BS is BS in any language

Turned on the satellite and **click** Bill O’Reilly:

“I am not worried about North Korea because I think China can contain them. Iran, on the other hand, I do worry about. If they get nuclear weapons they *will* give them to the terrorists and POOF Cleveland goes up in smoke.”

It was the last minute of Oprah.

POOF Cleveland goes up in smoke.

Every time I see these FOX news pundits I am reminded of the regime: They use the same tactics: bs, hyperbole, fear, and ignorance (their own and ours).

Sometimes the regime gets it right. Sometimes FOX news gets it right. Most of the time both depend on our lack of critical thinking skills and, in the case of FOX, our inalienable right to be entertained to numb us into inaction.

Missing, 2

A great piece of reporting from FT's Najmeh Bozorgmehr and Guy Dinmore

Just why Robert Levinson, a former Federal Bureau of Investigation agent and now private investigator, should venture into Iran to meet a American fugitive wanted for murder in the US remains a mystery that the highest Bush administration authorities are trying to unravel.

As the Financial Times revealed this week, Mr Levinson disappeared on March 8 after a six-hour meeting on the Iranian island of Kish with Dawud Salahuddin, an American who converted to Islam and was recruited by revolutionaries to assassinate an Iranian opposition activist near Washington in 1980.

Friends of Mr Levinson are mystified that he took the risk of travelling for such a meeting. They fear he is the victim of a sting operation by Iranian secret services engaged in an escalating "dirty war" between the US and Iran, involving hostage-taking and covert cross-border operations.

Mr Salahuddin, who fled to Iran after the 1980 murder and has at times expressed interest in returning to the US to face justice, told the FT in Tehran that he, too, feared Mr Levinson was an "innocent victim" of the clash between what he calls Iran's paranoia about the US and Washington's misguided foreign policy.

Mr Salahuddin said they registered a room in the Maryam hotel before he, too, was detained that night but released the next day after his Iranian passport was checked. Mr Levinson has not been heard from since. Iran's foreign ministry says it does not know where he is. The US believes he is in ­detention.

RIP

Indulge me...

Kurt Vonnegut: Those cigarettes sure took a long time to kill him...

I started reading him when I was 14, and I never stopped.

Then I'm going down the steps, and my wife calls up, "Where are you going?" I say, "Well, I'm going to go buy an envelope." And she says, "You're not a poor man. Why don't you buy a thousand envelopes? They'll deliver them, and you can put them in a closet." And I say, "Hush." So I go down the steps here, and I go out to this newsstand across the street where they sell magazines and lottery tickets and stationery. I have to get in line because there are people buying candy and all that sort of thing, and I talk to them. The woman behind the counter has a jewel between her eyes, and when it's my turn, I ask her if there have been any big winners lately. I get my envelope and seal it up and go to the postal convenience center down the block at the corner of 47th Street and 2nd Avenue, where I'm secretly in love with the woman behind the counter. I keep absolutely poker-faced; I never let her know how I feel about her. One time I had my pocket picked in there and got to meet a cop and tell him about it. Anyway, I address the envelope to Carol in Woodstock. I stamp the envelope and mail it in a mailbox in front of the post office, and I go home. And I've had a hell of a good time. And I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you any different.

(Timequake) (I know I should link to the site where I found that quote, but it did not link to Timequake, so I won't link to it.)

My friend at Miniver Cheevy wrote his own obit. Unlike him, I never became disaffected with Vonnegut. I loved him: limitations and all.

Leaving Iran...

There are several ways to leave Iran. Among them: marry an American, claim asylum in the Netherlands if you are gay, apply for a student visa or residency, or win the Green Card lottery. For Christians and Jews and Ba’hais, there is another way: asylum based on religion. It requires a few months stay in Vienna or another city where paperwork is processed and “homeless” Iranians find temporary housing before moving on to new homes in Orange County, Chicago, or Virginia.

If Muslims could do the same they would. They would pick up and move out in higher numbers than the minorities. Iranian law may be harder on minorities, but the minorities I know express no more displeasure with their lives in Iran than do the Muslims I know.

Awhile ago, a Ba’hai family that I met told me that Iranian society had become more tolerant since the revolution. The law, they explained, had become less tolerant, but their neighbors and friends had become more tolerant.

I asked a young Jewish friend how his parents felt. He told me that they would agree. “Before the revolution, Iranians were much more religious. If my father would visit a shop or the home of a Muslim, they would clean everything. They felt he was dirty. Now, it is never a problem. Muslims shake my hand all the time. Most of my friends are Muslims.”

“My grandmother was that way,” Keivan added. “She would clean the house from top to bottom if a Christian came over. My mother, no. I had a Christian friend who was always over.”

An Armenian friend of ours recently made the move to Vienna to await her paperwork for residency in the US. “My father is broken-hearted. He loves Iran,” she told me. “Iran saved our family. They were refugees from Turkey. They all love Iran so much, but it is too hard to continue. He is sick of lying all the time so we are moving to America.”

Soon, Iran will have almost no religious minorities. They won’t be able to point to their “big” Jewish community of 30,000. In Hamadan, where the tomb of Esther and Mordecai is located, only 17 Jews are left. Iran reports that there are 30,000 Jews here, but every day the number gets smaller. It isn’t because of any “special” persecution. It’s just that they *can* leave.

What has Iran ever done for me?

A commenter recently asked:

what are the main contributions to the health and happiness of the world that iran has made outside of its borders in the last 50 years?

Another commenter responded that Iran houses more refugees than any other country in the world. That is true. There are many Afghanis and Iraqis here. Someone from the UN told me that it is hard to count the number of Afghanis because they make every effort to disappear into Iranian society.

Going back a bit more than 50 years, we should not forget that Iranian diplomats were instrumental in saving many Jews during the Holocaust and that many Armenians found refuge in Iran as well when they were being killed by the Turks.

That's not too shabby, I would say...

Enough with the sailors

…Although, hmm…six figures for the story of a 15-day detention in Iran? Help! I’ve been held hostage for almost four years. Is there an agent out there willing to save me?

Happy Passover, Easter, and the Prophet of Islam's Birthday

Ahmadinejad covered them all when he signed the papers announcing the release of the 15 British sailors.

It was their clothes that were so interesting to me and Keivan: the woman, Faye Turney wearing a giant striped shirt with baggy pants and an over-sized blue shirt; the men in their standard-issue Hacoupian suits. It's hard to imagine the process of dressing the British sailors. They had quite the array of outfits: their uniforms, the gym suits we saw them in while they sat in a room close to the location of Ahmadinejad's press conference, then the suits and Faye's really unfashionable outfit (clearly, shopping for her clothes was not done by Iran's chic set).

Keivan has been speculating on how they were fitted for their outfits and who bought them. And the strangest part yet (at least for me) is the parting gifts. Who provides released foreign captives with parting gifts? They got pistachios too: not too shabby a parting gift at all!

Imagine, 5 years in Guantanamo and then you get a little party bag filled with Starbucks coupons and Gap t-shirts. "A mememto of your stay with us."

And of course the British sailors were under psychological pressure... that comes as no surprise. What I find the most unnerving is that our (American) behavior at Abu Gharib and Guantanamo has completely robbed me of the right to be indignant. If Americans don't agree with me, tell me why I am wrong.

Click on the New York Times multimedia link for a good slideshow of images

As usual, The Onion has the best take: Iran Releases British Sailors

Missing

Apparently, an American has gone missing from Kish. I know nothing more than you do about it. It’s a mystery to me.

