Persian Girls: A Memoir

by Nahid Rachlin

  Now Taheri was allowed to come and see Pari once a week and be alone with her for a short time in the salon during each visit. Whenever I could get away with it I spied on them. Every time Taheri tried to kiss Pari, she said, “Not until we’re married.”

  “He keeps saying how I’m the only person he has ever wanted to marry,” Pari told me. “That no one has ever stirred him to exaltation the way I do. He has promised to let me pursue acting. He said he wants me to be free and do what matters to me.”

  “Pari, is it wonderful to be so adored?”

  “You know, Nahid, sometimes he frightens me, he’s so intense.”

  I couldn’t understand how Pari was going to tolerate Taheri day after day, live with him, share his bed. Neither could I see myself in the same situation, marrying someone I hardly knew or even liked. Resistance was only hardening in me.

  Pari now had a high status at school because she was one of the engaged girls. And Mohtaram paid more attention to her, taking her shopping, adding various items to her jahaz, which she had started preparing for her daughter as soon as she agreed to the marriage.

  They came back with packages of high-quality bedspreads, pillowcases, towels, china, and silverware, some imported, some made in Iran. Mohtaram had said to Pari, “Taheri loves you so much, you’ll learn to love him, too. I cried when I married your father but now I can’t imagine being with anyone else.”

  For days Father, Mohtaram, Taheri, and his sister, and sometimes Pari, too, discussed the wedding. Taheri wanted everything carried out in the old traditional way with its elaborate rituals.

  “It’s all so stifling,” Pari said to me.

  Pari didn’t bring up Majid at all, and I left it up to her to do so, as I assumed at this stage it was very painful for her even to mention his name. Pari had become a bit remote from me, partly because she was buried in all the expectations and planning. But I sensed she was upset that she hadn’t kept her side of the promise that we would marry only for love. I wondered about Majid, if he was now going to ask his mother to look for another wife for him or if Pari had been unique to him, someone he truly loved, someone whose loss he would not get over for a long time.

  Maryam and Aziz came for the occasion and planned to stay for two weeks. While Pari was busy with her wedding plans I spent a lot of time with them. Although I had drifted from their values, I still felt immense comfort in their presence. They had brought me presents. Maryam gave me a gold ring with a cornelian stone on it; she bought it in Karbala, Iraq, where she went to visit the shrine of Imam Hussein, the son of Ali and grandson of Prophet Mohammad. She planned to rent her rooms in Tehran and live in a rooming house near the shrine, at least for a year. “My home has never been the same since you were taken away from me,” she told me. “Being by the shrine and praying there every day will help my soul.”

  Aziz gave me sohoon and gaz, sweets filled with honey and pistachios, treats unavailable in Ahvaz. She told me I didn’t need to share them with Manijeh, about whom I had complained to her.

  “She’s just afraid you’ll take her place in Mohtaram’s heart,” she said in a kind tone.

  “But Mohtaram is cold to me, too.”

  “I’m sure you love Maryam more than her and she must sense that.”

  I contemplated her remarks, but caught as I was in my insecurities, they didn’t help.

  The day before the wedding Mohtaram took Pari to a woman to get her pubic hair removed. This was the custom for a girl about to get married. The woman applied an herbal concoction to Pari’s pubic hair, then, after a half hour, removed the hair, which came off easily but still left a sting, Pari said.

  On the day of the wedding Mohtaram took Pari to a beauty salon. When they came back Pari’s hair was set in curls, her eyebrows plucked to narrow lines, her face made up with dark lipstick, rouge, and eyeliner. Now that she was about to become a married woman makeup was acceptable. Pari said it made her feel she was onstage, as the whole marriage did.

  Then followed the two stages of a traditional Persian marriage, originating partly in Zoroastrianism, the religion of Iran before Islam. It could last for several days but Taheri wanted them both on the same day as he was in a rush to go on their honeymoon and then to Tehran as soon as possible.

  The first part was aghd, the legal process of getting married. This took place in our house.

