The House of Yesterday by Deeba Zagarpur
I don’t think there are enough words in all of the three languages that I speak to express the amount of love I have for this book.
House of Yesterday isn’t just a book that explores grief and the consequences of past that was buried being unburied, it also explores the ups and downs of childhood friendships, the consequences of a young child because of her parent’s divorce as well as the emotions that come when you see one of the people you love the most suffer from a disease such as dementia. This also explores the beautiful culture that is almost never represented in modern media, the beauty that is having a big family around you, the food that you come together to eat and the memories you have with your cousins-that-are-actually-like-your-siblings.
It is so rare that we get to see, in modern media, proper representation of Afghan, Uzbek and Tajik culture.
That being said, you’re probably reading this and thinking “Uh…nowhere does it mention Tajik culture”. Well, let’s just say that the author is also Tajik but publishing is…well, publishing.
Moving on, I think that the author portrayed grief so well in this book - it’s obviously hard for our MC, Sara, to deal with not only her parents divorcing but also to deal with her grandmother’s dementia. She’s a young girl who is dealing with so many things and when her mother tells her about a house they bought that they are going to fix up to sell, Sara starts seeing things when she enters the house. Most importantly, she sees a younger version of her Bibi jan - the same person who looks at her and always asks “who are you?”.
We also see Sara’s bond with her best friend Sam and with her cousins on her mom’s side. I really liked seeing the cousin relationships - even if Sara said something stupid and completely out of line, her cousins will always come back and help her out.
The thing I loved the most though is the representation of the culture. I don’t speak Tajik but having grown up back home, I can decipher words easily most of the time and I do eat Tajik food quite often. One thing that I was shocked to see was “shir chai” which is a dish I grew up eating and is basically the answer to any problem, food or otherwise: cold outside? eat shir chai. you’re sick? eat shir chai. guests? shir chai! extra bread that will become super hard in a few days and you don’t want to throw it out? shir chai. too lazy to cook but have the right ingredients for it? shir chai!
I don’t know about other Central Asian people but in my house we always and I mean always have the ingredients needed to make shir chai and frankly all you need is milk, tea, water, salt, bread, and butter. Not sandwich bread though, I mean like either flatbread or baguettes. It’s such an almost universal dish because you can have it anywhere - my grandmother told me a story of when she was on the train with a friend and she asked for hot tea, milk and bread and when her friend came back from the food spot, she was mad that my grandmother didn’t tell her she was making shir chai. That’s how much of a big deal it is in my family. We also joke around that as a test, for anyone introducing their significant other, if the person doesn’t like shir chai, they’re not approved (it’s obviously a joke because people do have different tastes but so far, no one has failed).
So yes, I really, really loved this book and I think this is the step that was needed to show publishing that we! want! more! Central Asian stories! And not just from one country but from ALL of them.
Go read this!
5/5 stars
Love,
Mila