New York Newsday has a story on him that may tell you more


Apparently he was working for an independent filmmaker. Who knows? This must be disturbing for his family.

The Iranian government denies that anyone has gone missing from Kish.

We are all happy that the Brits are being released. It's a relief.

Release Papers Signed

Fars News Agency is reporting that Ahmadinejad has signed the release papers for the 15 British soldiers.

You know what this means, don't you? It means that Keivan wins the pool for when the Brits would be released. He guessed sometime this week. I thought it would be 15 months from now.

Our commenter Hossein also gets to keep both of the s's in his name. (He offered to give one up if this whole thing lasted beyond Keivan's prediction.)

Aside: This is an interesting coincidence: Sharafi is back in Tehran.

15 sailors, 10,460 news items

Last night, while Al Alam and western news organizations were showing the latest confessions from the British soldiers, Iranians were watching Buster Keaton unfold a giant newspaper...


Why is Iran losing its case in international public opinion and why doesn’t the Iranian government care about this?

It is no secret that governments and corporations around the world spend millions, even billions, of $s to improve their public relations. When governments or corporations are under attack or when they see their policies or actions are not received well at the national or, as in this matter, international level, they try to present their side of the story in a compelling and coherent manner. They also seek help or guidance from the partners that they count on to come to their side in times of need. Looking at events surrounding the capture of 15 British sailors in the past 10 days proves that Iran does not care about its public image and does not know how to gain the support of the international community. Iran is speaking with too many voices and has too many different agendas. Iran will come out of this crisis the big loser.

Just a few months ago it seems that the people in the Arab world were supportive of Iran’s policies such as in the case of so-called peaceful nuclear energy and standing up to the west. Now it seems that they are increasingly nervous that Iran might provoke another war. Some guy on the BBC said about this that Iran scored an own goal. (sorry, can’t remember his name)

What Iran needs at this time is a brand new political calculation machine that can better analyze situations both tactically and strategically. If anyone knows of such a machine, there’s a market in Iran.

Why am I saying this? This morning when I got up, I went through all of the comments people left on this blog since the 15 British sailors ware captured on March 23. There is a storm of news articles and opinions about it around the world. I can see very clearly that Iranians writing inside and outside Iran take a similar approach: were the 15 sailors in Iranian waters or not, and if they were, was that right or wrong? I think this shows how black and white we Iranians tend to see international events. I bet there are incidents of foreign ships entering a nation’s territorial waters all the time: these breaches do not become international incidents because they are rationally dealt with and solved. Usually, as I wrote earlier, with a megaphone.

Here I want to give you guys a few statistics regarding a couple of issues Iran is dealing with or needs to deal with. I am hoping to prove to you that whatever Iranians had planned or not planned that the result of their actions is more damaging than the UN resolution against the country. You might say that Iran was good at taking the attention away from the UN resolution, but may have brought extra and more damaging sanctions upon itself through its actions.

Here we go:
If you search for 15 British sailors on Google News, you get 10,460 news items/articles.


Search for subject United Nations Resolution 1747 will deliver 208 hits.

Combination of United Nations Resolution 1747 + 15 British sailors will ONLY deliver 37 hits.

US + 15 British sailors delivered 7,366 hits. In the same time deployment of 21,000 new soldiers in Iraq add only 90 hits

We Iranians should look at what people are saying about us: they say that we have a tradition of taking hostages: there were the Americans taken hostage in their embassy at the start of the resolution, the British sailors that we took a few years ago, and that in the 1800s we killed the Russian ambassador when we attacked his embassy.

This is another disaster for us. It will take years for us to recover from it. It isn’t only the Iranian government that will suffer, it is the Iranian people as well. We need to stop being such losers and so short-sighted. Iranians need to see that we are losing big time in international public opinion. Our image is as important to defend as our territorial borders. Right now the world sees us as out of control. That is a very dangerous image to present to the world.

For the record, these televised confessions that the Iranian government keeps showing on its Arabic channel Al Alam are a big joke and they only serve to make us look stupid. I, like other Iranians, know of many people who were forced into making confessions for television.

People may form an opinion of us in ten minutes that it will take us decades to undo.

Not quite an update... more on the fifteen

Keivan woke up this morning and heard Ahmadinejad saying that the British had to apologize. "The negotiations are over now. Now we have a problem," he said. What he meant was that now an official voice had spoken and Iran's position was getting more firm.

Angus McDowall has a good article about this very issue:

Last night's dramatic footage demonstrates how extremists with a grudge against the West and a burning sense of ambition can force Iran into sudden confrontations that its smoothest-talking diplomats can have trouble defusing. The revolutionary guardsmen and their radical supporters behind this crisis only represent a single faction. But they have been able to take Iran's foreign policy hostage and provoke an international incident.

Taking advantage of the deep fractures in the Iranian state, the revolutionary guards have created a fait accompli, forcing the government to adopt a position from which it will be hard to back down. Driven by their experiences of the revolution and eight bloody years of war with Iraq, many guardsmen want to see Iran take a more aggressive stance against Britain and America. The confusion is caused by Iran's unusual political system, which combines democratic elements such as an elected president and parliament with the theocratic rule of a supreme leader. In practice, this means decisions are rarely made by a single person: they are disputed and fought over by a host of political factions and vested interests, including religious leaders, elected politicians, wealthy merchants -- and soldiers.

I also agree with parts of what The Moor Next Door says about Iran's capture of the 15 British sailors:

This move lacked tact and subtlety. This kind of bold behavior irritates enemies and solidifies their alliances. This sort of action simply validates American perceptions of Iranian behavior (which are often incorrect, and even dangerous, in their judgements, because they are usually hysterical and spasmodic), and serves to potentially transfer those across the Atlantic.

(Found via Global Voices)

Last night, we decided to start a pool (I know, it's crass...) for when the sailors will be released. My guess is 15 months (everyone thinks I am nuts. I hope they are right), Keivan and another friend think sometime next week after Sizdeh Bedar (the 13th day after the New Year and the last day of the New Year's holidays). No one else was brazen enough to hazard a guess.

Negotiating,,, Redux

Iranian rebuttal shown via BBC World

Any diplomat who has ever worked in Iran can tell you that negotiations rarely go your way once the issues become public.

The problem is that in a case like this one: where 15 British sailors were nabbed while boating in troubled waters, in front of 2 journalists, which pretty much meant that there was no way of keeping the event quiet. This also meant that there was no way to have a kind of low-key negotiation behind-the-scenes.


It is only normal that the British public would demand a show of strength from its government. Unfortunately, it is likely that this show is also jeopardizing the negotiations. As Keivan and I have learned in much, much lower stakes negotiating, any show of desperation or demand is met by stonewalling and backtracking. Many Iranians seem to have no concept of win-win negotiating, which makes them dangerous.

“If I am not screwing you, you must be screwing me,” is how many Iranians seem to think of the negotiating process.

I am sure that the British politicians and diplomats understand all this, but now they are stuck with a public “ratcheting up” that just may end up meaning a few months of detention for the British sailors. Hope I am wrong.

No News is Good News... or Not

“I can only come over if I can accept a call from a radio station,” a friend said to us last night. We thought: cool, we’ll get the scoop on the 15 British Sailors. Well, turns out he didn’t know any more than we do, which is not all that much, but probably more than many of you know.

Is no news good news?

In most of the cases no news is good news, but since lately Iran doesn’t do things like any other places do this may not be the case here.

