"That's why they buy it."
Back in Tehran, we spot two women driving without scarves,
basically a big ‘eff you’ to anyone who sees them.
In the hotel, the woman working the kitchen leans over the counter
to ask, “Mister, Iran good?”
*
The Persians have probably had a good laugh at my expense -
‘ghameh zani’ translates to ‘knife’ beating.
*
Unsure of how the Samara Shia shrine bombing is playing in the
west, its big news in Iran.
Its appalling. “Bebaxshid”.
“Why?”, H2 asks me, “its not your fault.”
The Ayatollahs have called for restraint. The politicians call it a
failure of the “arrogant occupation”. The all-sports channel breaks
into its programming to announce that for the next seven nights, the
network will show sad movies. The clerk changes the channel.
President Ahmadinejad is giving a morning oratory. One channel -
IRINN - carries the broadcast. He competes with an exercise
program; a kids show featuring cartoons, puppets and bunnies;
educational lessons; memorial footage of the shrine in Samara; and
old school TV drama ala “Streets of San Francisco”.
The ticker maintains...
“Experts: NHS Breast Cancer screening program saves 1400 lives a
year”...
“New guidelines: hospital patients should be routinely screened for
malnutrition and offered specialty nutritional support”...
“Study: Sharks may be more vulnerable to fishing industry than
previously thought”...
*
I don't know if you've ever been to the Tehran bazaar.
“Be sure to look up in your English translator a word spelled
‘c-h-a-o-s’,” I suggest to H2. “You’ll use it more than ‘augur’.”
Maybe its the train of pushcarts pummelling us, perhaps the blue
Saipa pickups driving in the enclosed alley, probably the Fire Engine
called into the bazaar to extinguish some fireworks.
The previous night we watched “Training Day” on satellite TV. I
tried my best to explain its enunciation of the American vernacular;
the dialect of the street being difficult for H2 to pick up. He has
second thoughts about visiting America after witnessing the level of
portrayed violence and corruption.
The next day his neice is watching “Coneheads”. I ask her if she
likes it. She scrunches up her nose.
“Not really.”
Its harder to veer away from the gauntlet brought down by George
C. Scott’s opening monologue in “Patton”, in the presence of H2’s
father, who spent part of the 70s in the US -
“Now I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by
dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb
bastard die for his country.”
“A lot of people didn’t know how to take this movie when it came
out. Did you see this movie?” (“Take”?)
“Americans traditionally love to fight. All real Americans love the
sting of battle.”
Swallow hard. “It was sort of a precursor to the 1970s anti-hero
many Americans identified with.” (“Is that even true? Anti-hero?”)
“Americans have never lost and never will lose a war.”
“It came out during Vietnam. Its an old movie.”
*
Red cards in the first five minutes, fisticuffs at halftime, general
disappointment among the partisans, Persepolis FC continued to
founder. Then a new coach from Europe arrived and they won. Still,
its a season H2 would rather forget.
We're hanging out in a Tehrani park chaikuneh, watching the
Iran-Taiwan Asian Cup match, a game well-handled by the Iranians,
4-0, who are without their stars playing in Europe. Iran's national
team is ranked 22nd worldwide and open up the World Cup against
the 6th-ranked Mexican squad. Iran's nationals are having a difficult
time scheduling friendlies against other countries in preparation for
the June event in Germany. H2 blames Bush, saying the US has told
its allies not to play Iran. The Iranian team has a history of rallying
together when odds are against them, as it has previously in the
World Cup, and when Saddam invaded the newly formed nation in
the early 80s.
The parrot inside the chaikuneh talks, but instead of saying "Hello",
"Good day" or "How are you?", it cracks "salam", "ruz bexheir" and
"cha-touri".
A random guy walking in front of us toward the bazaar is wearing a
"Fayatteville Jaycees" windbreaker. He would be no less ironic in
Minneapolis. Along the way I've occassionally seen sports adorned
in FUBU. I ask H2 if “those consumers know that its a popular,
successful black-owned fashion line in America whose slogan is ‘for
us, by us’?”
"Yeah, they know," H2 answers, "that's why they buy it."
*
We while away a couple hours at the well-maintained ground of
Sa’d Abad, the Shah’s former residence. It was here that the young
Pahlavi met with the CIA as it planned the first coup in the
organization’s existence, bringing down the 1953 government of
democratically-elected, oil-nationalizing Mohammad Mossadegh,
Time Magazine’s Man of the Year during the previous calendar.
