Goodbye Iran
One beautiful spring day in May in the early 1980s, at Tehran Mehrabad International Airport. Yet, the air inside was eerie and cold. With me that day were my parents, younger siblings, uncle, and the spirit of my executed older brother, Aref. About three years before that day, when he was only eighteen, he was killed by the dictator regime of the so-called Islamic Republic of Iran.
I was terrified to leave my country. A thousand thoughts passed through me as I followed my father's steps toward Air France's departure gate. I was sent to Paris to escape from my home country and stay alive. I had no idea when I would return to see my childhood home, family, and friends.
The airport security let my father—and, narrowly, my uncle—pass the passport check because I was still a minor. The security guard looked at my passport and asked if I was traveling alone to Paris. My father replied dryly, "Yes." The guard then informed us that my name appeared in their system with a warrant for arrest and that I was forbidden to leave the country. I felt weak in my knees, and my heart started pounding hard from apprehension.
My father started protesting, but my uncle intervened amicably, imploring the guard that there must be a mistake and to let me go before I missed the flight. My uncle was contending that it was perhaps a name mixed up— and as if he was expecting the guard's response, he allowed a stack of cash toward him under a piece of paper. I don't remember many details—only small bits and pieces, like flashbacks. Finally, after many excruciating long minutes that felt forever, the guard returned and stamped my passport as an exit visa to leave.
I saw my mother on the other side of the glass wall. Her face was covered with tears, in her eyes a sea of unease, and yet with a smile of gratitude. My sister, who was only a year old, was crawling around in her little white hand-knitted dress, oblivious to the entire happening. I envied her carelessness. I waved back at my younger brother, quietly witnessing it all, but my voice shot into my dried throat. My heart sank.
There is a scene at the end of Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis graphic novel in which she experiences the exact moment of leaving Iran.
"I couldn't bear looking at them there behind the glass. Nothing is worse than saying goodbye. It's a little like dying." —Marjane Satrapi in Persepolis.
I relived the very exact moment. I looked back one last time before onboarding the airport bus to the plane. My father held my mother to help her walk away from the airport security point. It was a sad and difficult moment that I will never forget.
With the help of the flight attendant, I found my seat. The plane was packed with Arab men. Aside from their apparent outfits, I knew because as soon as the plane took off, they chanted in Arabic, "Allah o Akbar," meaning God is Great. It took me back to the daily obligatory prayers in school. I wondered how badly the pilot was that made them pray for take off. It made me nervous to sit among them, reminding me why I was running away. I felt nauseous, perhaps from nervousness or my first time flying. Sadness took over me, not knowing when I would see my family again. I cried.
I could also hear some Persian-speaking individuals in different rows of the aircraft. I remember one woman walking toward me to comfort me, asking, "Why are you crying? You're going to Paris, honey, the Bride of all the cities in the world!" Paris was known to Iranians that way, referring to its beauty. I couldn't care less. All I wanted was to be back in my mother's arms.
Like everything else in my life, the short journey took an unexpected turn. Before landing in Paris, our plane expected a brief stop in Cypress. I am trying to remember why, perhaps due to a technical problem, we had to spend the night there, which felt more like a nightmare!
Unfortunately, cell phones were not a thing in the eighties, so I could not contact my parents or cousins in Paris. So, confused and uncertain, I followed the same Persian group, like a lost puppy, from the airport to the taxi and the hotel that the airline provided. That night, I barely got any sleep. Now I think about it, I should've accepted their invitation to go sightseeing. But I stayed in my room, scared. I remember my phone rang disturbingly a few times during the night, but I did not pick it up or answer the door knocking. I don't know if I was frightened or homesick. I can still picture the room's darkness and cold temperature and hear the city's noise. It was a lot to rehash and cope with for a teenage girl who's never been separated from her family.
To clarify my seemingly "overreacting emotions," I was already heartbroken and impacted by a few years of family mourning over my brother's loss and constant horrifying news. Our grieving was followed by the regime's abusive suppression of my family. During the past three years, my parents and I were taken into custody for interrogations to create fear and distress. Moreover, it was the regime's tactic to torture the family of the "anti-Islamic-revolutionary" members emotionally and psychologically. They forced my parents to retire early by cutting their salaries; I was banned from attending any university; Hijab— women's headcover and daily school praying were mandatory. They confiscated some of my parents' properties. They even broke my brother's stone tomb because my parents had engraved a beautiful poem. We were living in constant fear. And now I was forced to leave my family and home country indefinitely with a small suitcase. None of which were my choice.
"Leaders who do not act dialogically, but insist on imposing their decisions, do not organize the people–they manipulate them. They do not liberate, nor are they liberated: they oppress." —Paulo Freire in Pedagogy of the Oppressed.
When my plane landed in Paris, it was daytime and sunny. My arrival in Paris was not exactly the romantic scene I imagined in the pictures and movies. The bus ride from the plane to the gates after that long flight caused me motion sickness. It is strange how I remember these random memories. I am sure the lack of sleep from the night before added to the distress, too. I felt so sick that I threw up at the airport. I arrived pale and weak. Later, I overheard the family friends, who picked me up, telling my parents over a phone conversation that I looked like a wasted zombie from hell when they found me at the gate.
Everything was surreal. That night, the view of magical Paris with its shimmering lights will forever be etched in my mind. The Eiffel Tower reminded me of Tehran's Azadi Tower (meaning freedom, formerly the Shahyad Tower). I remember thinking, "Why don't we light up our tower like this?" I couldn't believe I was in Paris, and I wished I could share this with my schoolmates and cousins, whom I had left behind and who could not escape, the loved ones I didn't get a chance to say goodbye to. I felt so lonely. I felt like Cinderella passed the midnight hour.
In the days that followed, I found myself in an unknown city with an unrevealed future among the strange foreign-speaking people, who, for example, shrugged their shoulders with a peculiar sound they made with their lips instead of saying: "No" or "I don't know." however, ironically, every uncomfortable moment I tolerated and handled made me want to be better at things, stand above it all, and be resilient.
Those days were the start of the strength and independence I found in exile for many years and the challenges I overcame. To my not knowing, this would become my home for the next three years. I became fluent in French, made new friends, and learned to smoke cigarettes while indulging in many cups of café au lait in charming Paris cafes. Slowly, the fears were replaced by images of Audrey Hepburn in the movie "Breakfast at Tiffany's."
I navigated through the Metro and walked all over the picturesque city. Those walks and explorations became my first steps toward freedom and learning to be vital and rely on myself.
The final destination, however, was to go to the US. Yet, living in Paris started a new chapter of my life that would change the entire course of my life.