Funny In Farsi: A Memoir Of Growing Up Iranian In America Quotes
"America was a place where anyone, no matter how humble his background, could become an important person."
"I stood up straight and proudly recited all that I knew: 'White, yellow, orange, red, purple, blue, green.'"
"In her era, a girl’s sole purpose in life was to find a husband."
"Having spent a year in America as a Fulbright scholar, he had returned with a photo of a woman he found attractive."
"I had to accompany her to the grocery store, the hairdresser, the doctor, and every place else that a kid wouldn’t want to go."
"He was the only person who actually read each and every document before he signed it."
"After a few months of television viewing, she could correctly tell us whether a coffeemaker cost more or less than $19.99."
"The unbreakable bond between my father and his siblings serves as a testimonial that even though their parents lived very short lives, they did something right."
"History is full of stories of men overcoming poverty to amass great fortunes in steel or pig farming."
"Somewhere along the way, he started to believe that he was a gifted bowler."
"I thought you had been kidnapped," he told me, still out of breath.
"Having spent his formative years in Africa, he wasn’t used to wearing clothes."
"We were offered a clue one day by a neighbor, who told us that he knew about Iran because he had seen 'Lawrence of Arabia.'"
"I am the Christopher Columbus of the family."
"You’re like a rock! You’re hopeless! What’s wrong with you?"
"I don’t care if you do nothing with your college diploma, but you will have one!"
"When the Prophet Muhammad forbade ham, it was because people did not know how to cook it properly."
"It’s not what we eat or don’t eat that makes us good people; it’s how we treat one another."
"You have to look and see what’s in their hearts. That’s the only thing that matters."
"I just go and tell them I have no money and my brother doesn’t understand English."
"I am so sorry, but the government of Saudi Arabia does not accept Iranians at this time."
"The language of Shushtari, with its abundance of animal and plant imagery, reflects the simple agricultural life of its residents."
"Any gift from a true friend is valuable, even if it’s a hollow walnut shell."
"People sometimes talk louder and laugh harder in their native tongue."
"I placed first in the impromptu-speech contest, met with suspicion and investigation."
"Why do they keep speaking French with us if they know we don’t speak the language?"
"This was going to be the best summer of my entire life."
"I was the youngest contestant, yet my life was more exciting to them."
"I had never been so excited in my entire life."
"I searched the airport for someone carrying a sign with my name on it."
"I explained to her that I was a VIP, a Very Iranian Person."
"Even though I was the youngest contestant, I placed first."
"Nobody understands their English, and they know that."
"It's fair to say that the Shushtari floating in my house did not give me any edge in the French language."
"The first time they met François, my parents insisted on taking him to the nicest Persian restaurant in Los Angeles."
"François ate enough food for three people and not be fat."
"In Iranian culture, fathers will consent to a marriage only if the future groom and his family worship the bride."
"Before meeting me, François had a longtime French girlfriend."
"I had to. In the Iranian culture, fathers will consent to a marriage only if the future groom and his family worship the bride."
"My parents, like all their sisters and brothers, never dated, their marriages having been arranged by family members."
"After the contest, my parents started receiving phone calls in French."
"I was scheduled to arrive two days before the national celebration of the French Revolution, Bastille Day."
"I had envisioned myself spending evenings having enlightening discussions over home-cooked French meals."
"The upside of my lonely two months was that I became completely fluent in French."
"A few months after my return to California, I received a letter from Noëlle letting me know that she had moved to New Caledonia."
"If someone were to make a movie of my summer in Paris, it would not be the touching coming-of-age film I had hoped for."
"My father was just happy that I was getting married."
"We invited 140 people, 163 accepted; 181 showed up."
"François and I had agreed that we would be married both in the Catholic Church and in a traditional Persian ceremony."
"We’ll tell them that it’s possible to own a whole bunch of beautiful, valuable things and still be miserable."
"The people we think we know best are the ones who surprise us most."
"Maybe someday I would end up thinking Jacques Brel’s lyrics were uplifting."
"The downside of my summer was realizing that maybe the joys of being seventeen, even in Paris, were highly exaggerated."
"I wondered if the summer somehow foreshadowed the rest of my life."
"What better way to showcase the wildflowers of Provence than by painting a few topless models purple and placing them among the flowers?"
"I never made it to watch Saturday Night Live. I was in my third cycle of REM sleep."
"We’ll see whether I wanted to marry François. 'She has gone to pick flowers.'"
"The police are often in on it. We have a lot of wealthy cops in the Bahamas."
"My father had always told me that a college education would give me endless opportunities."
"François and I moved to San Francisco, where we rented an apartment on the top floor of a four-story building."
"The minute she heard the word 'California,' she perked up even more."
"Noëlle told me to meet her the following night so we could go to the Champs-Elysées together."
"A home for families of children undergoing long-term treatment at a nearby hospital was having a benefit auction."
"My parents were thrilled that I had taken up a normal hobby."
"A man standing next to a river cannot appreciate water."