A Nightingale Press Original
September 2012
The Rose Hotel
Copyright © 2012 by Rahimeh Andalibian
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
Published in the United States
by
Nightingale Press, California.
ISBN-13: 978-0615672236
ISBN-10: 061567223X
Nightingale Press
www.nightingalepress.org
Printed in United States of America
The water lily must grow through a hostile, drowning environment – the water itself – in order to bloom. However, once it reaches the sunlight, it rests beautifully and calmly on the surface of that same environment, and is supported by it while its roots are planted - grounded - in the murky water below. Here, the water lily does not
drown – rather – it blooms.
To my extraordinary family – the reason this book exists – you are
tremendous. To my parents, Maman and Baba, whose love and dedication gave me the heart to know compassion and
commitment, and to my four brothers whose resilience and pledge to their unique paths have taught me generosity and
acceptance.
This book is dedicated to families: to mine, to yours, and to all peoples and families around the world who ache for freedom and peace.
THE ROSE HOTEL
A True-Life Novel
Author’s Note:
“In the last 33 years, I have questioned, listened, and investigated to recreate in my imagination some scenes which I could not witness, but later learned of in greater detail. These chapters are presented as I envision they occurred and based upon the accounts of those who were present. The facts in this story are true insofar as any memory is ever truthful. I have changed and compressed aspects of characters, events, and dates whenever doing so did not compromise the essence of the story, in order to protect friends and family.”
Rahimeh Andalibian
BOOK ONE
The Iranian Dream
ROOM 314
December 30, 1978, Mashhad, Iran
The hotel was deserted.
I led my baby brother Iman down the long polished marble corridor. No one was watching us. Along with the guests, the staff had vanished – the doorman in his brown jacket with the gold buttons; the maids in their crisp white uniforms. There was no one to shout at us: “Stop! Get back here. You are not allowed in there...”
What we wished for all the short years of our lives was suddenly granted – the hotel was ours, a private high-rise castle playground.
We could slide, run, climb balustrades, and peek into the empty chambers. There were so many guest rooms, public reception areas, secret service nooks, and the ultimate, a banquet hall. To a four-year-old girl and a two-year-old boy, the ten-story hotel opened up – an infinite indoor labyrinth.
We invented games on the spot like “make believe ice sledding” on the slick marble. Hanging on my back, Iman laughed and whooped. I shed my plastic slippers at the entry and picked up speed wearing only socks. Their persimmon-colored fluff ball ties flew straight backward, airborne, as I accelerated, first running, and then skidding on the slick floor. Our giggles echoed through the deserted hotel, the single sound.
I slipped and slid with little Iman. At the tea and reception room we paused to filch refreshments. We found the pistachio nougat candies hidden in the pantry, intended as treats for guests, and then made the most magnificent discovery: the ice cream was still there in a fridge. We spooned the stretchy rose water, cardamom and pistachio Bastani-e Za’farāni from the container. I made note, for future reference, of a still-wrapped supply of Western chocolate-covered wafers in the freezer, Kit Kats. We devoured stacks of circular ice cream waffle sandwiches in abandon; then licked our lips like kittens.
“Oh, this was the best day of our lives...”
We tiptoed past the prayer room, a bit chastened by the portrait of Imam Ali, the son-in-law of Prophet Mohammad, whose stern visage, topped in black headdress, stared at us, as if he could see our misdeeds. He seemed an animate shadow in our lives, demanding obedience. If we were caught disobeying, what would he do to us? It was too terrible to consider.
We were not chastened for long. We aimed for the summit, the top floor with its advertised crystal banquet room. Did we dare ride the elevator alone? We darted into the elevator, but we could not quite reach the buttons all by ourselves. Inspired to commit more mischief, I boosted little Iman upon my shoulders. Aha! Now, he could reach the glowing buttons.
“Go ahead!” I encouraged. He pressed “10,” the world of the unknown, the never-seen top floor. Reflected in the elevator’s brass panel was Iman’s fat little face – his red chubby cheeks and dimpled chin, his bright almond eyes aglow with this new thrill.
Ten. The top. We entered a sacred silence – the deserted banquet room sparkled with crystal chandeliers. I set down Iman. At age four, I could carry his solid weight for only so long.
I regarded Iman more as my baby than my brother. My mother had become pregnant with him in the hope of giving me a baby sister. Before the birth, my parents bought me and the unborn baby girl-to-be matching tiny golden earrings. I ended up with two sets.
After Iman’s birth, my mother had her tubes tied: there would be no more attempts for a baby sister. In secret, I always gloated that he had not been another girl, but my own personal baby boy, sweet and peaceful like a little Buddha. He was always trailing after me, sucking candies and calling for me, as he would for my mother in a babyish combination of our names: “Maman Rahimeh!”
The crystal ballroom seemed daunting. Iman took my hand and pulled me into the vast, empty room. I felt my heart beat faster. We dragged ten of the tables together, put dishes over the cleared tabletops, and placed silverware in lines, creating highways and streets mimicking a small town. For hours, we played with our toy cars in our make-believe city, while unbeknownst to us, other, more drastic events were taking place outside in the real city.
