By
Heidi Noroozy
Don’t
you love seeing your familiar world through the fresh lens of a stranger’s
eyes?
I
do.
So
do my husband’s relatives in Iran, who are amused at my take on things they accept
without question. They grin at my naiveté when a shopkeeper at the bazaar repeatedly
insists that my purchase is a gift for a guest to his country, and I believe
him. In fact, he’s dissatisfied with the price we’ve negotiated and wants more
money. Or my fascination with the way the small bags of garbage people put out
daily seem to vanish overnight. And my
puzzlement over why people put out bones for the feral cats that no one
would allow inside their homes—to catch rats, naturally.
Firoozeh
Dumas flips the coin for me in her book, Funny
in Farsi, a memoir about growing up Persian in Southern California. Born in
Abadan, Iran, an oil town on the Persian Gulf, her family moved to a suburb of
L.A. in 1972. In this slim volume and its sequel, Laughing without an Accent, Dumas points out the idiosyncrasies of
American life with an irony that is often laugh-out-loud funny.
She
is bewildered by the unappetizing names we give to food: hot dogs, catfish, Tater
Tots, and sloppy Joes. “…no amount of caviar in the sea would have convinced us
to try mud pies,” she writes.
Her
first trip to a public lending library introduces the book-loving Firoozeh to a
concept so wondrous and perplexing she doesn’t quite believe it at first.
Surely no one would actually lend her a book for free! She brings her purse and
a few coins along just in case. At seven, Dumas learns that there is such a
thing as a magic carpet, only it’s called a library card.
One
of my favorite chapters in Funny in Farsi
is “The F Word.” And no, she doesn’t mean that
f-word. The essay is about her name and the difficulty many Americans have in
remembering or even pronouncing it. In Persian, Firoozeh means turquoise. “In
America, it means ‘Unpronounceable’ or “I’m Not Going to Talk to You Because I
Cannot Possibly Learn Your Name And I Just Don’t Want to Have to Ask You Again
and Again Because You’ll Think I’m Dumb or Might Get Upset or Something.’” And
so she tells everyone her name is Julie. Nice and simple. Problem solved. Or at
least until her American friends meet her Iranian ones and she can’t remember
who knows her as Julie and who calls her Firoozeh.
Boy
can I relate to that! But for me, the problem is reversed. I’m often confused
by the various Persian/American configurations of names my Iranian friends and
relatives use, but usually the Farsi versions are easier for me to remember.
They are the ones I learn first. When I’m used to people calling themselves
Shahab, Faribourz, or Sharzad, it throws me when they call on the phone and
say, “This is Dean.” Or Freddy or Sherry.
In
both her memoirs, Firoozeh Dumas writes with a gentle, wry humor. She pokes a gentle
fun at Americans and Iranians in equal measure, pointing out not just the
oddities of American culture through her non-native eyes but also the absurdity
of her own reactions to it.
Whether
you’ve lived abroad, married into another culture, or just have immigrant
friends, these books offer something we can all relate to—with a smile and a
chuckle.
Heidi, this sounds like so much fun. It's such a great adventure to watch another culture with foreign eyes.
ReplyDeleteOoh, I'll keep my eye out for these books! Thanks for the recommendation!
ReplyDeletePatricia and Beth, definitely try these books. The essays are entertaining and stay with you for a long time.
ReplyDeleteThese books sounds so interesting. I love everything that teaches me about other cultures. Thank you for your the recommendation.
ReplyDeleteThanks for stoping by, Marianne! I hope you try these books and enjoy them.
ReplyDelete