Laughing Together: Lessons from the Heart

It was early Summer, 2025 (Yerevan, Armenia) and my group carpet weaving classes with Hasmik were nearing their end. One evening, almost as an aside, she said to me:

“I have nothing left to teach you.”

I remember feeling a pang of sadness. Her classes were never only about weaving. They were a social anchor for me — a place where I could connect with people who shared a love for Armenian craft and culture. With Hasmik, conversations flowed easily: Armenia, people, carpet and rug weaving, traditions, everyday life. But as I thought about what she had said, I realized she had been teaching me far more than just knots and patterns.

Through her, I was learning what it meant to be Armenian.

Hasmik is a proud mother, wife, artist, folk arts master, and lawyer — a woman deeply rooted in who she is. I watched how she treated people, how former students returned just to see her, how she supported others even when no classes were running. She is a “light”; steady, warm, guiding without ever calling attention to the glow she gave off. Any question I had, weaving, craft, culture, or otherwise, she always had an answer.

So one day, I showed up to class with something new to ask.

“Hasmik,” I said, “there is something you can teach me. I want to learn the Kochari dance. Will you teach me?”

Kochari is the traditional Armenian circle dance I had watched entire crowds perform together — sometimes whole city squares moving in that same ancient rhythm. To me, it felt like something essential, something I wanted to understand from the inside.

Hasmik’s response caught me completely off guard. She gave a quiet smile, let out a small chuckle, and in a voice I’d never heard her use, said:

“I can’t teach you that. I don’t know how to dance.”

I blinked. What do you mean? You know everything!

We both burst into laughter. Afterward, we talked about Kochari dance, and she pointed me toward groups who could teach it.

But the moment stayed with me.

It wasn’t just that I had finally found something Hasmik didn’t know. It was that the realization revealed something deeper: even our teachers, even the people we admire and look up to, are human. And sometimes our “human-ness” creates a surprising connection — a sudden leveling where you both simply get to be people, not expert and student. It was a small moment, but one I’ll never forget. A funny little reminder that sometimes the most meaningful connections come from the moments in between the actual learning.