When we exhausted the possibilities, we rode the elevator again, zooming down to the basement. Our play ultimately led to the kitchen freezer, where sheep and lamb legs used to hang, ready for hotel feasts. Now empty, the cold steel chamber exhaled in our faces – a scent not entirely pleasant, a whiff of missing meat that had gone bad.
I grabbed the bunch of keys dangling from hooks on the wall beside the freezer. There was more to explore upstairs. We reboarded the elevator, and got off at the first floor.
Deep in my secret heart, I knew someone would put a stop to this – that we would be apprehended – but we were still wild for more. I led the next charge, down the longest main hallway, which seemed to extend forever to a vanishing point, not like a real place at all, but the vague ending of a dangerous dream.
Only the night before, I had suffered that kind of dream, when it seemed I heard wailing, then “hsssh” sounds…
I sat up in bed, my heart hammering alarms.
The next words I heard were, “Room 314.”
And a voice – surely my Maman’s scared whisper: “Not, no, not here, not in our hotel, not around our children. We have a daughter – What about Rahimeh? And what about me? The woman they took was older than I am…”
Then a man’s voice, surely Baba, my father: “Hush! No more such talk, the children might hear.”
Not far away, men were yelling. But to me, at age four, their words “revolution,” “rape,” and “execution,” were meaningless. From that other place, beyond
the wrought iron gates, the great forbidden “Outside,” there came a distant cacophony, the shrill of raised voices, and honking car horns. All the adults had run there, to the Outside, and it was only years later, that I understood what truly happened that day in Mashhad.
At four years old, I did not even know my city, Mashhad. Bordering Afghanistan and Turkmenistan, it was the second largest city in my country, Iran, and was in the midst of a revolt that was being waged just yards beyond the serene grounds of the Rose Hotel. All I knew was the safe cocoon of my family and the palace I inhabited. Although so many walls of the Rose Hotel were glass, it never occurred to me that they might crack, that the world I knew could shatter and end.
Iman and I knew something dark, something scary, was happening outside the Rose Hotel, and we ducked behind the heavy tapestry hanging on the main lobby’s wall and hid, hoping never to be discovered. The men stormed past, taking the stairs – their steps pounding all the way to the third floor.
I would soon learn more about Room 314, and who would stay there. But for a little while longer, I could play hide-and-seek and forget the dream that seemed to end in threat.
The night before, I awakened from my nightmare. But I kept feeling as if someone had grabbed me from behind by my short hair, an almost fatal yank backward that could have snapped my neck. In my dream, I saw the door of that hotel room and the number:
“314.”
HIDE AND SEEK
The ringing of the phone echoed throughout the empty halls, startling us as we hid behind the tapestry. Iman and I could hear the men running through the hotel. Someone paused, stopped. I could feel him – a heaving presence on the other side of the wall hanging.
I held my breath. “Shhh…” I whispered to Iman, but too late. He could not help himself – he let out a little baby boy squeak of fear.
A big hand pushed open the tapestry and I heard “Aha!”
I looked into dark, burning eyes, magnified by black-rimmed eyeglasses – Baba.
Our father scooped up Iman and grabbed my hand. There was no time to scold us for breaking the rules. Baba took us through the side door, set down Iman, and said, “Quick, run…into the house!”
And we did.
From the Outside, we heard the sounds of chanting and breaking glass. Baba watched us cross the hotel lawn until I pushed open the heavy gate to our home and shooed Iman inside. It shut with a clang, dividing our lives into before and after.
THE LAST MORNING
December 29, 1978 (one day earlier)
The Rose Hotel and I shared a rare destiny: I was born the day my Baba’s grand hotel opened. Our fates were forever linked. For our celebrations, sheep were sacrificed and fed to the poor, and the Qur’an was read, placed upon a mirror.
The Rose Hotel had been an immediate success – its location selected for one reason, pilgrimage. The hotel served visitors to the holy city of Mashhad, which means “the place of martyrdom.” The Rose Hotel was near the city’s main holy landmark, the Haram. A great mosque with a dazzling golden dome hovering over the Shrine where Imam Reza is buried, it is second only to Mecca in the world, and is sacred to Shi’a Muslims.
The Shrine was named for the eighth descendent of the Prophet Mohammed. Because of its holiness, Muslims from all over Iran and from the four corners of earth came to make pilgrimage at the Haram. Many of the most prosperous pilgrims stayed at the Rose Hotel, known for its religious owner and his reputation.
The Haram of Imam Reza meant so much to my family, in ways both ephemeral and pragmatic. With its complex of seven courtyards, fourteen minarets and fountains, a museum, a library, and four seminaries, it also held the cemetery with the graves and gravesites for my own family. The Haram was the center of our spiritual life, our livelihood and our ultimate destination – we would all be buried there.
But that was “after.” Before, we all were in awe of the Haram. Its Golden Dome was the center of my vista, and even as a child, I felt within its force field. It exerted a supernatural energy over Mashhad and an even stronger pull over my family. Its pull was so strong that, whenever we left Mashhad for a pilgrimage of our own to Mecca, my father would drive past it three times, circling within its radius of attraction.
