by Stephen Orth
With my expensive camera I am also asked to snap a few photos. Men on the seats of the Jeep, women on the hood. Sensational material that would send the moral police into frenzies. Unfortunately, I will never be able to publish them.
“There’s nothing to drink, so what shall we do?” Elaheh asks the mother of all questions. We sit around on plastic chairs and eat melon and smoke miniature cigarettes called Bahman. I learn how to say “Your father is a dog” and “Eat shit” in Persian and in return teach the others a few filthy German phrases. Just because this party is forbidden doesn’t automatically mean that it’s a good one.
On the way back in the late afternoon we stop at the Venice Café, which is as close to a cozy European pub as you can get without selling alcohol. Behind the bar there are rows of bottles containing different colored liquids, not spirits but fruit syrups. The words La fortuna puì grande è trovare felicità nelle piccole cose—Happiness is enjoying the small things in life—are written in white chalk on a board. How true. At the moment I’m enjoying the aroma of a real cappuccino; at last, a coffee that’s not based on the ubiquitous Nescafé. The interior with wooden walls is so dark that the faces of the young guests are mainly illuminated by their tablets or cell phones, on which they play Castle Clash or send a few words and loads of emoticons via Viber. Viber and Telegram are the most popular communication apps because WhatsApp doesn’t always work here.
There are also pauses in our communications because we are distracted by the glare of the screens. Elaheh orders a French coffee and talks of illegal drugs. “I think, in fact, the government has nothing against them because they stop people from getting silly ideas. If you are high you don’t start a revolution.” She inhales her Bahman cigarette with obvious pleasure. “Apart from that, it’s written in the Quran that alcohol is forbidden, but there are no clear instructions about hash, opium, or heroin.”
“Aren’t you frightened of getting caught drinking?”
“It’s a game of chance; up to now I’ve been lucky.”
We again turn back to our cell phones. Elaheh studied dentistry for five years in Istanbul, was in Europe three times, knows Hamburg, Berlin, and Münster. Her father is a banker, her mother is a biologist, and they share an apartment. In Europe she would be considered to have high potential. In Mashhad, the second-largest city in Iran, she can’t find a job. “At the moment I’m assisting a bit in a dental practice just for the experience; I don’t earn anything.”
Elaheh has two siblings, a brother who is an engineer and a sister who is a doctor. Both moved away long ago and now live in the U.S. Probably she will soon follow them abroad. Like so many people who are highly educated she has no prospects in her home country, and on top of that, she has had bad experiences with Iranian men. “Most of them are interested in only two things: money and pornography,” says Elaheh.
A friend of hers joins us—who is as plump as he is chirpy—businessman Mehdi, who deals in electronic parts and fittings. He speaks perfect English, because he lived for a number of years in Toronto, and talks nineteen to the dozen. He tells us about an Arabian prince who bought golden light switches from him, about the Italian ambassador in Tehran who is much more relaxed than his stuffy German equivalent, about a crash landing a few days ago in the eastern Iranian city of Zahedan and the friend who survived it, about the electronic trade fair in Frankfurt that he visited in March. And about Mashhad.
“My friends in Tehran think that Mashhad is boring because of all the religious fanatics, but it’s not true. There is everything here that you could want: parties, good cafés, everything. As long as you avoid Haram, the area where the shrine is, you can live well here.”
Mehdi is not interested in religious destinations; for him there are far more interesting alternatives. “From time to time I make a pilgrimage to Amsterdam. Last year I took a couple magic mushrooms and went to the flower show at Keukenhof—that was incredible. For two days I only wandered around with sunglasses.” Enlightenment for all: Muslims make pilgrimages to the shrine in Mashhad and nonreligious Mashhadis make pilgrimages to Dutch coffee shops.
LOST IN VISA APPLICATION
I’M NOT SURE whether Imam Reza heard my request for a visa extension. The necessary stamp didn’t materialize in my passport overnight, so the next morning I take a cab to the Foreign Affairs Office to be grilled in a plain waiting room by a small man in a fine gray suit.
“Why do you want to extend your stay here?” he asks, his tone implying that I had asked him whether he needed a naked cleaner for his apartment.
“I love traveling in Iran; I like it very much here.” One of the few sentences in the ensuing hours that is the complete truth.
“What are you doing in Mashhad?” he demands.
“Visiting the holy shrine.”
“Where did you get the first extension?”
“In Kerman.”
“What did you do there?”
“I made a tour of the Kaluts in the desert. I’m interested in the whole country; I want to see as much of Iran as possible,” I say, trying to win him over.
