The official, Iranian government line on the US presidential election has been that they don’t mind who is elected, as long as they deal with Iran on a basis on fairness and respect, and recognise Iran’s national rights. After last week’s victory, President Ahmadinejad sent Obama a message of congratulations, in a first for an Iranian president since the victory of the Islamic Revolution (Feb 1979).
Let’s all hope for better things.
Sunday, 9 November 2008
Saturday, 18 October 2008
SUCCESS AT LAST!
A few days ago I received a formal offer of publication for my proposed book Among the Iranians and two days ago I received the contract by email. All I have to do now is print it out, sign it and return it to the publishers in Boston, Mass.
It’s been so long since I sent in the proposal (March 2007 – before we left London, in fact) that I am used to waiting for a response and I find it hard to believe that the wait is over and that I now need to get down to work. The manuscript has to be ready by 15 June 2009, more or less the time when the children’s examinations are over, very conveniently.
Today I made a start with a new chapter on clothes.
It’s been so long since I sent in the proposal (March 2007 – before we left London, in fact) that I am used to waiting for a response and I find it hard to believe that the wait is over and that I now need to get down to work. The manuscript has to be ready by 15 June 2009, more or less the time when the children’s examinations are over, very conveniently.
Today I made a start with a new chapter on clothes.
Wednesday, 8 October 2008
Back to Tehran (20 September 2008)
We got back to Tehran around midnight on Saturday, September 20th. Although we had made sure all the windows were shut fast, the house was full of dust. Drama Queen just had to do the dusting at the time and would not be persuaded to leave it until the morning. Hossein went out in search of essentials, like milk (you’ve got to hand this to Tehran: you can find shops open at this time of night) and came back with a roast chicken for the pre-dawn meal, this being the 20th of Ramadan.
Schools started two days later, on Tuesday 23rd September, which barely gave us time to pick up schools things and uniforms, shorten trousers, label and cover school books. Since then, it’s been non-stop work clearing a huge ironing backlog, clearing out wardrobes and cupboards, shopping and doing myriad other things around the house.
Then there was some work checking against copy waiting for me from the publishers I work for and the final check of the chapter I’ve written for a collection of essays (Face, Language and Social Processes, forthcoming in 2009, Equinox Press). Oh, and a huge chunk of my time and energy goes into comforting frantic Drama Queen, who on the first day back from her Art High School decided that everything is too difficult for her and she won’t make it and everybody is better than her, and she’ll fail the year and people will laugh at her… Two weeks on, she is admittedly better, but still needs practical help and psychological support. Thank God that at least Yussi absolutely loves his new school and has made a very good start.
And I thought I was meant to be writing.
Schools started two days later, on Tuesday 23rd September, which barely gave us time to pick up schools things and uniforms, shorten trousers, label and cover school books. Since then, it’s been non-stop work clearing a huge ironing backlog, clearing out wardrobes and cupboards, shopping and doing myriad other things around the house.
Then there was some work checking against copy waiting for me from the publishers I work for and the final check of the chapter I’ve written for a collection of essays (Face, Language and Social Processes, forthcoming in 2009, Equinox Press). Oh, and a huge chunk of my time and energy goes into comforting frantic Drama Queen, who on the first day back from her Art High School decided that everything is too difficult for her and she won’t make it and everybody is better than her, and she’ll fail the year and people will laugh at her… Two weeks on, she is admittedly better, but still needs practical help and psychological support. Thank God that at least Yussi absolutely loves his new school and has made a very good start.
And I thought I was meant to be writing.
Vienna, 19-20 September 2008
On the way to Tehran we had to spend the night in Vienna, thanks to the lack of direct flights between Athens and Tehran. Athens had just started cooling down (meaning that the highest temperature was 31C), but Vienna was already wintry (8-13C with rain the day we were there), which was a bit of a shock. I had anticipated something like that and had packed three hoodie jackets for Hossein and the children, but I was literally left out in the cold.
As soon as we got out the airport train station in Vienna, I popped into a small supermarket and bought a pashmina shawl, an unlikely but necessary souvenir.
In fact, the overnight was not much use: we had woken up at 3.30 am that morning in order to catch the 7.15 flight to Vienna. We left our suitcases at the airport so that we could hang around a little and have lunch before checking into our hotel room just after lunchtime. The plan was that we would rest for a bit after lunch and then go out in the evening, but we were so tired, that we slept until after 6 pm when it was already dark. To be fair, we prepared to go out and we did walk along the street where our hostel was. A supermarket was still open. We went in to have a look and ended up buying snacks and a bite for supper. Coming from Athens, the streets looked deserted, even though it was Friday evening, and Hossein had a cold, so we went back to our room: we were simply too tired to go anywhere.
The following morning we had just two hours to look around the historic centre of Vienna, so we got off at Museums Quartier, walked through towards the Hofburg and St Michaelsplatz and caught the underground again back to the hostel to retrieve our bags and get to the airport.
Last time I was in Vienna (1986, half my life ago) I was twenty-two. I was travelling on an Interrail student ticket with my then classmate and now good friend Anastasia, who was in love with the city. We had stayed for a whole week then, but I now find I can’t remember much of the city as it was then. This is the mystery of the human mind. I wonder what Anastasia remembers of our stay.
As soon as we got out the airport train station in Vienna, I popped into a small supermarket and bought a pashmina shawl, an unlikely but necessary souvenir.
In fact, the overnight was not much use: we had woken up at 3.30 am that morning in order to catch the 7.15 flight to Vienna. We left our suitcases at the airport so that we could hang around a little and have lunch before checking into our hotel room just after lunchtime. The plan was that we would rest for a bit after lunch and then go out in the evening, but we were so tired, that we slept until after 6 pm when it was already dark. To be fair, we prepared to go out and we did walk along the street where our hostel was. A supermarket was still open. We went in to have a look and ended up buying snacks and a bite for supper. Coming from Athens, the streets looked deserted, even though it was Friday evening, and Hossein had a cold, so we went back to our room: we were simply too tired to go anywhere.
The following morning we had just two hours to look around the historic centre of Vienna, so we got off at Museums Quartier, walked through towards the Hofburg and St Michaelsplatz and caught the underground again back to the hostel to retrieve our bags and get to the airport.
Last time I was in Vienna (1986, half my life ago) I was twenty-two. I was travelling on an Interrail student ticket with my then classmate and now good friend Anastasia, who was in love with the city. We had stayed for a whole week then, but I now find I can’t remember much of the city as it was then. This is the mystery of the human mind. I wonder what Anastasia remembers of our stay.
Wednesday, 17 September 2008
Temple, Church, Mosque
If you stand at the north-west corner of Monastiraki Square in Central Athens and direct your gaze towards the south, you will be rewarded with an image worth a thousand words.
Far in the background, stands the holy rock of Acropolis, and over it, one of the most famous buildings in the world, the Parthenon. Visible from many parts of the city, it was dedicated to the temple of the virgin goddess of wisdom Athena in 5th c. BC, at the height of Athenian civilisation.
In the foreground, in the middle of the square is occupied by the Byzantine-style church of the Passing of our Lady (Koimisis tis Theotokou) and in the middle distance between the temple and the church is an Ottoman period mosque, now housing the Museum of Folklore Art.
These three religious influences can be seen all over the culture, the food, the music, and reflected in the tourist souvenirs sold around the area: polymer clay replicas of the Parthenon and gods of the ancient Greek pantheon, Byzantine icons of saints and the Holy Mary, antique silver jewellery and semi-precious stones similar to the ones sold in the Tehran bazaar.
All these under the cyan blue Attic sky, today dotted with fluffy clouds that remind me of Vatican frescoes.
Far in the background, stands the holy rock of Acropolis, and over it, one of the most famous buildings in the world, the Parthenon. Visible from many parts of the city, it was dedicated to the temple of the virgin goddess of wisdom Athena in 5th c. BC, at the height of Athenian civilisation.
In the foreground, in the middle of the square is occupied by the Byzantine-style church of the Passing of our Lady (Koimisis tis Theotokou) and in the middle distance between the temple and the church is an Ottoman period mosque, now housing the Museum of Folklore Art.
These three religious influences can be seen all over the culture, the food, the music, and reflected in the tourist souvenirs sold around the area: polymer clay replicas of the Parthenon and gods of the ancient Greek pantheon, Byzantine icons of saints and the Holy Mary, antique silver jewellery and semi-precious stones similar to the ones sold in the Tehran bazaar.
All these under the cyan blue Attic sky, today dotted with fluffy clouds that remind me of Vatican frescoes.
Friday, 5 September 2008
A Hafez Augury
Athena, Yusef and I had pledged to give some money to the poor so that our trip would be sorted. On our last night in Tehran (Friday 22 August), Hossein’s niece and nephew came round to say goodbye, so I grabbed the chance to put the money pledge in an envelope and send it over to my sister-in-law to pass on to a relative and on to the poor.
As I scrubbed the cooker ready for our departure early the following morning, I was going over the adventure we had with this year’s Greek holiday. Then I remembered what happened the previous Thursday (14 August) when Hossein’s brothers and sisters and their families and we four took a picnic in a park in central Tehran by way of a goodbye.
I sat on a bench with two of my sisters-in-law. A beggar came by holding a small box with folded pieces of paper in the one hand and a parakeet on the other. Each paper carries a lyric poem, a ghazal, by Hafez, Iran’s most famous mystical poet, and an augury relating to the poem and presumably giving advice to the reader of the augury. Without warning, the deaf-and-dumb beggar put the parakeet on my hand and proferred the box to it; I was startled, felt some humidity on my hand, motioned to the man to take the bird away. It picked out an augury and the man indicated that I should take it.
I can’t remember the poem, but the augury said: a journey is on the cards, but it will be problematic; however, the problems will be solved by giving money to charity.
As I scrubbed the cooker ready for our departure early the following morning, I was going over the adventure we had with this year’s Greek holiday. Then I remembered what happened the previous Thursday (14 August) when Hossein’s brothers and sisters and their families and we four took a picnic in a park in central Tehran by way of a goodbye.
