Letter from Evin 2

 

And this is how we turn thirty!

By Atefeh Nabavi

Translation by Davood Eftekhar

Two years and three months have passed. In the agitated moments of [ward] 209 [solitary confinement] I thought of the [amount of] time I would have to spend in this place. My mind could not comprehend the word “year”, and the months and days were more plausible and desirable criteria for measuring time. “20 days passed. They won’t keep you for more than 50 days… one month passed, [but] temporary detention is usually two months. Three months, four months, seven months…” You think: “Don’t worry, the passage of time is to your advantage; as it passes, you reach the end.” But when you turn 30 in prison, instead of hours and days and months, your criterion changes to years. You don’t feel like you have gained [anything] from the passage of time. You realize these are perhaps the brightest moments of your life, which you restlessly see pass you by; unique and irreversible moments. {This is the time] for passion, enthusiasm, and youthful ecstasy, but you spent all this time here in this swamp like a swimmer unable to surface for breath. Bitterness fills your soul.

100 days [were spent] in ward 209, one year [was spent] in the public ward with criminals, addicts, murderers, and sick girls and women, who are undoubtedly, to a great extent, the products of their perverse society. And now [it has been] over 11 months of living in an isolated environment where there is no communication with the outside world. We live disconnected from whatever links humans to others, nature and life. We only get 20 minutes per week for cabin visits with our families. Prison guards threaten to end [visitation] to put [increased] pressure on us.
More than two years have passed since the [June 2009 Iranian Presidential] election and the result was nothing but hundreds of years of prison sentences for the children of this land. And now I, one of the first post-election female prisoners, at the turn of my thirtieth birthday, am paying the price for a protest not tolerated by those in power. This is my third year of imprisonment without furlough, face-to-face visits, and telephone contact.

On June 15, 2009, just like the three to four million people who came to the streets to show their protest, I felt like a significant incident was taking place in my country. I felt [obliged] to take part and rely on the promises made only one week before, during the presidential debates. I imagined that I would return home after the protest and remain a social activist. However, not only was this promise not kept and I did not return home, but also my husband was sent to prison because he had followed up on my case.

Now, I am experiencing the unwritten chapters of history. [I have experienced] interrogation, intimidation, solitary confinement, [witnessing] the execution and exile of my closest friends (someone from the next bed or from the same table [where we used to eat]), the endless desire for hearing the voice of those dearest to you ( even for a single moment).-I haver watched the silent mourning of those who are not permitted to attend the funeral of their loved ones, and the restlessness of a mother who cannot participate in the wedding ceremony of her child. [I have experienced] disease, sorrow, and nostalgia; which all seems to become intensified and less bearable by the tall and concrete [prison] walls.

However…
Experiencing these conditions is not something you [would want to] wish upon anyone. The combination of pain and passion embedded in yearning souls creates an elixir that not only wears the soul but also polishes and purifies it.
This is how we turn thirty in [prison]…