Wedded Bliss, Iranian Style

Tehran, July 21, 2005. It is 24-year-old Mariam’s wedding day. She is getting married to Mehti. During the wedding, women and men are not allowed to mingle. The men celebrate in one room, women in another, and the bride and groom eat their wedding dinner alone in a third room. No alcohol is served. Everyone drinks Fanta.
 

TEXT AND PHOTOS BY SANNA SJÖSWÄRD – BILDBYRÅN SILVER

I was born in Iran in 1973. My biological mother was unable to take care of me, so I was placed in a children’s home in Tehran when I was just a few months old. I lived there for the first four years of my life, and then in 1977 I was adopted by my Swedish parents.

In 2000 I went back to Iran. I found my birth mother, Sedighre, by taking out an ad in a local paper. I discovered that I had two sisters and that we had lost our biological father, Abolfazi, to an addiction. He died in ’92.

My parents met at a very young age. She was 18. My father started abusing drugs and alcohol soon after. He used to lock Sedighre up in a room and go out for the night. When he came back in the morning he would unlock the door. My mum told me she was very afraid toi be alone.

I’ve been back many times, and during one trip, one of my sisters got married. I took these photos during the wedding.
Sanna just published a book called Roots. It’s about her going back to Iran to find her biological mother. To look at it, go to Sannafoto.se.
 

In the morning Mariam has gone to a beauty salon to pluck her eyebrows and remove facial hair. She will also try on the wedding dress and have her hair styled.

Mariam and Mehti are picked up by car at the beauty salon. People gather around the car to get a glimpse of the bride.
    Outside the salon the women wait in the alley to get picked up by a car. It’s not considered good taste for women to be standing out in the street. Everyone left the salon a little before me, and when I followed them out into the street it was completely empty. I stood there scratching my head until someone came and ushered me away from there and into the alley.
    Mariam is very happy about getting married. She has picked her husband and she is very much in love. It is a big day. The only thing she didn’t expect was the big hoo-ha around the wedding, and all the attention she is getting. In Iran, 24 is a pretty common age to get married, at least in the bigger cities. In the country, people can be as young as 16 or 17.
 

After the dinner the bride and groom leave the restaurant. They speed around Tehran in their car, and all their friends and relatives follow in their cars and sing and honk their horns.
    When we get to the family of the bride they will slaughter a sheep and burn incense, and the bride will say good-bye to her parents. Then she leaves to go live with her husband in her new home.
    Since I’m not from Iran it was hard to know what was OK behavior and what wasn’t. When you’re not at home or in a relative’s house, you have to think about how you conduct yourself. I was taking photos of my niece at a bathing house and the staff came up to me and threatened me. They forced me to delete all the photos and said that if I had ever showed them I would have been hung.