Since last Friday, I have had the TV remote control glued to my hand. In Tehran, it is raining, and we did not go away for holidays, so I am trying non-stop to get a little bit of news about the 15 sailors who ware captured 5 days ago. So far my only sources about this incident are the internet and foreign media outlets. My couple of attempts to get any news from the Iranian government official web site or the TV news were very disappointing. Here in Iran, the government has a different take on news: they are in the business of getting news and information rather than providing it.

Imagine the deputy foreign minister of Iran meeting with Geoffrey Adams, the British ambassador in Iran and asking him: whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat’s up? Here it is not just “what is up?” “how are you?” like it is in the Budweiser commercials but more like “hey Mr. Adams do you have any news of your 15 sailors, because we sure don’t have any?” Here in Iran most people are on vacation. My brother called me yesterday, and he didn’t even have any idea that this had happened. “Didn’t you see the news?” I asked him. “No,” he said. He is like most Iranians: he is enjoying the new year holidays not worrying about sanctions and territorial waters.


I still want to know if they were in our waters or not. This should not be very difficult for Iran to prove considering all the advanced equipment Iran has got. Certainly, if we can enrich uranium, we have GPS systems. Right? Our foreign minister, like the British one did, can go in front of Iran’s parliament and show our evidence. Why should they ask the British sailors to tell them if they were in Iranian waters?

Today I am almost 100 % convinced that those sailors were not in Iranian waters. It is not just because I saw a live report of Margaret Beckett on the floor of the British parliament. I believe this because it is the first time I see the west, in this case UK, show evidence in a lot of detail, publicly, and very quickly. Usually we just hear that we will show you evidence, but it never really gets shown.

Margaret Beckett’s announcement that British government stopping all bilateral business activities until this issue is solved, is really bad news. It just means that we are starting the year with even more problems.

As I said before in my other posting, even if the sailors were in our waters, the problem could have been solved by using something called megaphones. Iran should and could use this tool more often to prevent anybody getting into our waters. This high tech device could prevent a lot of international crises.

The good news is that we hear that the 15 sailors are well & in good condition. Iran may release the one woman in the group in good faith. That is good but not good enough I fear.

In Iran, we say that you know if the coming year will be good by Spring time. It looks like we are starting off this year all wrong.

300 Spartans + 15 sailors

Last Friday’s capture of 15 British sailors in Shatt al-Arab waterway dividing Iranian and Iraqi territory ruined my attack plan against the new movie 300. Last week we had a problem with 300 Spartans, this week we have the additional problem of 15 British sailors and new UN sanctions. We are not afraid problems. We are a nation of problem-solvers. Hey you guys out there: any problems you can’t handle? Hand them to us…


Tony Blair said, "We have certainly sent the message back to them very clearly indeed. They should not be under any doubt at all about how seriously we regard this act, which is unjustified and wrong." (http://news.scotsman.com/politics.cfm?id=465272007)

Yes I do believe it was a big mistake from Iran’s part and I am willing to say this incident may be even worse for Iran than the UN Security Council resolution 1747. Why do I think that? I will get back to that in other positing. But let me now get even with the movie 300. I do recommend that you see this film. The best way is if you and 100 other friends buy one DVD together, Otherwise you would be paying too much.

We saw the movie last week, when all was well in Iran and people were getting ready for a lovely new year. A friend invited us to his house to see it. Unlike other times when we were invited, there were no drinks on the table waiting for us. That night we were dealing with very important issues. 300 against 70 million. I cannot complain about the film from an artistic point of view: it seemed like it was beautiful in a fascist sort of way. Since I am not a woman, I cannot complain that there was only one woman in the movie who spent most of her time in bed. And I don’t think my black friends should complain either since they such huge roles in the movie. How that happened, I don’t know.

There were 7 people in the room, behalf of me and Esther. They were all these big guys from foreign newspapers, a few Iranians and our superstar foreign correspondent visiting from a Northern European country who I almost kicked out of the window because he was talking about himself too much. His comments about everything were getting to me. He was like one of those people who thinks he is an expert in the politics of every country that he visits even if he has only visited once and for no more than a week. His first comment to us was, “I hate Americans.” I said, “Then you are in the wrong place because Iranians love Americans.” Then he said, “Some of my best friends are Americans.” (Doesn’t that kind of line make you sick to your stomach? Just like when people say Iranians are terrorists but my neighbor is Iranian and I like him.)

First let me be honest with you, what I feel here is what I am almost 100 % sure you would be feeling if someone made you and your country look like monsters. This is not just about Iran; this insult can be made about any other country, because you don’t have to be right or historically correct. You can always make up stories about any nation and I am sure you can find research to prove what you want to say. From the other side what Azadeh Moaveni wrote:” It is going to take an act of foolhardy courage to distribute that film in Iran. It will truly be 70 million against 300” is ridiculous because yesterday I saw at least 4 places selling the movie 300. They were openly yelling out “300, 300, 300…” It was no secret.

Selling 300 on the streets of Tehran:


and here too:


Iranian newspapers are saying that the making of this film distorts historical facts and makes Iranians look like monsters. Many other Iranians believe that it was made in order to prepare the American public to start war against Iran. One of my friends asked Esther if it was true that America always made a movie like this before going to war. “Wasn’t there a movie like this about Saddam Hussein?” He asked her.

This is part of big conspiracy that the US government is responsible for everything and that US has plans for everything, any time and everywhere. This may be true if you think Americans have super powers and that they are so good at planning. Anyone who has ever visited the US should know that it is not true that everything is so well-planned. This is just part of line which people use to blame everything on others. I wonder why we Iranian buy into this kind of BS all the time?

You can only ask others to be fair if you are fair. Iranians may be upset about this movie, which makes us look very bad, but everyday some of us get up and go to the street to shout down with America. We need to tell our own stories. We need to look at our own propaganda and be more critical of it. Hundreds of people here ask me all sorts of crap about western families: do sons and daughters sleep together? Do they care more about dogs than their own children? Where do they get those ideas? From our own distortions.

I’ll leave you by saying that everyone in the group watching the movie (even the American and the Brit who wants to be known as Scottish, not British) thought it was racist, ridiculous, and dangerous. They all knew it was a fantasy. Esther could not figure out who we were supposed to have sympathy for. “Ahoo!”

In Iranian waters or not in Iranian waters?

A commentor on my last post wrote:

"and you don't have the slightest doubt that they were not within Iranian Waters..."

Let me agree with the commenter for a second that the British sailors were in Iran's water, if that is the case everybody knows that this is against international law. Iran should have the right to protest that move.

I also strongly believe, particularly in this case, that the best way to act is not to choose to use the very last option you have. It is no secret to anybody that we are living in a very tense situation. At the moment that I am writing this, the UN Security Council is probably passing another damaging series of economic sanctions against Iran. This is a time that Iranians should put their nationalistic feelings aside and not just go after what is right at the moment, but to act in a way that ensures that we prevent a new disaster in Middle East.

So dear Commenter, since we both know that every coin has two sides, what about if the British sailors were not in Iranian waters? Is right to hold them? Will Iran benefit from this action? If Iran is wrong in this case, it will only add to the feeling of people around the world that the Iranian government is out of control. You do not have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out.

I do believe that Iran is looking for ways to show that they are not joking when they say they will retaliate if they come under attack. This may mean that the Iranian government believes that the US and its allies will attack Iran..

(BTW, ET adds that there is a pretty comprehensive roundup at Slate and at Jules Crittenden

Why oh why were British soldiers taken prisoner?