*
People remember Googoosh with fondness. Satellite TV beams into
Iran from the Arab States, Tehran-geles, Tehran-to, Europe. Videos
from pre-revolution stars (“she died of drug overdose”) are mixed in
with the steadfast Persian pop scene, replete with production values
purchased in Southern California. Tehran tried to crack down a
couple years ago on unauthorized satellite reception. Resilient
citizens removed the mechanics from the husk of their
window-frame air conditioner, using it instead to hide their satellite
dish.
Its a few hours before departing for the airport and arrangements
through a mutual friend have serendipitously allowed for tea with an
American woman working as a journalist in Tehran. She says she
doesn’t exactly feel oppressed, but clearly there are different laws
for women. Despite having a press card which should give her
carte blanche, she still has problems getting a hotel room as a single
woman. She admits a sizable number of women like the feeling of
protection under which they are cloaked. The government doesn’t
censor what she writes as long as she’s balanced. Womens’ issues
and obesity among young people are fair pegs for feature stories.
African American men raised in nearside US neighborhoods play
professional basketball in Iran.
*
I ask H2’s sister if her family has any travel plans. Perfectly
befuddled she redirects, “Where can we go? We’re Iranian.”
Iranians are free to leave the country. No nation will have them.
Across the Gulf, Dubai is a popular destination to get your drink on
once a man has completed his compulsory 20-month military service.
Following their stint, men are considered active for 5 years; H2 can
still be called up over the next two.
He says he’ll tell people he’s Spanish if he travels so they won’t hate
him for being Iranian.
*
“If we could export mullahs, we’d be rich!”, a taxi drivers says. He
says I’ve come to Iran to improve the relationship between our
countries.
Roughly two-thirds of the Iranian population was born after the
Revolution. They listen to Metallica, access the internet and play
games over a LAN. Some blame the country’s economic woes - oil
rich, well educated, wha? - on the ‘old culture’.
*
SPOILER: potentially offensive material ahead:
There’s a joke in Iran about a conservative, religious executive for a
nation we’ve all heard of that speaks simply and firmly to his
supporters who follow him because they feel he has conviction -
quick, who am I talking about? Ahmadinejad? Bush? The Pope?
The joke goes that this guy was born with his brains in his stomach
and the first time he took a shit he flushed them down the toilet.
The joke is not about the Pope.
In one of my Uglier American moments earlier in the trip, I began
talking back to the TV in H2’s presence. The BBC reported that 12
people had died as a result of ‘cartoon violence’.
Knowing the answer would certainly be 12, I asked “How many of
the victims were Moslem?”
Protesters burn US and Israeli flags, though neither country had a
publication on the front burner of the issue, to my knowledge.
“Do the protesters know that in America, Moslems can worship as
they see fit as long as they’re not inciting violence?”
Moslem counter protesters have taken the streets of London, calling
for a stop to the violence.
“That’s what we need, the moderates to condemn the extremists, in
all religions.”
Ritually polite, H2 said nothing.
*
A few years ago I was in a London nightclub, one of the few
authentically music-forward clubs in Picadilly. Within the half hour
of my arrival I had spoken to no one but the bartender. I was in the
restroom and a local asks me where I’m from.
> “The States.”
“Oh. No one likes you.”
Americans knock themselves out to visit such places; where the
dollar is weak, tourists are targets and you might be insulted to your
face. When they arrive, many indulge in exactly the same behavior
they exhibit in the US - going to bars and nightclubs and getting
wasted.
These same people might jump out of their skin when holiday in Iran
is suggested. With smarmy indignation they’ll knowingly proffer,
“Don’t you watch the news? Don’t you know what’s going on over
there?”
> “No, I don’t know what’s going on over there. Please tell me.”
Visit a country where the dollar is strong, goods and services
inexpensive, tourism safe and full of cultural antiquity at an
everlasting crossroads; perhaps, ironically, the one place that’s left
where Americans are welcomed with open arms - heaven forbid
anyone would want to go there!
Think of the dominant images you have of Iran. What are they?
Where did they come from? Let’s say Tehran has 14,000,000
people. The next time you see 10,000 of them protesting in the
street, remember that 13,990,000 are *not* protesting in the street.
I saw a poll this week reporting something like 70% of Americans
rank Iran as the United States’ ‘worst enemy’. Before you go and
vote for anyone who will drop a bomb on Iran, please know in your
heart that the exact inverse - if not greater - is true in Iran. Most of
them have no problem with us. Most of them love us and don’t want
us to kill them.