“Then you should do it in twenty days.” He stabs the date in my original visa with his index finger to emphasize his point.
“So I can’t extend it here?”
“Go to the police station, Imam Reza Street 1, and ask there.”
He turns away. He seems to have decided that our conversation is over. I take a cab to Imam Reza Street.
The cab driver must have misunderstood me. He lets me out at a tiny police post at a roundabout, where two weary policemen are keeping watch. There’s no way that they will have a visa extension stamp in the drawer of their desk, is there? Well at least it’s the right street. I suppose I could ask them where the main police station is, but it all seems a bit odd. If you can’t renew a visa in the Foreign Affairs Office, how on Earth would it be possible here? And isn’t a voluntary visit to the Iranian police something that a multiple lawbreaker simply has to avoid?
I walk down a street that consists almost solely of hotels and souvenir stores. Studio photos of kids grotesquely spruced up, using Photoshop to embed them in front of the Reza shrine dome, seem to be very popular.
On a corner I see the Aria Travel Agency sign and buy a bus ticket for the next day to a town on the Caspian Sea. Then I ask about the prospects of getting a visa extension. The boss himself offers his help and grabs the telephone to make inquiries.
“Impossible,” he then says.
“Impossible? In Mashhad or in all of Iran?”
“In the whole country. But you could go to another office and talk to the people there.”
“Do you think it’s worth it?”
“If you ask me, no chance. Big problem.”
“And at the police station?”
“No, they can’t speak English. I’ll write down the address of another visa office.”
“And they will understand me?”
“Yes, but it’s still absolutely inconceivable that you will get an extension to your visa.”
Back on the street I hold the paper with the address under a cab driver’s nose. After twenty minutes he stops outside a green wall in a side street off Piruzi Boulevard. “Edareh-ye Gozarnameh,” he says, the name of the office that the man in the travel agency gave me. A narrow entrance leads to a courtyard with wood-paneled reception huts, and a couple armed soldiers walk around busily. The counter clerk greets me with a radiant smile.
“Hello, where do you come from?” he asks.
“Germany.”
“Ooh, Germany! Welcome to Mashhad! You probably want your visa extended. Please go into the main building, turn left, and speak to my friend!” I am so surprised by the friendly reception that I almost drop my passport.
The “friend” in the next room carries on where the other left off.
“How are you?”
“Fine, thanks.”
What can I do for you?”
“I’d like to extend my visa.”
<
br /> “Okay, fill out this form. How long is your visa valid?”
“Another five days.”
“Okay.”
“How long will the formalities take?”
“Roughly five days.”
“Oh, I’m traveling on tomorrow. Is there not a possibility of speeding things up?”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
The warmth of the official is in stark contrast to the austere waiting room ambience of his office. Please don’t ask unnecessary questions to save the time of the staff and other customers is written on a poster. Another shows a portrait of Ayatollah Khamenei with the words: If the leader order, we attack. If want our head, we grant our head. A third poster is all about information for foreigners wanting to marry Iranian women: Please respect the valid laws, otherwise expect prison sentences from one to three years.
I fill out the form. German address, name of father, reason for travel (tourism), profession (website editor), Hotel (Al-Naby. It was the first hotel listed in Lonely Planet). I give the piece of paper to a third official in a neighboring room, where a glass pane, with a tiny slit to pass the forms through, separates the applicant from the clerks. Above it there is an LED display with the calling numbers .167. 199. 267. A loud ping accompanies each new illuminated number.
“Is it possible to have it dealt with today?” I ask.
“I will check.” Two minutes later: “It could be possible, particularly as you are German. We like the Germans.” A slim man in military uniform, he glances at my application. “What a coincidence; I’m also a website editor. Which programming language do you use?”
“I write the content; I don’t program.” Now it’s getting tricky.
“Who do you work for?”
“I’m freelance and do advertising. For museums and cultural institutions.” He seems satisfied.
“Are you single?” is his next question.
“Yes,” I answer, too nervous about my Münchhausen job description to find the question adequately disconcerting.
“Excuse me, this isn’t an official question, but how tall are you?”
“6” 2‧.”
“Exactly as tall as me! We have a lot in common! How much do you earn a month?” So much for Please avoid unnecessary questions.
A fourth official joins us. Obviously, I’m the high point of an otherwise uneventful day.
“Hamburg! Mahdavikia!” he says.