  Mohtaram, with the help of Maryam, Aziz, Ali, and Fatemeh, a young maid who came in every few days, prepared the salon, putting bouquets of flowers in different spots and spreading the sofreh-ye-aghd on the floor.

  The cloth used for the sofreh on this occasion was passed from mother to daughter. Mohtaram, who received it from Aziz, intended to use it in each daughter’s wedding. It was made of a rich gold-embroidered cashmere fabric. On the sofreh they placed symbolic items: a mirror (for fate), two candles (representing brightness in the bride and groom’s future together), a platter of seven multicolored herbs and spices (to break spells and witch-craft), a basket of decorated eggs (to symbolize fertility), a platter of pomegranates, “heavenly fruits” (to assure a joyous future), and a bowl of gold coins (symbolizing wealth and prosperity). A cup of rose water extracted from special Persian roses perfumed the air. Two hardened sugar cones were also there, to be crushed over the head of the bride.

  A specially baked and decorated flatbread with “Mobaarak-Baad” written on it in powdered sugar and saffron blessed the wedding. In addition, an assortment of sweets were set on the sofreh for the guests to eat after the ceremony: honey, sugar-coated almond strips, baklava, mulberry-almond paste in the shape of mulberries, rice-flour cookies, chickpea-flour cookies, almond-flour cookies, and honey-roasted almonds.

  A copy of the Koran, opened to the middle, was placed on the sofreh, too, symbolizing God’s blessing for the couple. Taheri’s sister had made sure it was there (it wasn’t part of the Zoroastrian origin of the ceremony). Of course Maryam and Aziz were pleased about having the Koran there.

  The bridegroom was the first to take his seat in the room at the head of the sofreh-ye-aghd. The bride came afterward and joined the bridegroom. An aghound and a notary came in to perform the legal part of the ceremony. After the preliminary blessings and a few words about the importance of the institution of marriage, the aghound conferred with the witnesses. Hassan, Taheri’s uncle, a tall, hefty man with an upward-twisting mustache, was his witness, and Father was Pari’s. Both said that they indeed wished to proceed with the ceremony and that there were no objections.

  “Do you wish to enter this blessed marriage?” the aghound asked Taheri.

  “It is my deepest wish,” Taheri said.

  Then the aghound asked Pari the same question.

  Pari didn’t answer immediately. It was proper for the bride not to show eagerness. To make the bridegroom wait for the bride’s answer signified that it was the husband who sought the wife and was eager to have her and not the other way around. But again I could tell Pari wasn’t playing a role here. Her hesitation about the marriage was still there and I could sense it.

  The aghound asked the question three times and at the third time Pari said, “Yes.” A simple yes. Then the aghound asked the groom if he understood that in case of, God forbid, a divorce initiated by him, he would have to pay the bride the full mehrieh, as was the law. Taheri said yes.

  The aghound, Father, Hassan, the bridegroom, and the bride signed the documents and the aghound pronounced the couple husband and wife. “God bless this marriage,” he said.

  Then the bride and bridegroom placed the wedding bands on each other’s fingers and fed each other honey.

  Manijeh and I held a cloth over the bride’s head, as we had been instructed, and Mohtaram held the two cones of sugar over the cloth and rubbed them together, to sweeten the marriage. The pieces of sugar fell like crystal onto the cloth. Then everyone in the room broke into clapping and congratulating the bride and groom, “Aroosi Mobarak . . .”

  Pari was showered with gifts—mainly expen
sive jewelry that Taheri himself and his sisters, parents, and other family members had sent or brought. Maryam and Aziz also had brought presents, and relatives who weren’t attending had sent them—a crocheted silk bedspread, a linen tablecloth and napkins, embroidered at their edges, a silver tea set, a samovar.

  My parents gave Taheri a Rolex watch (it wasn’t proper to give the groom more than one or two gifts).

  Ali brought in tea in our best tea glasses, dainty, gold-rimmed, in filigreed silver holders, and served it to everyone.

  After a while everyone dispersed to get dressed for the reception that would be held two hours later at a garden restaurant. Maryam and Aziz declined to go to that part of the celebration—neither of them would be comfortable at a large party where none of the women would be wearing the chador and alcohol would be served to men.

