LIFE & STYLE | Let There Be No More War

As you already know, I am not very brave.

So imagine not being brave and be forced to live through a war.

I was only 8-years-old when the Iran-Iraq war started.

The war was mainly concentrated on the borders between the two countries but there were numerous raids on the capital Tehran (my hometown) and other major cities during that long war.

Some of the war refugees were place inside a hotel not far from my house in Tehran. My heart broke every time we passed in front of that hotel.

I still have horrible flash backs from that horrible war.

Whenever I hear the emergency response test on the television, I feel a chill. That siren brings back horrific memories.

The Bomb raids were horrible. Most of the time, the alert came after the bombs were already hitting Tehran.

At night, the sky was glowing with anti-aircraft missiles that were trying to shoot down Iraqi airplanes.

It was nightly fireworks from HELL.

The entire city of Tehran shook from the impact of those bombs. Sometimes we rushed to our basement. Sometimes we just stayed in the hallway of our house and prayed.

After the bombing, we frantically called our family to see if they were still alive.

During the non-stop bombing, schools were closed for days. Then my parents would send me and my younger brother to stay with relatives in other safer cities.

Since my mom was in the Air Force, she wasn't allowed to leave and my dad always stayed behind with her.

With war came the shortage of lifes' basic necessities.

Food was rationed. I remember waiting in line for hours just to buy milk. Buying food on the black market became a fact of life.

At beginning of the war, we lived on an Air Force base.

Later on, we lived in a two story house that we shared with my grandparents.

When the bombings got really bad, we would end up sleeping in my grandparents house on the first floor, hoping that if a bomb hits, then there would be an extra layer of protection between us and the bomb. 

When the war ended in 1988, I was 16 years old.

I was one of the lucky ones. Some of my family members fought in the war and some of them got injured. But they all came back. Other people were less fortunate. My friend Zari Javanshir lost her dad in the war. My mom lost numerous friends and co-workers in that war.

In the end, countless lives were lost and two countries were ruined.

Signing off until next Monday- Panteha