Wedding Song

by Farideh Goldin

  During those years, either pregnant or tending babies, I didn’t have the energy to make the long trip to visit my mother and Niloufar. At the same time, the American embassy in Israel refused to grant them a visa to visit us because they carried Iranian passports at a time when Americans were kept hostage in Iran, and because the American immigration office feared that once they arrived in the United States, they would seek refugee status.

  When my father finally received his exit visa, he boarded a plane to the United States. Waiting on the runway, ready to taxi, the plane was turned around. An anonymous phone caller had claimed that his passport was forged. His papers had passed scrutiny a week earlier, but now the inspectors were afraid to verify the passport’s authenticity. So, he stayed in Iran for another six months, enduring beatings whenever he dared to go back to various offices to reclaim his passport. At the end, a mola asked him to come back with all his money in a cashier’s check, took the envelope, and signed for his release. When I picked him up at the airport, he was only a shadow of the forceful man I remembered. Bent over, he followed me with downcast eyes.

  The decision to take my mother and siblings away from Iran despite condemnation from the family and my grandmother’s pleas for him to stay must have been the most difficult decision my father made in his life. The entire family dissuaded him from leaving. An aunt told my father that these things were “in the hands of God,” not man, that he couldn’t change his fate by removing himself from the family and the country. Another aunt asked him why Baba thought his family’s lives were more precious than the others. How could he be so selfish to act independently of the rest of the family? My grandmother verbally attacked my mother, telling her that it was her fault my father was leaving the family behind and, in her high emotions, her breathing became labored and she fainted.

  Khanom-bozorg died shortly after my father had finally made his escape. Baba called Iran to learn that his mother was already on her death bed, asking for him. I had never seen my father so tender, crying softly. He held the telephone receiver lovingly as if holding his mother’s hand, whispering his words of comfort and love to Khanom-bozorg in Judi, our forgotten language. I couldn’t understand all the words, but then I didn’t have to. My father sat on the floor for hours with his head in his hands, moaning. “How could I not be at my mother’s side?” he kept asking himself.

  My father murmured a retold story, its words vague this time in his grief, but clear to me who had heard it so very many times. One single image of Khanom-bozorg had always overtaken the rest in my father’s mind, one that had erased any shortcomings she could have had. One day, Baba, a mere teenager during the post–World War II famine, went home excited, bringing a prized sheet of flat bread he had fought for vigorously at the bakery. Khanom-bozorg told him she had eaten already, and that he should feed the kids, the little starving one first. After the bread was gone, my father went looking for his mother and found her crouched in a closet, gnawing on the tender bark of a tree.

  My grandmother had tried to keep the family together, sometimes at any cost, because she feared being alone. The last years I spent in Iran, my father often slept next to her to calm her nightmares, her sudden anxiety attacks that were pronounced in short spasms of lungs trying desperately to pull in air. The sound reverberated throughout the quiet of the sleepy house, like the noise of a cat clawing the walls. It frightened us, kept us awake. One night, trying to rush to her side, my father broke his arm against the bed post. At our grandmother’s death, my siblings and I did what we knew best: We kept silent, hid our sorrow, and sensed the past fading away, dying.

  At my cousin’s outdoor wedding, I couldn’t help but remember my Khanom-bozorg; she had been at the same spot for my wedding with her waterpipe and colorful kerchiefs, hesitant at not covering her body with a chador in public. Because this was the kind of event she always loved, being surrounded by her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, I couldn’t help but think that her spirit hovered over all of us.

  We didn’t talk about Khanom-bozorg at the wedding. Instead, most aunts and uncles approached me to say, “Your father’s place is empty!” I did miss him too. I couldn’t remember the last time all of us had been together as a family.

  “My mother too,” I answered back. “I miss Maman too.”

  The blunt answer surprised the well-wishers, who quickly replied “Yes, of course!”

  In the eyes of the family, Maman’s job had been to take care of my grandmother. My siblings and I, and even my father now, recognize that she did her best at a cost to herself. The rest of the family often complained that Maman didn’t serve her mother-in-law well. Anyhow, my grandmother was dead now, leaving no need for my mother. She was erased.