I sat on a bench with two of my sisters-in-law. A beggar came by holding a small box with folded pieces of paper in the one hand and a parakeet on the other. Each paper carries a lyric poem, a ghazal, by Hafez, Iran’s most famous mystical poet, and an augury relating to the poem and presumably giving advice to the reader of the augury. Without warning, the deaf-and-dumb beggar put the parakeet on my hand and proferred the box to it; I was startled, felt some humidity on my hand, motioned to the man to take the bird away. It picked out an augury and the man indicated that I should take it.
I can’t remember the poem, but the augury said: a journey is on the cards, but it will be problematic; however, the problems will be solved by giving money to charity.
Athens At Last
As I explained in the previous post, we weren’t able to travel on the flight to Istanbul on Monday 18 August as planned. The passport hitch was resolved the following day, but the bigger problem was finding free seats on any flight to Istanbul. This proved impossible, mainly because of huge overbooking on Turkey flights (Iranian nationals don’t require visas to travel to Turkey), so .eventually, we returned the Istanbul tickets and had new ones issued via Vienna, thanks to the unstinting efforts of a travel agent (“the friend of a friend”), who bent over backwards to issue the tickets on Friday 22 August.
We flew to Vienna on Saturday 23 August. We had a five hour stopover there, so we were able to take the CAT train to Vienna and walk until Stefansplatz, teeming with tourists, a festival of Turkish music attracting a fair crowd.
We got to my parents’ house in Athens at 1 am on Sunday morning and have generally been relaxing and doing nothing much since, apart from last Thursday when it was my daughter’s fifteenth birthday, and she was to choose the outing. A sign of the times that the shopping-starved youngster would choose visiting an American-style shopping mall, named rather predictably, The Mall in Athens, near Neratziotissa metro station last.
Athena found all the familiar shops she hadn’t seen since we left London: Zara, Bershka, Funny Fish, Carpisa, Tie Rack, M&S, Nine West, Monsoon, Accessorise. As we sat eating our KFC (the ultimate culinary blasphemy in the land of souvlaki), I looked around at the people and the place. The scene could have been anywhere, from New York to Dubai to Hong Kong. The Mall has been built to cater for Greeks in the same way that ancient Roman emperors provided bread and spectacles to keep the mob quiet. At the same time the traditional areas of Monastiraki and Plaka in the centre of Athens attract tourists in search of a Greece that is fast becoming a museum attraction
We flew to Vienna on Saturday 23 August. We had a five hour stopover there, so we were able to take the CAT train to Vienna and walk until Stefansplatz, teeming with tourists, a festival of Turkish music attracting a fair crowd.
We got to my parents’ house in Athens at 1 am on Sunday morning and have generally been relaxing and doing nothing much since, apart from last Thursday when it was my daughter’s fifteenth birthday, and she was to choose the outing. A sign of the times that the shopping-starved youngster would choose visiting an American-style shopping mall, named rather predictably, The Mall in Athens, near Neratziotissa metro station last.
Athena found all the familiar shops she hadn’t seen since we left London: Zara, Bershka, Funny Fish, Carpisa, Tie Rack, M&S, Nine West, Monsoon, Accessorise. As we sat eating our KFC (the ultimate culinary blasphemy in the land of souvlaki), I looked around at the people and the place. The scene could have been anywhere, from New York to Dubai to Hong Kong. The Mall has been built to cater for Greeks in the same way that ancient Roman emperors provided bread and spectacles to keep the mob quiet. At the same time the traditional areas of Monastiraki and Plaka in the centre of Athens attract tourists in search of a Greece that is fast becoming a museum attraction
Wednesday, 13 August 2008
Visit to Imam Khomeini's House and Jamaran
Last Monday, as a friend and I were leaving a meeting somewhere in Niavaran Avenue, in the north of Tehran, she asked if I had ever visited Jamaran, the village at the foot of the Alborz mountains where Imam Khomeini lived and where several members of his immediate family, including his widow, still live.
I said that, like millions of people, I had only seen the interior of the Hosseiniyeh (prayer hall) on TV broadcasts.
“Well, then, we must go! It’s only five minutes away,” my friend said.
We drove to the end of the road and turned left. Immediately the feel of the place changed: in place of the wide Niavaran avenue with its luxurious blocks of flats covered in ochre marble and granite, we found ourselves in a village road lined with one-storey mud-brick houses and little shops. We parked the car and turned into a narrow alley with more brick houses. A half-open iron gate revealed a curtain with a flowery curtain billowing in the breeze. Next to it, ivy flows over a high brick wall, telling of life inside the humble courtyard. A few metres beyond, an ancient plane tree overshadows the alley. It is, obviously a couple of centuries old, since new sprouts sprung from its trunk and grew stout and gnarled in turn, next to the mother trunk. A group of boys played football in its shade.
Just beyond the tree, tucked at the end of another narrow alley lies a small heart disease unit, where the Imam was hospitalised when he suffered a heart attack in 1980. After the heart attack, his physicians recommended that he move from Qom to Tehran, where the weather would be more beneficial. But he had no house, so Ayatollah Jamarani, who had in his endowment a small house adjacent to the Hosseiniyeh Jamaran, gave it to the Imam and it has been the Imam’s family home ever since.
The Hosseiniyeh and Imam’s house are literally next door to the heart unit. As we crossed the entrance to the complex, the call for the midday prayer was being broadcast. We carried out our ritual ablutions and entered the Hosseiniyeh.
For those friends who are not familiar with prayers, these are the two Quranic surahs (chapters) used during every prayer. The first one is compulsory, but the second one can be substituted by any other, usually short, surah.
Surah 1: Fatiha (The Opening)
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
Praise be to Allah, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the Worlds;
Gracious, Most Merciful;
Master of the Day of Judgment.
Thee do we worship and Thine aid we seek.
Show us the straight way,
The way of those on whom Thou hast bestowed Thy Grace,
those whose (portion) is not wrath, and who go not astray.
Surah 112: Ikhlas (The Purity of Faith)
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
Say: He is Allah, the One and Only;
Allah, the Eternal, Absolute;
He begetteth not, nor is He begotten;
And there is none like unto Him.
(Translation by Abdullah Yusuf Ali)
The Hosseiniyeh is quite unlike any other place of worship I have seen. The walls are finished with a mixture of mud and hay, like peasant houses and there are no carpets, only thin, woven traditional kilims in blue and white, called zilou. I was told that the Imam resisted any move that could be seen as luxury, such as plastering and painting the walls or replacing the zilous with thicker carpets. He eventually agreed to lining the lower parts of the walls with marble slabs, but only because people who came to listen to him leant on the walls and got their clothes dusty.
To the right, the raised platform famous from TV broadcasts on which the Imam appeared to speak to his followers is never used now. His chair is covered with a white sheet, just as it used to be.
“What is that door on the left side of the platform?” I asked my friend.
We put on our shoes, walked up to the back of the Hosseiniyeh and turned left through a metal gate into a small yard. The other side of the door to the platform, now locked, is linked to the eivan (terrace) in front of the Imam’s reception room, by means of a raised ironwork bridge covered with a length of cheap fitted carpet.
Large French windows open on to the eivan from the reception room. Actually, ‘reception room’ is too grand for this room; I only call it so because this is where the Imam received his guests, otherwise it’s a smallish room lined with a coarse carpet in green background, with a sofa at one end covered in a white sheet and a mantelpiece with a round mirror and a stack of books. His worn-out slippers are paired next to the sofa.
“And to think,” my friend mused, “that from this little room he shook the world.”
The place has such an air of utter simplicity and homeliness that although I had never been here before, I had the feeling I was visiting the house of a beloved grandparent. I thought of how much he could see that we never even dream of and how far we are from his vision of the world.
By the front gate, as I turned my face inwards to take in a last image of the yard, I caught a scent of roses.
I said that, like millions of people, I had only seen the interior of the Hosseiniyeh (prayer hall) on TV broadcasts.
“Well, then, we must go! It’s only five minutes away,” my friend said.
We drove to the end of the road and turned left. Immediately the feel of the place changed: in place of the wide Niavaran avenue with its luxurious blocks of flats covered in ochre marble and granite, we found ourselves in a village road lined with one-storey mud-brick houses and little shops. We parked the car and turned into a narrow alley with more brick houses. A half-open iron gate revealed a curtain with a flowery curtain billowing in the breeze. Next to it, ivy flows over a high brick wall, telling of life inside the humble courtyard. A few metres beyond, an ancient plane tree overshadows the alley. It is, obviously a couple of centuries old, since new sprouts sprung from its trunk and grew stout and gnarled in turn, next to the mother trunk. A group of boys played football in its shade.
Just beyond the tree, tucked at the end of another narrow alley lies a small heart disease unit, where the Imam was hospitalised when he suffered a heart attack in 1980. After the heart attack, his physicians recommended that he move from Qom to Tehran, where the weather would be more beneficial. But he had no house, so Ayatollah Jamarani, who had in his endowment a small house adjacent to the Hosseiniyeh Jamaran, gave it to the Imam and it has been the Imam’s family home ever since.
The Hosseiniyeh and Imam’s house are literally next door to the heart unit. As we crossed the entrance to the complex, the call for the midday prayer was being broadcast. We carried out our ritual ablutions and entered the Hosseiniyeh.
For those friends who are not familiar with prayers, these are the two Quranic surahs (chapters) used during every prayer. The first one is compulsory, but the second one can be substituted by any other, usually short, surah.
Surah 1: Fatiha (The Opening)
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
Praise be to Allah, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the Worlds;
Gracious, Most Merciful;
Master of the Day of Judgment.
Thee do we worship and Thine aid we seek.
Show us the straight way,
The way of those on whom Thou hast bestowed Thy Grace,
those whose (portion) is not wrath, and who go not astray.
Surah 112: Ikhlas (The Purity of Faith)
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful.
Say: He is Allah, the One and Only;
Allah, the Eternal, Absolute;
He begetteth not, nor is He begotten;
And there is none like unto Him.
