I’m tired of my blog…

Tagged as:Iran daily life

“There’s nothing to write about.”

“You’ve been here too long,” I tell my friend who keeps his own blog about Iran. “Everything seems normal to you.”

“That’s the problem, I know. I try to get away, but it’s still too normal. What’s strange is that every time I go abroad, all the talk is about Iran. Here we just laugh things off. There they take everything seriously. My God, this talk of flying gas chambers is really outrageous.”

“I feel like I am getting sucked into the hysteria. All I write about is political anymore. Dress code, nukes… it’s all getting on my nerves. If I don’t write about it, then I am dragged into it.”

“Oooohh… I see you wore your lovely red-striped ethnic identification clothing tonight.”

“Just another piece of mass hysteria.”

“The problem is Conrad Black’s paper publishes it and then everyone starts linking to it. The retraction gets less attention than the rumor.”

“People think that Iranians are as obsessed with the nuclear issue as they are, but in reality people here just have to deal with the every day pressures.”

“As if there is not enough to worry about… Like frigging taxis overcharging you, shopping, funerals…”

Everyday Pressures

“What do you think of Iran?” a nurse asks me.

“If I had never worked here, I would love it.” She laughs. “You’re lucky. You work with women. I have to work with men.”

“Iranian men break their promises.”

“Tell me about it…” Just then K opens the door of the doctor’s waiting room. “Except for my husband.” All of the women in the room laugh.

From the doctor’s office, I tag along with K as he heads downtown for an informal business meeting. I am tagging along. Their work completed, the men gather for tea and cigarettes. They are soon deep in conversation about Iran.

“The only honest thing an Iranian ever says is that Iranians are liars,” K says.

“Aha. Exactly,” Man 1 says.

“It’s gotten so much worse since the revolution. It’s all the fault of Jimmy Carter and the mullahs,” Man 2 says.

“We have 3000 years of history, but all we do is blame others for our problems. It’s the fault of the British, the Americans, on and on…”

“But shouldn’t they take some responsibility? Didn’t the British and Americans conspire to bring down Mossadegh? Was that our fault?”

“For a few million tuman, they were able to bring down a government: all they had to do is bribe a few people. We sell ourselves out cheap.”

more later...