After I finished reading “Yalda” I felt different. It had been a while since the last time I read a book not in English. It was an Iranian story, it was the best book I’ve ever read. It brought me to tears and it made me laugh out loud. It was strong, deep, full of sorrow, full of love, full of energy. I was truly inspired. It took me only a week to read it. It was about 400 pages. I am much faster when I read in English, that’s why this was surprising. It means it was very good. Anyway, I am bringing it up because it was full of meaning. I learned a lot from it. Some things were sad to know, but helpful. I wish they would translate it to English. Everything in it was real. Nothing was a lie, though I believe it was a work of fiction. It wasn’t just a story, it was reality.

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Ignorance by Milan Kundera speaks exactly of how I feel about my homeland. This greatly written story is about immigrants who have escaped Prague during communism. Some of these immigrants return after 20 years.
I was only away four years, but I still felt a great connection with this book.
Even in Belgium there are many Iranians who have not returned in many years. To me four years was very long and I couldn’t imagine being away any longer. Now I see the ones who have not returned in 16 or 17 years and I think, what was I complaining about?!

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