Informant: My friend is Persian, and her mother told her old tales like these in order to get her to behave as a child.
Original Piece: Women’s dreams are the opposite – usually the most relevant when something big is happening in your life and it’s constantly on your mind and you dream about it, the opposite is what’s actually going to happen. For example, when my high school Mock Trial team made it to finals, I could barely sleep the night before. It was constantly on my mind and I had a dream we won and it was announced on the school intercom and it was a whole ordeal. Woke up to the news that we lost. But it relates to other things too – for example, if you dream someone is sick or dying that means they’ll live a long healthy life. Essentially it’s the flip side of every story.
Context of Performance: I invited her over for dinner and we were remembering stories we shared as roommates, and I remembered her talking about all the things she used to believe growing up. I asked her if she would share any particular pieces of folktale from her childhood.
Thoughts about the Piece: This piece is particularly funny to me. I remember we used to argue over whether this is true, because even in college she would interpret her dreams (and mine) according to this belief.