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Reprinted with permission from the Provo Herald, originally appeared 2/11/1998 SALT LAKE CITY - The Iranian disc jockey has frenetic hands and finicky mannerisms. When a few seconds of dead silence hit the airwaves, his hands grab his face and he shrieks. "My hands are beginning to shake here," he says, fumbling through the CD cases and cueing up the next song. "Seven minutes here. This is going to save me," he says, waiting for the pending 420 seconds of free time. "I will be with you momentarily," he says, grabbing the phone and putting the caller on hold. He waves the CD changer out, hoping a feverish hand gesture is enough to quicken the machine's pace. He quietly talks to himself, making sure he's doing everything possible to ensure the three-hour Monday morning show goes according to plan There's more planning than the show is long, he admits. "I don't get to enjoy the music myself while I'm doing this", he says. "But I do tape it so I can enjoy it afterward." The disc jockey picks the phone up again. "All right, sir. Now we have a good five minutes." The radio announcer's frantic movements have nothing in common with his subject matter. He moves as fast as his music moves slow. He's often the only voice heard during the Monday morning show. "Good morning and welcome to Prelude to Peace." "This is Sohrab Mafi." Peace
through music
Mafi wakes up his morning listeners
with music
from around the world. From 9 a.m. until noon on KRCL,91 FM ,Mafi tries to forge a connection between Utah and countries nowhere near it. He'll move from the Japan’s Kitaro to Yanni, a Greek musician, to Italian pianist Giovanni to Europe's Enigma. "This type of music really transcends all nationalities," says Mafi, who has been hosting the show for two years. In the middle of it all, Mafi will include poetry or a reading from a selection of writers of different religions. Mafi owns about 2,000 CDs and albums of mainly new age or world music. Monday, one of Mafi’s "best fans" stops into the radio station with discs Mafi doesn't have. Introduction to new music comes on both sides of the radio station. "In fact, I thought I had everything," says Dee Erickson of Bountiful. "He's introduced me to some new stuff." Mafi spends hundreds of dollars of his own money every month to make sure his programs are well-planned with appropriate music. The community station's programs require voluntary time, but Mafi says he gets more out of a Prelude to Peace program than any award he might receive for work at his full-time job, Zion Printing & Graphic Design. "I've never felt anything like this in the last seven and a half years of running my business," he says. Mafi recently opened a small music store below his print shop, selling the music he plays. Heartfelt Music will help him reach listeners with music that is supposed to make people think, especially about the world around them. "I do believe that music is the ladder to the soul," Mafi says. Mafi is so attentive to his program during his weekly shift because he wants to make somebody's day a little more peaceful. Peace is something Mafi feels strongly about. It's something he's shouted from his license plate for 13 years. It's part of his faith. Mafi explains that he can withstand difficult times because those times shaped his life. Important things like peace and human rights usually come after living through some painful ordeal. Mafi raised himself from 15 years on because he left his family in Iran, a country that didn't afford them many rights. He got his education elsewhere. Many people pay the price of education with years of debt. Mafi paid in years of separation from his family. He'd never see his father again, it would take 16 years to get a visit from his mother and a brother and sister would raise nephews he had never met. "That was one thing we didn't think about - that we would be separated like that," Mafi says, shaking his head. Leaving Iran
Mafi was born and grew up in Tehran, Iran’s capital. He and his family belong to the Bahá'í faith, the largest minority in Iran. The Middle Eastern country's predominant faith is Muslim, and those who don't worship accordingly are denied constitutional rights, Mafi says. Almost 20,000 people have been killed for believing something different from the rest of the population. People in his country started to talk of bad times to come for minorities in Iran. "It didn’t take me 10, 15 years to see what is happening," Mafi says. He left for India when was 15 and studied for three years there. "At the time, it was horrible," Mafi says. He lived in a country that didn't speak his language. He needed to boil water and set it out to cool for sanitation reasons. "I've slept in trains with urine in it," he says. "There's a lot of discomfort for a 15- to 16-year-old." Mafi returned to Iran for only two weeks to acquire a visa to the United States, a country that has allowed him religious asylum for 20 years. He remembers that the military was ruling at the time, so he had to stay indoors. The day after he left for the United States, Iran closed the airport. That was also the last time he had seen his older sister and brother, Heideh and Siamak. Mafi arrived in Texas in 1979. His other older brother, Soheyl, was already in the United States. He later visited Logan and discovered the terrain and climate were very similar to his homeland. He started an electrical engineering major at Utah State University, but when the Iranian government would not allow his parents to send more money for his education, he had to drop out of school. He managed a hotel in Nevada for a year, moved to Salt Lake City and picked up his engineering degree at the University of Utah. After later switching majors, getting married and then divorcing, he ended up dropping out of school and working full-time for a print shop. In 1990, he started Zion Printing in Salt Lake and has been working there since. He didn’t even know that print shop work was in his family; his father had been printer in Iran for years while Mafi was away. Family
reunion
Mafi’s father passed away a decade ago, and Mafi wasn’t able to visit his dad while he was sick in the hospital. Almost four years ago, his mother was finally able to get permission from the government to visit her youngest son. She was given an exit visa that allowed her to go abroad only once. Many of the Bahá'í faith feel very strongly about their religious affiliation. When leaving the country, Iranians are forced to write down their religion. Some say, "Why don’t you simply put down Muslim and leave the country? It’s that simple." Mafi’s mother and family wouldn’t do that. Mafi says he wishes he could say the reunion was different from what it was. He met his mother’s late-arriving plane and had to rush to the next departure instead of reminiscing about lost time. "I said , ‘Mom, we’re running late. Good to see you," he remembers. And when she met him in the airport, she was gray-haired, older lady, not the young woman he remembered. Now, the 37-year-old also has gray mixed in his short-cropped black curls. Mafi’s mother came for a visit, but she is still here. That’s in part because she was diagnosed with colon cancer and needed medication in the United States. But the conditions in Iran are so bad right now that Mafi doesn’t know what will happen if she returns. Mafi’s older brother is trying to come to America to visit his ailing mother. Again, his brother is encountering discrimination in Iran. Mafi’s brother is married, but the country does not recognize his relationship with his wife. The government collected taxes from his company, but wouldn’t give him a business license. Mafi has thought about returning to Iran to see his family, but there are still too many risks. "In Iran, there is no really serious law that people abide by," he says. "Even if I make it to Iran, what if I get stuck?" Patient for
Peace
For someone who’s had his share of sadness, Mafi accepts hardship because of what it might bring. "I welcome a lot of sad things in the world," Mafi says. "Humanity works in such a way that we have to work from our mistakes. Bahá'í believers talk of two types of peace, one of which is called lesser peace. Lesser peace is what Bahá'í followers think might take place around the turn of the century. It involves one government to unite the world , he says. Mafi talks of how Iraqi president Saddam Hussin can help bring about lesser peace. If he keeps provoking his people and other countries, the rest of the world might unite to suppress his actions. Mafi doesn't like to call it "putting up" with problematic behavior. He just understands that sometimes things happen so that he next, better thing can take place. "It's like making mistakes," Mafi says. Mistakes can be corrected for progress. Reprinted with permission from the Provo Herald, originally appeared 2/11/1998 http://www.heraldextra.com
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