dedicated to the Armenian language. They not only beautifully recited in Armenian, but sang Armenian songs and performed Armenian dances, which they had learned in the “Aghbyur” Choir (choirmaster Ruzanna Ovanisyan) and in the Dance Group Hegnar (Choreographer Marietta Poghosyan).

The hall had been festively decorated for the occasion. Guests in attendance, the children’s parents and relatives, the Center’s administration, teachers, as well as representatives of the Armenian community of Batumi, enjoyed themselves at the children’s performance and exhibition that was organized by the students of the same aesthetics club who presented their art works. The occasion was honored with the presence of Pastor of the the Surb Prkich Church (Saint Savior) in Batumi, Rev. Father Ararat Gumbalyan.

The Center’s Director Sona Hovhannisyan highly valued the event, as an expression of love of the children who have strayed far from their roots for the mother language, exhorted the Center’s students to keep learning the mother language. The works of the aesthetics club’s students she valued as an expression of love for mother language and motherland created by child’s imagination.

In his closing remarks, Rev. Father Ararat Gumbalyan appreciated the works of the aesthetic club’s students. Father Ararat highlighted the work of the Alexander Mantashev Center, located far from Armenia, the purpose of which is to preserve the national identity, bring Armenians of Batumi closer to their roots and mother language.

At the conclusion of the event the aesthetic club’s tutor and parents expressed their gratitude.