(Translation by Abdullah Yusuf Ali)
The Hosseiniyeh is quite unlike any other place of worship I have seen. The walls are finished with a mixture of mud and hay, like peasant houses and there are no carpets, only thin, woven traditional kilims in blue and white, called zilou. I was told that the Imam resisted any move that could be seen as luxury, such as plastering and painting the walls or replacing the zilous with thicker carpets. He eventually agreed to lining the lower parts of the walls with marble slabs, but only because people who came to listen to him leant on the walls and got their clothes dusty.
To the right, the raised platform famous from TV broadcasts on which the Imam appeared to speak to his followers is never used now. His chair is covered with a white sheet, just as it used to be.
“What is that door on the left side of the platform?” I asked my friend.
We put on our shoes, walked up to the back of the Hosseiniyeh and turned left through a metal gate into a small yard. The other side of the door to the platform, now locked, is linked to the eivan (terrace) in front of the Imam’s reception room, by means of a raised ironwork bridge covered with a length of cheap fitted carpet.
Large French windows open on to the eivan from the reception room. Actually, ‘reception room’ is too grand for this room; I only call it so because this is where the Imam received his guests, otherwise it’s a smallish room lined with a coarse carpet in green background, with a sofa at one end covered in a white sheet and a mantelpiece with a round mirror and a stack of books. His worn-out slippers are paired next to the sofa.
“And to think,” my friend mused, “that from this little room he shook the world.”
The place has such an air of utter simplicity and homeliness that although I had never been here before, I had the feeling I was visiting the house of a beloved grandparent. I thought of how much he could see that we never even dream of and how far we are from his vision of the world.
By the front gate, as I turned my face inwards to take in a last image of the yard, I caught a scent of roses.
(Belated) End of School Year Report
Over here life is a bit too busy now because we are trying to tie up loose ends (like this blog post) before the family long holiday which starts on Monday 18 August.
School lessons ended on 20 May and Athena’s and Yusef’s end of term exams were over on 14 June. And after that, three months of uninterrupted leisure (boredom?) until 23September, when the new school year starts. Iranian children usually sign up for classes of swimming, painting, English, pottery and all sorts of things they don’t have the time to do during the school year. Athena and Yusef would like to divide their holidays between London and Greece, but we are not millionaires (yet), so we are going to Greece. We are flying via Istanbul because there are no direct flights from Tehran to Athens, which makes the fare quite expensive anyway. We’ll spend four nights in Istanbul and then fly on to Athens on Friday 23 August, where we’ll stay with my parents for a month.
Although this is going back a bit, I haven’t mentioned what happened with the children’s new schools. I’ve mentioned before that they spent a year at the special Adaptive School, which caters for children who’ve come from abroad, like them. They both did extremely well, exceeding everybody’s expectations: Athena got an average grade of 19.85, coming top of her class (even among students who had been at the school for more than one year) and Yusef 18.79, coming second after a boy in his second year at the school.
With such grades Yusef enrolled in the third and last year of Rahnama’ei (Guidance) School at a small private school twenty minutes’ walk from our house. He’ll only be there for a year before he moves to High School proper (Dabirestan), so another search will be on next spring.
Athena faced a tougher choice: having finished the first year of Dabirestan, she now had to choose among four academic directions (Islamic Studies, Humanities, Maths/Physics, Life Sciences) or Art/Vocational High School. Although I would dearly have liked her to study Humanities and Hossein Maths or Sciences, none of the academic directions appealed to her, so eventually we agreed that she could go to Art School (Honarestan) to study what is here called ‘Graphics’, but includes freehand drawing, calligraphy, working with colour, professional photography, hand printing and other lessons up to a professional standard. So by the time she graduates from Honarestan, she will have all the technical skills she will need to work in design at the same time as continuing her studies at university. She would have taken Art for GCSE if she were still in England, and she would probably have continued it at A level, so, all things considered, she is better off here.
We looked around a few Honarestans and eventually we settled on one not too far from our house. Our initial visit was not very encouraging. To begin with, no men were allowed inside the school grounds (all schooling is segregated in Iran), so Hossein and I sat at a small security office by the front gate and waited for the headteacher to come out to us.
When Hossein explained that Athena was currently in the Adaptive school this year, the headteacher said she regretted that they do not enrol girls from there, because the school is a mish-mash of people and in the past girls who came from there were problematic. Hossein explained that in our case we had no other option but to enrol her there; also when he visited the school the year before he had got a very good impression of it, so he didn’t look further. He added that Athena had been a very good influence on others in her class rather than learning bad things from them.
The headteacher softened; she asked whether Athena dresses modestly like her mother and whether she follows religious precepts. If she doesn’t, she will find difficulty fitting in with the girls of the school.
By the end of the interview she was quite changed. She invited me inside to view the school, spoke to me in English, offered me ice-cream and showed me into the library “We’ve got a foreign visitor,” she told the librarian. There are other foreign mothers in the school too, she said, and she hoped that I would be able to be involved in the affairs of the school.
So it now remains to be seen how well they will both settle in their new schools.
School lessons ended on 20 May and Athena’s and Yusef’s end of term exams were over on 14 June. And after that, three months of uninterrupted leisure (boredom?) until 23September, when the new school year starts. Iranian children usually sign up for classes of swimming, painting, English, pottery and all sorts of things they don’t have the time to do during the school year. Athena and Yusef would like to divide their holidays between London and Greece, but we are not millionaires (yet), so we are going to Greece. We are flying via Istanbul because there are no direct flights from Tehran to Athens, which makes the fare quite expensive anyway. We’ll spend four nights in Istanbul and then fly on to Athens on Friday 23 August, where we’ll stay with my parents for a month.
Although this is going back a bit, I haven’t mentioned what happened with the children’s new schools. I’ve mentioned before that they spent a year at the special Adaptive School, which caters for children who’ve come from abroad, like them. They both did extremely well, exceeding everybody’s expectations: Athena got an average grade of 19.85, coming top of her class (even among students who had been at the school for more than one year) and Yusef 18.79, coming second after a boy in his second year at the school.
With such grades Yusef enrolled in the third and last year of Rahnama’ei (Guidance) School at a small private school twenty minutes’ walk from our house. He’ll only be there for a year before he moves to High School proper (Dabirestan), so another search will be on next spring.
Athena faced a tougher choice: having finished the first year of Dabirestan, she now had to choose among four academic directions (Islamic Studies, Humanities, Maths/Physics, Life Sciences) or Art/Vocational High School. Although I would dearly have liked her to study Humanities and Hossein Maths or Sciences, none of the academic directions appealed to her, so eventually we agreed that she could go to Art School (Honarestan) to study what is here called ‘Graphics’, but includes freehand drawing, calligraphy, working with colour, professional photography, hand printing and other lessons up to a professional standard. So by the time she graduates from Honarestan, she will have all the technical skills she will need to work in design at the same time as continuing her studies at university. She would have taken Art for GCSE if she were still in England, and she would probably have continued it at A level, so, all things considered, she is better off here.
We looked around a few Honarestans and eventually we settled on one not too far from our house. Our initial visit was not very encouraging. To begin with, no men were allowed inside the school grounds (all schooling is segregated in Iran), so Hossein and I sat at a small security office by the front gate and waited for the headteacher to come out to us.
When Hossein explained that Athena was currently in the Adaptive school this year, the headteacher said she regretted that they do not enrol girls from there, because the school is a mish-mash of people and in the past girls who came from there were problematic. Hossein explained that in our case we had no other option but to enrol her there; also when he visited the school the year before he had got a very good impression of it, so he didn’t look further. He added that Athena had been a very good influence on others in her class rather than learning bad things from them.
The headteacher softened; she asked whether Athena dresses modestly like her mother and whether she follows religious precepts. If she doesn’t, she will find difficulty fitting in with the girls of the school.
By the end of the interview she was quite changed. She invited me inside to view the school, spoke to me in English, offered me ice-cream and showed me into the library “We’ve got a foreign visitor,” she told the librarian. There are other foreign mothers in the school too, she said, and she hoped that I would be able to be involved in the affairs of the school.
So it now remains to be seen how well they will both settle in their new schools.
Monday, 11 August 2008
A Visit to Maman Jun's old House
This visit obviously happened before the operation, but I have only been able to write it up now that I can sit at my desk for longer than ten minutes at a time.
Haj Nasser’s blacksmith workshop was at no. 214, 24 Metri Avenue, Shahrerey (Shabdolazim). This twenty-four metre wide avenue, hence its name, radiates to the east of Shabdolazim square and ends at the ancient fortress of Qal’eh Gabri. Haj Nasser married Maman Jun (my mother-in-law, God rest her soul) and moved to Shabdolazim in the mid 50s. After a few years he managed to buy a house plot at no 214, where he had the workshop built, with the house at the back.
I learnt the story of the house in scraps, from bits of memories Maman Jun recalled now and then. At the end of the long corridor that ran the length of the workshop and opened up to the front yard was a small room and the toilet. When I first visited the house in 1989, the small room was used to store Haj Nasser’s work-clothes (too dirty to be let into the house) and to house two washing machines, one AEG automatic and one top-loading, twin tub machine with the instructions in English and Arabic. Why did Maman Jun have two washing machines? I asked. She used the twin tub for her everyday laundry: she filled up the tub manually, making sure it didn’t overflow, set it to wash and went back to the house, only to return in a bit to change the water. The AEG machine was only used on special occasions, such as washing bedlinen, so that it would last longer. (When Maman Jun passed away in 2002 and Haj Nasser moved to a flat, the AEG machine moved too, until, upon his death in 2007, it was given away to a family friend.) This small store room was the birthplace of Mansoureh, my sister-in-law, while the main house was still being built.
To the left of the yard was the outdoor toilet, with a washbasin just outside the toilet and a jasmine tree climbing round the water pipe on the wall. But Maman jun’s favourite part of the yard was the ornamental pool, lined in green, orange-veined marble with a little fountain in the middle. This pool was sometimes transformed into a flower bed, whenever Maman-jun fancied flowers rather than water, and after some time it was turned into a pool again.
