Instead of Crying, She Laughed

Narrated by Mahin Khamisabadi

Selected by Faezeh Sasanikhah
Translated by Mandana Karimi

2025-8-7

When Jahad announced that we should go fruit picking, we couldn’t leave our children alone at home; they were too young. At times like this, poor Akbar Agha would rent a bigger vehicle so the children could come along too. About ten or twenty women would gather, and we would work hard picking the fruit from the trees and packing them into boxes. At sunset, a truck would come. The men would load the fruit and take it away. This was our routine until the late days of the war. Sometimes we would wash the fruit, cut it into small pieces, and cook it with sugar. Then we would send the jams to the front lines.

Once, we were sent to the Emarat orchard near Malard. It was a quince orchard, and the fruit was worm-eaten. About ten or twelve of us went, picked the quinces, and threw them in the yard of the Hosseiniyeh mosque. We washed them and removed the damaged parts. Then we chopped the fruit and made jam with it.

That day when we went to the orchard, a dog chased after our daughters, but instead of crying, my daughter laughed.

Even though the dog was chasing my daughter Leila, she was laughing. Setareh said, "Look! Instead of crying, she’s laughing!" Then, in the Hamedani Turkish dialect, she told her own daughter, who was crying out of fear, "Look, look! Learn from Leila, kid! You cried so much, your mouth dropped onto your heart!" (meaning: your mouth literally fell on your heart!) Shamsi Khanom kept laughing at Setareh’s words until sunset while we were in the orchard. She said, "Setareh! How on earth does a mouth fall onto the heart?!"

Source: Tavakoli leshkajani, Narjes, Rahimi, Mohammad Mehdi, Ma Ham Jangidim: Revayet-e Zanan-e Malard Az Poshtibani-e Defae Moghaddas (We Also Fought: Narratives of the Women of Malard on Supporting the Holy Defense), Rahyar Publishing Co. 2022, Pp 115.