by at Home;Abroad Laughing Without an Accent: Adventures of an Iranian American
The first day of the cruise consisted of everyone finding his room, unpacking, and participating in the mandatory evacuation drill. We were instructed to carry our life vests from our rooms to the appropriate deck, put on the life vests, then line up in the designated spot for roll call.
Some of my relatives had a hard time reaching the deck because they had put on their life vests in their cabins, despite the Please Do Not Put on Life Vest in Your Cabin sign. It had taken them a while to maneuver their way, like bumper cars, down the narrow hallways. To the naïve person, this may seem like a result of the language barrier, but anyone who has spent time in other parts of the world knows better. Whether the sign says “Stop,” “Do not put your feet on the chair,” or, like the ones barely visible through the haze in restaurants in France, “Fumer interdit,” most people do what they are going to do. If humans actually followed rules, we would all be Swiss.
Once we lined up on deck, we were introduced to the ritual of “Smile!” and click. Every single move on the cruise ship was photographed—then offered for purchase. Who wouldn’t want to spend twenty dollars on a photo of himself strapped in a bulky orange life vest? Who wouldn’t want a photo of himself holding the dinner menu and leaning toward his wife, who is also holding the dinner menu? My father, for one. Throughout the week, he kept interrogating relatives about the number of photos they had purchased, then converting that to Iranian currency and letting them know what that money would have purchased in prerevolutionary Iran. This naturally led to a discussion of how the revolution had derailed his life, which led to the often-discussed “I wish I had bought a house in California in 1972.”
Fortunately, by this point in my father’s speech, it was time for a meal, which on a cruise is defined as the time when one is not asleep or in the bathroom. I can only imagine the letters the international staff members write to their relatives in the Philippines, Ukraine, and Romania: “It is amazing the ship has not yet sunk.”
Not only did the ship’s restaurants present an array of food choices at every meal, but passengers also had the option of receiving, for an extra thirty-five dollars, a large plastic tumbler that enabled the owner, every day, all day, to drink as much soda as he or she wanted. I often saw entire families, each member with his own tumbler, walking around, as if the ship’s deck were really the Serengeti and they had not just finished a meal twenty minutes ago. Judging by the obvious man-to-cup bond, I would not want to be the person to tell them, “No, you can’t take that with you on the lifeboat.”
My father’s birthday party was scheduled for the fourth night of the cruise. That night was significant; it was the only night when a table for fifty-one was available. I had the party hats ready, and these had not been easy to find. According to the decision makers in the world of party supplies, people turn “Fifty and Fabulous!” or “Sixty and Sexy!” but then the merriment stops. “Eighty and What Was I Saying?” was nowhere to be found. There was nothing for ninety either. Someone needs to seize this marketing opportunity but quickly.
I ended up purchasing hats that read “30!” With the help of my daughter and a permanent marker, the threes became eights. My relatives each received a conical hat that uniformly evoked the same comment: “I’m not wearing this.”
When my father entered the restaurant, we all started singing “Happy Birthday” in English. We wanted to sing in Persian (tavalod, tavalod, tavalodet mubarak…) but a large group of Middle Easterners these days scares people enough. Add to that any form of exuberance with clapping, cheering, and guttural sounds and next thing you know, we are trying to convince the nice men from Homeland Security that we are not plotting to take over the buffet lines.
After we finished singing and clapping and cheering, a man who introduced himself as Chuck told my father that it was also his eightieth birthday, but he was not as fortunate to be surrounded by so many family members. My father, wearing his 80! birthday hat, said to Chuck, “It’s not my birthday and I’m not eighty.”
Usually I try to fix things. I am the interpreter, the cultural bridge, the one who calls the insurance people when they claim that my mom’s foot surgery is cosmetic and therefore not covered. But this evening I suppressed the urge to explain anything to Chuck. I watched him walk back to his table and sit down. I wouldn’t have known where to begin.
The highlight of the cruise came on the last evening, when after six days of “If we were geese, the foie gras would now be ready,” the Midnight Chocolate Buffet was announced. This event was to be held in the back of the ship. I only hoped that by staying in my room in the front of the ship, I would be able to prevent the ship from tilting. I did.
François had decided to go, as he put it, “for anthropological research.” I stayed in the room happily rereading Love in the Time of Cholera. I waited and waited, but by the time François returned, I was fast asleep. He woke me up, breathless with excitement. This is what a midnight rendezvous with chocolate does to a man. “You should have seen this!” he said, holding a paper plate piled with various shades of brown. “There was an hour-long wait. All your relatives were there, by the way.”
“They’re your relatives, too,” I reminded him.
Apparently, the trash disposals had malfunctioned and the entire back of the ship, next to the chocolate buffet, stank like a day’s worth of trash produced by twenty-five hundred people on an enclosed ship. “It was unbearable,” he said. “But everyone held their noses and waited. And I can tell you this, it wasn’t even good chocolate,” he said, taking a bite of the chocolate-marshmallow-caramel-coconut square he’d brought back. “It’s like Halloween quality—overly sweet, not very much cocoa, just junk,” he added, finishing a chocolate macaroon.
