A daughter, a father, and the poems that guided them
Photo exhibit on display this weekend at the Catholic Centre for Immigrants combines poems and poetry
An Ottawa woman will celebrate Father's Day with her dad for the first time in more than 25 years at a charity photo exhibit to celebrate the poetic lessons he imparted.
Parisa Rezaiefar, a family doctor in Ottawa, fled her home country of Iran and wanted to do something meaningful for her 86-year-old father, Heidar Ali Rezaiefar.
He still lives with his wife in the southwest Iranian city of Shiraz, but came to Ottawa to visit his daughter.
Heidar Ali Rezaiefar lost his own father at a young age and spent most of his early life around boys and men, first attending an all-boys school, and later teaching at one.
Having daughters, he told his daughter, was a struggle. At one time he told her he was "not a good dad," she recalled.
"He said … 'I didn't know what being a father was. I did the best I could, but don't know if it was enough,'" Parisa Rezaiefar told the CBC's Hallie Cotnam.
"His honesty, his acknowledgement, was worth everything for me. I forgave him that day. I forgave him because I recognized we're all doing our best as parents."
A memorizer of Persian poetry
Her surprise gift to her father is a series of enlarged prints of family photographs he took using an old Russian Lubitel 2 camera, superimposed with snippets of Persian poetry her father recited to teach her life lessons.
She said that whatever the problem was, her father had a poem for it.
When she asked him in her youth if she was pretty enough, he responded with a Persian poem that read in part:
'When you enter the room with your goodness and virtue you bring grace to mortals
Jewels make charmers alluring
You my enchanting silver jewel render jewels alluring'
Parisa Rezaiefar wasn't sure how her father would take the surprise exhibit, or if he would react at all.
"This is a man who grew up at the end of the Second World War, he has witnessed a civil war, he has lived through a revolution, raising five kids under war. I don't think anything would surprise or faze him," she said.
But when he saw what she had done, he asked his daughter warmly in Farsi, "Where did you get these photos?"
Exhibit this weekend
She said the effort was worth it.
"I feel relieved," she said. "I feel as if I died tomorrow, my heart would be fully achieved."
Her efforts, entitled "Ten Life Lessons I Learned from my Dad," will be on display at the Catholic Centre for Immigrants on Saturday from 1-4 p.m. and again on Sunday at 1830 Kilborn Ave. from 8-9:30 p.m.
All proceeds from the sale of prints will be donated to refugee children at Maison Sophia House, a 96-bed facility providing temporary accommodation and orientation to government-sponsored refugees and refugee claimants for up to four weeks.