This morning when I woke up, I immediately turned on the TV to watch the latest BBC world news report on the British naval personnel who were captured yesterday morning, but I ended up watching a totally different program first, Francesco da Mosto’s travel journey to explore the history, culture, and modern-day life of Italy. He sets off heading south to Sicily. Francesco da Mosto’s journey is my favorite travel show. He finished this program by saying "Our country is not to be explained, but to be experienced and felt. I really think you can say that about Iran too.

But experiencing it lately means feeling a lot of pain.

Have you ever had a time when nothing is going well for you? Yesterday’s capture of the British Navy personnel by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Naval Corps is just another bad thing at a time when most Iranians feel nothing is going well for them. Considering Iran’s situation, one would think that we would do everything to improve its position in the world, and would do everything possible to make sure that the UN Security Council would not pass another damaging series of economic sanctions against it. But that is when you are rational and you are not looking for crises.

I still don’t understand what happened yesterday. But since yesterday I have been trying to figure out why Iran captured British Navy personnel at the moment when every eye in the world is upon us.

A couple of things came to my mind:

Iran is desperate to show the world and the west in particular that we are able to protect and control Iran’s territorial waters. Why we want to do this by capturing 15 British sailors is not clear to me just yet. The idea may be to have something to exchange for the 5 Iranians who were arrested last January in northern Iraq. This is also a bit strange since the 5 Iranians are held by American forces, not by British forces. It is not even clear those 5 want to come back to Iran.

Another idea is that perhaps Iran wants even more attention. Here are a few more notions that I have been considering:

1) We Iranians cannot read maps very well and got confused about where our territorial waters are.

2) Iran's Revolutionary Guard navy corps did not have anything to do on a boring Friday morning.

3) Iranians like to deal with multiple problems at the same time: a new UN resolution is just not enough for us to deal with when we can handle so many more crises at the same time.

4) The new Iranian Navy exercise in the waters off Bushehr province went berserk.

5) We know Margaret Beckett, the Foreign Secretary will say "We have asked for a full explanation on what has happened and we are leaving them in no doubt that we want the immediate and safe return of our personnel and their equipment."

6) Our president needed a reason for not traveling to the US to give a speech at the UN.

What do you guys think?

It's all the fault of the British...

Of course, only people who have lived in Iran or have read the book My Uncle Napolean realize that what I wrote is a joke.

Today Iran grabbed 15 British soldiers. We found out when we returned from seeing the movie Ekhragieh, which was about 6 misfits who join the Iranian military during the war with Iraq (their war, not ours). Turned on BBC and heard Frances Harrison speculate that Iran may have taken the soldiers in order to negotiate the release of their own captured "diplomats" in Iraq.

It's not the first time that Iran has detained British soldiers, but it is a particularly precarious moment to do so when any provocation could go further than Iran or the West would want.

This was exactly our fear when we heard rumors of Iranian sailors leaving grafitti on American tankers or we imagined nervous, young soldiers getting itchy fingers as they were forced to keep still while smugglers zipped in and out of Persian Gulf waters.

So far baztab.ir is reporting what the BBC reported, which is that the British sailors were brought into Iranian waters by Iranian warships.

Shit.

New Year's wishes

Kamangir tagged me to write my new year’s wishes. He writes that this is going around the Iranian blogosphere. Thanks to my “slow as molasses” Persian reading comprehension skills, I am not even going to attempt to read the wishes written in Persian.

What are my wishes?

1. I wish that we would be paid the money we are owed by one of our clients. The thing is that there is so much corruption in Iran that you have a hard time getting paid if you don’t make bribes. “If I try to get you paid, people will think I have been bribed,” clients tell us. Huh? So I have to bribe you to get my check and you can’t get me my check because I have not bribed you and people will think that I have.

Bureaucracy is the true legacy of the 3000 year old Persian culture. Even corruption is bureaucratic. I am sure they’ll find an ancient version of Catch 22 in the ruins one day.

2. I wish to lead tours for Jewish visitors to Iran and not have people ask if we are Muslims before we are allowed to enter Daniel’s tomb.

3. I wish for a good haircut.

Who is tagged from me? Mr. and Mrs. Behi, my husband, a non-celebrant who has written about his travels in Iran: Sean Paul Kelley, and David Yaghoobi at ddmmyyyy (BTW, why am I crossed off your links list?). DY will have to find the tag online because I cannot find his email address.

Norooz for sale

Goldfish have been on sale for awhile, but a couple of days ago the stores started really pushing their Norooz wares. On Norooz, families place displays in their homes that include 7 items starting with the Persian "S" along with items that represent spring and rebirth (eggs, for instance).

 

Oh how the mighty Persians have fallen! From empire to chia pet!

 

Fish, candles, eggs, sprouts, and candles all for sale at the fruit market.

 

Boys eagerly eyeing the fish.

The Last Tuesday in no more...

Last Tuesday, I headed for Meidun-e Mossehni with a friend who was visiting Tehran from Bombay. We walked for at least 90 minutes, passing more police and and military than I have ever seen in my 3.5 years in Iran. Every corner had at least a traffic cop and a soldier. Some had Revolutionary Guards and Basigi. When we arrived at the square there were about 50 motorbike cops (not motorcycle cops). The only people out were boys and boy-men with firecrackers. And that's what pissed me off: the worst aspects of Chahr Shanbeh Souri were evident everywhere: the irresponsible use of fireworks that included throwing them at people's feet and underneath cars and dirty fires made of anything that could be found. It seemed to me that the only purpose of the military/police presence was intimidation, not safety. The regime can say "safety" until they are blue in the face, and I won't believe it. Why control irresponsible fireworks when it's the fear of them that keeps people off the streets in the first place? The police/military presence was there to control fun. That's it.

The dried tumbleweed like branches that usually are for sale all over the city were nowhere to be found. In the residential streets, families lit fires, jumped over them and went home. It was quiet where we were. "What happened?" I asked when we arrived at our mini-celebration. "Last year people were dancing in the streets."

"We've become Islamic," our hostess joked.

"The military has been driving up and down the streets since 10 this morning," a man by the fire told us.

The nice aspects: the small fires, music, dancing, and celebration, were hidden.


We took pictures, but our camera disappeared. So, sorry, none here. But you can see some here.

Chahr Shanbeh Souri

Well, the fireworks are going full force, and a friend and I are about to wander off to jump over fires.

I hope to have pictures up in a couple of days. In the meantime:

Give me your red!

Take from me my yellow!

Freedom of speech

What are you talking about?

Free speech for others.

For everybody?.

Do you know, how much more time exercising freedom of speech would add to my daily life in taxi cabs and butcher shops here in Tehran? It would take me 5 hours in cabs to travel from west Tehran to east Tehran and hours more at the butcher shops because then I would need to listen to everybody. That would be really a nightmare, maybe even worse than not having free speech.

Can't we all just get along? Can't we just go home Esther? I mean, leave this place.

I would get you your own TV show in Los Angeles and you can talk as much as you want about free speech.

I am going crazy here.

Are you crazy to start this discussion with the Iranians? Most of Iranian people I know, (sorry guys) who live, work, married and have wonderful lives in the west love free speech, but not for others. I say this because if, we could tolerate disagreement better than we could agree about something. (You Iranians know what I am talking about. Esther always says two Jews, three opinions. We are even worse.) The fact is that we can almost always agree to be against something but we can almost never agree about what to do about it. We have an even harder time agreeing to be *for* something. This may not be just an Iranian problem, but we definitely need to work on this.

I know I am getting in big trouble now. But, the good news is that I and Esther will have a (?) book for sale soon, it is by the printer and would be ready to ship in couple of weeks. So watch this space.