“Floss well,” I said.
When we returned from the cruise, bloated with memories, I wrote a magazine article about my father’s eightieth birthday party. When the editor sent me the proofs for the piece, an illustration of a conical birthday hat with the saying “Eighty and Flirty!” had been added. I asked the editor to please remove the word “flirty,” since I had never used that word. The editor and I e-mailed back and forth a few times, with him telling me it was funny, and me telling him it was insulting. To his credit, he agreed to remove it.
When the article came out, I told my father the story of the undignified illustration and the ensuing e-mails with the editor. “I fought for you,” I told him. “Of course I will never get published in that magazine again, but such is the price of dignity. It was worth it.”
My dad let my words of courage sink in. Then he asked me what “fe-lare-tee” meant.
I told him.
“But I like that,” he said.
Peelings, Nothing More Than Peelings
As the youngest child in my family and the only girl, I was my mother’s constant companion. Unlike today’s overscheduled children, I had nothing to do all day but wander in my garden or follow my mother. Where she went, I went.
She and I didn’t talk much, not for lack of affection but because my mother just wasn’t the type to have a lengthy conversation with a five-year-old. Instead, she held my hand firmly as she went about her daily routine, a routine that introduced me to the same cast of characters every week: the vegetable vendor who always offered me a sugar cube with his dirty fingers; the fishmonger, Mashti seh kaleh (“three-headed Mashti”), who although possessing only one head, possessed a rather large one; and the butcher with his bloodied apron, who simply scared me.
All the vendors treated my mother with respect, not just because she was a customer but because of her fair complexion. Our “European” look put my mother and me a couple of rungs higher on the social ladder, but it also meant that my mother, often mistaken for a farangi, or foreigner, was often charged more.
When my mother wasn’t haggling with the fishmonger over the price of his catch from the River Karun, she could be found haggling over the price of imported Kuwaiti bananas.
Bananas were very expensive in Abadan
and happened to be the favorite fruit in the Jazayeri family. My mother could never buy enough.
One day, the postman knocked on our door and handed my mother an enormous box.
“What is this?” my mother asked.
“I just deliver,” he responded, waiting for a tip.
My mother gave him a few toumans. She closed the door and opened the box. It was bursting with bananas.
My mother, breathless with excitement, called my father at work. “Kazem!” she exclaimed. “Someone sent us a box of bananas. There’s no return address. Who could have done this?”
“God works in mysterious ways,” my father explained. “I’ll be home soon.”
My mother hung up the phone and called my aunt Sedigeh.
“Bavaret nemeesheh!” You won’t believe this,” my mother exclaimed. “I have bananas for everyone.”
“Who are they from?” my aunt asked.
“God,” my mother announced.
Ten minutes later, my aunt Sedigeh, my cousins Mohammad, Mehdi, and Mehrdad, my two brothers, Farid and Farshid, our servant Naneh Pooran, my aunt’s servant Ali, and my mother sat staring in disbelief at an enormous pile of bananas. With laughter and glee, the mad peeling began. One banana after another was consumed. High on potassium, we delighted in our good fortune.
Before all the bananas disappeared, my mother suggested to my aunt Sedigeh that she should save a few to mail to her son Mahmood, who was studying in Tehran. My aunt Sedigeh tucked a few of the greener ones in her purse.
Half an hour later, the only proof that the banana buffet had not been a dream was the mountain of banana peels that served as a reminder of God’s love for us.
Then the doorbell rang. It was the postman.
In a panic, he exclaimed, “I delivered the wrong box to your house. It was meant for the Javaheris, not the Jazayeris.”
God does indeed work in mysterious ways, although not as mysteriously as the Iranian postal system.
Unable to hide her shame, my mother apologized. “Bebakhsheed, I am so sorry,” she said, “but what was in the box is no longer available.”
My mother called my father and explained the situation.
“It was an honest mistake,” my father said. “No one will ever know.”
A few months later, the new school year began. On the first day of school, my brother Farshid wore his new clothes, his new shoes, combed his newly cut hair, and went with my parents to meet his new teacher.
The teacher looked at my parents.
They looked at her.
My parents suddenly wished they were invisible.
Her name was Mrs. Javaheri.
From that day on, on every possible occasion, Farshid presented Mrs. Javaheri with a bouquet of bananas. And Mrs. Javaheri, thankfully, always smiled.
Of Mice and Mandalas
I was staying at my parents’ house in Newport Beach when I received an invitation for a speaking gig in Palm Springs. I had never heard of the organization, they would be meeting at six in the morning, and there was no mention of a speaking fee—all bad signs. I thanked them but turned them down.
I made the mistake of mentioning this to my parents. “What?” my father said. “We would have come with you! Remember the Date Festival?”
My parents and I had attended the Date Festival near Palm Springs back in the seventies. Like the Garlic Festival, which we had also attended, the Date Festival was essentially an excuse to walk around eating deep-fried foods on a stick. There had also been, of course, carnival rides I wasn’t allowed to go on, thanks to my father, the engineer. “Who assembles these? One loose screw and you’re dead. Here, have a funnel cake.”