*
Making a hurried final pass through the “Male Entrance” to my
concourse, H2 and I both later regretted we couldn’t properly
express our sadness after - step by step, mile by mile - spending a
month of continuous time in each other’s company. We hope its
because we’ll see each other again, insh’allah. We’ve covered over
4000 km, ate every meal together, watched football in each other’s
hotel rooms. I met his college buddies and he asked for advice
concerning his girlfriend. He’d patiently wait for me when I was at
an internet cafe. He negotiated all our accomodation and
transportation, saving me roughly the equivalent of what I was
paying him. He and his family repeatedly invited me into their home,
serving an endless array of fruit and tea. His mother cooked dizi for
my final dinner.
“I’m ready when you are ready”, he’d say.
*
The flight out of Tehran is half an hour late, then an hour, then
finally five minutes.
Mehrabad Airport, onboard Turkish Airlines, 4:30 am. The veils
come off.
Twenty-six hours pass on four consecutive flights with layovers in
three cities. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Air France offers an episode of
“The Love Boat”, guest starring Don Knotts - peace be upon him -
as an unlikely amorous interest.
“Shock” is a strong word; I’m culturally confused. I know where I
am, but indulge an urge to go to the chaikuneh. At the 331 Club, a
woman shows off her authentic Girls Gone Wild beads - typically
reserved for exhibitionists who show their breasts - claiming, “I
didn’t even have to do anything for them!” One man scolds
another for not knowing how to properly negotiate their cheap thrill.
Talisker on the rocks. Bells Ale - (along with Derek Jeter) the pride
of Kalamazoo, Michigan - on tap. The club’s biweekly
nouveau-old-tyme burlesque event featuring half naked Eastern
European women is over, but the drummer from the show returns to
add live percussion to a song coming over the speakers. “I Am
The Walrus” makes perfect sense. All the kids wear ink.
Sunday Night Service For Saturday Night Sinners, the regulars greet
a prodigal with enthusiasm. The congregation sings “Beautiful
Savior” and takes communion. Many tell me of their prayers for safe
passage. mash’allah.
*
Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord a quiet, desperate
Tehrani hotel clerk - measuring his affliction day by day, numbering
over 870 in duration - experiences without religious or familial
restriction true love. Amen.
*
When I returned from Ghana I had the overwhelming sensation, “I
can’t wait to get to Africa”, like it would be the first time despite the
fact I had just been there. The same thing is happening now.
I have a new appreciation for crosswalks. Women’s hair is radiant. I
look for H2, but he’s not here.
khoda hafez.
basically a big ‘eff you’ to anyone who sees them.
In the hotel, the woman working the kitchen leans over the counter
to ask, “Mister, Iran good?”
*
The Persians have probably had a good laugh at my expense -
‘ghameh zani’ translates to ‘knife’ beating.
*
Unsure of how the Samara Shia shrine bombing is playing in the
west, its big news in Iran.
Its appalling. “Bebaxshid”.
“Why?”, H2 asks me, “its not your fault.”
The Ayatollahs have called for restraint. The politicians call it a
failure of the “arrogant occupation”. The all-sports channel breaks
into its programming to announce that for the next seven nights, the
network will show sad movies. The clerk changes the channel.
President Ahmadinejad is giving a morning oratory. One channel -
IRINN - carries the broadcast. He competes with an exercise
program; a kids show featuring cartoons, puppets and bunnies;
educational lessons; memorial footage of the shrine in Samara; and
old school TV drama ala “Streets of San Francisco”.
The ticker maintains...
“Experts: NHS Breast Cancer screening program saves 1400 lives a
year”...
“New guidelines: hospital patients should be routinely screened for
malnutrition and offered specialty nutritional support”...
“Study: Sharks may be more vulnerable to fishing industry than
previously thought”...
*
I don't know if you've ever been to the Tehran bazaar.
“Be sure to look up in your English translator a word spelled
‘c-h-a-o-s’,” I suggest to H2. “You’ll use it more than ‘augur’.”
Maybe its the train of pushcarts pummelling us, perhaps the blue
Saipa pickups driving in the enclosed alley, probably the Fire Engine
called into the bazaar to extinguish some fireworks.
The previous night we watched “Training Day” on satellite TV. I
tried my best to explain its enunciation of the American vernacular;
the dialect of the street being difficult for H2 to pick up. He has
second thoughts about visiting America after witnessing the level of
portrayed violence and corruption.
The next day his neice is watching “Coneheads”. I ask her if she
likes it. She scrunches up her nose.
“Not really.”
Its harder to veer away from the gauntlet brought down by George
C. Scott’s opening monologue in “Patton”, in the presence of H2’s
father, who spent part of the 70s in the US -
“Now I want you to remember that no bastard ever won a war by
dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb
bastard die for his country.”