Damp

Dream, watery dream, sweaty dream:

Angus McDowall has a great mistranslation up at his site

The will to support…

Dissent, disagreement, and debate…

I wrote a piece for “The Persian Impediment”.

It ends with this paragraph:

Iran is a society filled with thoughtful and outspoken individuals. Only the bravest or the most desperate have the nerve to organize. The rest exercise their freedom of speech in taxicabs and butcher shops; at parties and swimming pools; in poems and through blog posts. There is no dearth of conversation and debate here. The dearth is in the legal protection to debate and the social will to support those who publicly disagree.

I realize that this ending is more of a provocation than a conclusion. So here I am to provoke:

“I thought I was fighting for free speech but when I came to live in the Netherlands, I found myself upset when I heard opposing views,” this is what an extremely enlightened, extraordinarily brilliant, and fantastically wonderful Iranian-born friend told me. “I realized that free speech was also for people who disagreed with me! Not just for me.”

This is not an Iranian problem, this is a universal problem. We tend to like and trust people who agree with us more than people who don’t. We forget that free speech applies even to those with opinions we reject.

I once marched in a small, quiet anti-war rally (except for one guy who had to have been a plant: his slogans were too militant and offensive for the rest of us) that was met with anti-anti-war protestors yelling “We’re fighting for our rights, and this is the way you repay us?!” Yes. I repay you by exercising my rights. What could be more appropriate?

Free speech requires legal protection. Yes. It also requires public will and a culture of debate. These two aspects of free speech do not just miraculously appear with a change of government or law. They have to be exercised, learned, and constantly renewed.

Norooz facts and links

Norooz starts on March 21st at 00:07 Greenwich Mean Time. This means it will be at 3:27 in Tehran and the rest of Iran and 19:07 in New York City and 16:07 in Los Angeles.

Unlike the January 1st New Year, The Iranian/Persian/Zoroastrian New Year begins at the same moment all over the world, which means those who are up at 3:27 in the morning in Tehran will be celebrating with people having afternoon tea in Los Angeles.

For those of you Down Under… would you rather celebrate Norooz on our autumnal equinox, which, I guess, would be your vernal equinox? Tell me.

Here in Iran, the shopping and decorating has begun. Goldfish and mirrors are out everywhere. I haven’t seen grass yet… For those of you who have never celebrated Norooz, grass, mirrors, apples, coins, candles, goldfish, decorated eggs, money, and new clothes are all part of the festivities. I have included some links below the post that can help you find your way around Norooz. As always, watch Norooz 2007 for links and pictures as they come in.


About the Equinox:
Equinoxes & Solstices

About Norooz:
About Norooz

The New Year of the Iranian Peoples

Flickr photos tagged norooz

Wikipedia (of course)

Norooz countdown

A Norooz story

Another one

About the Iranian Calendar:

Wikipedia (again)

Tough women

“Khanum [Ma’am], Iranian men do whatever their wives want.” (There is probably a better translation for this that includes the word “whipped”)

“Exactly,” my husband agrees.

In my travels around Iran, many of the men I have met from all sorts of socio-economic backgrounds have expressed a kind of admiration for the tough Iranian woman. It’s kind of a new twist on machismo: “My woman is the boss. She is tough. I do everything she says.” I am not sure where it comes from but a friend of mine whose mother came to Iran from Russia tells me that her mother always said, “Marry an Iranian man. Don’t even dream of marrying a Russian. Iranian men love their wives. Russians go crazy with jealousy.”

(Iranian women are fond of denigrating their men as in: “Never marry an Iranian man.” I am not sure how deep that feeling goes. Any thoughts?)

The Iranian women I know and meet are indeed tough. I stand in awe of these outgoing, outspoken women. I know very little about the case of the 33 feminist activists who were arrested, but I, like others, am awestruck by their courage and will.

It’s ironic to me that a revolution that was inspired in part by the ideas of Karl Popper, who believed in a self-critical society, would be so unwilling to tolerate peaceful protest and the criticism of citizens who only want Iran to become a better place.

Roughneck USA

New post at Mideast Youth. Read the whole thing there.

“All of the foreigners who ride in my taxi – French, German, Spanish – they all love Iran. I am curious, so I ask them.”

“They love Iran because they expect something much worse.”

“What do you mean?”

“They expect to be frightened and see people living in fear.” (Forgive me if I am not nuanced in my conversations… I am not a fluent Persian speaker. I do the best I can with my limited abilities.) “We are afraid of you.”

The driver laughs. He thinks I’m joking. I must be joking. Us afraid of them?

“Why is it that foreigners have such a bad impression of Iran?” the taxi driver asked me.

“The only images of Iran that we see in the west are of thousands of people shouting, Down with America, Down with Israel, and then burning flags. This scares us.”

“Yeah, but that does not mean that we dislike Americans. We like Americans. It’s the government we don’t like.”

“Americans do not understand that difference.”

“Don’t they ask why we burn their flag? Don’t they want to know?”

“We do not want to know why. It just makes us angry.” [Our 'friends' dislike us the most, it seems.]

Read the whole post at Mideast Youth

Naive, not stupid

From Keivan

I am not sure were I am going with this, but first let me thank you all for your interesting comments. I do feel that if you read all of the responses to my posting you guys all will get at least partial answers to your asked/non asked questions.

I am definitely not sorry for taking part in the revolution. A 16 year-old boy who was part of something so huge and amazing can’t take a lot to take a credit for anything.

I feel that I need to clarify a couple of things. A woman wrote: “ I am one of those Iranians who lost much because of the revolution. at times, I sit down and blame people like you (or my husband), who were young, and stupid, and didn't listen to your fathers”. Basically I am not sure how to answer this, but first let me tell you this I was definitely young, but not stupid. (I know that I wrote that I was young and stupid. Probably “naïve” is a better word than “stupid.” At the time I did feel that what I was part of was the right thing to do. I had a sense of social justice. I could not accept that 44,000 Americans were getting paid more than the rest of the country. It was obvious that there were people who were just stealing from the nation, just as there are now. We were also very concerned about human rights.

Almost the whole country was proud to be part of the 1979 revolution: whether they like to admit it now or not. Considering the situation now, you can say most of people were better off then than now. Looking at boys and girls who are the same age I was at the time of the revolution, I can easily say we had much better lives then than they have now.

I am not sorry to be part of the revolution at all. I would do it again under the same situation; you can call it stupid or what ever you want. My father was wrong to just use his personal (maybe historical) experiences to keep me from being part of a something that a lot of people in the world called it one of the most amazing events of the last century. I say that, but my father was also right. He was right for the wrong reasons.

I do think the direction of the revolution changed from the way we imagined it. That is why I would not forgive people for wasting our dreams building a society that is collapsing from corruption, drug abuse, and dishonesty. I see unjustness here everyday.

I am not going to get in to why the revolution changed, because there are 100’s of books that are still not able to describe all the factors. It is just unbelievable how people in power here can heep people is this miserable situation and still appear on TV/Radio as innocents to complain about the lack of this and the lack of that. Even the dumbest person/government should learn after 28 years how to govern.

Naj wrote: “But you see ... this time around, Iran wants peace, and America is sending more fighter carriers to the Persian gulf ... why IS America not leaving us to our own problems?” If Iran wants peace, then why are they playing a mouse and cat game with the international community? Iran should defend its rights, including the right to Nuclear Technology, but Iran should be more transparent, at least in its foreign affairs, because the International communities are not like you and me who can be shut-up by the Ahmadinejad government. There are many ways to get what you want. It looks like we Iranians use always the most difficult and least successful ways. This is how I feel about Iranians in Qom, Los Angeles, and Tehran. Sorry if I create more arguments for you guys. I am going away for a couple of weeks, so you’ll just have to argue by yourselves.

