The British Ambassador is sitting next to me. After a few days in Armenia the nights all blur into one long party. The only certainty is that brandy was involved.
Armenian brandy slides down the throat as smoothly as a juicy slice of fruit.
Taking a slug is like picking a grape off a bunch. One is never enough. At one end of the long, dim cellar is the wierd mournful wail of Armenian music, four men playing clarinets like Acker Bilk considering suicide, while a fifth man beats a Grim Reaper rhythm on a drum resembling an Irish bodhran. Armenians have got much to be mournful about and it comes out in the music, which makes Leonard Cohen sound like The Laughing Policeman. In fact it's the Armenian group from the table at the other end of the room.