  The garden was decorated with colored bulbs and lanterns strung between trees. A fountain splashed colored water into a pool, making a rainbow. The moon was full and its jewel-like brilliance was reflected in the water.

  Pari was wearing a long white satin dress with embroidery at the neckline. Her diamond engagement ring and wide gold wedding band sparkled on her finger. About two hundred guests—family friends, some with their children, Pari’s friends—kept trying to get close to her and the groom.

  As Father and Mohtaram had insisted, Manijeh and I were dressed identically in rose-colored dresses and dark blue shoes. Manijeh had borrowed Mohtaram’s ruby earrings and ruby-studded pendant. Mohtaram had on a blue satin dress and blue silk shoes. She didn’t look much older than the bride.

  Waiters walked around and served marinated whitefish, caviar, doogh, a drink made with yogurt, and sharbat, a drink made with fruit and cardamom, for women, and alcoholic drinks for men who requested it. Some men and women chose to sit at tables separated by gender. I took care not to sit with Manijeh, always aware of the thick cloud of tension between us, neither of us able, at this stage of our lives, to get beyond our irrational jealousies of each other. Young boys and girls looked at one another wistfully, not daring to go any further than that.

  Waiters began to serve the dinner—roast lamb, sweet rice, dill and lima bean rice, broiled whitefish, pomegranate chicken, lamb and beef kababs, Shirazi salad, yogurt-and-cucumber salad.

  Mrs. Alavi and Mrs. Davoodi, friends of my parents who frequently came to our house, were sitting at my table. Their husbands were at another table.

  “Jaleh is getting a divorce,” Mrs. Davoodi told Mrs. Alavi. “The judge granted it after we got a statement from a psychiatrist that her husband is manic-depressive. He couldn’t perform his husbandly duty, even on the first night. Jaleh knew something was wrong from the beginning.”

  “Didn’t you know that about him, I mean the mental state?” Mrs. Alavi asked.

  “The few times we saw him before they got married he must have been under control by drugs. He seemed perfectly normal. He returned from America, where he was studying, and then his parents looked for an eligible girl. He’s good-looking, educated, but sick in his mind.”

  “These days girls aren’t the same as in our time,” a woman sitting at an adjacent table said to another. “They don’t have our tolerance. We were better off, we knew only one way of life.”

  “Hasn’t Manijeh turned into a beautiful woman? She’s going to be snapped up soon,” a woman sitting behind me said to another woman.

  I caught snatches of conversation from other tables.

  “I’m going into my father’s business as soon as I graduate,” one boy said.

  “I’ll be going to the polytechnic university in Tehran,” another boy remarked.

  “You used to live with your aunt in Tehran?” a girl sitting next to me asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “I wish I could live in Tehran. But my parents have someone in mind for me. He’s an officer in the army.”

  Another strand of conversation reached me.

  “He’s in jail? No! For what? Such a nice young man.”

  “Maybe someone didn’t like the way he dresses, or scratches his head.”

  “Let’s not dwell on sad things. This is a wedding, two people uniting for life.”

  “It’s all the Westoxication that creates turmoil,” a man said, his voice rising above all others.

  “Our view of America isn’t all realistic.” This was said by a man with a rigid posture and expression who was standing under a tree. “If you examine the country closely you see serious problems there. All the suicide, murder, violence. There’s no soul.”

  “You’re right,” the man standing next to him said. “No closeness between people there, no sense of family. They are a lonely crowd, as one of their own sociologists said.”

  Lonely crowd. Didn’t these pompous men see the loneliness in our own country? I thought. Look at me. Look at Pari. Pari, dressed in expensive clothes and jewelry and sitting next to her dark-suited husband, seemed to be a million miles away.

