The 311th Night of Memory-2

The memories of the days of life

Seyyedeh Pegah Rezazadeh
Translated by: Fazel Shirzad

2020-3-10

According to Iranian Oral History Website, the 311^th session of memory night was held in commemoration of women of the imposed war on February 20, 2020. In this session, Iran Torabi, Seyyedeh Fawzia Madih and Hajji Mehdi Zemorodian narrated their memories.

The second narrator of the night, Seyyedeh Fawzia Madih, is another Iraqi woman in the eight-year war against Iran. A war-torn girl who saw the fall of Khorramshahr for only 21 years and she attended in war. Spontaneously. Madih is the wife of Martyr Mansour Goli, and after two years of his husband's testimony, she married with the brother of Martyr Mansour Goli, Massoud Goli. It was not long after Massoud Goli injured by chemical bomb in operation Majnoon Island. This martyr's wife, during the sacred defense, has also given relief and has felt the war deeply. He is the narrator of book The Most Beautiful Days of Life.

Seyyedeh Fawzia Madih started his memoir with a few verses of poetry and continued: "The book The Most Beautiful Days of Life is a narration of the events and realities of the imposed war. This book depicts the presence of women and their families in Khorramshahr, written by Somayeh Shariflu. One day, Shariflu told me that I was so overwhelmed in your memories that I cried during my drafting and rewriting, so much so that my eyes were dried.

This quote from Shariflu reminds me the days when my husband became martyred, and I was suffering from dry eyes. Anyway, I was born in Khorramshahr and I felt the imposed war. I was present in the days of war and resistance in Khorramshahr. I have travel to this city up to know to this day. The book "The Most Beautiful Days of Life" is about 800 pages and takes 11 years to write and publish. I want to share with you some of the memories in this book. When I married with martyr Mansour Goli, he was one of the guards of the Khorramshahr Corps. We started our lives in Abadan. Our lives began and formed under enemy fire. My life with Mansour lasted no more than six months. In Abadan, we had to live in abandoned houses. Believe me, when I think back to those years, I have to say honestly that I was not upset about living with the martyr,  although I was along with him moment by moment and I endured many hardships. I am honored and have said many times that if those days repeated again and if Mansour asks me again for marriage, I will accept his request. I want to repeat those days heartily. There was mouse in those deserted houses. The mice were not as large as the mice in Tehran. The mice we saw in those houses had a larger size than the mice in Tehran. At night, the enemy planes used to pass over the sky of Iran in order not to be able to take pictures or videos of the houses, we would bring everything we needed from the evening to the evening, close the curtains of windows that no longer had to go into the yard and turn on the lights and attract the attention of enemy. That is, we were camouflaging in some way. One night I had to go to the kitchen. The houses of that time had old courtyards and were surrounded by rooms around. In the cabinet I opened, a rat jumped out of my cabinet into my face. Next to the kitchen, we had a garden where the mice nested. They made a channel from the garden to the wall; they had come out of my kitchen cabinet to access food. In fact, we lived by the ears of animals that existed in Abadan at the time! The sisters who lived in Abadan at that time certainly know what I'm saying. My wife often was not at home. He would go to the front line and come home every two or three days. But when he came home and saw me doing housework, like crushing greens, he tried to help me in his army uniform. I would often capture these moments with a camera because I knew Mansour would not stay next to me forever, I would want to revive my memories by looking at those pictures. Mansour used to complain that I was going to take these photo to show his mother and tell him why he did house works for his wife but wouldn't he help me?! Mansour was interested in three things. I still respect Mansour in my heart and soul. He devoted most of his time to study. He was particularly interested in various books, especially the books of Imam Khomeini, Martyr Motahhari and Martyr Dastgheib. He reads Kamil[1] prayer with sincerity. His comrades have told me that sometimes when he was in the bulwark and the enemy was setting fire to the line, so that we had to empty our bulwarks, we had to look for Mansour and we did not know where he was! In spite of  all the bombing, there was no news of him and we couldn’t find him, When we went to another bulwark or went elsewhere, it was discovered that Mansour was reading Kamil prayer! He did not notice the enemy's fire. We could hardly pull Mansour out of the bulwark. He understood the appeal to the Ahlul-Bayt (AS)[2] fully and heartily. I think it is a beautiful feeling to pray to God because it brings us closer to the rightful owner. Another favorite was the night prayer. In the six months I lived with him, I don't remember that he forgot even one night's prayer, even when we were in trip. My wife had two days off and we used to travel. On the way to travel, sometimes it was necessary to pray shortly. I didn't want to sleep and miss these times. After a while, I joined Mansour for the night prayer, congregational prayer, even trying to pray together at home. Mansour was martyred in operation Beit-ol-Moqaddas[3]. When the operation began in Abadan, the enemy bombed Abadan. We went to Ahwaz with a few families living together. It was said there was more security because if something would happen to us we would be closer to Mansour and his companions and they would be informed. I did not see Mansour again until the first phase of the operation was done. It was as if he already knew he would be a martyr. I found in his eyes that he felt like she would not come back. Prior to his martyrdom, he had dreamed of Martyr Beheshti hugging Mansour and talking to him. I can say that he was ready to be martyred in every way and in every respect. After the first phase of the operation, he came to see me. He stayed one night and went. But that day was different from all the other days. I cried loudly; I was inspired that Mansour would be martyred. On the one hand, however, I couldn't believe I could no longer see Mansour. He said to me straightforwardly said: "Don't cry for me!" I come here safely to see you. Cry for martyrs who have become martyrs and whose bodies have become bulwark for us and the enemy and cannot give them back to their families." Suddenly I was upset. Because he named some of the injured that I knew some of them. While we were living in Abadan, warriors had the food of army and rarely had home-cooked food. Consequently, because fewer families lived there. He used to call me in Khuzestan language Allawi (Side) and said that he wished to invite some of the warriors home every once in a while to make food and feed them with warm food. Although we had no market during the war and some of our food was brought from Mahshahr, we invited some of the worriers and feed them. There are photos of those days that are memorable for me. I go back to the beginning my words and tell you why I knew most of the worriers whom Mansour had named that day and they were martyred. He returned home after the first phase of the operation and then went on to the second phase. He came home after the second stage, but with a severe headache. He suffered from the pain a lot. That night he was going to come back to the front line at four o'clock in the morning. All night I was crying until morning. I cannot describe that sense and mood precisely and completely.

He came home from the front line after 15 days. I had not cleaned the frozen fish and put it in the pot on the stove for lunch, but it was off until I clean the fish. Mansour arrived home, he was happy, because he would see me after a long time. He poured unintentionally water on the unburned and uncooked fish and turned on the stove. A few moments later strong foul smell was spreading everywhere. I said: "do you know how hardly I got this fish from Mahshahr; we lost our lunch today". He said, "Oh what the hell!" That day we ate bread, cheese and yogurt in the backyard of the house and it was enjoyable for us!

The 311st session of night of memory was held in Sooreh Hall of Hozeh Honari (Art Center) by the Center for Resistance Culture and Literature Studies and Research and the Office of Resistance Literature and Art, on Thursday, February 20, 2020. The forthcoming session will be held on April 23, 2020.