A Talented Woman: Helen Tanahan

Looking at my grandmother now, I see a strong, talented woman. A woman who has been able to avoid the dread of losing the Shah of her homeland. A person who cooks, cleans, and cares for her family. A highly respected and loved human being. Sitting down at her spare time, she enjoys to knit scarves, hats, and other interesting things with much creativity. Helen Tanahan, a mother, grandmother, and most definitely a hero, began to explain how much Iran has changed since she was younger.

I was born in South of Iran, in Masjed Soleyman. I lived there for thirteen years. I left Masjed Soleyman and went to Esfahan, returning shortly after five years. It was in Masjed Soleyman that I got married. We used to live like European people, we had a lot of freedom. I was an Armenian living in Iran, so we had the right to celebrate Christmas and New Years if we wanted to. On our spare time, we would go to sports clubs, do art, sew, and knit.

At the time when I was going to school, girls and boys would be separated when taught, but shortly after we were combined. We had a fair democracy when the Shah of Iran was there. We had a lot of freedom. To speak, to do anything. We weren’t allowed to speak against the Shah, though. In the days that I lived in Iran, we didn’t have to wear shawls or anything. We were allowed to dress as European people did, short skirts and all.

There was a secret army of Savak, I heard, and they would hurt people if they did bad things. But I never actually witness this happen, I just heard about it. The military wasn’t hard on the soldiers, but if they spoke against the Shah they would have to be harmed. There wasn’t much equality in men and woman. They had more respect for the women, the girls, the ladies. Even in classes. If a boy did something wrong, they might hit him with a stick, but never a girl. There was never any child labor, either. There were a lot of educated people in Iran and a lot of jobs. There were educated engineers. They used to come from Europe and America.

We would see posters of our Shah everywhere around town. The Shah’s statue, posters, pictures, paintings. Outside, we could see very big posters everywhere.

The Revolution started in the beginning of 1978, while we were out of Iran and living in London. We left Iran near the beginning of 1977. We never witnessed the Revolution, just heard about it. We heard that the Revolution started because of university students. They were complaining about the high payments of universities. But we just heard this information.

We didn’t hear there was going to be a Revolution. All of my family was living in Australia. The closest place we could go to live with Christians and have my children grow up as Christians was London, England. A lot of bad things happened to us because we were in a new country, we didn’t know the rules or have enough money. There was no work for us because we didn’t have work permits and didn’t have permission to stay in the country. It was very difficult. Near 1984, we got permission to work and got our green cards, leaving to the United States of America.

I lost a lot of things when I left Iran. We had a house down there, but we sold it for cheaper then it had to be sold. I lost a suitcase filled with valuable things, like antiques and souvenirs of my kids when they were babies.

After I left Iran, the Islamic government took over and the Shah left Iran. He was very sick. He came to the United States, then after went to Egypt, where he passed away. Khomeini, the Islamic leader, took over Iran. Now all the girls had to wear chador, something like a long scarf that covers the whole body. They are not allowed to wear makeup. They are not free and very unhappy. A lot of Christian Iranian’s left the country. They would receive harm because of their religion.

We are all hoping the situation will change down there. If it does change, I might take my kids, grandkids, my son in law and daughter in law to see it. Especially my son in law since he’s never been there. I would like them to go see how it was like to be born and raised in that country.

I haven’t been back to Iran for nearly thirty years. I left when I was thirty five. I have nothing there, that’s why I never thought of going back.

Interviewed by Tanya Basmadjian