It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Lillian Barmakian on November 16 from cancer.
Lillian was born an identical twin in Montreal in 1936 to John and Youghaper Tatigian who had escaped genocide and created a successful life in Canada. Her father was a sociable jokester who ran the local hamburger hang out (think Happy Days) and her multi-lingual mother worked part time as an interpreter for newly arriving immigrants at the airport. She prided herself on knowing how to “interpret” their answers to make sure they would not be turned away. A grade school teacher worried about the twins’ ethnic-sounding birth names Syranoush and Syrpouhi and began calling them Lillian and Sylvia respectively, names they kept for the rest of their lives.
After idyllic 1950s teenage years in Lachine, Canada, in her early 20s she and her twin sister Sylvia were set up on a blind date with visiting identical twin boys Diran and Vahan Barmakian from Watertown. They were married not long after in a double wedding which made national papers in Canada and the U.S. Diran and Lillian and Vahan and Sylvia settled in a single family home in Arlington eventually raising their seven children as one set of siblings. (A neighbor admitted she hadn’t been aware they were twins and couldn’t understand the miraculous, constant pregnancy of one woman for 6 years.) Later when the couples moved to Winchester, they never parted. The only time any distinction between the families was made was the occasional separate family vacation.
Lillian never tired of hosting large family holiday gatherings, cooking Armenian delicacies like kufte and yelanchi in volume, and setting a beautiful table. The family home was a neighborhood hub with at least one or two children always having friends over. Lillian loved her wide circle of friends and family and her home was always open. Except for pets. When begged for a family dog, in her usual quick dry wit she quipped “what kind, cement or bronze?”
She loved sports of all types. She was an avid golfer, tennis player and bowler. She was in two bowling leagues well into her 70s. She and her sister were avid sports fans of Boston teams. (If the Sox lost the night before, the breakfast table was very quiet.) They were also fans of their children’s teams. They nearly always had beach chairs in their car, ready to watch a game or even a practice. Lillian was an eager traveler, ready to join a trip at short notice and enjoyed many with her husband and later with her adult children across Canada, the U.S. and Europe.
Lillian especially cherished her summers on Martha’s Vineyard where the family spent every summer since the early 1960s. Out of their tiny cottage kitchen, she and her sister seemed to entertain and feed armies of the extended Barmakian family who also summered there. In later years, sitting on her porch watching the ocean was a favorite solace as extended family and friends would drop by to sit and chat about everything and nothing.
Lillian is survived by her twin Sylvia Barmakian, her brother Emile Tatigian, her children Sima Seymourian and her husband Bruce, Liane Bush and her husband Ed, Krista Janigian and her husband Marc, Deanna Barmakian and her husband Michael Jimenez, her nieces Adreena Barmakian and Nyree Valdes and her husband Eduardo, and nephew Adam Barmakian. She is also survived by her grandchildren and grandnephews Ariana, Jacob, Gabi, Talene, Isabel, Greta, Leo, Lily, Diran, Berj, Evan, Emil, and Oliver.
Funeral service and cemetery service will be private. In lieu of flowers, memorial gifts may be made to the Armenian Eye Care Project, www.eyecareproject.com