Always with the homeland: a night at Hayastan Foundation Toronto's 2026 dinner
On Sunday, October 25, 2026, the Crystal Grand Banquet Hall in Mississauga filled with people who have spent decades turning Toronto's generosity into schools, houses and clinics in Armenia. The occasion was the Annual Fundraising Dinner of Hayastan Foundation Toronto, held under the banner the foundation has carried for more than thirty years: Միշտ Հայրենիքի հետ, Always with the Homeland.
We were in the room. Tomsak was invited to the dinner, and we spent the evening among the volunteers, clergy and donors who make this foundation what it is. It was, to borrow our own words from that night, an amazing evening. This is what it looked like, and why it mattered.
If you want the full background on the foundation and how the dinner works, we wrote a preview of the evening a couple of weeks before. This post is about the night itself.
The night itself
The thing that stays with you about a Hayastan Foundation Toronto dinner is who is in the room. The foundation's voting membership is made up of 17 community associations, churches of three denominations, cultural and educational societies, political parties, professional groups and compatriotic unions. Organizations that rarely share a stage share this one. For one evening the ARS, AGBU, Hamazkayin, the member churches and the rest sit at the same tables, under the same tricolour banner, for the same reason.
The hall did its part. White linen, gold chairs, flowers on every table, the flags of Canada, Armenia and Artsakh near the head table, and the foundation's slogan glowing on the screens. Clergy from the member churches moved through the room. Families arrived together, three generations at a time. Dinner was served, and between courses the real business of the night began.
A guest of honour from Yerevan
This year's keynote speaker was Marie Lou Papazian, founding CEO of the TUMO Center for Creative Technologies, who travelled from Yerevan for the evening.
TUMO is the free after-school programme in Yerevan where teenagers aged 12 to 18 learn animation, game development, robotics, programming, filmmaking, music and design. There are no entrance exams and no fees. Students follow a self-paced path through online activities, workshops and project labs led by professionals, and they leave with a portfolio rather than a diploma. It was founded in 2011 by the Armenian-American philanthropists Sam and Sylva Simonian, and roughly 20,000 students go through its programmes every year. The model has since spread to cities across Europe and beyond, from Paris and Berlin to Lisbon and Buenos Aires.
The pairing made sense. Hayastan Foundation Toronto builds the classrooms. TUMO shows what a classroom in Armenia can become when someone invests seriously in it. For a room that has spent decades funding school buildings, hearing the woman who built TUMO describe what happens inside one was the right way to spend an evening.
Thirty-four years, written in concrete
It helps to remember what this foundation actually is. Hayastan Foundation Toronto Inc. is an all-volunteer Canadian registered charity and the Toronto affiliate of the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund, known in Armenian as Հայաստան Համահայկական Հիմնադրամ and in the community simply as Himnadram, the Fund. The global fund was established by presidential decree in Armenia in 1992, and it works through affiliates around the world. Canada has two, in Toronto and Montreal.
Since 1992 the foundation reports completing some 146 projects that have benefited more than 120,000 people. Broken down, that record is 9 brand new schools, 10 major school renovations, 5 medical and community centres, 60 houses, 20 potable and irrigation water networks, a renovated hospital dialysis department and a renovated home for the elderly. Those are not grants handed to another agency. They are buildings, and you can drive to them. Because the foundation is registered with the Canada Revenue Agency, every donation receives an official tax receipt.
What this year's dinner funds
The money raised in that room is already spoken for. The 2026 dinner supports six projects now under way:
8 houses in Nalbandyan for multi-children families displaced from Artsakh
4 houses in Lernagog, also in Armavir province, for multi-children families from Artsakh
8 houses in Balahovit, in Kotayk province, for families where a parent lives with a disability
2 houses in Nalbandyan for families where a parent lives with a disability
A medical centre for the village of Shenavan
A six-storey, 24-unit apartment building in Gyumri
The housing responds directly to September 2023, when Artsakh's entire Armenian population of about 120,000 was ethnically cleansed from Nagorno-Karabakh and forced into Armenia, many with only what they could carry. Emergency kits were the foundation's first answer. Houses are the second, and the one that lasts. The Gyumri building carries a thread that runs back to the 1988 Spitak earthquake, because 24 units means 24 families with a permanent address.
Why Tomsak was there
We will be honest about how we ended up at those tables. When the foundation's invitation reached us in late September, we were honoured and a little heartbroken at the same time. We are the Tomsak team, five high school students aged 15 to 17, and buying tickets to a fundraising dinner was simply not possible for us. What we could do was promise to tell everyone we know.
