Liyah Babayan

From once an illiterate girl in a small Idaho town to book tours, testifying in Congress, giving a TED Talk, inspiring first-generation entrepreneurs and youth around the world, life has a way of coming full circle.

Back in Denver, the city where everything truly changed for me in 2019. After being invited to give a TEDx Talk, Denver hosted my very first book signing for "Liminal, a refugee memoir," and from there this journey took off beyond anything I could have imagined. This city and its network of bookstores, readers, and community were among the first to embrace my voice and Liminal's universal story of survival, faith, interdependent & resilience.

Idaho will always be my roots, but I feel deeply blessed to have community across America sharing my book through Barnes & Noble stores in major cities throughout the country. Connecting with readers, hearing their adversity victory, from every walk of life.

Coming back now to reconnect with the people and places that supported me from the very beginning feels incredibly emotional. The "Mile High" city where this advocacy journey first took flight feels powerful in every way.



TED Talk link in comments. 🎤
Amazon book page in comments. 📖

she never made it to my games,
she never made it to my dances,
she never made it to school plays,
because she worked 2 jobs to rebuild our life in America after surviving ethnic killings and war, through all the mental health challenges refugee parents face alone in a new country.

she never made it, as a sacrifice, so I could.

I will not, even if given a thousands lifetimes live enough to honor my parents as much as they both deserve. I've seen my Mama make magic happen in the kitchen even when we had nothing in the fridge. She taught me that self respect, work ethic, integrity, humor & humility is the ultimate form wealth a person can possess. That womanbood is not in a woman's beauty, body, fancy clothes or jewelry, but in her valor, grace & compassion.

Mama thank you, everything I am and I am not, is due to your stern, unconditional, wise love.

Since we came to 🇺🇸 30 years ago.
So much about our life has changed, some things remain exactly, perfectly, traditionally the same. The simple details of our culture.

Life rhythms, shishkabob sturgeon, Armenian music while we prepare for dinner parties.

I measure my wealth by togetherness with family, cooking together, gathering to drink, eat, sing, play, laugh and dance together.

This, not that other superficial version this society tries to pass off as knock off happiness. This is wealth & success.

Family. Generations. Savoring Life. 🙏🏽✨️
I pray my children never forget our ways.

Genocide is the darkest low of human potential, no other species organizes to exterminate itself.

In Twin Falls, Idaho

❗️SHARE EVERYWHERE❗️
That is the least you can do…‼️

Next week is April 24th. the 111th. commemoration❗️
++++++++++++++++++++
The Armenian Genocide was the systematic destruction of the Armenian population of the Ottoman Empire during World War I, primarily between 1915 and 1917. It began with the arrest and ex*****on of Armenian intellectuals and community leaders in April 1915, an act that removed the cultural and political backbone of the community. What followed was not random violence, but an organized campaign that targeted an entire people.

Armenian men were often separated from their families and either executed outright or sent to forced labor battalions, where most died from exhaustion, starvation, or abuse. Women, children, and the elderly were deported from their homes and forced to march hundreds of miles toward the Syrian desert under brutal conditions. These marches were not meant for relocation, they were designed to destroy. Along the way, deportees were subjected to starvation, dehydration, disease, and repeated violence. Many were beaten, robbed, or killed. Others collapsed on the roads and were left behind to die.

The cruelty extended beyond physical destruction. Families were torn apart, children were orphaned, and many were abducted or forcibly assimilated. Women were especially vulnerable, facing widespread abuse and exploitation. People were stripped not only of their lives, but of their identity, dignity, and connection to their homeland. Entire villages were emptied, churches destroyed, and centuries-old communities erased.

By the end of this period, an estimated 1 to 1.5 million Armenians had died. Survivors were scattered across different regions, forming what is now known as the Armenian diaspora. Many carried deep trauma, having witnessed the loss of their families, homes, and culture.

The legacy of the Armenian Genocide remains deeply significant. It is recognized by many historians and countries as one of the first modern genocides and is studied as a warning of how systematic violence and dehumanization can escalate when unchecked. At the same time, it remains a subject of political dispute, particularly regarding official recognition.

