I joked with a friend that I had been Beijing’ed. My family and I moved here last June, and ever since, I’ve felt my connection to the Iranian diaspora slipping–this week hammered that home. My mistake, missing the ever-important kick-off event to the Nowruz season, wouldn’t have been a thing back in DC. But, if I’m honest, this disconnect isn’t anything new. I mean, we grew up in rural Kentucky. So, it felt like everything Iranian happened in a vacuum. While we knew we were Iranian, my father’s maintenance of our cultural touch points was basically limited to rice with every meal and facilitating a love of radishes.

But the biggest violator of my mother’s ban on her children’s consumption of sweetened cereal was not my father, it was her father—my grandfather. There is no question whether or not he was aware of the embargo—he was. He willfully and knowingly chose to ignore it. Nothing my mother said or did could have convinced my grandfather of the merits of her moratorium on sugar filled cereals. I am not sure she even put up a fight. Her acquiescence was likely due to her in depth knowledge that his stubbornness—which she picked up from him and subsequently passed along to me—would likely further entrench his position if she were to protest loudly.

Nostalgia can often hit in the moments when you least expect it. Last week, I was hit with waves as I cooked up this soup for the first time.