For me, as a child, the mosque itself was a dazzling place, almost 700,000 square feet, its crystalline ceiling soaring so high it seemed an alternate sky. To enter, we removed our shoes, which were accepted by rows of men, known as “the shoe collectors,” who performed this service without pay, as an honor, to serve Allah, his God. Our shoes were stored in shelves with numbers, and we would reclaim them to step back outside into the blazing sun of the ordinary world.
As every Muslim in Mashhad and my family did, I lived under the compelling sepulchral spell cast by the Haram. No matter how far I travel, no matter where I live, or whom or what I worship, the magnetism to Mashhad, to the Haram, will always be embedded in my soul and beckon me home.
As a child, I did not know the area was also infamous as the setting for an early violent resistance against Reza Shah Pahlavi and his regime’s increasing warp toward the West, away from the traditions and rules of Islam. I also didn’t know that my father had fought to get approval from the city officials, and had struggled to secure loans, for this “religious tourist hotel.”
At four years old, I did not know the history or future threat of this location – all I knew was that I was so privileged to have my “own” hotel and the garden of roses for which it was named. The borders of my life were defined by two buildings – home and hotel – the margins further delineated by the trim topiary hedges. A driveway rounded and connected the two buildings together. The house was almost hidden from the hotel, accessible only from the outside by a separate set of heavy keys.
How often I skipped for joy along that driveway – from one pleasure dome to another. In summer, the hotel grounds were aromatic with roses, in winter, sharp with the sweet scent of snow. Our backyard held a small farm and garden. Chickens ran everywhere. In season, the hens lay brown eggs as gifts that we found as if on a treasure hunt. Vegetables – carrots and greens – grew in my mother’s – my Maman’s – garden.
I was not allowed to venture alone beyond the border of the hotel property. It was forbidden for us children to wander since safety lay within our walls. In any case, there was no need for me to explore beyond; life was complete within.
That is how I remember my past. No doubt I would have remembered it differently had it not been destroyed. There is special attention to detail that follows death, and I am either cursed or blessed to have near total recall of the end of the Rose Hotel and all that followed.
On that last morning, everything was still perfect. Now, I cherish every detail, as one can only appreciate what is lost. I can inhale the perfume of cardamom rising from the samovar as Maman pours tea, the aroma of the fresh baked barbari bread. Maman looks so beautiful. The steam makes her hair curl into wisps that cling to her smooth forehead, her rose-petal lips smile as she regards her children. At thirty-two, she is still young and shapely for a mother of five; even her house chador, soft blue floral cotton, suggests her curves. In the house, she is not hidden under the great heavy black robe and head draping of the outdoor chador.
In the house, we can enjoy her smiling face and the beauty of her kind smiles; the way her almond eyes flash when she laughs. Whenever she leans forward to serve me more fruit, I inhale the sweet scent of her skin; she uses a cantaloupe cream that also imparts a glow. She is incandescent, a pearl. Oh, if I can be half the beauty Maman is when I am grown.
The steaming tea and baking barbari bread warm the room. It is a winter breakfast; I remember that well. The corner heater glows with its orange filament fire. We have never been cold, never suffered “the Outside.”
A gentle snow was falling, a veil between our house where we sat and our hotel across the white lawn.
Our Rose Hotel stood ten stories high, with its proud sign on the top floor: “Without Music and A
lcoholic Beverages.” Often, a nightingale would perch on the sign, which seemed a good omen, since our last name means “nightingale.”
Below, attached at a right angle to the flank of the hotel, rested our house. Elsewhere in Mashhad, our home would be considered large. But, next to the hotel, the one-story house with five bedrooms seemed small and snug, set low behind the snow-covered flower beds, like a sugar cottage.
That last morning, inside our house, all seemed especially sweet. Even more warming than the hot tea and food were the endearments, pleasantries, and jokes that my family exchanged across the sofreh, in between the bites of fresh feta cheese and hot barbari bread.
The sofreh, the soft plastic tablecloth upon which we ate our meals, was laid out, as always, on the floor beside the dining table with its proud, untouched bowls of fruit. Our dining room was a testament to Iran being in transition between the East and the West. We ate on the floor, but the high-polished table sat there, awaiting future Western-styled meals.
The moments come back to me as fragmentary images, like pieces of a broken mirror. Gathered around the sofreh, our family reflected different mixtures of looks and personality – the combinations of Maman and Baba. Three of my four brothers surrounded me: Hadi, ten, Zain, six, and my baby brother, Iman, two. The boys giggled and joked. We were all anticipating the imminent appearance of our brother, Abdollah. At fifteen, and the eldest, he was the acknowledged “star” of our family constellation.
We mirrored and somewhat distorted the genetic reflections of our parents. Zain and Iman inherited Maman’s beauty: her perfect dark eyebrows, those black almond eyes. Hadi and I were a combination that showed more of Baba: wilder dark eyebrows, bigger Iranian noses. Abdollah was the tallest, the most appealing and retained the best of both of our parents – like Baba with his thick hair and with the fine beautiful lips and the gentle gaze of Maman. From his brilliant black eyes shone both Baba’s authority and Maman’s love and gentle nature: the two emotions that dominated our lives.
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