  Yet I couldn’t be bitter. At such a beautiful wedding, under the clear sky, by the waters of the Elizabeth River, among the white lace and laughter, we had all gathered with our own unique stories. What a long journey this had been for us all, filled with biblical-like tales of our wanderings from Iran. Through the deserts of the east, some had struggled across Afghanistan and Pakistan. Through the western mountains some had made their way to Turkey on donkeys behind molesting smugglers. They had been processed in Italy, Austria, Tel Aviv, and New York. They had endured scud attacks in Shiraz, Tehran, and Israel. They had prayed in lonely Iranian jails and Turkish prisons and in sealed rooms in Israel. Many were still trapped in Iran, but others, dazed and unsteady on their feet, had finally come to be cradled in the arms of America. Our last refuge. Our only safe place in the world.

  And two days later came September II.

  My mother leaves myrtle branches at her mother’s grave in Israel.

  A Closure

  Writing her autobiography, said Gerta Lerner, took “more nerve than jumping off a cliff into cold water” (Fireweed, Temple UP, 375). For me, letting my book be published took more daring. I feared hurting people around me, those whom I love, and even some people whom I might not favor. The purpose of writing this book, and publishing it, was simply to tell the truth as I knew it, my truth. I have changed names to preserve the dignity and privacy of many in this work of creative nonfiction.

  The writing, though painful, has been cathartic. I have come to appreciate the men and women I have known, to understand how oppression can warp lives, characters, and deeds. Reaching a stage of empathy, I have come to understand myself as well, to forgive and to ask to be forgiven.

  After finishing my book, I went to visit my parents in Israel in June 2002, after the “Passover massacre,” when the country was numb from frequent acts of violence against its civilians. I needed to see my parents before the book was published, fearing our relationship—one that I had nurtured and tried to mend for many years—might change afterward. For the first time, I visited them as a true adult, not needy, not bitter, not wanting to change them. Now I understood their pain and their boundaries as parents.

  I also visited the grave of my maternal grandmother Touran for the first time. No longer angry, I felt humbled by her courage and endurance. My mother and I washed the stone on her grave with care and deep sadness. We lit candles. We put myrtle branches into an urn on the grave. I silently asked for her forgiveness.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Anita Clair Fellman, Nancy Bazin, Janet Bing, Carolyn Rhodes, Janet Peery, Luisa Igloria, and Sheri Reynolds have been my teachers, friends, and mentors in the Women’s Studies and Creative Writing Departments at Old Dominion University. Thank you for putting the pen back in my hand. Thank you, Sheri, for understanding my work, for having the vision to sculpt it, and for your many insights that have guided me with my writing for the past two years.

  I would especially like to thank Carolyn Rhodes, my friend and mentor for the past seven years. Thank you, Ernest, too.

  My dear friends Annie Laurie and Art Sandler gave me constant encouragement and opened many doors for me. I am grateful.

  I am deeply indebted to The Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, its founding dire
ctor, Shulamit Reinharz, and its senior research director, Susan Kahn. They have empowered Jewish women around the world.

  I would like to thank my editors, Phyllis Deutsch and Mary Crittendon.

  For their constructive comments and encouragement, I thank Marjorie Agosin, Helen Epstein, Joseph Skibell, Marita Golden, Edward Jacobs, Madison Smartt Bell, and Farzaneh Milani.

  Thank you, Gina Nahai, for paving the road for Iranian Jewish women writers.

  Finally, I am indebted to my siblings Nahid, Freydoun, Farzad, and Niloufar. They have enriched my memories by sharing their own stories. And thank you, Steve, Alisa, and Suzy.

