AZERBAIJAN IN HOUSTON

"Ordinary people can accomplish much more than diplomats" to establish efficient intercultural ties.  The Association of the Sister Cities of Houston and Baku is an example of building this type of an international dialogue.  The organization is headed by Irada xanim Axundova, an Azeri living in the USA.  Irada xanim visits Azerbaijan for at least a few weeks every year to see her family, tackle work-related issues and simply see her motherland.  This year, Irada xanim also arrived in Baku to take part in the III Congress of the World's Azeris, which was held in Baku on 5 July.  R+ discusses Baku and Houston, the work of the association and many other matters with Irada Axundova.

- The third Congress of the World's Azerbaijanis was held recently, and you took part in it.  What is your assessment of the event?  Can we say today that the Azerbaijani diaspora is growing stronger and becoming influential?

- For Azeris who live abroad, it was an important event.  It provides us with the opportunity to meet one another and communicate.  I have met many people thanks to the event.  It is an opportunity to share news, joys and problems, discuss plans and discuss joint projects.  I would very much like all the American organizations which are connected with Azerbaijan to unite and cooperate among one another.  After all, we all have the same objective:  To popularize our Motherland and promote its interests.  But our diaspora has one major problem - that of unity.  True, everyone always has problems.  But they seem easier and are easier to address when we are together.  When we are together, all difficulties are easier to deal with.  Unfortunately, the Azerbaijani diaspora is not that influential yet because every organization of the diaspora wishes to see itself as a leader.  I think that the explanation is simple:  The diaspora is very young - we are only 10 years old.  It is just a begging of it all.  Time will come when we will be saying with pride that we have outgrown this difficult moment of our development.

- How come Houston and Baku have become sister cities?  How was the association of which you are the head created?

- Its history starts in the 1960s, when the relations between the USSR and the USA were very tense.  It was the Cold War era.  That was when President Eisenhower started the sister city movement to bring peoples closer to each other.  Of course, diplomats do the official work of establishing relations between countries, but ordinary people can accomplish much more.  The main office of the movement is in Washington, and subsidiaries have been created in all the states of the USA.  It is a US nongovernmental organization staffed by volunteers.  In other words, we are part of the table of organization of the mayor's office, but in reality we work as volunteers.  Houston is on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and is considered a city of oil industry, where many oil companies are headquartered.  In the early 1970s, there lived in Houston an oil tycoon Douwe De Vries, who was a very wealthy and much-respected person.  He used to visit Baku frequently on business.  The mayor of Houston asked him to head the sister cities initiative and asked him which city he would like to have relations with.  Douwe De Vries chose Baku.  So, it all began with business relations.  Later, already in 1976, the heads of these cities met, and the memorandum of cooperation was signed.

- Tell us, please, about the association you are heading.  When and how it all began?

- The association of the Houston's sister cities has the history of 35 years.  It is one of the first official US organizations with connections in Azerbaijan.  I have been heading it from 2006.  It so happened that my husband Eduard Mammadov - a researcher and specialists in the field of designing catalysts for petrochemical reactions - was invited in 1996 to Houston, where he was appointed head of a research lab for catalysis.  Before that, we lived for several years in Spain and Saudi Arabia.  When we moved to Houston, I started to look for Azeris there and formed a group so that we could spend time together.  An activist by nature, I created a "Houston oasis" of Azerbaijani hospitality, as my friends once told me.  Today, there are about 250 Azeri families in Houston, most of whom are employed by oil companies.  We have created our little Azerbaijan in Houston.  When I was a school kid, I heard all the time that Houston and Baku are sister cities, so when I moved to the USA as an adult, the first thing I started to do was looking for contacts to meet people who were involved in this activity.  Back then, I met with late Rafiq Quliyev, a mathematician who sent me to the Houston mayor's office and explained what I had to do to be useful in this matter.  Although I did go to the mayor's office back then, I was not taken seriously.  The association back then was headed by an Iranian, and my most sincere attempts to put forth efforts and emotions into promoting relations between the two cities and revamp the organization were perceived as "attempts to seize power."  But eventually, the city's mayor's office invited us, the most active Azeris living in Houston, including myself, and asked us to "revive" the branch of our diaspora - the Houston-Baku:  Sister cities association.

Sara Rosin, an Americna whom I knew from the times when she implemented her medical projects at the republican hospital in Baku, became the president of the association, and I was invited as a vice president.  I was initially afraid that I would not manage.  But Mr Hafiz Pasayev, Azerbaijani ambassador to the USA, told me words of support:  "If not you with your energy, then who?  How many interesting events you have organized at home!  You can work on a larger scale too, I will be helping you."  Some time later, Sara told me that she wanted to give me control of the association.

I do not want to brag, but among the 16 sister towns, we are the most active.  Houston Mayor Annise Parker and Consul Mary Jarvis Johnson called us volunteer Azerbaijani ambassadors in Houston.  We started off with Saida Haqverdi and Riyad Afandi.  We have a good team of very different interesting people - Maude Beck, Xanim Aziz, Mehriban Afandiyeva, Sattis Harla and others.  Despite the fact that all these people work, and most of them in the oil sector, they find time to take part in the association's work.  We are all a close-knit group.

