Eskandar Afshar

Lila was an exceptional lady, full of emotions and sensitivity. 

I often speak to Eskandar Afshar, Lila’s husband, he returned to Iran after Leila’s passing and now lives in Tehran. Recently, they went on a short trip to northern Iran. Azar is Eskandar’s second wife. As was the case with Eskandar, Azar also lost her spouse after his long struggle with Cancer. They live together sharing the burden of their pasts and individual losses in their hearts. 

One late fall night in Los Angeles we managed to connect with them in a city in northern Iran by phone.

 I had heard from Pasha about Azar’s serenity, her affability, and her kindness and empathy towards Eskandar’s three children. 

Eskandar Afshar, Lila’s husband and the man who lived with her for more than 30 years, was not only the main admirer of her beautiful and loving songs, but he was also a source of her escapism from the pain caused by her terrible disease. 

Eskandar struggles to have a conversation. He insists he has amnesia and has memory loss and says that he is now 90 years old and has forgotten everything for quite some time now. I will try to speak to him and draw him into a conversation about how he met Lila. 

My eldest brother was initially a colleague of Lila’s father in the Iranian army, and later they became friends. I met Lila during a family gathering with the Kasra’s. This acquaintance eventually led to a strong relationship and an intense love between us which resulted in our marriage. It was the same typical story of acquaintance, love, and marriage. 

Lila was an exceptional lady and a very good person. She had very reverential qualities. Her greatest qualities were her soulfulness and her softheartedness. In fact, you might say, she was too emotional. I am unable to recall an unpleasant quality in her. She was good in every way, and I was committed to her and loved her. We got married, and our three boys were the result of our life together. We had a romantic life and were happy until this deadly disease slowly ravaged her body and eventually took her life. 

At the start, we tried to find a cure for her in Iran and relied on the best disease specialists available at the time. But they found the disease uncurable and did not manage to find a cure. It had a been a year and half since the revolution. At the time, Lila’s aunt lived in England, and we made the decision to travel and continue the pursue of a cure in England. Thus, Lila went through treatment in London for a while. She also went through an unsuccessful surgery with no positive outcome which made us even more skeptical. 

Lila’s bother Anoushirvan Kasra, lived in the United States, he shared the specifics of her illness with renowned specialists in America, and according to the advice he received and upon his recommendation, Lila and I traveled to the United States along with our children. 

I cannot recall precisely, but I imagine that Lila was under constant treatment for about 12 to 13 years in America. She endured several surgeries and struggled with illness, pain, and suffering and ultimately succumbed to the disease.

It was impossible for me to continue living in that environment after Lila’s passing. I came back to Iran and stayed here. My kids were young then. My oldest son Pasha was 23 at the time. 

Ultimately, Lila was gentle minded and full of emotions. She wrote love poems that had lots of enthusiasts and fans. I was not of the same mind set as her as far as her mental and emotional state when it came to her poems and thus did not interfere in these matters. I would read her poems or listen to them. But I did not express my opinion when it came to these things. I am a farmer. The truth of it is that I am a peasant, and I am not familiar at all with poems and poetry. Following my return to Iran, I managed to get back some of the lands that we owned, and even at this age I still farm. My only problem is my memory loss. I am not even able to recall the date of my own birth. I also cannot deal with speaking on the phone. If Azar does not help me, I would not be able to manage anything. 

Lila wrote lots of love poems. She believed she had written them all for me. I also really loved her. I was much more in love with her than she was in love with me There was a true mutual love between us. 

Lila was a very good wife for me and was an extraordinary mother to our children. She was very soft hearted and full of affection. She was basically a very kind and honest lady who was praised and admired everywhere. She liked to help people. If she felt somebody needed her help, she never had any doubts about going and helping that person. She was loveable 

I miss Lila tremendously, and I cannot describe how empty her absence is in my life. She is always with me. I have spent all the moments of my life, whether they were before or after her death, with Lila Today, 30 years has passed since she left me, but it is as if she is still always by my side and in part of my being. 

 Her entire life is dear memory for me. Her manner of speaking, her laughter, her sadness and gestures, her walk, the way she sat and and stood up are all vivid in my memory. 

I am away from my children. I love them more than my eyes. They are busy with their own work and life, and I am here, in Iran. This was our destiny and sadly, there is no way to escape from what was meant to be.