Shuffling Through Tehran & Esfahan

I like to get away with things. Nothing serious - just little devilish acts. So when I loaded my iPod Shuffle for the trip to Iran I purposely selected songs that would set a stark contrast to the Islamic Republic street surroundings.

And what a rebel I am. It’s an eerie feeling to stand on a busy street corner in Tehran under the watchful eyes of the nearest Khomeini & Khameini billboard while grooving to DePeche Mode’s “My Own Personal Jesus”. When the next song shuffled to Duran Duran's "Hungry Like The Wolf" however, my skin overloaded with nervous tingles. Stares coming at me, bodies brushing by me, but no one knew the devil that lurked between my ears as the background singers moaned full blast. It felt illegal.

And later in the trip I was told that it IS illegal, which accounts for why I was the only one walking around Tehran with cords from my ears. Still, after a few days of carefully wearing the mandated hejab over my head, it felt to me like a healthy rebellion - not to mention the fact that wearing a scarf on your head is the perfect concealer for a strategically placed iPod.

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That little iPod gave me another wonderful memory - in Esfahan.

Strolling the Si-o-Se Pol mid-day, I crossed paths with some young boys hanging out in the sun while playing around with a volleyball. When my Farsi ran out, I looked around for something to continue the conversation - my iPod shuffle. Setting the song to something by Lenny Kravitz, I passed it first to the oldest boy who winced at the sound of it and pressed every button to find something new - not the reaction I expected - especially since his shirt displayed "Eminem". So I reset the track to play a poetry recital of Omar Khayyam's "The Rubaiyat" and handed it back to him. Labkhand bozorgtarin bood (He had the biggest smile) then his eyes stared into space and his demeanor changed into a tranquil zone far away. This was cultural exchange at it best.



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THOUGHT: Taking an iPod for a walk through San Francisco downtown, I’m just blending with the crowd, but in Southern Tehran iPods are a cultural anomaly. Now suppose there were 10 or 20 others like me in Tehran, grooving down the street, braving crosswalks at the speed of U-2 or Madonna. I wonder how that would affect the street culture over the span of a couple months.

Young Iranian Men - Bush Supporters

Not to suggest that all young Iranian men support George Bush, but I heard praise for George more than once, twice, or three times as we journeyed across four Iranian cities. I heard it often when we were in the major cities of Tehran and Esfahan and it came from the same demographic of lower to middle-class, 15- to 30-year-old men with a thirst for more out of life than what the Islamic Republic government is willing or able to offer them.

The first time I heard it, I was confused. The 20ish year-old sat on a bench in Tehran's Parque Melat also perplexed that I didn't support my President. When I asked him whether he was nervous about Bush's track record of pre-emptive strikes, or the fact that Afghanistan and Iraq have suffered under Bush policies, he was not well-informed except to say that he admired Bush because he relentlessly stands up for his beliefs. From my perspective, here was a young man living in a country that requires him to bend at the whim of the Islamic Republic, rather than act on his own volition living by his own beliefs. In this twisted way, it makes sense that the cowboy is his hero.

The second time I heard it, I tried to make sense of it by assessing the commonalities between the people who were saying it. Having tea amongst the carpets in Tehran's Bazaar Bozorg, the passionate 30-year-old carpet vendor spoke with a fervor wanting to see governmental change at any cost, but felt stymied by a lack of organization by leftists. He appreciated Bush's take-no-prisoners style and welcomed an attack by the U.S. How else would he see change in his lifetime? From what I was hearing, the spirit of young men wanting to realize their life's potential was being quashed by the current Islamic Republic and this 30-year-old was hearing the clock tick loudly against him.

The third time, it seemed that Iranians have something in common with Americans - either by choice, apathy, or force, they're only partially informed and they make decisions based on that limited information. Sitting with the young guys at the river in Esfahan, I heard them forming strong opinions based on sound bytes from satellite television and controlled internet sites. Although they were eager to learn more about the current state of worldwide politics, their opinions were easily swayed by the theatrics of a dynamic speech coming from a commanding voice behind a well-cut suit. In reality, when it came to politics, these young men were more focused on friends, family, and obtaining the best education possible in order to make the most of their personal lives - revolution was not on their list of things to do. Still, with a limited number of well-paying jobs in Iran, I wondered if even an advanced degree could satisfy their life's expectations.

In addition, I never heard any women praising Bush, further justifying the idea that Iranian men are in need of a male role model. It seems that Bush taps into the essential masculine traits that young Iranian men value - straight-forward, unrelenting, decisive. Since young Iranian men are rarely able to express these traits, they admire those who do. Even Bush.

Whoa.