The house was sold in the spring of 2002, and with it went a lifetime of memories. The buyer only bought it for its central position: Aqa jun’s sooty blacksmith’s workshop is now turned into a dazzling shop selling chandeliers, crystal and fine china. One evening Mansoureh and I went to buy a gift for a friend. I could hardly believe that this was the very same shop where Aqa jun spent his whole life working.
‘And what about the house?’ I asked the owner.
‘It serves as the shop’s storage area.’
‘Can I go round and have a look? I asked again.
‘By all means; this is your own house,’ he said. He opened the side door on to the yard corridor.
‘Are you coming?’ I asked Mansoureh. She nodded no.
The yard was not as I remembered it. It was now covered by cheap, corrugated plastic sheets, to keep out the dust, and stacked to the roof with carton packaging. I tried to make out where the yard ended and the room began.
The large living room window had no frame anymore, but the marble window sill where I used to sit in the absence of chairs was there, covered in dust. Boxes filled the room too: it was hard trying to remember where the fitted cabinet with Aqa jun’s documents had been; Maman jun’s chest of drawers; the mantelpiece which carried her wedding mirror and candlesticks and which she eventually had removed because it served as a dumping ground for keys, pens, loose bits of paper, detritus of everyday life (Hossein still carries the family tradition using a bronze bowl on top of the shoe cabinet).
The living room light was on. Maman jun’s lampshade in the shape of a flower still hung there, in the middle of a decorative plaster motif.
I pulled my scarf down towards my forehead and made a hasty exit.
Haj Nasser’s blacksmith workshop was at no. 214, 24 Metri Avenue, Shahrerey (Shabdolazim). This twenty-four metre wide avenue, hence its name, radiates to the east of Shabdolazim square and ends at the ancient fortress of Qal’eh Gabri. Haj Nasser married Maman Jun (my mother-in-law, God rest her soul) and moved to Shabdolazim in the mid 50s. After a few years he managed to buy a house plot at no 214, where he had the workshop built, with the house at the back.
I learnt the story of the house in scraps, from bits of memories Maman Jun recalled now and then. At the end of the long corridor that ran the length of the workshop and opened up to the front yard was a small room and the toilet. When I first visited the house in 1989, the small room was used to store Haj Nasser’s work-clothes (too dirty to be let into the house) and to house two washing machines, one AEG automatic and one top-loading, twin tub machine with the instructions in English and Arabic. Why did Maman Jun have two washing machines? I asked. She used the twin tub for her everyday laundry: she filled up the tub manually, making sure it didn’t overflow, set it to wash and went back to the house, only to return in a bit to change the water. The AEG machine was only used on special occasions, such as washing bedlinen, so that it would last longer. (When Maman Jun passed away in 2002 and Haj Nasser moved to a flat, the AEG machine moved too, until, upon his death in 2007, it was given away to a family friend.) This small store room was the birthplace of Mansoureh, my sister-in-law, while the main house was still being built.
To the left of the yard was the outdoor toilet, with a washbasin just outside the toilet and a jasmine tree climbing round the water pipe on the wall. But Maman jun’s favourite part of the yard was the ornamental pool, lined in green, orange-veined marble with a little fountain in the middle. This pool was sometimes transformed into a flower bed, whenever Maman-jun fancied flowers rather than water, and after some time it was turned into a pool again.
The house was sold in the spring of 2002, and with it went a lifetime of memories. The buyer only bought it for its central position: Aqa jun’s sooty blacksmith’s workshop is now turned into a dazzling shop selling chandeliers, crystal and fine china. One evening Mansoureh and I went to buy a gift for a friend. I could hardly believe that this was the very same shop where Aqa jun spent his whole life working.
‘And what about the house?’ I asked the owner.
‘It serves as the shop’s storage area.’
‘Can I go round and have a look? I asked again.
‘By all means; this is your own house,’ he said. He opened the side door on to the yard corridor.
‘Are you coming?’ I asked Mansoureh. She nodded no.
The yard was not as I remembered it. It was now covered by cheap, corrugated plastic sheets, to keep out the dust, and stacked to the roof with carton packaging. I tried to make out where the yard ended and the room began.
The large living room window had no frame anymore, but the marble window sill where I used to sit in the absence of chairs was there, covered in dust. Boxes filled the room too: it was hard trying to remember where the fitted cabinet with Aqa jun’s documents had been; Maman jun’s chest of drawers; the mantelpiece which carried her wedding mirror and candlesticks and which she eventually had removed because it served as a dumping ground for keys, pens, loose bits of paper, detritus of everyday life (Hossein still carries the family tradition using a bronze bowl on top of the shoe cabinet).
The living room light was on. Maman jun’s lampshade in the shape of a flower still hung there, in the middle of a decorative plaster motif.
I pulled my scarf down towards my forehead and made a hasty exit.
Thursday, 7 August 2008
Hospital stay
On Saturday 26 July I was admitted to Mehr Hospital for an obstetric operation. I had a private room with its own bathroom. If it wasn’t for the hospital gown and the oxygen outlet over the bed, one would almost mistake it for a hotel.
Private rooms are paid for at double the rate of a two-bed ones, primarily because patients want a relative to stay with them overnight and not, as in the case of freaky foreigners, in order to be alone. On the Saturday nothing much was happening, so I welcomed the opportunity to finish off some reading and some writing I had started. Except for the two hours of visiting (3-5 pm) when Hossein and the children came to see me that afternoon, I spent a day of perfect solitude, except for the nurses, the catering lady and the cleaner who came and went in the course of their duties, repeatedly asking, “Haven’t you got a companion tonight?”
Sunday morning I was scheduled for the operation between 8 and 8.30 am. I had hoped that Hossein and his sister, who had kindly offered to stay the night with me, would be there before that. As it happened, the doctor came in at 7.30 to say hello and shortly afterwards I was wheeled into the operating theatre. I had to take off my glasses in the room, before getting on the wheeled stretcher (incidentally, why can’t patients walk to the operating theatre?), so from that point onwards the whole thing is, literally, a blur. I looked at the ceiling of the lift, at people’s heads looking down at me and felt like a scene from Casualty. The first porter handed me on to another, as far as I could see, younger one. “Are you in for a Caesarean, lady?” he asked me. Well, I don’t blame him.
“No, thank you,” I answered.
“But you are scheduled for no. 6, which is a Caesarean room,”
“Well, please make sure…it’s not a Caesarean,” I stuttered.
“The doctor knows anyway,” he answered.
The young man left and a nurse took over. She chatted warmly, trying to help me relax while she tried to find a vein for the drip.
“Not very easy,” she said. “Your arms are chubby. But then, Iranian women are chubby, just like me,” she joked.
“Firstly, I am not Iranian, and secondly, you are not chubby,” I retorted.
“Oh, aren’t you? So how come you speak Persian so well?”
The doctor came in at that moment, dressed in green.
“My husband is Iranian,” I answered.
“So,” the doctor asked, “are Iranian men good?”
“Well, mine is; I don’t know about the others.”
“Excellent,” the doctor said, “that’s a fine answer. There are good and bad people everywhere.”
The clock showed 8 am when the needle for the drip went in.
The next time I remember looking at the clock it was 5 pm: I was back in my room with an oxygen mask on my face. I was feeling sick and very thirsty, but at least I had survived the anaesthetic. I had been worried about that.
That night passed without major problems, except that I couldn’t sleep comfortably because of the drip. I came home on Monday afternoon and I was advised to rest in bed as much as possible for the following two weeks. Today is the eleventh day after the operation. I am feeling much better but I get tired easily and if I stand or sit for too long I feel the internal stitches pulling, just like now. I’ll sign off now and take it easy until Monday 18 August, when we are flying to Constantinople, where we will stay for five days on the way to Athens. Fingers crossed, I’ll be all right by then.
Private rooms are paid for at double the rate of a two-bed ones, primarily because patients want a relative to stay with them overnight and not, as in the case of freaky foreigners, in order to be alone. On the Saturday nothing much was happening, so I welcomed the opportunity to finish off some reading and some writing I had started. Except for the two hours of visiting (3-5 pm) when Hossein and the children came to see me that afternoon, I spent a day of perfect solitude, except for the nurses, the catering lady and the cleaner who came and went in the course of their duties, repeatedly asking, “Haven’t you got a companion tonight?”
Sunday morning I was scheduled for the operation between 8 and 8.30 am. I had hoped that Hossein and his sister, who had kindly offered to stay the night with me, would be there before that. As it happened, the doctor came in at 7.30 to say hello and shortly afterwards I was wheeled into the operating theatre. I had to take off my glasses in the room, before getting on the wheeled stretcher (incidentally, why can’t patients walk to the operating theatre?), so from that point onwards the whole thing is, literally, a blur. I looked at the ceiling of the lift, at people’s heads looking down at me and felt like a scene from Casualty. The first porter handed me on to another, as far as I could see, younger one. “Are you in for a Caesarean, lady?” he asked me. Well, I don’t blame him.
“No, thank you,” I answered.
“But you are scheduled for no. 6, which is a Caesarean room,”
“Well, please make sure…it’s not a Caesarean,” I stuttered.
“The doctor knows anyway,” he answered.
The young man left and a nurse took over. She chatted warmly, trying to help me relax while she tried to find a vein for the drip.
“Not very easy,” she said. “Your arms are chubby. But then, Iranian women are chubby, just like me,” she joked.
“Firstly, I am not Iranian, and secondly, you are not chubby,” I retorted.
“Oh, aren’t you? So how come you speak Persian so well?”
The doctor came in at that moment, dressed in green.
“My husband is Iranian,” I answered.
“So,” the doctor asked, “are Iranian men good?”
“Well, mine is; I don’t know about the others.”
“Excellent,” the doctor said, “that’s a fine answer. There are good and bad people everywhere.”
The clock showed 8 am when the needle for the drip went in.
The next time I remember looking at the clock it was 5 pm: I was back in my room with an oxygen mask on my face. I was feeling sick and very thirsty, but at least I had survived the anaesthetic. I had been worried about that.
