I knew there was no future for me as a Jew or as a woman in Iran

As told to Malkie Schulman

I

was in college in Iran when the Islamic Revolution was in its beginning stages. My fellow classmates were busy with protests against the Shah, but I stayed away. Aside from the fact that the Shah was very good to the Jews, my mother had always warned me, “Maryam, don’t get involved. You’re Jewish. Stay out of politics.” So I went to classes and then came straight home. After I graduated, the situation got worse. I knew there was no future for me as a Jew or as a woman in Iran. I had won a scholarship to Harvard, and my husband of a few months and I decided it would be a good idea to leave for America.

IN August of 1979, five months after the revolution started, we arrived at JFK and went straight to my brother and sister-in-law’s house. They had been living in New York for a few years already. I recall my first Shabbat in America, seeing men and women sitting together without a mechitzah. What is this? I asked myself in shock.

On Yom Kippur, I saw my sister-in-law looking for something. “What are you looking for?” I asked.

“It’s Yom Kippur,” she answered. “I’m looking for the keys so we can go to shul.”

“No, thanks,” I said. “I’m walking.”

After that, my husband and I knew we had to leave my brother’s house. It was disturbing to see how they and other Iranian friends and family left their religion behind when they came to America.