Open Letter on Iranian Holocaust Denial Conference

I would be remiss if I did not post a link to this letter from a handful of Iranian intellectuals over at Norm's Place.

(I know I wrote "handful," but I believe it is only a handful because more Iranians did not have an opportunity to sign the letter before it was sent.)

Norooz 2007

Continually updated post... Watch this space for more and more and more...

Pictures and posts:

From Kamangir: Let the Propoganda Begin

From Papillon: Noroze.

Fram Payvand: Iranians Celebrate Chahar-Shanbeh Soori, Festival of Fire

Norooz: An Eternal Iranian Tradition

From me: The Last Tuesday...

Norooz for Sale

From Flickr: Photos tagged with norooz

From Elizabeth: Haft Cinn

From Pars-Arts: Happy Norooz!

From Levantine Cultural Center: Happy Norouz



Goldfish have officially gone on sale in Iran. Goldfish are one of the items that most Norooz displays have.

You can email me (responses (AT) gmail (DOT) com) or link to this post when you have added a Norooz 2007 link. Or you can always add your link in the comments section.

Thanks

Iran's bazaar

Before I came to Iran, I thought a bazaar was a quaint relic that had more value as a tourism draw than as an actual economic powerhouse. Iran's bazaar, I learned, is more than that, and Angus McDowall has written a great article about Iran's bazaar. Here is an excerpt:

The bazaar, a city within a city sprawling across central Tehran, has been at the heart of the Islamic republic since it rose from the ashes of the Shah's monarchy in 1979. In so secretive a world, it is impossible to know the extent of the bazaar's control, but estimates range up to a third of the country's retail market. With its high political connections and long economic reach, some Iranians see the bazaar as the centre of a mafia that permeates the entire state.


But this thumping commercial heart, which has pumped Iran's lifeblood for hundreds of years, is in trouble. Its arteries already clogged by modernisation, it now suffers the effects of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's reckless foreign policy and the belligerent rhetoric of the United States: the threat of sanctions and war. The economy is in crisis, the bazaar feels its pain, and worse could be in store as a result of Iran's nuclear showdown with the West.


"The economy is very bad now - prices are high, sanctions are coming," says Yadollah Bakhtiari, a grey haired mercantile veteran whose business has survived revolution, war, international isolation and a fast-changing economy. "Enmity is bad for business."

See Iranians at play....

Guess what. There is a great opportunity for journalists, photographers, and Iranians to present a different picture of Iran than the flag burning and fist raising that is so emblematic of Iran. The Iranian New Year holidays are fast approaching. They start on the last Tuesday evening prior to March 20 and go until April 1.

What is great about these holidays is that there is no religious or political obligation to celebrate them. The celebration in Iran is the celebration of a culture—of a whole people. The New Year is when you see the people of Iran at their best and at their least politicized. It is also a holiday that belongs to everyone. It is not religious.

Thirteen days after the New Year, usually on April 1, the entire nation of Iran goes out on a picnic. This is a public gathering that is not coerced or orchestrated. It is a great opportunity to see huge numbers of Iranians publicly enjoying themselves.

If the media is not interested in presenting this image of Iran, there is no reason why those of us in Iran cannot. I would like to see as many people as possible go out during the Norooz holidays and take pictures. Upload your pictures and tag them "Norooz 2007". That's an order…;-)

Down with down withs

From Keivan...

Down with America

We got up at 4 in the morning; it was a dark and cold winter day. My older brother, who was most of the time sick of having me around, agreed to go together to Qom. It was one of the coldest winter mornings that I had ever felt. The winter of 1979 was one I would never forget.

The night before we had convinced our mother and older brother that we would be okay and that they should not worry. We were going to witness the arrival of Ayatollah Khomeini in Qom, right after he got back from France.

My lovely dying father, who was in bed with lung cancer at the time, tried everything to stop us from going. In a very powerless voice tried to convince us not to go. He was telling us non-stop that this revolution would bring the country backwards and that we should never trust the Mullahs. He was definitely not a Shah lover, but he had this bad feeling about everything was happening. We did not listen. We left for Qom.

It was not far from my hometown to Qom. We got there around 6 in the morning. We knew that Khomeini would arrive much later. On the ugly streets of Qom, my brother and I yelled -- not for first time -- thousand of times ”Allah-o akbar, Khomeini rahbar, marg bar Amrika.” (God is Great, Khomeini is the leader, down with America)

I will never forget that day. I did see Khomeini, and I was really happy to take this big action to witness an historical day in Iran.

I was happy about the revolution. Now I am like millions of my fellow countrymen who, like me, as young men and women went to the streets to cheer on the revolution and to shout down with America, and who now feel betrayed and devastated. Will the young people yelling the same thing today learn from me? Will they be like me? Regretful? Homeless?

My father was right about all of this. We were young and we were stupid. Maybe we were right about the revolution, but we were wrong about its direction. We did not know what we were talking about, just as my father said. Things took a turn for the worst. Me being only almost 16, I was really excited for the first time. Like people today on the streets of Iran, I did said many times Down with America. And I am really sorry about that. Not because America has been such nice friend for Iran, not because I say down with America and I don’t mean the American people, but because it is just so wrong to call for the death of a nation, and I don’t care which nation it is. This is especially true if you want to improve your image or you are internationally isolated.

I totally agree with Esther about this horrible flag burring sh*t.

Iranians should feel very sad and ashamed. I cannot imagine waking up in an apartment in New York city or any other city and looking out of the window and hearing people singing Down with Iran. It would be really painful. I know that I could not take it, and I know for a fact that it would make me sick. Hearing Down with America here is making me sick and that is not just to support Esther because she is living here with me, but because she is right. I am really sick and tired to hear how Iranians always blame others for every misfortune.

Even so I blame the British. ;-)

22 Bahman… and another day off…

Corrections to the text made thanks to comments from "M".

Tomorrow is the anniversary of the revolution: the day that the Shah's regime fell and several days after the Air France flight landed with Khomeini on board. Hundreds of thousands of Iranians (really millions: certainly all 10 million Basiji will be there) will turn out tomorrow to chant Nuclear energy is our inevitableinalienable right (inevitable? Why “inevitable” I wonder? Note to: M, I did see someone wearing a hand-painted sign that had "inevitable" written instead of "inalienable"), Down with America (of course), Down with Israel (double of course), Down with England (maybe they’re on to something ;-) ), and perhaps Down with France and Germany as well. For most it will mean nothing, but for some it will mean something. For a dangerous minority, the aggression is real.


I watched Khamenei speak to air force servicemenat the induction of new police officers (on television, not live). Thousands of blue-hatted men lifted their fists in the air and shouted “Down with America” like a bunch of automatons. Why do regimes always choose to portray themselves in the most despicable manner? Why do they goose step and raise their fists in the air? Why do they choose to set themselves against an enemy rather than for themselves?

It’s wasteful and despicable. And for all those Iranians asking me to tell the world “We are not terrorists,” I challenge you to present a different view. I know it is tough. I know, I know, I know. I am sympathetic. I know it’s fun to be out in a crowd. I know that it’s fun to let yourself get swept away in crowd behavior the way I might do when I go to a rock concert. I know. I know. What’s worse, is that I know how seductive the image of the demonstration is for the media (all-inclusive, because the Iranian media is just as responsible for the image of flag-burning, fist-waving fanaticism as the bugaboo Western media). I know that marchers ham it up for the camera. “I almost got my hair singed,” a photojournalist told me. “When the marchers saw me with my camera, they decided to burn one of their flags.” (For those of you who want to join the fun, burn your own virtual flag. Read what Scott Adams says about flag burning.)

