Midfield of Dreams : Karapetyan, Who Emigrated From Armenia With His Family, Makes It With the Galaxy
Harut Karapetyan is living an Armenian Dream, only in America.
It’s a dream that began when he was a child in Armenia, before he could speak in sentences but babbled happily whenever he saw soccer balls or similar objects.
It continued through his adolescence, as he traveled about 15 miles each day to play soccer--his country’s sporting passion--and attend a state-run school for gifted athletes.
The dream survived his family’s immigration to Hollywood in 1989 and the hard times that followed. It is reaching fulfillment with the Los Angeles Galaxy in the newly formed U.S. professional league, Major League Soccer, before roaring crowds at stadiums across the country.
“When I was little I showed that I was crazy about soccer; this was the only sport I was in love with,” said Karapetyan, a 24-year old midfielder with the Galaxy, which plays host to D.C. United today at the Rose Bowl. “A lot of people came from Armenia [to the U.S.] at my age and got disappointed with the soccer but I loved it still and just kept practicing.
“I said this is the thing I love and I’m going to keep going as far as I can.”
Galaxy Coach Lothar Osiander and assistant Octavio Zambrano say Karapetyan has a bright future with the team, though after starting the first two games he has become a reserve.
“I think the best of Harut has yet to be shown,” said Zambrano, who has been a mentor to Karapetyan and helped keep his career alive. “He’s got a great left foot and good left-footed players are hard to find. He’s a player for the future of this franchise.”
What makes Karapetyan’s story compelling is not only the brightness of his future but the struggles of his past.
The first of four children born to Karapet and Agavni Karapetyan in the Armenian capital of Yerevan, young Harut showed early promise in soccer and thrived in the backyard training drills his father devised. By age 8 he was enrolled in a Soviet-run sports school where twice-daily team practices were sandwiched around five hours of academics.
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Though his enrollment was free, Karapetyan’s family still sacrificed to make his attendance possible. Each day, his father drove him to and from school, working an eight-hour shift as a sewing-factory mechanic in-between trips. Karapetyan’s mother, a seamstress in the factory, would return home from work each day to wash his soccer clothes and dry them over a heater.
“They’ve done a lot of things for me,” Karapetyan said. “My father has always wanted to take care of me in soccer. All his life he was driving but he never said ‘This is enough. I’m not going to take you.’ He did everything for me.”
Karapetyan earned a spot in Armenia’s youth national team program at age 12. He was headed for what he hoped was a professional career with the republic’s lone Soviet first division team when Armenia became independent of Soviet rule in 1988.
Spurred by a crumbling economic system and a distaste for the government, the Karapetyan family immigrated to Southern California in March of 1989, settling in Hollywood because of its low-rent housing and proximity to Armenian enclaves.
The transition was not particularly smooth. The Karapetyans sold their house in Yerevan but had to spend the money on airline tickets. Armenian officials allowed them to take few belongings to the West and the family arrived in the U.S. with only a few hundred dollars. None of the Karapetyans spoke English. Neither parent was able to find work quickly and for a time, the family was on welfare.
“We had a hard time in the beginning; we just survived,” Karapetyan said. “But now my brothers have jobs, I have a job. Things are better.”
Karapetyan, who was 17, began attending the 10th grade at Marshall High 10 days after his family’s arrival. He played soccer for the Barristers during the 1990 season and helped the woefully under-funded team to the second round of the City Section playoffs.
“We didn’t have shirts, we didn’t have shorts, we had about five plastic balls for the whole team,” Karapetyan said. “But [playing] was fun because everything was easy for me. Back home we had hard practices and I felt the pressure. Here, anything I wanted to try, I was successful. I was scoring four or five goals a game.”
Karapetyan transferred to Hollywood High for the 1990-91 school year but did not play soccer because at 19, he was too old for high school competition. He gradually worked his way onto club and semipro teams in the region and maintained an intense training regimen while searching for ways to continue playing soccer.
Karapetyan’s break came after he graduated from high school in 1991. The Los Angeles Salsa, a team in the second-division A-League, held a tryout camp that attracted more than 1,000 hopefuls. The 20-year old Karapetyan was the only player chosen.
“I didn’t know how they were going to chose a team from all these people,” Karapetyan said, shaking his head at the memory. “You couldn’t see any of the players, any size, any age. I made it because Octavio [Zambrano] saw me and liked me.”
Zambrano was then a Salsa assistant. He lobbied for Karapetyan to make the team and the young midfielder played three seasons before the Salsa disbanded in 1994.
Despite the letdown, Karapetyan refused to lose focus. Rumors of a first-division professional league in the U.S. were growing stronger and he wanted to be ready.
“The whole time I kept playing,” he said. “I knew that if something comes up in one second and you’re not in shape you cannot prove that you work in [a team system]. It only takes once and if a coach doesn’t like you you’re out.”
But when Zambrano moved on to the Galaxy, Karapetyan got his shot with an invitation to an MLS combine in Irvine.
“He came in and did well but not so well that the other [teams’] coaches would know about him,” Zambrano said with a sly smile.
Karapetyan was selected by the Galaxy in the seventh round of the MLS draft.
He started as a left outside midfielder in the team’s first two games and did not record a goal or an assist before being relegated to a reserve role.
“As the games become more competitive [players] have to be aware of more things and we have to put an experienced team on the field,” Zambrano said.
“It’s not only your size, your speed, your left foot. Harut needs to know what his duties are when he’s defending, not just going forward. But those are minor things and he’s done well.”
Karapetyan’s success is particularly exciting to Armenian Americans in the area. Approximately 500 relatives, friends and acquaintances were among the Galaxy’s home-opening crowd of 69,255 at the Rose Bowl on April 13.
After that game, Karapetyan was interviewed by an Armenian American television crew and he has been featured in several local Armenian American publications.
Asbarez, a 25,000-circulation daily newspaper in Glendale, covers the Galaxy’s home games to keep tabs on Karapetyan.
“We didn’t have a pro athlete role model in our community,” said Pasadena Mayor and Armenian American Bill Paparian, who held a news conference on the steps of Pasadena City Hall to celebrate the Galaxy’s drafting of Karapetyan.
“He’s a poised, dignified and understated kind of a guy. There are pictures of him on my boys’ bedroom walls.”
After years of living in cramped apartments, the Karapetyans two years ago moved into a four-bedroom house in Van Nuys.
Last week, Harut Karapetyan sat in the living room with his father, his fiancee, Eliza Karamanukyan, and other family members.
“My father feels like he did something good for me,” Karapetyan said. “Before and during the [home opener], my father’s chest was tight because he was so excited. He remembered back home when the stadiums were full [for soccer] and finally in L.A. it’s the same thing. It’s all worth it.”