“A lot of people didn’t know how to take this movie when it came
out. Did you see this movie?” (“Take”?)
“Americans traditionally love to fight. All real Americans love the
sting of battle.”
Swallow hard. “It was sort of a precursor to the 1970s anti-hero
many Americans identified with.” (“Is that even true? Anti-hero?”)
“Americans have never lost and never will lose a war.”
“It came out during Vietnam. Its an old movie.”
*
Red cards in the first five minutes, fisticuffs at halftime, general
disappointment among the partisans, Persepolis FC continued to
founder. Then a new coach from Europe arrived and they won. Still,
its a season H2 would rather forget.
We're hanging out in a Tehrani park chaikuneh, watching the
Iran-Taiwan Asian Cup match, a game well-handled by the Iranians,
4-0, who are without their stars playing in Europe. Iran's national
team is ranked 22nd worldwide and open up the World Cup against
the 6th-ranked Mexican squad. Iran's nationals are having a difficult
time scheduling friendlies against other countries in preparation for
the June event in Germany. H2 blames Bush, saying the US has told
its allies not to play Iran. The Iranian team has a history of rallying
together when odds are against them, as it has previously in the
World Cup, and when Saddam invaded the newly formed nation in
the early 80s.
The parrot inside the chaikuneh talks, but instead of saying "Hello",
"Good day" or "How are you?", it cracks "salam", "ruz bexheir" and
"cha-touri".
A random guy walking in front of us toward the bazaar is wearing a
"Fayatteville Jaycees" windbreaker. He would be no less ironic in
Minneapolis. Along the way I've occassionally seen sports adorned
in FUBU. I ask H2 if “those consumers know that its a popular,
successful black-owned fashion line in America whose slogan is ‘for
us, by us’?”
"Yeah, they know," H2 answers, "that's why they buy it."
*
We while away a couple hours at the well-maintained ground of
Sa’d Abad, the Shah’s former residence. It was here that the young
Pahlavi met with the CIA as it planned the first coup in the
organization’s existence, bringing down the 1953 government of
democratically-elected, oil-nationalizing Mohammad Mossadegh,
Time Magazine’s Man of the Year during the previous calendar.
*
People remember Googoosh with fondness. Satellite TV beams into
Iran from the Arab States, Tehran-geles, Tehran-to, Europe. Videos
from pre-revolution stars (“she died of drug overdose”) are mixed in
with the steadfast Persian pop scene, replete with production values
purchased in Southern California. Tehran tried to crack down a
couple years ago on unauthorized satellite reception. Resilient
citizens removed the mechanics from the husk of their
window-frame air conditioner, using it instead to hide their satellite
dish.
Its a few hours before departing for the airport and arrangements
through a mutual friend have serendipitously allowed for tea with an
American woman working as a journalist in Tehran. She says she
doesn’t exactly feel oppressed, but clearly there are different laws
for women. Despite having a press card which should give her
carte blanche, she still has problems getting a hotel room as a single
woman. She admits a sizable number of women like the feeling of
protection under which they are cloaked. The government doesn’t
censor what she writes as long as she’s balanced. Womens’ issues
and obesity among young people are fair pegs for feature stories.
African American men raised in nearside US neighborhoods play
professional basketball in Iran.
*
I ask H2’s sister if her family has any travel plans. Perfectly
befuddled she redirects, “Where can we go? We’re Iranian.”
Iranians are free to leave the country. No nation will have them.
Across the Gulf, Dubai is a popular destination to get your drink on
once a man has completed his compulsory 20-month military service.
Following their stint, men are considered active for 5 years; H2 can
still be called up over the next two.
He says he’ll tell people he’s Spanish if he travels so they won’t hate
him for being Iranian.
*
“If we could export mullahs, we’d be rich!”, a taxi drivers says. He
says I’ve come to Iran to improve the relationship between our
countries.
Roughly two-thirds of the Iranian population was born after the
Revolution. They listen to Metallica, access the internet and play
games over a LAN. Some blame the country’s economic woes - oil
rich, well educated, wha? - on the ‘old culture’.
*
SPOILER: potentially offensive material ahead:
There’s a joke in Iran about a conservative, religious executive for a
nation we’ve all heard of that speaks simply and firmly to his
supporters who follow him because they feel he has conviction -
quick, who am I talking about? Ahmadinejad? Bush? The Pope?
The joke goes that this guy was born with his brains in his stomach
and the first time he took a shit he flushed them down the toilet.
The joke is not about the Pope.
In one of my Uglier American moments earlier in the trip, I began
talking back to the TV in H2’s presence. The BBC reported that 12
people had died as a result of ‘cartoon violence’.