- Was it not difficult for you to bring together our countrymen abroad?

- I am very proud that we live like one big family there.  Most of the Azeris living in Texas know one another and socialize.  There is no Azeri in Houston whom I would not know or who would not know me.  Despite the fact that we live quite far away from one another - the shortest distance is 40 minutes of driving - we often meet or visit one another.  Incidentally, our organization's members are not only ethnic Azeris, but also other nationals, for example, Indians, Dutch, or Americans - they are all people who love Azerbaijan, and you cannot even imagine what work they do for our country.  What attracts them is that they have heard about Azerbaijan and they know that our organization was - and remains - the most active among the 16 others working with sister cities.  For example, this year we are celebrating our 35th anniversary, and Mayor Annise Parker officially awarded a commendation to us at an official reception at a meeting of the regional consuls in the Mayor's Office building.  It thanked us for the activity in work and for achievement of the organization's goals.  Of course, there is always the desire to organize something, but wishes cannot always be fulfilled.  Officially, we are registered as a US NGO and can get involved in any type of social activism.  The only thing we cannot do is politics.  This is why all events which are organized within the framework of our charter are welcome and highly valued by the authorities.

- It is known that the association takes part in the annual international festival in Houston and represents Azerbaijan.  Tell us about the latest festival.

- Indeed, and when we organize the international festival during which we represent our country, we, together with other organizers, go to schools and tell children about Azerbaijan, show them films, present books to them.  Sometimes our dancers arrive for the festival, and they always delight the visitors.  The number of visitors is usually between 15,000 and 30,000.  This year, the Azerbaijani Culture and Tourism Ministry sent the delegation of 29 people.  Professional dancers arrived.  Americans were greatly impressed with their original ethnic dresses and amazing performance.  People often come to us after events and thank us.  Thanks to our close connections with Houston's Grand Opera, the "West-South" piece was performed there.  To accomplish this, an opera was commission from Azerbaijani composer Firangiz Alizada.  In May 2011, F. Alizada's opera "Your Name is Sea" was staged by Houston Opera.  It was a combination of the Western classical music and Azerbaijani mugam.  The opera was staged on three consecutive days at different stages of the city with great success and at the Turkic House in Houston.  We do our duty to Azerbaijan and pride ourselves with this.

- What other events do you plan to organize this year?

- The holy month of Ramadan is to begin soon, and we plan to organize traditional open iftar dinners.  The main idea is to demonstrate how tolerant our religion is, especially after the 9/11, and to demonstrate that Islam does not mean terrorism.  We organized this type of event a few years ago for the first time.  Later, other sister cities decided to follow suit.  Then we started to organize these events together with Turks.  It is much simpler for them because the Turkish cultural center, Turkic House, is a large three-story building with large rooms where different large-scale events can be organized.  They can invite more American guests.  Of course, Americans form their opinion about the country when they see this kind of luxury.  Unfortunately, we have no such resources, so we gather in cafes, at our homes or elsewhere.  Yes, we were given a small room, so that we too can meet, but if there are more than three people, it is already crowded, so we rarely use it.

- So who finances the Turkic House?  State or sponsors?

- It can be sponsors, and it can be state.  Because there are wealthy Turkish businessmen who live in Houston and who invest in the culture center.  But I think that state too takes part in this because the staffers of the Turkish association are paid salaries.  At present, my greatest dream is creation of a large Azerbaijani cultural center in Houston.  But these are just plans, and there is nothing specific yet.

- Overall, what is Americans' attitude toward Azerbaijanis?

- We are always received well, very warmly and wholeheartedly.  During festivals, they dance yallas, sing our songs, they remain after the official part and ask many questions about the country.  We are friends not only with Azeri, but also American families, so the Azerbaijani-American relations are great.

- You said that you have no right to be involved in politics, but I think that the association could not avoid the problem of Nagorno-Karabakh to tell Americans the truth about the conflict…

- Yes, we cannot get involved in politics, and we have no right to come up with political issues.  But as Azerbaijanis, we have a duty to our Motherland.  We meet with congressmen, write official letters.  The Senate of Texas recently recognized the genocide in Xocali.  All this is accomplished by us, ordinary people, and this is our success.  As an association, we also do not sit on our hands.  We have an awareness program for these issues.  We read lectures on the Azerbaijani history at least 2-3 times a year at universities.  We do not do lobbying, but we show people films about Azerbaijan and discuss events which took place in our country when it gained independence.  These events include 20 January, the Karabakh conflict, Xocali.  All these events are organized in cooperation with the student organization of the Houston University.  They organize them, and we supply materials, films, reply to questions.  Americans do not like politics and shun discussing it or debating political issues.  But I always tell them:  "This is not politics, this is our history, and you should know it, so that you are not deceived."