That night passed without major problems, except that I couldn’t sleep comfortably because of the drip. I came home on Monday afternoon and I was advised to rest in bed as much as possible for the following two weeks. Today is the eleventh day after the operation. I am feeling much better but I get tired easily and if I stand or sit for too long I feel the internal stitches pulling, just like now. I’ll sign off now and take it easy until Monday 18 August, when we are flying to Constantinople, where we will stay for five days on the way to Athens. Fingers crossed, I’ll be all right by then.
Wednesday, 23 July 2008
Bank clerk
Forgive the cliché, but my blogs are like buses: there isn’t one for ages and then two come along.
Yesterday I visited Bank Parsian in order to transfer money from my account to our joint and pay for the Greece fares. Hossein advised me to go at about 3 pm when it shouldn’t be too crowded. I got there at 3, and pulled out queue number 523 from the machine. At the time queue number 397 was being served and out of the twelve counters only half were open. I thought I wouldn’t get to be seen until 4, when the bank closes.
I asked a woman sitting next to me how long she had been waiting for. She told me for an hour and a quarter, and her queue number was 463, but a man had given her his number (405), so she gave me hers, which brought me sixty numbers forward.
Eventually, I got to the counter at ten minutes to four. I had a couple of transactions to do and was tying myself in knots (I still mix up the digits as they are written in Iran). It didn’t take long before the clerk asked me where I am from. (Is it the smile that betrays me?)
“From Greece,” I replied.
“So what are you doing here?”
“Erm…living?” (as good a candidate as any).
“Pretty place you’ve chosen to live, haven’t you?” he asked and fed my passbook into the machine.
“What’s wrong with it?” (my chance to do some research for the book).
“Sign the back of the slip, here. Do you think it’s good?”
“It’s very good. The people are friendly…” (and you’ve got fresh, steaming bread and real cream cakes, I wanted to say).
“No, it’s not good, not as it used to be. There’s nothing for young people here.” He took the slip. “So, do you work here?” (maybe he was an interrogator in another life).
“I am writing a book on Iranian culture, which is very interesting.”
“So Iran is a good place, but we didn’t know it,” he mused, counting the fifty-thousand rial bills.
I wanted to tell him that the fact that he struck a conversation with a total stranger should point him to the right direction.
Yesterday I visited Bank Parsian in order to transfer money from my account to our joint and pay for the Greece fares. Hossein advised me to go at about 3 pm when it shouldn’t be too crowded. I got there at 3, and pulled out queue number 523 from the machine. At the time queue number 397 was being served and out of the twelve counters only half were open. I thought I wouldn’t get to be seen until 4, when the bank closes.
I asked a woman sitting next to me how long she had been waiting for. She told me for an hour and a quarter, and her queue number was 463, but a man had given her his number (405), so she gave me hers, which brought me sixty numbers forward.
Eventually, I got to the counter at ten minutes to four. I had a couple of transactions to do and was tying myself in knots (I still mix up the digits as they are written in Iran). It didn’t take long before the clerk asked me where I am from. (Is it the smile that betrays me?)
“From Greece,” I replied.
“So what are you doing here?”
“Erm…living?” (as good a candidate as any).
“Pretty place you’ve chosen to live, haven’t you?” he asked and fed my passbook into the machine.
“What’s wrong with it?” (my chance to do some research for the book).
“Sign the back of the slip, here. Do you think it’s good?”
“It’s very good. The people are friendly…” (and you’ve got fresh, steaming bread and real cream cakes, I wanted to say).
“No, it’s not good, not as it used to be. There’s nothing for young people here.” He took the slip. “So, do you work here?” (maybe he was an interrogator in another life).
“I am writing a book on Iranian culture, which is very interesting.”
“So Iran is a good place, but we didn’t know it,” he mused, counting the fifty-thousand rial bills.
I wanted to tell him that the fact that he struck a conversation with a total stranger should point him to the right direction.
London Visit
I haven’t written recently, I know. With apologies to those friends I didn’t get to speak with, I was in London from 6 to 15 July. The main reason of my visit was to visit a prospective publisher who shows a very strong interest in my book on Iranian culture.
It felt funny to be back after a year of absence: as if I hadn’t been away at all. When I got off at West Acton tube station, dragging my suitcase after me and getting drenched in a summer shower of rain, I felt back at home. As soon as I let myself into our flat I sat down on the bed and cried, sobbing loudly. Everything around me reminded me of how much trouble we took over the house extension: how we chose the floor tiles, the dishwasher, the cooker, and how little use we made of them before we decided to pull up sticks and move to Tehran. In the dresser drawer I found Athena’s small pink purse, Yusef’s old school diary, drawings, my old spectacles I was planning to give away to Specsaver’s charity bin, detritus of our old life.
But I was happy to be back in London, even for a few days and determined to make the most of it. A parable of life’s transience.
Days went by very quickly, what with browsing in Waterstone’s and Foyles, seeing my good friend Alex twice (bless her, she is such a great help with the book project), visiting my other very close friend Mali three times, meeting the publisher and sorting out a few things in Hossein’s office. After nine days I was ready to come back, with some new ideas in my head and quite a few books in my suitcase.
The meeting with the publisher went very well: he likes the concept and the style of the book but he would like me to package it differently, so as to make information more accessible. I promised to think about it a bit more and get back to him by mid- August, when we are all travelling to Athens via Constantinople (no direct flights from Tehran to Athens).
Oh, and another thing. On Sunday 27 July I will be having an operation (women’s troubles, but nothing serious, I hope), so I may be out of action for a few days – as if I were very punctual otherwise! Please remember me in your prayers.
It felt funny to be back after a year of absence: as if I hadn’t been away at all. When I got off at West Acton tube station, dragging my suitcase after me and getting drenched in a summer shower of rain, I felt back at home. As soon as I let myself into our flat I sat down on the bed and cried, sobbing loudly. Everything around me reminded me of how much trouble we took over the house extension: how we chose the floor tiles, the dishwasher, the cooker, and how little use we made of them before we decided to pull up sticks and move to Tehran. In the dresser drawer I found Athena’s small pink purse, Yusef’s old school diary, drawings, my old spectacles I was planning to give away to Specsaver’s charity bin, detritus of our old life.
But I was happy to be back in London, even for a few days and determined to make the most of it. A parable of life’s transience.
Days went by very quickly, what with browsing in Waterstone’s and Foyles, seeing my good friend Alex twice (bless her, she is such a great help with the book project), visiting my other very close friend Mali three times, meeting the publisher and sorting out a few things in Hossein’s office. After nine days I was ready to come back, with some new ideas in my head and quite a few books in my suitcase.
The meeting with the publisher went very well: he likes the concept and the style of the book but he would like me to package it differently, so as to make information more accessible. I promised to think about it a bit more and get back to him by mid- August, when we are all travelling to Athens via Constantinople (no direct flights from Tehran to Athens).
Oh, and another thing. On Sunday 27 July I will be having an operation (women’s troubles, but nothing serious, I hope), so I may be out of action for a few days – as if I were very punctual otherwise! Please remember me in your prayers.
Tuesday, 24 June 2008
Nightly Adventure
21 June 2008, early morning
Just when we thought that life was getting rather boring…
At four o’clock this morning I was woken up by the sound of the rubbish collectors’ van emptying the skips: it was a rattling noise, like lots of glass bottles tumbling down. I turned over, trying to block it out of my ears; then I heard water running in the bathroom. In a couple of minutes Athena stood over my bed, in tears. “Mummy, my ring is stuck on my finger and it’s stopping the blood.”
“Try using soap,” I mumbled, half asleep.
“I have; it won’t come out,” she whined.
I sat up and reached for my handcream, which didn’t work either. Athena made a lot of noise, moaning, saying that her finger felt numb, it was going to explode, she was dying..the usual drama queen stuff.
We went to the kitchen and squirted washing liquid on her finger. I tried easing the ring out, but the pleat of flesh over the knuckle was swollen. Things were complicated more because the ring was wide like a wedding band.
I reasoned that if we used hot water, the ring would expand. The unsuccessful experiment proved that so would the finger. How about using oil? That might help the ring slip out. But Athena’s fussing and fretting didn’t let me think.
As I was struggling to pull the ring out, we heard the call to the morning prayer: it was 4.08 am. Hossein got out of bed and offered his morning prayers, then sat down in front of Athena to work with the washing liquid. He massaged the finger for a few minutes and managed to push the ring almost over the knuckle. If somebody heard Athena’s cries, they would think we were torturing her. She screamed and shouted, and pulled her finger away. The ring slipped back.
I suggested we ring the emergency services. The hospital nearby said that we could take her there so that they have a look, but our best bet would be to take her to a jeweller’s in the morning to have the ring cut.
I thought that if hot water didn’t work, cold water might. I filled a bowl of cold water and put it on a chair by her bed. By that time Yusef was awake too.
“Why didn’t you get up then?” I asked him.
“I thought she felt sick but couldn’t and was trying to.” Yusef, just like me, has got a thing about seeing people get sick.
“So you thought you’d lie low, eh?” I joked. He pulled the sheet over his face, probably smiling.
Hossein came into the room. “Does the fire brigade deal with that sort of thing?”
I thought of cats high up on trees and a nervous laughter came all over me; but it might work. Hossein got on the phone again and thankfully, in a few minutes all four of us were in the local Fire Brigade Station.
The young man there thought this was a piece of cake. He brought his First Aid kit over and took out a contraption that slides under a ring; a lever on top of it is turned, cutting the ring through. He struggled with this for a few minutes but he only managed a minute chip at the edge of the ring.
“What metal is this, lady?” he asked me.
“Titanium, I think.” A metal that up to now I had not given much thought to. As hard as steel. Why do they make jewellery out of this? Good for handcuffs, I bet.
The young man went out and called his superior, a surly man in his fifties with a paunch and two chunky agate rings on his right hand.
“Don’t worry, sister,” he told Athena. “We’ll have it out in no time.” He brought a thin metal file and a circular saw. Athena looked at me terrified.