Knowing the answer would certainly be 12, I asked “How many of
the victims were Moslem?”
Protesters burn US and Israeli flags, though neither country had a
publication on the front burner of the issue, to my knowledge.
“Do the protesters know that in America, Moslems can worship as
they see fit as long as they’re not inciting violence?”
Moslem counter protesters have taken the streets of London, calling
for a stop to the violence.
“That’s what we need, the moderates to condemn the extremists, in
all religions.”
Ritually polite, H2 said nothing.
*
A few years ago I was in a London nightclub, one of the few
authentically music-forward clubs in Picadilly. Within the half hour
of my arrival I had spoken to no one but the bartender. I was in the
restroom and a local asks me where I’m from.
> “The States.”
“Oh. No one likes you.”
Americans knock themselves out to visit such places; where the
dollar is weak, tourists are targets and you might be insulted to your
face. When they arrive, many indulge in exactly the same behavior
they exhibit in the US - going to bars and nightclubs and getting
wasted.
These same people might jump out of their skin when holiday in Iran
is suggested. With smarmy indignation they’ll knowingly proffer,
“Don’t you watch the news? Don’t you know what’s going on over
there?”
> “No, I don’t know what’s going on over there. Please tell me.”
Visit a country where the dollar is strong, goods and services
inexpensive, tourism safe and full of cultural antiquity at an
everlasting crossroads; perhaps, ironically, the one place that’s left
where Americans are welcomed with open arms - heaven forbid
anyone would want to go there!
Think of the dominant images you have of Iran. What are they?
Where did they come from? Let’s say Tehran has 14,000,000
people. The next time you see 10,000 of them protesting in the
street, remember that 13,990,000 are *not* protesting in the street.
I saw a poll this week reporting something like 70% of Americans
rank Iran as the United States’ ‘worst enemy’. Before you go and
vote for anyone who will drop a bomb on Iran, please know in your
heart that the exact inverse - if not greater - is true in Iran. Most of
them have no problem with us. Most of them love us and don’t want
us to kill them.
*
Making a hurried final pass through the “Male Entrance” to my
concourse, H2 and I both later regretted we couldn’t properly
express our sadness after - step by step, mile by mile - spending a
month of continuous time in each other’s company. We hope its
because we’ll see each other again, insh’allah. We’ve covered over
4000 km, ate every meal together, watched football in each other’s
hotel rooms. I met his college buddies and he asked for advice
concerning his girlfriend. He’d patiently wait for me when I was at
an internet cafe. He negotiated all our accomodation and
transportation, saving me roughly the equivalent of what I was
paying him. He and his family repeatedly invited me into their home,
serving an endless array of fruit and tea. His mother cooked dizi for
my final dinner.
“I’m ready when you are ready”, he’d say.
*
The flight out of Tehran is half an hour late, then an hour, then
finally five minutes.
Mehrabad Airport, onboard Turkish Airlines, 4:30 am. The veils
come off.
Twenty-six hours pass on four consecutive flights with layovers in
three cities. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Air France offers an episode of
“The Love Boat”, guest starring Don Knotts - peace be upon him -
as an unlikely amorous interest.
“Shock” is a strong word; I’m culturally confused. I know where I
am, but indulge an urge to go to the chaikuneh. At the 331 Club, a
woman shows off her authentic Girls Gone Wild beads - typically
reserved for exhibitionists who show their breasts - claiming, “I
didn’t even have to do anything for them!” One man scolds
another for not knowing how to properly negotiate their cheap thrill.
Talisker on the rocks. Bells Ale - (along with Derek Jeter) the pride
of Kalamazoo, Michigan - on tap. The club’s biweekly
nouveau-old-tyme burlesque event featuring half naked Eastern
European women is over, but the drummer from the show returns to
add live percussion to a song coming over the speakers. “I Am
The Walrus” makes perfect sense. All the kids wear ink.
Sunday Night Service For Saturday Night Sinners, the regulars greet
a prodigal with enthusiasm. The congregation sings “Beautiful
Savior” and takes communion. Many tell me of their prayers for safe
passage. mash’allah.
*
Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord a quiet, desperate
Tehrani hotel clerk - measuring his affliction day by day, numbering
over 870 in duration - experiences without religious or familial
restriction true love. Amen.
*
When I returned from Ghana I had the overwhelming sensation, “I
can’t wait to get to Africa”, like it would be the first time despite the
fact I had just been there. The same thing is happening now.
I have a new appreciation for crosswalks. Women’s hair is radiant. I
look for H2, but he’s not here.
khoda hafez.
posted by s. at 7:27 AM
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