IHP Annual Alumni Reunion + Please Touch Museum visit
On May 18th , I organized my first alumni reunion in my role as Alumni Relations Director and I am happy to report that it was a big success ! Over 20 alumni and friends gathered together to share a lovely brunch catered by Assad Khoury from the restaurant Kuzina by Sofia .
Brunch consisted of a buffet keeping with the theme of the Global Gala , Treasures of Armenia , which took place later that day . The food was great , but the best part of the morning was the reminiscing about times spent in the house and trading fun anecdotes with the current residents . It is incredible to see how their experiences mirror those of many of us who lived in the house even over 30 years ago !
A funny anecdote happened when Jonathan Gaev arrived at the reunion . Jonathan is an alumnus from the 80s and has continued his involvement with IHP in different capacities throughout the years . When he arrived he was pleasantly surprised to find our caterer and went straight to greet him at the chef-manned station . They started laughing loudly and cheerily , and I got curious to find out how they knew each other . I found out that Jonathan Gaev has a tradition of taking his mom out to lunch every Saturday at the Kuzina by Sofia restaurant in Cherry Hill . This particular Saturday , Jon thought it was OK to miss Assad ’ s food in order to make it to the IHP alumni reunion . Well , he ended up still having Assad ’ s food for lunch !
I didn ’ t know it , but Jonathan and Assad have been good friends for many years . This was such a great coincidence and added an element of surprise and camaraderie to the event that I could not have planned .
A fun fact about Assad is that his sister Anastasia Khoury , is an IHP alumna from 1979 and this is how we were connected to Assad in the first place !
The alumni reunion was a great opportunity to see familiar faces and also meet a few new ones . In fact , some of our young alumni came with brand new additions to their families and it was a chance to introduce these generations to each other . Julio Correa ( IHP 98-02 ) from Colombia and George Khalaf ( IHP 00-03 ) from Syria , were there with their babies Briana and Dean who have birthdays just a couple months apart . They said that they are looking forward for their children to grow up with an extended international family . For these children , like for mine , an international circle of friends growing up will be the most natural thing in the world . In my case , my children ( who are Mexican-American and are growing up bilingual in Spanish and English ) consider our friends from International House their extended family . Their favorite “ cousins ” are the children of Cigdem Ogutveren ( IHP 00-03 ) from Turkey and Richard Knebel ( IHP 01-03 ) from Norway . For my kids , having “ cousins ” who are Turkish-Norwegian- American is absolutely normal and provides an example of a multicultural family life like their own . A life where differences are cherished and celebrated , multilingualism is encouraged and international travel is part of growing up .
In order to accommodate the growing families of our young alumni , we also organized a trip to the Please Touch Museum after the brunch , during which time we caught up with even more friends like Clelia Lyra Battestelli ( IHP 96 ) and Eric Battestelli . This was a fun-filled day and we hope that next year more people will be able to make it down to Philly to celebrate with us .
The next alumni reunion is being planned for June 7 , 2014 ... so mark your calendars and start planning your trip to Philadelphia !
Sarvelia Peralta-Duran
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