In Twin Falls, Idaho. 🌎
NEVER AGAIN, means Never Again Anywhere.

NEVER AGAIN means
NEVER AGAIN ANYWHERE 🇵🇸 🇦🇲 🇸🇩

I write about the covered up 1990's pogroms in Baku. In my book "Liminal, a refugee memoir," I document my family’s escape from the ethnic killings of Armenians in Baku, Azerbaijan, through the eyes I had as a child living through war and violence during my most formative years. Grounded in the journal entries I wrote when I was young, I share what it was like learning English in America and how becoming a refugee shaped who I am.

https://www.amazon.com/Liminal-refugee-memoir-Liyah-Babayan/dp/0615649653

I take you into my most private world my struggle with identity, assimilation, and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I reflect on the loss of my innocence, my longing for the childhood I never had, and the weight of survivor’s guilt that has followed me.

You meet me as a child who learned to find safety in detachment, who sought peace in stillness, and who existed in the in-between space of a forming identity.

Through my story, I offer a glimpse into life in America as a newcomer. On the other side of the American Dream, I reveal the mental health struggles that so many refugees carry—often expected to assimilate quickly, with little to no support.

This memoir is my truth. It is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit, and to the strength of a family grounded in unwavering faith, unconditional gratitude, and determination that refused to be broken.

NEVER AGAIN means
NEVER AGAIN ANYWHERE 🇵🇸 🇦🇲 🇸🇩

📷 Photograph taken by Armin T. Wegner.

Wegner served as a nurse with the German Sanitary Corps. In 1915 and 1916, Wegner traveled throughout the Ottoman Empire and documented atrocities carried out against the Armenians.

(Courtesy of Sybil Stevens, daughter of Armin T. Wegner. Wegner Collection, Deutsches Literaturarchiv, Marbach & United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.)

This April, my Aunt Lola would have turned 67.

There are stories we inherit not through memories, but through loss. I never got to grow up with her, but I grew up carrying the horror of what was taken from her, from her daughter, from my uncle, from all our family.

Her life was taken during the Baku Pogroms, in an act of ethnic violence that forever changed the course of our family’s story. Even now, decades later, her absence is still felt in the silence, in the grief, and in unspoken pain.

In my interview with Armenpress, I shared my testimony of what we Armenians survived in the 90's. What we lost, and how those wounds followed us across borders into a new life as refugees in America. My aunt deserved a full life, a future, a family, a 67th birthday.

My book "Liminal, a refugee memoir," was born from that space between trauma and survival. It carries her story with it because she is part of why I wrote it, why I remember, and why I refuse to let the truth, the injustice disappear.

Read the full interview here:
https://armenpress.am/en/article/963236

Read Liminal on Amazon:
https://www.amazon.com/

They tried to erase her, but they didn’t succeed. She lives on in our story. In our survival. In our voices. In her grandchildren.

Happy heavenly 67th birthday, Aunt Lola. You are forever remembered. You are loved.

Always. 🤍 ✝️

Today I heard it in many languages, proclaimed same prophecy. Amen. ✨️🙏🏽

Armenian: Քրիստոս հարյավ ի մեռելոց
Russian: Христос воскрес
English: Christ has Risen.
Spanish: Cristo ha resucitado
Arabic: المسيح قام
Greek: Χριστός ἀνέστη
Amharic Ethiopian: ክርስቶስ ተነሳ

Christians, however you observe Easter. What matters most, are the days following Easter. The behaviors of our daily life. How we treat the most vulnerable of our community and wider society. Do you see the divine Creator in every human? Live your Christ love daily. ✝️

LOVE and MERCY for others.

Tradition moments with grandmother are forever sacred memories of the heart. 🐣✨

Armenian Diaspora, a blessed Zatik from our family to yours. We are up preparing, baking, dying eggs in the simple of ways, observing the Christian faith which not too long ago we survived persecution for. God Bless Everyone.

✝️🙏🏽