There also had been the requisite pageant, with the local high school girls all dressed up, and the stand with the baby animals, which I wanted to touch but which were also off-limits. “See those children touching the goats? They’re all gonna be sick tomorrow and they won’t know why. Let’s buy some curly fries,” my dad offered.
One day after rejecting the speaking gig, I received another e-mail from the same organization letting me know that I should reconsider. “Our members are a powerful and successful group of people, all at the top of their careers. Speaking for us could launch your career in unimaginable ways. Our members do not believe in limits.”
I had been a published author for only a few months and had spoken at some bookstores, libraries, senior homes, and book clubs. I knew that it was up to me to spread the word about my book, but I had no way of judging which gigs I should accept and which I should decline. I was afraid that the one I passed up would be the one with Oprah’s cousin in the audience. Up to that point, I had said yes to everything, but this Palm Springs invitation was too far and entailed spending the night in a hotel, for which I would have to pay.
I e-mailed back and asked how many people would be attending the meeting and if any of their members were in the media.
I received a cryptic response: “We have hundreds of members, although due to their hectic work schedules, not every member attends every meeting. They represent many creative fields. We cannot, however, divulge the details of their careers. We can only say that they represent the top tier of their chosen fields.”
The response, which I shared with my father, left me with a creepy feeling. My father had a different interpretation: “Very successful people are secretive. We should go.”
That is when I remembered the late Bob Hope, Palm Springs’ most famous resident. It suddenly dawned on me that many old-time Hollywood people live in Palm Springs, and maybe this was their meeting. Who else would belong to an organization that met at the crack of dawn? Wheeler-dealer Hollywood types who want to play golf afterward and wheel and deal, that’s who. These were probably people on the lookout for new talent, the types who, with one push of the speed-dial, could get me on a local but influential cable show hosted by a well-tanned and well-connected insider who would spread the word about me at the tennis club. Next thing I know, I’m telling the personal shopper at Nordstrom that I need a flattering monochromatic outfit for the morning shows.
I accepted the invitation and made a reservation at a hotel in Palm Springs for the following week. My parents, always looking for any excuse to leave their condo, came along.
It had been years since I had shared a room with my parents, and it will be years, if ever, before I do it again. My father, like most men of a certain age, snores. My mother, like most women of a certain age, has insomnia. As I lay on the sofa bed next to my parents’ king-size bed, I was forced to listen to my father’s rhythmic sonata interrupted periodically by my mother’s voice: “Firoozeh, are you awake? I am.”
Five o’clock rolled around eventually. We woke up my father, who declared the mattress “one of the most comfortable ever.” We all got dressed, grabbed the unused shampoo, conditioner, shower cap, and sewing kit and checked out of the hotel.
We arrived at the conference center at 5:45 in the morning, just as I had been instructed. There were about sixty people there already, which surprised me, but then again, these people didn’t mess around. Our escort—a woman dressed in a conservative suit with a scarf tied in a knot that only French women and flight attendants know how to make—immediately greeted us. She gave us our preprinted name tags and asked us to sign a document agreeing that we would not record the meeting or take any pictures. This was a first for me. She then led us to the breakfast buffet. “Here we have scrambled eggs, Canadian bacon, sausage, smoked ham, ham and cheese croissants, and prosciutto with figs,” she said.
“I’m guessing not a lot of Jewish or Muslim members, huh?” I quipped.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I’m just kidding,” I said, knowing that if I have to say “I’m just kidding,” it’s a bad sign.
She looked perplexed.
“Not a pig left in Palm Springs,” I said, throwing my head back with a fake jolly laugh.
“Excuse me?” she said, looking confused.
> “I just said that since there are so many pork products at this breakfast and, traditionally, Muslims and Jews don’t eat ham, it would seem that you don’t have a lot of Jewish or Muslim members. Of course I could be totally wrong, since many Jews and Muslims eat ham, although most don’t, but many do,” I said, completely regretting every word I had uttered for the last two minutes.
“Is that a problem for you and your parents?” the woman asked, looking panicked.
“No, no, of course not! We love all things porcine, really,” I said, piling my plate as proof.
She then escorted us to our designated table. “I’ll be right back,” she said. She walked up to one of the members and whispered something in his ear. He looked over at us, visibly alarmed. I took a big bite of the Canadian bacon, made an exaggerated look of satisfaction, and smiled at them both.
At six thirty sharp, the president of the organization took the stage and welcomed everyone. He introduced a couple of new members. “It is now time,” he said, pausing for effect, “for joy. Any testimonials?”
Half a dozen hands shot up in the air.
He called on a woman wearing an enormously loud purple and fuchsia caftan.
She stood up. “I just wanted to share with all of you that I just returned from a month at an orphanage in Gwa-tay-mahlah,” she said, pronouncing “Guatemala” with a heavy Spanish accent giving the impression that she had melded with that culture. “During the time I spent down there,” she continued, “I introduced the children to the power of visualization. I led workshops every day, and those children,” she paused, “were just transformed.” At this point, she stopped to wipe her tears. “And they really got it!” she exclaimed. Several people in the room pumped their fists and shouted, “Feel it!”