כיצד הוריי נפגשו והתחתנו

I want to tell you about how my parents met and got married.marriage in the days we lived in Baghdad, Iraq. Of course I wasn’t there, but this is what they told me.

In 1926, my mother was 22 and the oldest of the children in the family.  My father was 32 and had just returned from living in Iran.  (He was there for ten years.  He left Baghdad when WWI started and returned to get married, have children, and live there.)  

When it was time to marry, the mothers normally (most of the time) contacted the dallala.  The dallala brings a girl for the boy and a boy for the girl.  She brought Moshi for Naima and Naima for Moshi.  The family of each checked the other family and they said okay.  So, one afternoon, Moshi’s mother and two sisters went to Naima’s home to view her.  That night, the women told Moshi she is the one for him.  The servant overheard it and said the yes, she knows Naima.  Very nice and plump.  Moshi said he will not marry a plump woman.  The woman tried to persuade him that she was not plump, but he insisted that he has to see her himself with his own eyes.

Moshi’s family sent a servant to Naima’s home to say that he wants to come the following afternoon to view Naima.  Her father got upset and said that they already showed her.  Her mother pointed out that Naima was already 22 and the oldest of the children, and she convinced the father in agreeing to the visit.

Moshi and his brother-in-law, Yacoub, arrived the following afternoon.  Naima got up and offered them some candy.  Moshi agreed that she is not fat and agreed to the marriage.  They fetched the rabbi who wrote up the kattuba, spelling out the terms of the marriage.

I have the kattuba.  It is signed by Moshi and her father.  Naima’s name is not mentioned.  The boldest/darkest part spells out how much money he would have to give her if he divorced her.

They married, had a son and two daughters.  They moved to America.  They were married 39 years, until he died.