“It’s OK, don’t worry,” the man reassured her. He sent the younger officer out, who returned with a plastic pail and a washing liquid bottle filled with water. Then they set to work: he slid the metal file under the ring, squashing Athena’s finger even more. The saw struggled to cut the metal, firing sparks in all directions. The young man kept pouring water over Athena’s finger to prevent it from burning. Once or twice Athena pulled her hand away, but was told to sit still. I’ve got to hand it to her, she is impeccable in front of strangers.
Eventually a deep ridge was cut in the ring but the innermost part, near the finger, was still joined. The officer put the saw away and pulled at the sides of the ring with two pincers; after a lot of effort he managed to ease the ring apart, enough for the finger to be freed.
We all breathed a sigh of relief.
Athena’s finger got two long blisters, which have now dried and turned into dark red lines, a memento of an unpleasant experience that will, like many memories, turn to a story in the years to come.
Just when we thought that life was getting rather boring…
At four o’clock this morning I was woken up by the sound of the rubbish collectors’ van emptying the skips: it was a rattling noise, like lots of glass bottles tumbling down. I turned over, trying to block it out of my ears; then I heard water running in the bathroom. In a couple of minutes Athena stood over my bed, in tears. “Mummy, my ring is stuck on my finger and it’s stopping the blood.”
“Try using soap,” I mumbled, half asleep.
“I have; it won’t come out,” she whined.
I sat up and reached for my handcream, which didn’t work either. Athena made a lot of noise, moaning, saying that her finger felt numb, it was going to explode, she was dying..the usual drama queen stuff.
We went to the kitchen and squirted washing liquid on her finger. I tried easing the ring out, but the pleat of flesh over the knuckle was swollen. Things were complicated more because the ring was wide like a wedding band.
I reasoned that if we used hot water, the ring would expand. The unsuccessful experiment proved that so would the finger. How about using oil? That might help the ring slip out. But Athena’s fussing and fretting didn’t let me think.
As I was struggling to pull the ring out, we heard the call to the morning prayer: it was 4.08 am. Hossein got out of bed and offered his morning prayers, then sat down in front of Athena to work with the washing liquid. He massaged the finger for a few minutes and managed to push the ring almost over the knuckle. If somebody heard Athena’s cries, they would think we were torturing her. She screamed and shouted, and pulled her finger away. The ring slipped back.
I suggested we ring the emergency services. The hospital nearby said that we could take her there so that they have a look, but our best bet would be to take her to a jeweller’s in the morning to have the ring cut.
I thought that if hot water didn’t work, cold water might. I filled a bowl of cold water and put it on a chair by her bed. By that time Yusef was awake too.
“Why didn’t you get up then?” I asked him.
“I thought she felt sick but couldn’t and was trying to.” Yusef, just like me, has got a thing about seeing people get sick.
“So you thought you’d lie low, eh?” I joked. He pulled the sheet over his face, probably smiling.
Hossein came into the room. “Does the fire brigade deal with that sort of thing?”
I thought of cats high up on trees and a nervous laughter came all over me; but it might work. Hossein got on the phone again and thankfully, in a few minutes all four of us were in the local Fire Brigade Station.
The young man there thought this was a piece of cake. He brought his First Aid kit over and took out a contraption that slides under a ring; a lever on top of it is turned, cutting the ring through. He struggled with this for a few minutes but he only managed a minute chip at the edge of the ring.
“What metal is this, lady?” he asked me.
“Titanium, I think.” A metal that up to now I had not given much thought to. As hard as steel. Why do they make jewellery out of this? Good for handcuffs, I bet.
The young man went out and called his superior, a surly man in his fifties with a paunch and two chunky agate rings on his right hand.
“Don’t worry, sister,” he told Athena. “We’ll have it out in no time.” He brought a thin metal file and a circular saw. Athena looked at me terrified.
“It’s OK, don’t worry,” the man reassured her. He sent the younger officer out, who returned with a plastic pail and a washing liquid bottle filled with water. Then they set to work: he slid the metal file under the ring, squashing Athena’s finger even more. The saw struggled to cut the metal, firing sparks in all directions. The young man kept pouring water over Athena’s finger to prevent it from burning. Once or twice Athena pulled her hand away, but was told to sit still. I’ve got to hand it to her, she is impeccable in front of strangers.
Eventually a deep ridge was cut in the ring but the innermost part, near the finger, was still joined. The officer put the saw away and pulled at the sides of the ring with two pincers; after a lot of effort he managed to ease the ring apart, enough for the finger to be freed.
We all breathed a sigh of relief.
Athena’s finger got two long blisters, which have now dried and turned into dark red lines, a memento of an unpleasant experience that will, like many memories, turn to a story in the years to come.
Friday, 30 May 2008
Storm
After a few hot days, the evening before last Tehran was covered in thick, grey cloud. Eventually an intense electric storm broke out, lasting for hours into the night. It was spectacular: the whole of the sky was torn by lightning, the thunder rolled from the east and in a second echoed from the west.
The storm raged until the small hours of the morning: at about 3.15 am I woke up with the sensation of water being sprayed on my face but it wasn’t a dream. The wind blew so hard on the curtains that they almost touched the ceiling and the rain was driven through the mosquito net on the window inside the room and on my bed! The carpet under the window was soaked.
The morning after the Alborz mountains looked blue and clear, like a picture postcard.
The storm raged until the small hours of the morning: at about 3.15 am I woke up with the sensation of water being sprayed on my face but it wasn’t a dream. The wind blew so hard on the curtains that they almost touched the ceiling and the rain was driven through the mosquito net on the window inside the room and on my bed! The carpet under the window was soaked.
The morning after the Alborz mountains looked blue and clear, like a picture postcard.
Wednesday, 21 May 2008
Good News (fingers crossed)
My book Among the Iranians has been under consideration by the North America branch of a British publisher for the last fourteen months. After a change in personnel and my proposal going astray, I now have some good news: two days ago the publishers rang me from Boston. It seems that they are considering it very seriously and indicated that it would make a difference if I could meet the owner of the company in London, so I am trying to arrange a short trip to London in the middle of June in the hope that this should clinch the deal.
At Last!
Three days ago we got an ADSL internet connection, so there goes my excuse for not updating this blog more often! Still, the procrastinator in me will find something else soon.
Thursday, 24 April 2008
Meditatio Mortis
Last Saturday, 19 April, was our twentieth wedding anniversary. Long ago we had decided to buy new wedding bands to commemorate the anniversary, so last Monday we went to the Grand Bazaar of Tehran to look for a pair of simple wedding bands.
The Grand Bazaar of Tehran is a warren of covered narrow alleys developed over the years into a maze. I only know two entrances and can come out the same way, but those who work there seem to know it like the back of their hand. In the middle there is a mosque, formerly known as the Shah’s mosque, with the gems bazaar and a jeweller’s alley nearby. This gem bazaar is my favourite destination and a pole of attraction for foreign tourists, who come here in search of agate and turquoise rings, gem worry beads, antique silver jewellery and small decorative items made of lapis lazuli and other semi-precious stones.
Similar traders are grouped together in the alleys: once when I went in search of black fabric, I managed to end up in an alley selling only black chador fabrics. The quality and the price range was simply amazing: I never thought there would be so much variety in what seems to be, simply, a black covering.
So Hossein and I went into the underground main gold bazaar, specialising in wedding rings, second hand jewellery and gold coins (we came across an Elizabeth II gold sovereign, retailing at about £170 at today’s prices). The current fashion in wedding rings is white gold with little diamonds for both men and women. Row after row of shops displayed a variety of this theme: a mix of shiny and matt gold, some D-shaped, some rounded squares, some angular, but almost all of them set with diamonds. But no simple wedding bands anywhere.
We came out of the underground bazaar and went into the alley next to the gems bazaar. Same thing all along. We were beginning to consider buying silver rings, when I saw exactly what we were after. We went in. The amazing thing was that there were two identical rings in their tray and they were both in exactly our sizes, as if they were waiting for us.
We paid for them and came into the gems bazaar in search of an engraver’s stall. While he sat down to work engraving our names and the date of our wedding, the old man next to him offered us some peanuts. I declined the offer, but in true Iranian fashion, he insisted so much that I took the peanuts, not because I felt like eating them, but because I didn’t feel like refusing anymore (that happens to me a lot).
We then walked off in the direction of the alley selling small electrical appliances, munching on the peanuts. As Hossein was looking at a twin tea-maker, I coughed once, tried to swallow something that I felt was stuck in my throat and felt that I couldn’t draw breath. I was so short of breath I couldn’t tell Hossein what was happening. I panicked, not knowing what to do. I fanned myself with my hand; closed my eyes, which filled up with tears at the precariousness of my life, tried to calm myself. Hossein found a stool. I sat down and bent my body forward. After several deep breaths, the discomfort eased, but I wasn’t comfortable until late at night.
As I lay in bed that night trying to sleep, I remembered what Seneca called his frequent asthma attacks: Meditatio Mortis, a rehearsal of death. At least when death comes for real, I will know what to do: nothing.
The Grand Bazaar of Tehran is a warren of covered narrow alleys developed over the years into a maze. I only know two entrances and can come out the same way, but those who work there seem to know it like the back of their hand. In the middle there is a mosque, formerly known as the Shah’s mosque, with the gems bazaar and a jeweller’s alley nearby. This gem bazaar is my favourite destination and a pole of attraction for foreign tourists, who come here in search of agate and turquoise rings, gem worry beads, antique silver jewellery and small decorative items made of lapis lazuli and other semi-precious stones.
Similar traders are grouped together in the alleys: once when I went in search of black fabric, I managed to end up in an alley selling only black chador fabrics. The quality and the price range was simply amazing: I never thought there would be so much variety in what seems to be, simply, a black covering.
So Hossein and I went into the underground main gold bazaar, specialising in wedding rings, second hand jewellery and gold coins (we came across an Elizabeth II gold sovereign, retailing at about £170 at today’s prices). The current fashion in wedding rings is white gold with little diamonds for both men and women. Row after row of shops displayed a variety of this theme: a mix of shiny and matt gold, some D-shaped, some rounded squares, some angular, but almost all of them set with diamonds. But no simple wedding bands anywhere.
