by Scott Fisher
Turkey
Once back on the train it was a short ride to the Turkish border, Turkish Immigration, and the border of ‘new Europe’. I’d enjoyed Iran, but felt oddly happy to see the NATO flag as we crossed into what could someday be the EU’s outer rim. Fortunately, immigration here was a simple matter of giving my passport to the immigration guy and getting it stamped. No forms or anything – it took all of 30 seconds.
Once cleared to proceed into Turkey, we took the train another few hours to the edge of a large lake. The Tehran-Istanbul ‘Express’ only has rail lines extending to either side of eastern Turkey’s Lake Van. To get across, everyone has to get off the train and onto a large ferry to cross the lake. The only part of the train that makes the whole journey, here carried on the ferry, is the locked luggage car.
Once at the harbor, everyone piled off our train and onto the ferry, as those heading in the opposite direction walked past us from the ferry to board hell train. Once their luggage car was taken off the ferry and ours loaded, the ship pulled into the snowy night. It was just after 10:00 p.m. and we had a five-hour crossing before rendezvousing with the Turkish train on the lake’s western side.
The first part of the crossing went fine. It was cold, and there was some snow and ice, but nothing major. We’d left the harbor an hour or so behind schedule but, considering two separate immigration stops, plus dealing with a train-to-ship transfer, everybody seemed in a good mood and pleased with our progress.
About halfway across however, while I was sprawled out over a few seats trying to catch up on my sleep, the weather took a serious turn for the worse. By the time we reached the western shore we were in a full-scale blizzard. Visibility was down to a few feet and everything outside was rapidly getting buried under ice and snow. I went out in the 3:00 a.m. darkness and almost got blown off my feet – the wind was blowing so hard the snow was horizontal. Though the ferry had been able to dock, our train was nowhere to be seen – all the drifting snow had closed the line.
I ventured back out at five and the wind was still a gale, but the lights from the oncoming train were at least visible in the distance, inching toward the harbor. By seven it was light and the storm had broken. There was well over a foot of snow on the ground, with drifts twice that high. In two hours the train had only progressed a few hundred yards and still looked to be a couple of hours away. I tried to go back to sleep but was soon woken by, of all things, a group of people singing on the ferry. I went back out at eight to find the train had closed to within 30 yards of the dock. Then I saw the reason for the hold-up – no equipment! Just four really tired guys with shovels.
Little sleep for two nights in a row, plus 10 hours trapped on a boat, had me so stir-crazy and mind-bogglingly bored that I threw on my jacket and went out to help. I relieved one of the older guys of his shovel, to his shock and extreme happiness, and started blasting through the drifts myself. Years of digging out driveways in Michigan winters suddenly came in handy in the mountains of eastern Turkey.
A Russian guy I’d gotten to know on the train, thanks to the remarkably amusing English he’d picked up from Hollywood movies, saw me and quickly pitched in as well. Twenty minutes later the track was open and everyone was finally cleared to board the new train. For the rest of the trip, among the forty or so people still sharing this journey, I went from being the crazy American guy who’d gone alone to Iran, to the strange American guy who’d shoveled the snow. More importantly, the crew on the train saw me and remembered – generating enough goodwill from them to earn me a private compartment the whole way to Istanbul.
Boarding the Turkish train was like rejoining the 21st century. It boasted separate room controls for heat and radio volume that finally allowed for the comfort and quiet I’d hoped for when booking the trip. The only sounds were the wind outside and the rhythmic clacking of the rails.
Though we arrived in Istanbul over 12 hours late, the second half of the journey proved far more pleasant. Most of my time was spent in the dining car getting to know the Iranians on the train, nearly all of whom were in Turkey as the first step to immigrating. Some were heading to Europe, others to visa interviews at the U.S. embassy in the Turkish capital of Ankara.
The ones hoping to make it to the U.S. were full of questions about life in America, prospects for immigrants, and how best to make their case to the U.S. visa officials that would decide their fate. The discussions, outside of Iran and some even with women who’d removed their head coverings, were the perfect way to find out their opinions of their government, country, and leaders. Admittedly, a select group voting with their feet by leaving the country, they still provided a lot of the background information and opinions of government sprinkled into this account. Whereas Professor had served his country well by always attempting to put Persia in the best possible light, the people on the train felt few qualms about sharing both positives and negatives.
