A migrant’s epic journey through life, love, music, drama and teaching is revealed in a new book.

Armenian-Australian Peter Jerijian has traced his life from Lebanon to London and on to Melbourne via South Korea in his memoir ‘Bouncing Back’.

The Dandenong resident tells of leaving his family in Lebanon as a young man and moving to London in thew 1960s where, as an aspiring bass guitarist, he played with pop bands The Conquerors and The Lords.

He lived in a bedsit and frequented the haunts of his heroes the Rolling Stones and The Beatles, including the famous Abbey Road Studios.

“It was a fantastic time. It was dream for me singing on stage with these bands in London at the time of flower power,” Peter said.

“Aside from music, I needed to earn a living and with a work permit, I was able to begin a career as machine engraver,” he said.

“In 1969 I decided it was time to travel see the world. I had a Danish pen pal as a way improving my English, and I was planning to go and see her. As I was walking through the area where all the foreign embassies are, I walked past the British Embassy.”

Peter went in and was told he could geta visitor visa. He decided to apply for jobs in the UK and a friend helped with a resume.

He got a response from an engraving firm in East Twickenham and bought a one-way ticket.

“I arrived in London knowing no one, but so many people helped me. A friend had asked me to take a package to his friend Zuhair in London.

“Zuhair was really helpful. He took me to my interview with the employer Mr Davies who said I could start tomorrow. I told him I could start today because I had nothing else to do.”

Through workmates, Peter found London’s thriving pub scene.

“I didn’t realise you could just walk into a pub when a guy called Pip said come to the pub and meet my friends. We went to the Bull and Bush and I was accepted, even as a foreigner,” Peter said.

After meeting a Jamaican man who worked near to his employment, peter was introduced to screen printing, which would become his lifetime career.

In London, where he spent more than seven year, he met his Ethiopian fiancee and in the 1970s, the couple moved to Melbourne where, she had extended family members living.

But in the 1980s, during the national recession, Peter’s screen-printing business failed, as did marriage and he hit the lowest point in his life.

Fortuitously, he met his current partner Rosemarie Reed when he boarded with her in Dandenong North.

They took in overseas students as boarders and began to be exposed to new cultures and foods.

In the 2003 Rosemarie took up an English language teaching position in South Korea and Perer followed her.

“I had learned how to teach English volunteering with settlement agency AMES, where Rosemarie also volunteered,” Peter said.

“We had a wonderful time in Asia, working teaching English to kids and adults; and being exposed to new cultures and ways of thinking.”

Rosemarie said at one point she was teaching 19 classes of 50 students each week.

“It was hard work, but I had a ball trying to think up ways of getting the students to ask questions,” she said.

Peter said the couple were living their dream.

“We travelled to Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, the Philippines, Cambodia and Thailand. It was fabulous,” he said.

“We also loved the hospitality of the Korean families. We would go out to dinner with them and end up at karaoke.”

Now back in Dandenong, Peter has recorded his life in the book. A project that took five years and began as a COVID-19 lockdown project and as a way of filling in quiet nights stuck at home.

“There are sad parts to this story – writing it down made me cry sometimes. But the best parts were when those years when I was in a band and a drama group at a time that I was becoming a man,” Peter said.

“Overall, it’s been a fantastic journey.”

Over the journey, Peter has mastered six languages – Armenian, English, Arabic, French, Turkish and Korean.

Peter is from an Armenian family forced to flee Turkey during the WWI genocide, and who found refuge in Lebanon.

The genocide, overseen by the Ottoman Empire, saw the mass murder of around a million Armenians during death marches in the Syrian desert and also the forced Islamisation of others, mostly women and children.

“It was a rags-to-riches situation for my parents. We were poor but we were welcomed by the community of Bourj Hamoud, a town near Beirut that was then known as the Paris of the middle east,” he said.

“We were lucky to be taken in by that loving community and to this day, I can’t thank them enough,” Peter said.

“Our lives revolved around the local Armenian orthodox church and school where I sang in the choir. It was a fantastic, happy childhood.

“But when I was about 14 or 15, I realised my father was working hard to support six people. I was doing well at school, but I realised I wasn’t going to be a professional – a doctor or a lawyer – so I decided I would learn a trade.

“I was living in an Armenian area, but to get a job I would need to learn Arabic. So, for the last two years of school, I went to a local Arabic-speaking school.

“At the same time, during the holidays, I would sell steamed seeds that my mother made or American Chicklet chewing gum in the streets.

“At 15 I started to help my uncle with his graphic design business, and he found me a job with a photo engraver.

“At the same time, in the early sixties, I started to get into music. The Beatles were becoming very popular in Lebanon and my friends and I formed a band.

“This what eventually led me to London and the rest is history,” Peter said.

“God has been good to me. I feel like I have been blessed. Every time I have faced challenges in life something has happened, or someone has stepped forward to help me.

“And I seem to have an inner strength that enables me to go on and not give up,” he said.

‘Bouncing Back’ by Peter Jerijian is full of hilarious and heart-wrenching stories and anecdotes that sum up the migrant experience.

It was launched recently at the Armenian Community Centre in Springvale.

It is available through Amazon or by emailing or texting Peter on peterj313@hotmail.com  / +61 435 786 736.