  GLOSSARY

  aftabeh: water jug

  agha: sir, Mr., also a common name for father

  ameh: paternal aunt

  aragh: an alcoholic drink

  aroosak: a little bride, a doll

  baba: father

  bakht: luck, fortune

  bamieh: confectionary

  bandandaz: a woman who removes body hair

  baseh: enough

  bebakhshid: please forgive me

  befarmaid: a polite way of proffering

  beoft: fall

  besalamati: to your health

  biaboon: desert

  bolbol: nightingale

  boro: go

  bozorg: great, big

  brakha: prayer (Hebrew)

  brit-milah: the circumcision ritual (Hebrew)

  chador: a full body covering

  choobak: a shrub whose bark was used as soap

  daee: maternal uncle

  dard: pain

  dard-e-del: talking of the ache in one’s heart

  dayan: judge, spiritual leader (Hebrew)

  del: heart

  doft: daughter (Judi)

  farangee: foreigner

  galoo: throat

  gele-zard: yellow clay, soaked and used as hair conditioner

  gha’edeh: a woman’s period

  ghaltak: a cylindrical stone for packing earthen roofs

  ghalyan: waterpipe, hookah

  ghalyoon: waterpipe in the dialect of Shiraz

  gherti: a show off

  ghorbat: being away from home

  goh: excrement

  gom: lost

  gomsho or gom sho: get lost

  halwa: sweets

  hamam: bath, public baths

  hamami: a bath keeper

  hejab: veil, modesty

  hejleh: wedding canopy

  holoo: peach

  jaan: dear

  javeed: long live

  jendeh: whore

  jihad: holy war

  jude-koshi: killing the Jews, pogrom

  Judi: Judeo-Persian, a language spoken only among Jews of Shiraz

  kaleh: head

  khaleh: maternal aunt

  Khan: a leader; Mr.

  khanom: lady, Mrs.

  khanom-bozorg: a great lady, a title we used for my grandmother

  khastegar: a suitor

  khastegaree: marriage proposal

  khatam: inlaid wood and ivory

  khebeen, khesheen: are you well? (Judi)

  khoda: God

  khodaye bozorg: the Great God

  khoshgel: beautiful

  khupa: wedding canopy (Hebrew)

  kiddush: prayer over wine (Hebrew)

  kilim: a pileless, woven tapestry rug

  kippa: prayer cup (Hebrew)

  kiseh: a square glove used as a washcloth

  kol isha: the voice of a woman (Hebrew)

  konar: pulverized leaves used to wash hair

  koofteh: large meatballs made with rice, herbs, and chopped beef

  mahaleh: a place, also a ghetto

  maman: mother

  mamno'ol khorooj: forbidden to leave

  manghal: brazier

  mashalah: what wonders God has fashioned, or may you be preserved from the evil eye

  matalak: dirty phrases

  mava: mother (Judi)

  mazal tov: congratulations, good luck (Hebrew)

  meeshee: become

  mikvah: a ritual bath (Hebrew)

  mola: a religious leader, Jewish or Moslem

  moshaverat: gathering of elders to make a decision

  naan: bread

  najeeb: chaste

  najes: dirty, often refers to more than physical uncleanness

  naneh: mother (Judi or old Persian)

  pa-do-ak: “running legs,” boys who run errands

  rafigh-baz: the game of having friends

  sabzee: greens, herbs

  salam: hello

  setar: a musical instrument

  shadee: happiness

  shagh: stiff

  shalomalekhem (shalom alekhem): may peace be with you (Hebrew)

  shamee: potato and chopped meat pancakes

  sharbat: a fruit drink

  shavua tov: a good week (Hebrew)

  shekhitah: ritual slaughtering (Hebrew)

  shema: refers to the Jewish people’s proclamation of their belief in a single God (Hebrew)

  shiva: the seven-day mourning period (Hebrew)

  shokhet: a kosher butcher (Hebrew)

  shytel: wig (Yiddish)

  siah: black

  sigheh: temporary marriage

  simkha: a happy event (Hebrew)

  sofreh: a cloth that is often spread on the floor underneath the food

  taarof: the custom of exchanging polite words and niceties

  taher: pure

  tamei: impure (Hebrew)

  tanoor: clay oven

  Tehilim: Psalms of comfort

  toman: Iranian currency

  tonbak: Iranian drum

  tsedakah: charity (Hebrew)

  vasoonak: a collection of wedding poetry often sung by Jewish women of Shiraz

  verag: one who talks too much

  veragi: talking too much

  zaben-deraz: one with a long tongue, one who talks back

  zaifeh: the weak one (female)

  zarbol-masal: Persian proverbs

  ziarat: pilgrimage