We came out of the underground bazaar and went into the alley next to the gems bazaar. Same thing all along. We were beginning to consider buying silver rings, when I saw exactly what we were after. We went in. The amazing thing was that there were two identical rings in their tray and they were both in exactly our sizes, as if they were waiting for us.
We paid for them and came into the gems bazaar in search of an engraver’s stall. While he sat down to work engraving our names and the date of our wedding, the old man next to him offered us some peanuts. I declined the offer, but in true Iranian fashion, he insisted so much that I took the peanuts, not because I felt like eating them, but because I didn’t feel like refusing anymore (that happens to me a lot).
We then walked off in the direction of the alley selling small electrical appliances, munching on the peanuts. As Hossein was looking at a twin tea-maker, I coughed once, tried to swallow something that I felt was stuck in my throat and felt that I couldn’t draw breath. I was so short of breath I couldn’t tell Hossein what was happening. I panicked, not knowing what to do. I fanned myself with my hand; closed my eyes, which filled up with tears at the precariousness of my life, tried to calm myself. Hossein found a stool. I sat down and bent my body forward. After several deep breaths, the discomfort eased, but I wasn’t comfortable until late at night.
As I lay in bed that night trying to sleep, I remembered what Seneca called his frequent asthma attacks: Meditatio Mortis, a rehearsal of death. At least when death comes for real, I will know what to do: nothing.
Monday, 14 April 2008
Language School
As luck would have it, Athena’s English teacher at the Adaptive School suggested that she be entered for the PET Cambridge Examination. The Director of the language institute and examination centre (who turned out to be a fellow UCL alumnus) asked if I would like to teach there.
And so it happened that last Sunday I started teaching two groups, the first about six months away from the KET examination and a young Flyers group, both of them with seven students.
Before I started, I thought that all students would be children and I was a little bit nervous because I have never taught primary age students. But on Sunday I found out that the KET group is made up of adults (one law student, one accountancy student, a 35 year old biologist, a writer) and two high school girls.
The young Flyers group is made up of seven 9 or 10 year-old girls, who according to Iranian school culture, stand up ever time they addressed by the teacher. I didn’t realise why they were doing that to begin with: when the first one stood up I though she was about to ask for permission to go out. But no: she answered the question and sat back down. I was very impressed by both groups, but especially by the little ones. They were all keen to speak, despite making mistakes, which is not the experience I have with older learners. About five of the girls said that they started learning English at nursery!
Which goes on to show, catch them young.
And so it happened that last Sunday I started teaching two groups, the first about six months away from the KET examination and a young Flyers group, both of them with seven students.
Before I started, I thought that all students would be children and I was a little bit nervous because I have never taught primary age students. But on Sunday I found out that the KET group is made up of adults (one law student, one accountancy student, a 35 year old biologist, a writer) and two high school girls.
The young Flyers group is made up of seven 9 or 10 year-old girls, who according to Iranian school culture, stand up ever time they addressed by the teacher. I didn’t realise why they were doing that to begin with: when the first one stood up I though she was about to ask for permission to go out. But no: she answered the question and sat back down. I was very impressed by both groups, but especially by the little ones. They were all keen to speak, despite making mistakes, which is not the experience I have with older learners. About five of the girls said that they started learning English at nursery!
Which goes on to show, catch them young.
Tuesday, 8 April 2008
The Nowruz (New Year) Holiday
On Thursday 20 March 2008 at 9.18 am, at the precise moment when the earth entered the vernal equinox, spring and the new Iranian year (1387 Anno Persico, or Solar Hijri year) began.
At 9 o’clock Hossein, Athena, Yusef and I went to elder sister-in-law’s house to see the new year in. Then a long round of visits ensued, lasting the whole of the first twelve days of the year. According to the custom, first we visited Hossein’s elders, his four maternal uncles (no elders survive on his father’s side), some of his older cousins, a few friends, with some paying our visit back a few days later. In the space of these twelve days we saw people we don’t normally see throughout the year; in fact, Iranians appreciate the custom a lot, because it re-affirms familial ties that tend to loosen throughout the year, as people are busy with work and everyday life.
However, for some people this is the only time in the year they can get away from Tehran for a few days, which has three main effects: they miss out on the visiting; popular destinations like Mashhad, Shiraz, Isfahan and to a large extent all over Iran, overflow with visitors and it’s almost impossible to find accommodation unless planned well in advance. (for the third effect, see below). Even flights out of Tehran TO ALL DESTINATIONS were fully booked about six weeks before the start of the holiday. I know; I tried to book tickets to Athens. We didn’t really go anywhere over the holidays (mainly because I can’t stand the crowds) apart from visiting, a day trip to Qazvin (historic city to the west of Tehran) on the 24th and a wedding on 27th of March.
The third effect, the best of all in my opinion, is that Tehran empties of people, especially during the first week of the holiday. It took us forty minutes to reach Shabdolazim by car; on normal days it takes twice that and often more. And the weather is normally clear, the sky blue and the Alborz mountains seem so near that you think that if you stretch your arm you’ll touch them.
But this year, due to a bizarre weather phenomenon, the air was full of fine, sandy dust, blown over from the desert in mini-twisters, which filled the whole of the city and made the temperature rise to summer levels. This lasted for most of the holiday until a few days ago, when strong winds cleared the air.
This morning’s rain in Tehran meant a new veil of snow on the mountains, and more water in the summer. So we’re spared the heat for maybe another month or so.
At 9 o’clock Hossein, Athena, Yusef and I went to elder sister-in-law’s house to see the new year in. Then a long round of visits ensued, lasting the whole of the first twelve days of the year. According to the custom, first we visited Hossein’s elders, his four maternal uncles (no elders survive on his father’s side), some of his older cousins, a few friends, with some paying our visit back a few days later. In the space of these twelve days we saw people we don’t normally see throughout the year; in fact, Iranians appreciate the custom a lot, because it re-affirms familial ties that tend to loosen throughout the year, as people are busy with work and everyday life.
However, for some people this is the only time in the year they can get away from Tehran for a few days, which has three main effects: they miss out on the visiting; popular destinations like Mashhad, Shiraz, Isfahan and to a large extent all over Iran, overflow with visitors and it’s almost impossible to find accommodation unless planned well in advance. (for the third effect, see below). Even flights out of Tehran TO ALL DESTINATIONS were fully booked about six weeks before the start of the holiday. I know; I tried to book tickets to Athens. We didn’t really go anywhere over the holidays (mainly because I can’t stand the crowds) apart from visiting, a day trip to Qazvin (historic city to the west of Tehran) on the 24th and a wedding on 27th of March.
The third effect, the best of all in my opinion, is that Tehran empties of people, especially during the first week of the holiday. It took us forty minutes to reach Shabdolazim by car; on normal days it takes twice that and often more. And the weather is normally clear, the sky blue and the Alborz mountains seem so near that you think that if you stretch your arm you’ll touch them.
But this year, due to a bizarre weather phenomenon, the air was full of fine, sandy dust, blown over from the desert in mini-twisters, which filled the whole of the city and made the temperature rise to summer levels. This lasted for most of the holiday until a few days ago, when strong winds cleared the air.
This morning’s rain in Tehran meant a new veil of snow on the mountains, and more water in the summer. So we’re spared the heat for maybe another month or so.
Sunday, 9 March 2008
A Cemetery Visit
SATURDAY 8 MARCH 2008
I still continue to have problems with signing in the blog and posting new entries. I’ve finally decided to write up the entries in Word and post them whenever I’m lucky enough to be able to sign in, so you may notice that the entry date and the posting date may be out of sync. As the Iranians say, forgive me in your kindness.
Yesterday Hossein, the children, my elder sister-in-law and her family and I went to visit our dead at the Behesht-e Zahra Cemetery. Aqa jun and maman-jun, my in-laws, are buried in a two-storey grave (don’t imagine a tall grave; both storeys are below ground) with a granite gravestone level with the ground. It was a triple occasion: a Friday, the anniversary of the Holy Prophet’s death and of the third Imam’s martyrdom, so the cemetery was full of people giving out pledges of thick potage (ash) and saffron rice dessert (shollehzard).
Hossein spread a rug on the next grave and sat square-legged to read the Ar-Rahman chapter from the Holy Quran. This is a chapter about the blessings that God has given the world. A little girl came round and offered us sweets in exchange for a prayer for the dead. A little boy with torn trousers scattered wheat seeds on aqa jun’s and maman-jun’s grave. My brother-in-law gave him some money: the good deed of feeding the birds gives comfort to the souls of the departed.
Beyond a few rows of graves, a young man bent down to a grave and kissed the gravestone. Than he sat square-legged and started crying his eyes out. I listened to Hossein’s reading for a bit, and looked at the young man. The weight of the whole world on his shoulders, he remained bent over the grave, one hand spread on the gravestone as if trying to reach out to those he’s lost.
Two women with faded, patched chadors came over and exchanged hellos with us. They had known aqa-jun when he used to come to visit maman-jun’s grave every Thursday. One of them, Zahra khanum, told him that she had no heating in her room. Aqa-jun promised to get her a small gas stove she could use for cooking and heating. (Aqa-jun was an informal but well-known charity worker: many gave money or things to charity through him, as he knew many needy people and helped out whenever he could.) A few days later he brought the stove in his decrepit pick-up truck (if you haven’t read this blog since the beginning, see entry 28 July 2007) and waited for her for almost two hours at the grave to give her the stove. He was a good man, she said. May God rest his soul and give health and prosperity to his children.
I still continue to have problems with signing in the blog and posting new entries. I’ve finally decided to write up the entries in Word and post them whenever I’m lucky enough to be able to sign in, so you may notice that the entry date and the posting date may be out of sync. As the Iranians say, forgive me in your kindness.
Yesterday Hossein, the children, my elder sister-in-law and her family and I went to visit our dead at the Behesht-e Zahra Cemetery. Aqa jun and maman-jun, my in-laws, are buried in a two-storey grave (don’t imagine a tall grave; both storeys are below ground) with a granite gravestone level with the ground. It was a triple occasion: a Friday, the anniversary of the Holy Prophet’s death and of the third Imam’s martyrdom, so the cemetery was full of people giving out pledges of thick potage (ash) and saffron rice dessert (shollehzard).