This is the official picture of Iran and the unofficial picture of Iran. This image was created here, not in the west. It will have to be un-created here as well.

It doesn’t help for me to say that a black-tented woman shouting Down with America is much more likely to serve me dinner than to serve me up. It’s time for people here to start taking a bit of responsibility of the image being broadcast out.

And I know it’s hard. It may not even be possible.

Tips for web sites that are meant to be read behind the iron veil

I am amazed by the number of sites that I am *supposed* to read from here (Iran)that are filled with multi-media, links to Flik'r, Photobucket, and Youtube, and graphics heavy. Flik'r, Photobucket, and Youtube are all filtered folks. On top of that, the regime has put such a squeeze on our bandwidth that a dial-up modem is often faster than dsl. This makes using circumventors for blocked content a frigging headache.

So, if you want those of us behind the iron veil to read your site here are some tips:

1. Go easy on multi-media
2. Provide text feeds with complete posts or columns, not summaries
3. Don't depend on images or multi-media to tell your story (I am not saying don't use them, just provide the rest of us with some description so we can share in the joke)
4. Try not to make us move around the web too much to get the point of your story

That's it. Thanks for listening

Update of Life in Iran

Posted at Mideast Youth for those of you interested...

Happy Birthday

"You Shi'a certainly take a lot of holidays," a (rare) Sunni neighbor said to Keivan.

"Well, if you guys wouldn't kill us then we wouldn't have to have this holiday," Keivan answered. The neighbor was stunned at first but laughed with Keivan. He thinks the Shi'a are nuts.

Two days after Ashura, we found ourselves magically transported to a friend's birthday party. During a month when parties are infrequent or just simply quiet in order to avoid the prying of neighbors and potential visits from the police, this was a loud party with dancing and singing. Young and old were represented in healthy numbers as our friend was presented with cake and gifts.

"The sun should never set on Ashura," a woman told us as we discussed the best Ashura events in Iran. She had traveled the entire country observing them. Her favorite was in some out of the way corner of Iran and was, by her accounts, different from all others.

I imagined her standing by the procession in a black scarf and a black manteau crying as the battle of Karbala was recounted in chants. Now, here she was, vodka in hand, listening to music and watching the young people dance. This is what people mean when they tell you that you never know what to expect in Iran.

After a series of Iranian songs sung by a deep-voiced youth, the host's daughter attached her ipod to the stereo and acted as DJ: Bob Dylan, Queen, Cream, and R.E.M. Ahh… the tunes of my youth. What are they doing on the ipod of a 19-year old?

We all sang along to my favorite REM tune: Losing My Religion. It never sounded more like an anthem then when sung by these young Iranian party-goers.

Ashura: the pageant

"America is trying to take Ashura from us," the small, Ahmadinejad-like prayer leader called out to the crowd.

The crowd ignored him. Someone near me said, "He's trying to make this night political. It should not be political."

Still the man tried. It was like watching a rock and roll performer bomb while trying to get people to sing along with him.

Finally he gave up on politics and chanted the prayers for the sick. The crowd got excited then. That is what they came here for after all.

We were at the shrine in Tajrish in Northern Tehran. "Where are you from?" people asked me in broken English.

"America," I answered.

"Welcome to our country."

Inside the shrine, it smelled like feet, women with rainbow-colored feather dusters ushered the hordes of women to the grave. "We love Americans," a woman in a black chador whispered into my ear. "It's your government we don't like."

This was the night before Ashura. The next day we woke up to chants of "Hosseinjan, Hosseinjan." We went outside where a neighbor offered us a rice dessert with saffron. Ashura is a friendly holiday in Tehran. People are excited to be out together. It's an opportunity to express public emotion, to flirt, and to be part of a crowd. Iranians grab every one of these opportunities. Groups of young women looking their absolute best eye groups of young men with ridiculous hairdos while their parents and relatives look on.



The pageantry itself is amazing. Hazzans chant rhythmic mourning songs, men and women beat their chests. Men march, twirling chains and slapping them on their shoulders in time to the chanting. Giant mantles covered with bronze animals, shields, and feathers are carried through the streets.



And the food! Everywhere people were giving out food and drinks! We passed one group that was feeding 12,000 people. Mosques, private homes, private groups: everyone was handing out food. We ate ghemeh: a dish of split peas, potatoes, and mutton. Later we ate the heart, lung, and liver of one of the many sheep that gave its life that day.



Enough of that…

Ashura

Three years ago bombs went off in Karbala during Ashura: the holiday marking Mohammad’s grandson Hossein’s suicidal battle.

Iran is now immersed in Ashura mania, which is a bit like Halloween meets Death to America. It’s an opportunity to take to the streets and embrace the anonymity offered by huge crowds.

About a month ago neighborhoods started decorating for Ashura. Huge paintings of Hossein (or “Hossein’s friend” as one observant Muslim told me) went up alongside tents that are used for gathering to commemorate the death of Hossein. There seems to be more decoration than ever in Tehran. “The neighborhoods got more money for the decorations this year,” a man told us.

Iranians worship victim hood. They use graphic war footage of bombs falling on Iranian soldiers to recruit for the revolutionary guards. They embrace every opportunity for a good public cry. They portray themselves as victims rather than as aggressors.


Well, Inshallah, they don't want to repeat history with another suicidal battle.

Inshallah

Tehran is the quietest big city I have ever lived in. Very few sirens. Very few airplanes. Very few cars blasting music that makes your walls vibrate. And no discos. At least no discos that you can hear from the street.

Aahh peace. Yet when our dear friend witnessed a horrific traffic accident in north Tehran, it took two hours for a second ambulance to show up to treat the remaining wounded. There were hospitals within one mile of the accident scene and it was the middle of the night, so no traffic! The price of quiet…



(Business flash you rich Iranians: ambulance services for pay! For the pure of heart, use some of the profits from wealthy clients to subsidize ambulances for the poor and the struggling middle class. I offer this idea to you for free. I guarantee profit. I guarantee thousands of clients per day. Think of it.)

When an official of the government was in a fatal car accident, an ambulance never even arrived. He was carried out in a pickup truck.

This is the land of inshallah. God willing. Inshallah, our houses won’t collapse in an earthquake. Inshallah, America won’t attack. Inshallah, my child will get better. Inshallah, we'll get our delivery of milk by 10 am. Inshallah, we'll celebrate Hamid's birthday next Thursday.

The Leader and the Price of Tomatoes

“Khameini is dead,” my sister-in-law tells me. “They’ll announce his death during Ashura.”

“He’s just fine. I saw him on television.”

“They are showing old footage and writing “live” on it. But he is dead.”

“That’s just a rumor from abroad,” I add. “They say he’s sick. They say he’s dead. Is he even sick?”

“Yes,” one woman says.

“No,” another says.

One of our friends thinks he looks sickly; another that he looks healthy. There is nothing so subjective as the leader’s health.

“Tomatoes are 3,000 a kilo,” Keivan’s cousin says.

“The most I have paid is 1,700.”

“That’s what I paid last night,” I say.

“No one should buy them. They should be left to rot. Tomatoes are too expensive.”

“They are terrible now anyway. The taste is bad, and they are rotten.”

“Ahmadinejad says If tomatoes are expensive then come to my neighborhood to buy them.”