The only time an American can travel unsupervised and un-chaperoned in Iran is on that train – and after spending so much time freely talking to the Iranians onboard I could begin to understand why. They loved their country, and would help protect it in a heartbeat if attacked, but they dislike and resent much of what their government has become, especially in the eyes of the outside world. The idea of being lumped into an axis of evil with North Korea, and former enemy Iraq, both galled and frustrated them. Unfortunately, they could do little about their own government – instead they were following in the footsteps of the tens of thousands of Iranians who’d already left for better prospects abroad. I wish them luck.
Conclusion – Lessons Learned
Back on that first morning outside of Iran, sitting on the ferry waiting for the train and trying to catch some sleep, I was suddenly awoken by a chorus of singing at once both mournful and joyous. At first I laid there with my eyes closed and listened, wondering what language I was hearing and what the songs expressed. After a few minutes, I finally stuck up my head to see who was doing the singing. It was a group I’d noticed before, 12-15 people who seemed to be traveling together, but tended to separate themselves from the rest of the Iranians.
Seeing my curious look, one of the other Iranians came over to explain, “They are Bahai. They aren’t free to practice their religion in Iran so they are leaving to immigrate to your country.”
“What are they singing?”
“They are singing about how sad they are to be leaving their home and friends but how happy they are to be going to America. I am jealous. They have visas to go to your country.”
A group of people stuck on a small ship fleeing religious persecution singing of their joy at going to America. I’m not an emotional man, but their singing gave me goose bumps. How many times in our history has that scene been re-enacted? These people weren’t coming to America to get rich or take anyone’s job, they were coming for one of the very reasons we were founded – religious freedom. Stranded on a ship far from home; hungry, cold, and tired; their singing made me feel better than I had in a long time. It’s what motivated me to get out of my seat and do something – which in this case simply meant shoveling snow to help get us off the ferry and onto the train.
As I stood there working in the snow, I thought back over my tour. Not just of Iran, but of all the axis countries. That was when I finally realized what bothers me most about the term. It’s a cheap shot, not just at the people living in the three countries, most of whom are simply victims of horrible governments, but at my grandparents. They are the ones who fought a real axis of evil in Germany, Italy, and Japan.
The current axis of evil is simply a slogan created by a politician and his speechwriter to glom on to some of the success associated with an earlier war. Iran, Iraq, and North Korea are no more an axis cooperating in a war against the U.S. than France and China are valuable allies in Iraq. The governments in Germany, Italy, and Japan enjoyed immense popular support and, in the case of Germany and Japan, represented two of the most economically and technologically
developed nations of their era. The three countries were bound by treaty and, especially in the case of Italy and Germany, actively worked together in their war against the Allies.
Contrast those three with the current axis – three governments whose main unifying elements are unpopularity, economic incompetence, and future designations as very large lumps on the ass-end of history. The only cooperation is between North Korea and Iran – a link due more to their mutual pariah status than any special confluence of national goals. The only dealings between Saddam and North Korea I’m aware of have the North accepting millions of dollars as payment for missiles they never delivered – an abject lesson in dealing with North Korea if there ever was one. As for Iran and Iraq, they spent the better part of the 1980s trying to kill each other. Baathist, Sunni, Arab Saddam hated Shia, religious, Persian Iran. The idea that those two worked together in some form of 1940s-style German-Italian axis is utterly ridiculous.
As the Iran trip wound down and I started preparing this book, I wasted a great deal of time searching for connections between the three countries. I was specifically looking for the kind of ties that could help bring together the three distinct parts of this narrative. After months of research and reflection it finally dawned on me – THERE IS NO CONNECTION!
The only tie binding these three countries is in the imagination of a politician. The countries themselves have little in common aside from suffering populaces persecuted by their own leaders. Each one is in and of itself a horrible place – there is no need, reason, or tie that lumps them together into any form of axis – especially in a way that denigrates my grandparents and the memory and sacrifices of those in their generation who fought a true axis of evil.
Scott Fisher
Aug 15, 2006
(61st Anniversary of V-J Day – the day that ended World War II)