Sosy Karadanayan

Sosy is from a Syrian city Aleppo. Her grandparents had fled there during the genocide. Sosy was fond of designing ever since her childhood. She was offering designs for wedding and other events’ gift boxes. Soon she was known for her delicate and special taste in making those boxes and everybody in the Armenian community started to trust her. Some times later she made up her mind to also make sweets for the boxes. Her husband supported to fulfill her idea and they created their own sweet making small factory. Their hard work gave the wanted results. Before the war they produced almost 23 kinds of different sweets.

Thus the horror of the last day’s escape from Aleppo is still very tangible in Sosy’s memory. She remembers the very last day, when the city was under heavy shelling during the whole day. She and her husband were trying to reach the airport by all means, each of them carrying only one bag. Yet they didn’t even have tickets for flight. They managed to send their two young sons to Armenia 10 days before by a special flight taking Armenian children to Yerevan, from where they were distributed to different resorts in Armenia. When the couple finally reached the Aleppo airport it came clear, that some of the passengers of that flight couldn’t manage to reach the place, so they took the flight instead of them. Sosy is unable to forget a small episode on their harsh way to the airport. They were stopped by the ISIS fighters several times on their way and could manage to avoid being caught as hostages, thus they were warned strictly never to come back to that land, where they were born and lived their life.

The painful days are behind. Sosy and her husband have put strong roots in their motherland and have opened a new page in their life.