After Tehran (30 page)

I talked to a friend of mine, Steve, about my dilemma. Because of his job, he knew a great deal about human rights and victims of torture. He, too, had had a difficult past, and he understood my state of mind. He asked me if I was familiar with
los desaparecidos—
“the disappeared”—of Argentina and Chile. I had seen photos of Argentine and Chilean mothers holding the pictures of their lost sons and daughters, pleading for information about their fates. Steve said he could only imagine how terrible it was to know a loved one had been arrested and never to hear any news, never to learn if the person was dead or alive. He reminded me that thousands of people around the world have suffered like that. He believed that I should write about Jasmine. Not knowing what happened to her was an important part of my suffering and the suffering of many others like me. He believed I should honour her with my words; in so doing, I would be making my readers aware of
los desaparecidos
. He said he had no doubt I knew what was best.

But I didn’t. I had hit a dead end.

IN EARLY MARCH 2009
, I finally decided to join Facebook. This was a big step for me, because I am technologically challenged.
Andre believes that I would have been happiest had I been born in the Stone Age, which is probably true. Technology has always intimidated me. When we came to Canada, I refused to learn how to drive, and it took Andre years to talk me into taking driving lessons. I never failed a driver’s test, but for months after getting my licence I shook with fear every time I sat behind the wheel of our car. When I decided to publish
Prisoner of Tehran
, it was obvious that I had to type it, but I knew absolutely nothing about computers and found them scary. Even moving the cursor around the screen was difficult for me. To help me out Andre bought some voice-recognition software, but that only frustrated me more, because the program didn’t understand my pronunciation. I eventually learned to type, use Microsoft Word and many other programs, and surf the net. Friends kept inviting me to join Facebook, but to me it was another computer skill that would take me months to master. However, after being unable to confirm the news about Jasmine’s execution, it occurred to me that I could use Facebook to find old friends.

In the beginning, my Facebook page showed only my name and date of birth, but I soon began receiving messages from readers of mine who wanted to contact me. I was encouraged and put more information on my “wall,” and then I began looking for people. I connected with a few high-school friends who had never been arrested and had eventually left Iran, and then I started searching for my prison friends. But I failed in every case. Finally, I typed Jasmine’s name in the Search box. I didn’t really expect any results, but I had to try. Her name came up. I froze. This was impossible. It couldn’t be her. A small profile photo sat next to her name. I looked at it and my heart almost jumped out of my chest. Even though the woman in the photo didn’t look like the Jasmine I’d known, her smile was familiar. I tried to enlarge the photo, but it didn’t work. So I decided to write to her. But what should I say?
“Hi! I was wondering if you and I were in prison together …” If this woman was not my Jasmine, she would think me a mad person who was harassing her. So I worded my message carefully:

Hi: My name is Marina Nemat (maiden name Moradi-Bakht) and I’m an author living in Canada (you can Google me). I’m looking for a friend with the same name as yours. Are you the one I lost touch with in 1984?

For the next few hours, I sat in front of my computer and kept busy, but I constantly found myself staring at my Google Notifier. Would this woman write back to me, saying that she was not the Jasmine I was looking for? Or would my Jasmine write to me that she was alive and well?

The next morning, I opened my laptop before doing anything else and found this message:

Oh, my God! Of course I know you from those terrible times! I can’t believe it … I remember you and even your nightmares … remember you told me about them? How wonderful that you found me …

Jasmine

The world stopped. I read her words again and again. She was all right. Tears rolled down my face. I had found her. The dead had come back to life. I had so many things to ask her, so many things to tell her. Did she know that her name was on a list of the executed?

Jasmine! This is a MIRACLE! Where are you? When did they let you go? I’ve been looking for you forever. Please do me a favour and Google yourself. There’s a website that says you
were executed in 1984! I saw it in December ’08, and I had a nervous breakdown. I even contacted Amnesty International … I also contacted the people behind that website, and they said there was no way to verify the info. My God! I thought you were dead! I’m a writer now, and I even wrote a chapter about you to include in my new book. It’s like a eulogy of some sort. I was devastated because it looked like there was nothing left of you except a name and a date … So many terrible things happened. I’m so happy you’re okay!

As I waited for Jasmine’s response, I thought about the strange situation we were in. Even though she didn’t seem to think that I was dead, my message must have shocked her. I had spent the last few years thinking and writing about Evin, but she had probably tried to forget it—and now the ghost of the past was looking straight into her eyes. I didn’t want to be a reminder of pain and suffering; except, remembrance was all I had left. Jasmine and I were alive, but many others like us were not. Also, those who had survived Evin needed to be acknowledged in a human way. I realized I had to give Jasmine time to deal with the avalanche of memories she now had to face. But how I longed to hear her voice.

That evening, Andre came home from work and we sat at the dinner table to eat. I had not called him to tell him about my finding Jasmine. I had felt exhausted all day, staring at my computer screen, thinking.

“How was your day?” he asked.

“You first.”

“To tell you the truth, not that great.” He went on to describe his workday, and I listened impatiently.

“Your turn,” he said.

“I don’t know where to start. I’m still in shock.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing bad. It was great, actually. Miraculous. But I still haven’t been able to get my head around it.”

“What?”

“I found Jasmine. She’s okay …” I told him the whole story. He was thrilled.

The next day I felt like pulp. I hadn’t heard back from Jasmine. But I had to be patient. Too much was coming at her too fast. I was like a bomb that had just exploded in her world.