A day later came news we never expected. Vasken Altounian, Chairman of Hayastan Foundation Toronto, was personally sponsoring seats for all five of us. So we did the one thing we are good at. We promoted the evening the way we know how, across our social media, our newsletter, and our website and blog, so that more people in the community heard about it and made plans to come.
On October 25 we took those sponsored seats, listened to the woman who built TUMO, and sat among the people who have spent three decades sponsoring projects in Armenia from Toronto. A foundation that invests in a generation of young Armenians had just invested in five more. We are still grateful, and we wanted this post to say so properly.
What the night gave back to us
We did not expect the evening to give us so much in return. For a website that spends its days promoting everyone else's events, this was the first time many of those people met us in person. Organizers who knew our work but had never seen our faces came over to say hello, and the welcome was genuinely warm. They see the calendar and the posts every week, and that night they finally got to put faces to the name.
It turned into the best networking we have had. We met a number of organizations that wanted to work with us, we came away with new partners, including Nur Heritage, who partnered with us on the spot and a good number of people subscribed to the Tomsak newsletter on the spot. If you run an Armenian event in Canada and we have not met yet, come find us, or become a partner and add your event to our calendar.
How to support the foundation
The dinner is one night, but the projects run all year. If you want to help build the houses in Nalbandyan and Balahovit or the apartment building in Gyumri, you can donate to Hayastan Foundation Toronto through CanadaHelps and receive a tax receipt instantly. Cheques are payable to Hayastan Foundation Toronto Inc., and the organizers are glad to hear from anyone who wants to give or get involved: Hasmig Kurdian, Datev Keoshkerian, Vasken Altounian and Raffi Kouyoumdjian.
With Raffi Kouyoumdjian
Word of mouth works. It just does not reach everyone. That is the gap Tomsak tries to close, and it is why an invitation to a night like this one means so much to us.
Frequently asked questions
What is Hayastan Foundation Toronto?
Hayastan Foundation Toronto Inc. is an all-volunteer Canadian registered charity and the Toronto affiliate of the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund. Since 1992 it has built schools, houses, water networks and medical centres for communities in need in Armenia and Artsakh.
When was the 2026 Hayastan Foundation Toronto dinner held?
The 2026 Annual Fundraising Dinner was held on Sunday, October 25, 2026, at 5:00 PM at the Crystal Grand Banquet Hall, 2110 Dundas Street East, Unit 4, Mississauga, Ontario, near Highway 427 and Dundas.
What does "Always with the Homeland" mean?
Always with the Homeland, Միշտ Հայրենիքի հետ in Armenian, is the long-standing slogan of the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund. It appears on the foundation's banner and captures its purpose, keeping diaspora communities connected to Armenia through concrete, lasting projects.
Who was the keynote speaker at the 2026 dinner?
The keynote speaker was Marie Lou Papazian, founding CEO of the TUMO Center for Creative Technologies in Yerevan, who travelled from Armenia for the evening.
What is TUMO?
TUMO is a free after-school programme founded in Yerevan in 2011 by Sam and Sylva Simonian, where teenagers aged 12 to 18 learn technology and design skills such as animation, coding, robotics and filmmaking. It has no fees and no entrance exams, and roughly 20,000 students pass through its programmes every year.
How many projects has Hayastan Foundation Toronto completed?
The foundation reports some 146 completed projects since 1992, benefiting more than 120,000 people. They include 9 new schools, 10 major school renovations, 5 medical and community centres, 60 houses and 20 water networks.
What projects does the 2026 dinner support?
The foundation's current projects are 12 houses in Nalbandyan and Lernagog for multi-children families from Artsakh, 10 houses in Balahovit and Nalbandyan for families where a parent has a disability, a medical centre for Shenavan, and a six-storey, 24-unit apartment building in Gyumri.
Is a donation to Hayastan Foundation Toronto tax deductible?
Yes. Hayastan Foundation Toronto Inc. is registered as a charity with the Canada Revenue Agency, and donations made through its CanadaHelps page receive an official tax receipt instantly.
Was Tomsak at the 2026 dinner?
Yes. Tomsak was invited to the dinner, and the foundation's chairman, Vasken Altounian, sponsored seats for the five-member Tomsak team. Tomsak helped promote the evening across its social media, newsletter and website, and used the night to meet community organizers and new partners.
How can I donate if I could not attend the dinner?
You can give online through Hayastan Foundation Toronto's CanadaHelps page as a one-time or monthly gift and receive a tax receipt instantly. Cheques payable to Hayastan Foundation Toronto Inc. are also welcome, and the organizers can arrange sponsorships.