AYF Olympics Highlights, Detroit Wins at Home

I seem to never learn that it is nearly impossible to do everything, have fun which includes performing the Saturday picnic band, and still write an article on time. That is the AYF Olympics: lots of friends, family, food, athletics, kef, and sleep deprivation. None of the regular attendees would have it any other way.

Satuday Highlights from AYF Olympics

The Detroit and California softball teams

Saturday Softball and Picnic: Every day at the AYF Olympics is different. It used to be that Saturday was for track preliminaries but in recent years there has not been a need for preliminary races on a separate day. Co-ed Softball has become the athletics for Saturday. It has become an all-day event that has also turned into a picnic. When in Detroit, the picnic at the Softball games is a full-fledged picnic including kebab and live music.

This year the weather was perfect. It was in the low 80s and at times partly cloudy, mostly sunny, with a few threats of a storm that never materialized.

A scene from the baseball games

One of the highlights of the baseball game was Ari Alexanian of the Chicago Chapter. He had an unassisted triple play! He caught a line drive for one out. The base runners were moving, so he stepped on the bag for out number two and tagged the advancing runner for the third out. It was an exceptional play. Detroit and California played in the finals with Detroit prevailing. When it came time to take photos of the two teams, a fraternal spirit took over and there was just one large group photo. Look for more in-depth coverage of the Softball games in the forthcoming Olympics Special Issue of the Armenian Weekly.

Ari Alexanian, the triple-play man

In a sign of true genius, the Olympics Planning Committee had the same crew that made the delicious Agoump kebab referred to in the Thursday highlight article manning the grill again. The results were equally delicious to the point that there was always a line for food.

The band at the picnic was the Ara Topouzian Ensemble featuring Ara on kanun. Ara was joined by Mal Barsamian on clarinet, Mark Gavoor on oud and vocals, Tom Zakarian and Gerry Gerjekian on dumbeg. The music was definitely for the food and pavilion area but it also wafted over to the ball fields thus giving a distinctively subtle Armenian soundtrack to the softball games.

AYF counselors and staff dining together

After the games, we went to dinner at one of the great Arab eateries that are ubiquitous in Dearborn. It was a great and heartwarming pleasure to see a table of thirty plus AYFers. The counselors and staff of this summer’s Camp Haiastan season were all together. Very cool.

Saturday Night: Of late, the Saturday Night Dance has become the “new style” music night. We have had bands from L.A. and Armenia. We have heard well known singers like Harout Pamboukjian and Armenchik. As the Olympics have evolved and the attendee demographics have changed, it is important to cater to the two styles of Armenian music: old time and modern.

Khatchig Jingirian

Khatchig Jingirian and his band from California performed at the dance. Khatchig, with his rich resonant voice, can do it all. He has performed and recorded both old time and modern genres. That evening, the presentation was the contemporary style but they performed folk and folk dance music too. The back-up band of Vasken Karagozian (bass), Albert Bulbulian (keyboards), and Anto Ohanesian (drums) was very talented. The dance floor was full the entire evening with the average age of the dancers dropping every hour and there are many levels of interpretation to this statement.

Sunday Highlights from AYF Olympics

The weather reports all week long were calling for rain all day for Sunday, which would have certainly played havoc with the Track and Field portion of the Olympic Games. There is an old adage used in Detroit that states if you don’t like the weather here in Detroit just wait five minutes and it will change. Thankfully, it did change. Instead of rain, we got partly cloudy, hot, and humid. It was so hot and humid that shortly after the opening ceremonies, the crowd started to thin out. Nonetheless, the organizers, volunteers, and athletes persevered and the games went on without a hitch.

Four-hundred meter medalists Tamar Changelian (Detroit), Tarvis Hintlian (Providence), and Shayna McCarthy (New Jersey)

There were over 15 teams competing at the 81^st Annual Games. Coming into Sunday, Detroit and Providence were close. Philadelphia was nipping at their heels. There were also two improved teams with a lot of team spirit: Worcester and New Jersey.

Top Four Teams

Detroit
Providence
New Jersey
Philadelphia

The Pentathlon winners were repeats of 2013. Knar Topouzian (Detroit) won the Women’s and Vigen Sarkisov (Greater Boston) took the Men’s side. The Ernest Nahigian Sportsmanship Award was presented to Haigan Tcholakian and Peter Crane, both of Detroit. The most improved chapter was Worcester. There were five high scorers:

Women

Ariana Chipolone, N.J.
Lynne Tutunjian, Providence
Tarvis Hintlian, Providence

Men

Stephen Tutunjian, Providence
Andrew Hintlian, Providence

It is the first time in AYF history that two pairs of brothers and sisters were high scorers. Kudos to the Tutunjian and Hintlian families!

At the award ceremonies, all the award and trophy winners were happy and excited about their accomplishments. Certainly, the Detroit chapter was very happy and proud to win the entire Olympics. It must be noted that Worcester was equally delighted to have been named the Most Improved Chapter. One could have easily thought that New Jersey won the games, given their exuberance about their third place showing.

Olympic Kings Alex and Steve reading the Oath to the athletes

This year, two Olympics Kings were named: Alex Sarafian and Steve Panosian. Both, in their day were stalwart athletes that contributed to, in Steve’s case, the emergence of the Detroit Koppernick Tandourjian Chapter as a national power and a team to be taken seriously, and in Alex’s case, winning and retiring cups. Steve was the first swimmer that not only swam in high school but belonged to a club that swam and competed year-round. As a result, Steve was the best swimmer the AYF had seen as of 1970, when he swam at the Montreal Olympics. Since, Steve set the tone, the AYF has seen some great swimmers several of which were serious college swimmers. Steve was the waterfront and swim counselor at Camp Haiastan. Alex was a member of the University of Michigan Track Team and, as an AYF member, did the field events and pentathlons amassing 90 points in his career. He has been on the Olympic Governing Body as well as having organized and coached the Detroit team to several victories.

The Olympic Ball was exactly what it was supposed to be. It was a fun and fraternal celebration of the Olympics, all the athletes, winners and runners-up alike, and the AYF spirit in general. There was a live photo presentation. People were posting photos on Instagram and Twitter with #ayfolympics and seconds later the photo was on the big screen. This went on the entire evening. The classic big band of Hachig Kazarian, Mal Barsamian, John Berberian, Onnik Dinkjian, Jason Naroyan, Michael Kazarian, and Ara Dinkjian had everyone up and moving. It was a great AYF evening and a wonderful capstone to the weekend.

Old friends Ara Topouzian and Norman Vartanian

It was a successful Olympics and thanks go out to the Olympic Steering Committee for the outstanding job they did making everything happen not only on-time and without glitches but expertly coordinated and well planned. There must have been all kinds of issues behind the scenes but none were apparent to anyone outside the Committee.

Thank you for a job very well done:

Adi Assadoorian
Vahan Bagdasarian
Laurie Dakesian
Armen Derderian
Michael Kazarian
Ralph Kourtjian
Ara Markarian
Alidz Oshagan
Ara Topouzian
Simoné Topouzian