Jasmine wrote two days later and told me that she’d been released two years after me. She still lived in Iran. After Evin, she went back to school and got a university degree, and then she got married. I had so many things to ask her. Was she in touch with any of our cellmates? Had she talked to her family about Evin, or had she remained silent? Did her family ask her about what had happened to her behind bars? I desperately wanted to know every detail about her life after Evin. Yet she could be arrested because of her connection to me. I had heard that email was a safe way of communicating with people in Iran. But even though technology had become an effective tool in the hands of dissidents, the regime could use it against the people. I decided to stop writing to her, and she agreed that we should keep our communication to a minimum. I was not going to take any chances with Jasmine’s life. I wanted her to be safe and happy, and the truth was—I was a danger to her.

*
Lanaat Abad
.

**
Golzar-eh Khavaran
.

Letters from
My Cellmates, and
My Barbie Doll

S
ince the publication of
Prisoner of Tehran
, I have met many ex-prisoners from Iran, but most of them are not ready to talk about the past. They have approached me at events to offer a few words of encouragement, or they have emailed me and wished me the best of luck. One woman wrote to me saying that as a teenager she had been in Evin. She later immigrated to Canada and became a psychologist, but she had never talked about her prison experience with anyone, not even her husband and children. Once she read my book, she told her children that they had to read it. This was as far as she was ready to go. But I didn’t lose hope. I knew that others would come forward sooner or later. The truth cannot remain buried forever.

In December 2008, an Iranian woman—whom I will call Anamy here—wrote to me through my website. She said that she had been in Evin between the ages of sixteen and nineteen, around the same time as I was. After her release she had gone back to school and received a degree. She had remained in Iran until just recently, when she had begun to feel the urge to tell her story. She wanted me to help her publish her memoir. I wrote back to her, explaining my writing process and the difficulties I had faced, and I shared what I knew about the publishing world. I noted that
in order to be taken seriously, she needed to finish her manuscript and then enrol in creative-writing classes to perfect it. Once that was done, I promised that I would read it and give her feedback. We communicated regularly:

Dear Marina
,

Just like you, I was sentenced to silence for years … I cannot remember anyone asking me about my experience in the prison … No family member, no friend or boyfriend, not even my husband … Whether they want it or not, this silence makes our loved ones one of “them.” I think the best way is writing, but in the meantime, I guess talking has its advantages … I had a tough time reading some parts of your book. Especially the parts about interrogations and 246. It took me back there, and I was literally gasping for air …

There are major gaps in my memory. I was not aware of them before. I do not at all remember the room I was in Bandeh yek [a cellblock in Evin also known as 240]. I was there for months. How is this possible? In the meantime, I clearly remember the wet grasshopper I saw sitting on the windowsill the rainy night they forced us to evacuate 246 and move to Bandeh yek. I was desperate and hopeless … I think I remember everything that was somehow meaningful to me …

A couple of nights ago, I had this feeling that I would not have much time, like I would not stay alive for long. I don’t know whether it is an intuitive feeling or a hidden desire. I think, as you said in your book, I have been sleepwalking, too. I have always been somehow distracted from life, more like a witness and not like someone really involved in it … I have never been passive in my life, but I was doing it all from a distance. I always knew it had something to do with the prison. It is just like you have gotten off a train, and then after a couple of years, you once
again want to catch up with it! What you said in the interview on the last pages of your book about the effects of writing your memoir on getting back into life was really interesting to me. I had never thought of it like that before …

I cried a lot reading your email, and I had a very hard time replying. What you said about having the same feelings about death while writing your book had a very profound impact on me. Not just because it was so unbelievably exactly the same as mine, but because it made me start to think that many things that I considered to be my personal problems, now seem to be symptoms that all ex-prisoners are experiencing in the silent cells we are still in … It is so unbelievable to have this much in common with someone you do not know. In Evin, you and I lived literally metres away from one another for many months and maybe more than a year and still far away and unknown to each other. Now we live miles and miles away, yet this close and connected …

Marina, a part of me is still in Evin. By letting sixteen-year-old Marina speak, you have not only shown her to me, but you have also helped me see the sixteen-year-old me, still in prison, squatting in silence near a wall, looking straight into my eyes, and begging me to give her voice back
.

I want to speak. I need to
.

Anamy

After Anamy, a few other ex-prisoners from Iran got in touch with me and told me that they wanted to write their memoirs of the prisons of the Islamic Republic. Anamy and my other cellmates who have decided to break the silence are my beacons of hope. I relied on my friends in Evin to find a ray of light in absolute darkness; I now look again in their direction. I am not alone in my journey of trying to document the human experience
of those who have suffered at the hands of the Islamic Republic. My cellmates are out there, and they will sooner or later raise their voices. I hope that we will one day stand at a memorial for our lost friends in Iran. However, we will not wave our fists in the air, demanding revenge. No. We will want justice, but if too many years have gone by and justice for our dead friends and for us seems impossible, we will cry and grieve, but we will refrain from resorting to violence, because if not, we will become victims of the never-ending cycle of hatred and injustice that has already destroyed too many lives.

ON SEPTEMBER 22, 2008
, I had a meeting with Dr. Rosemary Meier to discuss the effects of torture on children. Dr. Meier is a geriatric psychiatrist, an assistant professor at the University of Toronto, and a member of the health committee and network of the Canadian Centre for Victims of Torture.