Country of Dust
Episodes
The Last Tonir
03 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
For our last episode of this season, we visit Vahandukht Melkonyan, the last resident of Kharkov – a village in the buffer zone between Armenia and ...
Rising Like a Phoenix
27 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Walk into the right basement on a Friday night, and you’ll see something that doesn’t happen anywhere else in Armenia - a drag show. Gigi Aries is...
When Home Stops Being Safe
20 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
We first did an episode with Gayane Milonyan in 2023 - the day after she and her family were forced to flee Artsakh. But we wanted to talk with her ag...
I Know How to Treat My Country
13 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Growing up, Nane Harutyunyan would never have touched a rifle. But after Armenia was defeated in the 2020 war, she felt like she had to be prepared to...
Homecoming
06 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Hasmik Varderesyan was born in Armenia, but moved to Turkey when she was two years old. Now she’s a teenager, she's moving back, and she's...
The Underground School
30 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Underneath an Armenian church in Istanbul, there’s a school that isn’t like any other. It’s a little slice of home for a group of migrant famili...
Daughter of the Crying Man
17 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This episode has a special companion video. An unexpected VHS in a Toronto basement leads to finding a branch of the family that has been lost for 60...
Bonus Episode: Something to do With Armenia
30 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Our podcast tells the stories of how Armenia is changing, but in this episode, we sat down to talk about how Armenia has changed each of us.Plus we ha...
Special Episode: My Land Feels so Sweet, but it’s Thirsty for Blood
03 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Gayane Milonyan, a mother of two, has just been forced to flee her home in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), along with over 100,000 people – the entire i...
These Bottles Have a Story
30 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Wine has been part of Armenia’s story since the beginning, and it can be a bridge from its ancient history, to the Soviet era, to today. In our fina...
Barev Dzez, Barev Dzez
22 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
After the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine, Armenia woke up with thousands of Russians moving here – escaping the draft, political crackdowns and eco...
I’m Just a Designer
15 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Ara Aslanyan designed one of the most iconic symbols of Armenia’s 2018 revolution - the dukhov hat. But he says he never cared about the movement, t...
I Want to Believe
08 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Mane Gevorgyan was Nikol Pashinyan’s press secretary during the most turbulent period of his premiership. She entered as part of a rockstar governme...
We Shall Prevail
01 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The nation’s hopes rose with the 2018 Velvet Revolution, then came crashing down during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War. Ruben Malayan is a calligraph...
We Don’t Talk About the Future
25 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Ashot Gabrielyan moved to an isolated village in Artsakh to work as a teacher after the 2020 war. He has loved living there, but repeated aggressions ...
Serving With a Rifle, and Then With a Pen (Part 2)
18 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, we delve deeper into Nikolay Stepanyan's personal journey during the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War, and hear his remarkable story of...
Serving With a Rifle, and Then With a Pen (Part 1)
11 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In our first episode, we introduce Nikolay Stepanyan, a young Armenian from Russia. We learn about the circumstances that shaped his life and that ult...
Introduction: Armenia as a Country of Dust
16 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Meet your hosts, listen to the poem that helped inspire our podcast, and hear why we think the best way to understand Armenia is by following the stor...