  After dinner, two waiters brought out a gigantic cake with the blessing “Aroosi Mobarak” written on it with colorful sprinkles. They put it on a table in the middle. Everyone stood up and clapped and sang, starting with “The aroosi be blessed by God, mobarak bashe.” A few women spontaneously broke into group dancing among themselves, snapping their fingers and singing. When they were planning the reception, Father and Mohtaram and Behjat had discussed having dance music for those who wanted to dance but Behjat thought it was a bad idea to encourage dancing, since a few of her conservative relatives would be at the reception and wouldn’t like boys and girls dancing together. So even the bride and groom didn’t dance.

  The waiters cut the cake and served it with tea and sharbat, and the women returned to their seats. A variety of pastries and ice cream were served along with the cake.

  Musicians on a platform in the middle of the garden began to play the drum, tambourine, and violin.

  At the end of the evening, after the guests had departed, Pari left with Taheri and his sister to stay in their home in Ahvaz for the night. The following day Pari and Taheri would be going on their honeymoon to Babolsar, a town on the Caspian Sea, and from there to Tehran, where the house was ready for them. Behjat was going to live with them until Pari learned how to run the household. Then Behjat would move in with her elderly parents.

  I went over to Pari and we embraced tightly. “I’m going to miss you so much,” I said.

  “You know I will miss you, too,” Pari said but her face reflected something I had never seen on it. It was as if she were on a river, floating away, without control. I had to push away the dark image that came to me, of her drowning. This was followed by intense loneliness. Soon Maryam and Aziz would leave, too, and I would be alone in this cold household.

  Thirteen

  Days, weeks went by and there was no word from Pari—not a phone call, not a letter. I wrote her a few long letters but got no response.

  When I tried to call her, Father snatched the phone from my hand. “Let her adjust to her new life,” he said.

  “I’m worried,” I said. “She hasn’t answered my letters.”

  “Do you think you care more about your sister than I do?” Father burst out.

  “Don’t create problems for your sister,” Mohtaram said.

  I sank back into the state I had been in when I was first torn away from Maryam and forced into a home alien to me. I flared up easily and cried at the slightest provocation.

  It was particularly hard for me during the Norooz holidays that year without Pari. Norooz, originating in Zoroastrian times, is the biggest secular holiday in Iran. Starting on March twenty-first and lasting for two weeks, it marks the beginning of spring and celebrates the renewal of life. Mohtaram planted seeds in trays so that they would sprout by the holidays. On Norooz day Mohtaram set on a table the Haft Siin, seven items, each starting with the letter S, representing rebirth, health, happiness, prosperity, joy, patience, and beauty. As we gathered around the Haft Siin table F
ather gave Manijeh and me money, the customary present.

  On the thirteenth day of the holiday, “getting rid of thirteen,” we went on a picnic in a park, as spending the day close to nature was supposed to be good luck. The park, on the outskirts of Ahvaz, was popular and many other families were there, too.

  We sat on a rug we spread on the ground next to a stream and ate fish kabab s cooked by Ali on a charcoal grill, and currant rice, and other dishes he had prepared earlier at the house. Ali sat under a tree, separate from us; as he ate he watched the pigeons pecking on the ground or flying. The air was filled with scents of spices and flowers in bloom. Children were jumping rope and swaying on swings hung from trees.

  After we ate Father went for a walk by himself. Mohtaram, Manijeh, and I went to the stream while Ali stayed to guard the rug. Many other mothers and young girls were throwing plants they had grown for the occasion into the stream. The plants were supposed to have collected all the sickness, pain, and ill fate hiding in the paths of families throughout the coming year.

  Before throwing her plant Mohtaram asked Manijeh and me to tie its thin leaves and then make our wishes, a ritual for young girls symbolizing the desire “to be tied” in a marriage during the following year.

  Instead of obeying her I walked away to a secluded area of the park. Mohtaram, focused on Manijeh, didn’t try to stop me. As I reached a quiet corner, I was startled to see Majid, Pari’s love, standing by the water, holding a fishing rod. He was wearing American Levi’s. A few brown curls hung over his high forehead. He looked sensitive, alive to the world; his large hazel eyes focused on me.

  “How is your sister? Do you hear from her?” he asked.

  I just shook my head, not knowing what to say.