“Yeah, and spend two hours getting there and 6,000 tuman on the cab.”

“Why is everything suddenly so expensive?”

“There are American warships in the Persian Gulf,” I say.

“Eh,” says my sister-in-law who lives close to the Gulf. Her face screws up and she starts to panic.

“Nothing will happen,” I say. I don’t know what else to say. She has already lived through her share of bombing.

“You don’t know, Esther, when Iraq was bombing Tehran it was terrible. The house next to us was hit; our neighbor’s car… Every day we thought that we would be next. It’s so horrible. I cannot take it again,” my other sister-in-law says. “Remember when we were taking care of Nooshin’s dog and how scared he was? He just hid under the couch.”

“That wasn’t during the war,” her husband says.

“It must have been Chahr Shambeh Souri,” I say (Last Tuesday night of the year: lots of bonfires and fireworks…)

She laughs. “You’re right. It was Chahr Shambeh Souri.”

So, do you think there will be war?

“So, do you think there will be war?” This is the way Keivan starts every conversation these days.

There is a reason: for the third time since we came to Iran, people are seriously afraid of being attacked.

“Please, when you go back to America,” a spice salesman tells me, “tell them not to attack us.” He was probably doubly afraid because his shop is about a mile from a heavily guarded military-industrial site.

“Saffron was 335,000 tuman a kilo last week. Yesterday the price went up to over one million tuman.” Stocking up on saffron in case of war? I would have thought that tuna fish would be more appropriate.

“There are 18 million soldiers ready to go to war if we are attacked,” a taxi driver tells us.

“Where?” Keivan asks. “Where are they?”

Trust me, the West underestimates Iranian patriotism and overestimates the connection between the way Arab political leaders feel (fear of Iran) and the way Arab people feel (respect for Ahmadinejad and his stand against the West).

Israeli sources seem to overestimate the chances of an Iranian nuclear strike on Israel and underestimate the response to an attack on Iran. I think that despite the Shi’a- Sunni split, most Muslims would see an attack on Iran as further evidence of anti-Islamic furor. I am going on record as saying the attack will not make Israel or any of the Arab states or America any safer. I am willing to say right now that the opposite will be the case.

“I sure hope Iran doesn’t use any Shahab missiles. If they do it will be the start of WW 3,” a friend says.

“Why do you think that?”

“They’ll hit everything but their intended target. A missile aimed at Israel will hit Saudi Arabia or Russia or some other country.”

Everyone laughs. Everyone goes about their daily business: hoarding saffron and tunafish.

Tehran City Council Elections

Tehran is a big and sprawling city with intractable traffic and seemingly random road closures. The metro will take you from Mirdamad station, which was once in a far northern section of Tehran and is now close to its center, to the far southern reaches of the city where Tehran's huge graveyard is in just 30 minutes. Getting to Mirdamad station from northern Tehran can take anywhere from ten minutes to an hour depending on traffic. Getting to Khomeini’s tomb from northern Tehran will take 45 minutes at 3 am and up to 2 hours on a day with normal traffic.

That’s just north south. East west is equally large. It’s like Los Angeles, Kansas City, or even Jacksonville: rambling on and on with about as much organization as a rash.

The smart thing to do would be to divide the city into precincts and elect city council members precinct by precinct. Instead, Tehran residents all over Tehran vote for the same pool of candidates. It’s all a bit overwhelming.

Candidates have to run a city-wide campaign to get elected. With limitations on television advertising, this means flyers, posters, sms messages, radio, and balloons. It’s expensive to run for Tehran’s city council. It takes a huge organization. Posters go up like wall paper. One candidate pasted right on top of another.

To make matters even more complicated, each candidate is assigned a code about two days before the election. Ballots are only valid when the candidate’s name and the candidate’s code are written correctly. The most successful campaigners produce cards with candidate’s names and their assigned codes printed on them. This, of course, favors conservatives who have strong organizations. Who else can safely meet and organize in Iran? Simply put, only the conservatives and the fundamentalists have been able to meet with impunity.

Voting for independents or reformers for city council meant scanning through hundreds of names at the polling station itself. Posters with names and codes covered every wall of most polling stations. You had to look carefully, find your candidates, write down their codes, and then vote. Most voters had scrap paper and pens that they carried with them from poster to poster.

It’s a wonder that so many people voted in the city’s elections and that so many ballots were cast correctly.

Surprise party

“Keivan is that you?” Our hostess calls. The road to her house is impassable, so we are making our way on foot through snow and dirt.

“I am so happy to see you,” she calls out. A young man appears at her side. “Be my guest for dinner.”

What’s going on? We thought we were having dinner in this remote mountain apartment with our eccentric intellectual friends. Now we are being herded five into a taxi and making our way through Tehran’s mountainous lanes. On the way, our host catches fire when his cigarette drops on his coat. Pulling up to our destination, the taxi falls into one of the open drainage ditches that can be found alongside most Iranian roads.


We arrive around 9:30, still waiting for dinner. Inside the modest apartment on the inaccessible lane is a lively group of young, budding intellectuals. There is no alcohol, but one of the guests managed to arrive drunk and remain drunk for several hours until he became equally sleepy. How much do you have to drink to remain drunk for three hours with no refills? It seems like a kind of miracle to me, but then again, I cannot drink enough to even get drunk, let alone stay drunk.

“A friend of ours has a cat that eats pistachios. It cracks them open and eats them,” I tell the assembled.

“If the cat eats pistachios, what does the owner eat?” A carpet seller jokes.

A jumbo man pulls out his tanbur – a two-stringed traditional instrument made from a gourd – and begins playing traditional tunes while the drunken man attempts to hush the party goers. “This is the real Iran,” our would-be hostess whispers in my ear. “This is why I don’t want to leave again.” She is incongruously dressed in a designer black party dress and a fur coat while the rest of us wear our ready-to-wear. This is not a party filled with prom dresses and posing.

“What do you think of your fellow classmates,” our hostess asks the assembled students.

“The women have beautiful faces and empty brains,” one young man volunteers. “They are in university just to be students. Our discipline is not taken seriously so you do not need very high marks to get in,” he explains. “The men are worse. They are just there to avoid military service. It’s annoying. There is no conversation, no probing.”

“I am afraid of the military service too,” I say.

“No, you are afraid of the military,” Keivan laughs. “You are not afraid of military service.”

Lest we forget

Whatever you think about the execution of Saddam Hussein, don't forget that his "stability" in Iraq was bought at a heavy price.

From Violence marked his rise, rule and fall
By Borzou Daragahi and David Lamb
Special to The Times

For his country, now convulsed in civil war, Hussein's most lasting and damaging legacy was the way his selective patronage and brutal violence divided Iraqis along lines that continue to split them.

Hussein moved rivers to reward Sunni Arab villagers loyal to his government and drained swamps to punish Shiite Muslims who rose up against him. He moved rebellious Kurds from the northern city of Kirkuk while selling cheap land in the city to Arabs to reward loyalists and upend the ethnic balance of the country's oil-rich north.

He imprisoned tens of thousands, ordered the killings of political enemies, real and imagined, including two of his sons-in-law, and used poison gas to wipe out whole villages in the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq. He granted construction contracts to favored Arab tribes, while depriving whole categories of people — such as Shiite Kurds — of their citizenship rights.

Such violence and manipulations may have established a semblance of stability. But they also built up a sense of entitlement by Sunnis and resentment on the part of Shiites and Kurds that fueled violence by death squads, militias and insurgents once the U.S. invasion of 2003 toppled his regime.