Hossein spread a rug on the next grave and sat square-legged to read the Ar-Rahman chapter from the Holy Quran. This is a chapter about the blessings that God has given the world. A little girl came round and offered us sweets in exchange for a prayer for the dead. A little boy with torn trousers scattered wheat seeds on aqa jun’s and maman-jun’s grave. My brother-in-law gave him some money: the good deed of feeding the birds gives comfort to the souls of the departed.
Beyond a few rows of graves, a young man bent down to a grave and kissed the gravestone. Than he sat square-legged and started crying his eyes out. I listened to Hossein’s reading for a bit, and looked at the young man. The weight of the whole world on his shoulders, he remained bent over the grave, one hand spread on the gravestone as if trying to reach out to those he’s lost.
Two women with faded, patched chadors came over and exchanged hellos with us. They had known aqa-jun when he used to come to visit maman-jun’s grave every Thursday. One of them, Zahra khanum, told him that she had no heating in her room. Aqa-jun promised to get her a small gas stove she could use for cooking and heating. (Aqa-jun was an informal but well-known charity worker: many gave money or things to charity through him, as he knew many needy people and helped out whenever he could.) A few days later he brought the stove in his decrepit pick-up truck (if you haven’t read this blog since the beginning, see entry 28 July 2007) and waited for her for almost two hours at the grave to give her the stove. He was a good man, she said. May God rest his soul and give health and prosperity to his children.
Monday, 18 February 2008
Taxi drivers
Taxi drivers don't usually talk with female passengers, but sometimes I come up with some interesting types.
Two days ago, I got off the Mosallah metro station on my way to the publishers I do some work for. An old Paykan car (modelled on the British Hillman- remember those?) is parked outside. The battered boot bears this inscription:
"Everybody fears Death; I a dishonest friend"
I flag him down. A few minutes later we get stuck in traffic.
"Don't know where all these people are going in the middle of the day," he gripes.
"Shopping for the New Year maybe," I answer, and commit the mistake of giving away the fact that I am not Iranian. Maybe I smile too much.
"Are you foreign, lady?"
I assent, bracing myself for a round of questions.
“So what are you doing here? This is not a country fit to live in.”
“Well…I like it...your culture is interesting,” I venture.
“What’s so interesting about it? We live here because we’ve got no choice, but you?” He pauses. “Is your husband Iranian?”
“Yes, we only came seven months ago.”
“Before he gets too involved, pack up and go. This is no place for you.
Last week, I came across a really funny taxi driver; he managed to extract a free introductory tutorial on modern Greek language and culture. He asked how we say hello and good morning, whether Greeks have a special sensitivity about their wives and daughters (used to, I said, but nowadays less than before). So, we are quite similar, he concluded, and I agreed.
Imagine having to drive through this traffic all day long. One needs to find something to occupy the mind. And what I find quite remarkable is that the vast majority of drivers are SO calm. Iranians and Greeks are unlike each other in this respect at least: Greeks lose their cool very easily when they drive, as if they feel the world is out to get them and they damn and blast their way through the crowded streets. On the contrary, Iranians are mostly unruffled by traffic and by the impudent motorbike who's just shot out of a side street and cut across them without even looking. What will be, will be.
Two days ago, I got off the Mosallah metro station on my way to the publishers I do some work for. An old Paykan car (modelled on the British Hillman- remember those?) is parked outside. The battered boot bears this inscription:
"Everybody fears Death; I a dishonest friend"
I flag him down. A few minutes later we get stuck in traffic.
"Don't know where all these people are going in the middle of the day," he gripes.
"Shopping for the New Year maybe," I answer, and commit the mistake of giving away the fact that I am not Iranian. Maybe I smile too much.
"Are you foreign, lady?"
I assent, bracing myself for a round of questions.
“So what are you doing here? This is not a country fit to live in.”
“Well…I like it...your culture is interesting,” I venture.
“What’s so interesting about it? We live here because we’ve got no choice, but you?” He pauses. “Is your husband Iranian?”
“Yes, we only came seven months ago.”
“Before he gets too involved, pack up and go. This is no place for you.
Last week, I came across a really funny taxi driver; he managed to extract a free introductory tutorial on modern Greek language and culture. He asked how we say hello and good morning, whether Greeks have a special sensitivity about their wives and daughters (used to, I said, but nowadays less than before). So, we are quite similar, he concluded, and I agreed.
Imagine having to drive through this traffic all day long. One needs to find something to occupy the mind. And what I find quite remarkable is that the vast majority of drivers are SO calm. Iranians and Greeks are unlike each other in this respect at least: Greeks lose their cool very easily when they drive, as if they feel the world is out to get them and they damn and blast their way through the crowded streets. On the contrary, Iranians are mostly unruffled by traffic and by the impudent motorbike who's just shot out of a side street and cut across them without even looking. What will be, will be.
Sunday, 3 February 2008
Still Here!
The translation of the teenage novel was finished last week and now my focus is on preparing a taster session for a series of English workshops I am planning to run with a friend.
I finally got my belated copy of MSLEXIA magazine ('for women who write'; if you haven't come across it, do check it out on www.mslexia.co.uk) for Jan/Feb/Mar and I was very pleased to see they published the letter I had sent them when I read the previous copy. Here is the letter dated Dec 07:
"Dear Mslexia
Trust Mslexia to have the finger on the pulse –or is it synchronicity? I moved to Tehran last summer and I received my Oct/Nov/Dec issue only last week with its main feature on Iranian women’s literature. This issue, along with the Writer’s Diary, have been the first items I received in my new PO Box; to me, this was a message of connection at a time when I am working on a non-fiction book aimed at making Iranian everyday culture more widely known to the West. Check out my blog www.movingouteast.blogspot.com (erratically updated, thanks to good old dial-up connection and other ‘technical difficulties’).
Many thanks for a great magazine!"
Talking of the book on Iranian culture, I hope to hear from the North American branch of a British publisher, who have shown strong interest in it. The bulk of the research is now completed and I'm waiting for the offer of a contract before I get down to writing the whole thing. Fingers crossed.
More everyday news: Hossein is in London since Saturday evening but he'll be back in about two weeks. The snow is slowly melting, but we had another white night the night before last. At least the temperature is higher now, so the snow turns to mud instead of ice.
Will be back soon (that's what I always say.)
I finally got my belated copy of MSLEXIA magazine ('for women who write'; if you haven't come across it, do check it out on www.mslexia.co.uk) for Jan/Feb/Mar and I was very pleased to see they published the letter I had sent them when I read the previous copy. Here is the letter dated Dec 07:
"Dear Mslexia
Trust Mslexia to have the finger on the pulse –or is it synchronicity? I moved to Tehran last summer and I received my Oct/Nov/Dec issue only last week with its main feature on Iranian women’s literature. This issue, along with the Writer’s Diary, have been the first items I received in my new PO Box; to me, this was a message of connection at a time when I am working on a non-fiction book aimed at making Iranian everyday culture more widely known to the West. Check out my blog www.movingouteast.blogspot.com (erratically updated, thanks to good old dial-up connection and other ‘technical difficulties’).
Many thanks for a great magazine!"
Talking of the book on Iranian culture, I hope to hear from the North American branch of a British publisher, who have shown strong interest in it. The bulk of the research is now completed and I'm waiting for the offer of a contract before I get down to writing the whole thing. Fingers crossed.
More everyday news: Hossein is in London since Saturday evening but he'll be back in about two weeks. The snow is slowly melting, but we had another white night the night before last. At least the temperature is higher now, so the snow turns to mud instead of ice.
Will be back soon (that's what I always say.)
Saturday, 12 January 2008
Snowed Under
Christmas didn’t really feature much here, although we put up our tree from mid december until 6 January. The children were meant to be in school on Xmas day and New Year’s day, but Athena persuaded her other four classmates not to turn up on Christmas. Then, when children in Englsnd went back to school, it started to snow.
Tehran has been under the snow since Thursday before last, and school has been closed too, which felt like a belated New Year holiday, only enforced and unplanned. This has had an impact on my work, which is home-based, but thankfully, schools have re-opened today.
My news on the professional front: I am quite busy, and may soon be busier still with interesting things. I am doing freelance translation for a government publishing company where a friend of mine works, and who have just given me a teenage novel to translate from Persian to English. The publishers think that this novel stands a chance of doing well at an international competition.
Another friend of mine, a Clinical Psychologist, has proposed that we prepare a series of ten English workshops for Clin. Psychologists. If it proves successful , we might repeat the same pattern with different content for different groups. On the whole, and despite the negative aspects of life in Tehran (traffic, pollution and overcrowding mainly), things are much bettter than I hoped, for me at least (Diet Coke is widely available too.)
I’d love to update the blog more often, but the dial-up connection is so slow that I get fed up with it. Today luck was on my side, but, to be fair, I woke up before everyone else, before the server gets overwhelmed.
Tehran has been under the snow since Thursday before last, and school has been closed too, which felt like a belated New Year holiday, only enforced and unplanned. This has had an impact on my work, which is home-based, but thankfully, schools have re-opened today.
My news on the professional front: I am quite busy, and may soon be busier still with interesting things. I am doing freelance translation for a government publishing company where a friend of mine works, and who have just given me a teenage novel to translate from Persian to English. The publishers think that this novel stands a chance of doing well at an international competition.
Another friend of mine, a Clinical Psychologist, has proposed that we prepare a series of ten English workshops for Clin. Psychologists. If it proves successful , we might repeat the same pattern with different content for different groups. On the whole, and despite the negative aspects of life in Tehran (traffic, pollution and overcrowding mainly), things are much bettter than I hoped, for me at least (Diet Coke is widely available too.)
I’d love to update the blog more often, but the dial-up connection is so slow that I get fed up with it. Today luck was on my side, but, to be fair, I woke up before everyone else, before the server gets overwhelmed.
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