My Story in Lists| Where I lived Part V

After a year and a half in Delaware, the four of us children boarded a plane one November evening and flew back West while mom and dad drove the cars back across the country. Once they joined us, they rented a house in Hacienda Heights where I would start and finish my Jr High years. It was not an easy move for me. It took some time before I was able to make friends at school and I spent at least a good month friendless at lunch time.

I finally settled in and found a good friend with a soul for books and writing just like me. We would spend hours after school in the library hunting for books, dreaming of becoming writers. Our weekends, once again, were filled with extended family. Somewhere towards the end of my 8th grade, we became aware of our next move. This time to a country that I had never heard of before called Iran. We were told that the city we were going to live in was called Esfahan and it was a resort area with a river running through the middle of the city.

Once again, we packed our things up and after celebrating my grandfather's birthday, in July of 1976, we were on a plane to a foreign land.

I knew it was going to be different, but I wasn't prepared for it. The moment we got off the plane, I was frightened. The people were loud, the colors of their clothing dark, the women in shadors, the men with piercing eyes, the writing was in symbols, the language unintelligible. It didn't help that we stayed in Tehran for a few days after we arrived in Iran at a corporate apartment and I got lost taking a walk in the complex. I didn't know from which building I started and panic arose within me as I wandered through the buildings trying to find my bearings. From the apartments all I could hear where people speaking strange language. Just about the time I was about to lose it, I spotted dad walking towards me and I ran to him crying.

After we made it to our flat in Esfahan, I refused to go anywhere for almost two weeks. I didn't realize it, but I was in culture shock.

Luckily we moved there in July and school didn't start for almost two months later. The first time I went to the bazaar, I was terrified of the long dark corridors, the smells were overpowering and hustle, bustle like I had never seen before. I tried to think ways I could get my parents to send me home. I knew I didn't belong there and I didn't know how I was going to make it through the two years we were told we were going to be there.

As time passed, I came to love this land and the most of the things that initially scared me. There was a beauty to the exotic differences between what I knew at home and what Iran offered.

It was strange because on one hand we were restricted in ways we had never been before, couldn't wear certain clothes or say certain things and on the other hand we had freedoms we didn't have before, Eliz and I hitched hiked like crazy with our friends, getting around the city and would go to nightclubs with our friends, sometimes on school nights (not that mom and dad knew, but we didn't take drugs or drink we just went to dance and have a good time)

Like Puerto Rico, everyone there was, like us, separated from family and friends so we became each other's family leaning and depending on each other in ways that we may not have normally done in the states. It was the best of times. It was the worst of times. I came to love most every moment.

There were things we missed. Simple things, like Welch's grape jelly, hot dogs, bubble yum. If someone would go back stateside, they would come back with shopping lists of goodies for everyone. There were things we didn't miss...tv, malls. We did miss family, but since Uncle Joe was working for Fluor, too, at this time, he was in Esfahan with his family at the same time so we were lucky enough to have part of our family there too.

As we drew close to the end of our second year there, things began to change. There were rumors of women who weren't wearing their chadors having acid thrown in their face. There was a military presence throughout the city and during a trip to Tehran with the American school, we had a group of guys chase us, throwing rocks at us. It was apparent there was civil unrest and dad decided that it was time to leave. In May of 1978, we were scheduled to go home on R&R. Dad decided not to renew the contract and head home for good.

And just like I cried when I arrived in Iran, I cried, only harder when I left. I think I knew it was likely that I would never be back. I would never again smell the smells at the Bazaars, I would not see the wonderful sights, stand at the edge of the street, hollering at the cars that slowed down so they could determine if they wanted to give me a ride to my destination. I would likely not see any of my friends ever again.

My Story in Lists|Where I've Lived (Part IV)

After a year in California, we packed up once again and headed back across the country, this time for Wilmington, Delaware. I knew there was a state called Delaware because it was a piece of a state puzzle my mom bought for us, but other than that I knew very little about the state which has the dubious honor of being called the First State of our nation.

It was summer when we moved, but unlike Illinois there was no year round school. The house my mom and dad rented was wonderful with things we've never had before such as hard wood floors, a basement, a living room and a family room AND my own room. It was wonderful.

I remember shortly after we got there we experienced our first summer lightening storm. It was as magnificent display of power, light and sound. I loved every minute of it, except for the hot, humid stickiness that accompanied the storm. 

We spent what was left of the summer waiting for school to start and picking weeds from the garden (my dad's idea). It was here that I saw my first real fire flies. The evenings were spent playing outside until it was time to go to bed.

There were many things I loved about Delaware. Since we were close to the coast, there were four seasons to enjoy, but the winters were much more mild than Illinois. There weren't weeks of snow, just days of it. Like Illinois, the first night it snowed there was magic in the air and we awoke to a fresh clean blanket of white powder in both the front and back yard. It was so beautiful I could hardly believe it. Somehow I managed to talk my brothers and sister into refraining from playing in the front yard so it could stay clean and fresh.

Living in Delaware gave us the luxury of seeing the history that was the foundation of our country. We were able to visit Valley Forge, Washington DC and other historical landmarks that were nearby. We learned rich history that seemed to come to life because you could see the river that George Washington crossed or the battlefields that turned boys into men because they believe what they were fighting for.

We even made a day trip to New York City...New York CITY!!

My Story in Lists|Places I've Lived (Part III)

Even though I was sad about leaving Puerto Rico, all my friends had left or were leaving around the time we were leaving. Dad's work was finished in Ponce and we were headed back to the states.

After a quick pit stop in California, we packed ourselves into our fake wood paneled station wagon with dad's 240Z in tow and headed across the states to Illinois where dad's next assignment was waiting.

We stayed for a short time at the house of one of dad's co-workers while mom and dad hunted for a place to stay. Not an easy thing for Californian's who were used to confined yards with brick or wooden fences. Like much of the Midwest at the time, there weren't many homes with enclosed backyards and I remember part of the allure of the house we ended up at, in a town called Bollingbrook was the small split log fence.

We were so excited because it was the first two-story house we ever lived in. I felt like a member of the Brady Bunch.

We arrived in Illinois in the summer so much to our surprise school was already in session for the area. Due to overcrowding, the district had instilled year-round sessions in which areas were sectioned off in quarters, each one would go to school for 45-days and then have 15-days off. Because our area was already full, they put us in a different schedule then the rest of the neighborhood. The kids loved to taunt us when they were off and we were on. Poor Vic, for some reason, got the brunt of it. Luckily the school wasn't far from us, but in the winter time, when the wind would blow the only way to avoid the pelting stinging snow was to turn around and walk to school backwards. That easily doubled the time it took to get there. But it made for good times imagining myself to be the true Laura Ingalls.

The most exciting night of our lives was the night we went to bed knowing that it was going to snow for the first time. We went to bed and woke up with the same anticipation as Christmas. There were little ponds around us that would freeze over and children would go ice skating. Eliz did that at least once, but poor, poor me, didn't have a pair of ice skates to my name so I make do with a makeshift rink that we lucked into when the water hose in the front yard burst. We had a blast sliding around the ice pretending to be ice skaters.

Before we knew it, it was time to move back to California, back to our little house on Peckam Drive. And little house it was. It was as though the house had shrunk because the room Eliz and I shared as little girls no longer felt big enough. The neighborhood, too, had changed. During the time we were gone, most of our friends had moved, too. While we made other friends, it wasn't quite the same.

By the next summer we were packing up again, preparing to head further east to a little state known as Delaware.