“Ali Daei! Ali Karimi!” I respond. Party mood at the visa office. If it goes on like this, we will all become Facebook friends and meet up later for a couple beers. But back to business. A colleague returns with my application. “We have to translate it into Persian. Could you fill in the hotel address.” I copy the address from the guidebook in capital letters. Molla Hashem Lane, not far from the shrine. Imam Reza, please extend my visa. “Take a seat. You will be called.”
A number of different things go through your head while waiting in an Iranian government agency after having told a few half-truths. Hopefully they don’t call my phony hotel. Why didn’t I just say I was a student instead of a website editor, like Yasmin did at the police station in Kurdistan? What do I tell them if they google my name and discover that I work for a large news site and not for a little museum? So many questions. At least one of the other posters gives me some hope: Patience is the key to success and prosperity comes to those who wait.
Time and again I hear the thump of stamps, but none of them on my passport.
“Mr. Stephan,” is suddenly announced. I go to the counter, to an official I haven’t yet seen. The bucket seat is fixed at ninety degrees to the window so that it isn’t too comfortable.
The man looks at me with a serious face and says: “Hmm.” Pause. My passport is in his right hand. “We have a problem,” he continues.
Stay cool, don’t forget to breathe, look unsuspicious. “What kind of problem?” I ask.
“You were in Kerman and extended your visa there. We have to investigate that more thoroughly. You can come again on Wednesday.” That is in three days.
“But I have a bus ticket for tomorrow.”
“Hmm. Take a seat.”
Patience is the key to success. Patience is the key to success. Patience. In Lonely Planet I read: “Mashhad is not the best place to extend visas.” I sit there for 1 hour, 1.5 hours.
Thumping stamps, blinking three-digit numbers, groggy brain. Ping, 188. If the leader orders, we attack. Ping, 211. Mahdavikia. Ping, 286. Are you single? Ping, 189. We like Germans. Ping, 212. In Kerman they smoke opium so that plane passengers in the air overhead can get high. Ping, 190. Patience is the key to success.
“Mr. Stephan!” I almost miss hearing my name. I go to the counter. The 6”2’ website editor passes me my passport—with a stamp valid until May 28, 2014, four extra weeks. “Please sign here. Goodbye!”
GREEN, WHITE, RED
THE LONG-DISTANCE BUS edges through the traffic jam on the outskirts of the city, where hundreds of Iranian flags and green, white, and red lights decorate the fringe of the highway. Three colors: green for belief, red for the blood of martyrs, and wedged in between, white for peace and friendship. A sword emblem with four crescent moons, stylized representations of the name of God, are emblazoned on the white background, as if to show that, when in doubt, weapons and Allah are more important than peace. But what kind of country is it really, over which this flag flies?
For me it is a country that enchants and enrages me at the same time. It enchants because there are such magical places, like Yazd, Shiraz, or Isfahan, and the countryside is magnificent, and because the warmth of the people is unique in the world. It enrages me because a state religion is imposed on the people without giving them a free choice. Because there are not enough opportunities for the young to make something of their lives. Because it is a rich country with gigantic oil and gas reserves, but most people have not benefited from them. They are like Cassim in the cave of treasures in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, surrounded by riches but trapped.
In Mashhad I experienced the contrast between the two Irans, the two realities that coexist side by side, particularly strongly. On the one hand, the theocracy, where people mourn their martyr at the golden cage in the imam mausoleum. And on the other, a “hide-and-seek-ocracy,” where people hold secret parties and seek worldly thrills instead of spiritual bliss.
I have visited numerous countries on all continents and nowhere have I experienced a stronger difference between public show and private reality.
And nowhere have I experienced such a pronounced culture of making do—they navigate as expertly around the laws as an Iranian driver through traffic jams.
Satellite dishes are forbidden, but in some neighborhoods you see them attached to every house. Tight women’s clothing and headscarves perched high on the head are against regulations, but in the afternoons in parks of Tehran or Shiraz they are omnipresent. Facebook is forbidden, but every person under forty uses it. And increasingly, older people, too, even Ayatollah Khamenei and President Rouhani. Both are also active on Twitter, which is blocked in Iran.
Outside it is night. Every now and then we pass the lights of towns and villages—Qushan, Shirvan, Gorgan. Patriotic monuments on roundabouts, martyr paintings on concrete walls, portraits of the bearded leaders. Every town is plastered with propaganda from the Islamic Republic. How many people living behind windows secretly long for a different regime? How many are happy with life in the only Shiite nation in the world? And how many are living in fear of their own government?
The bus conductor, a man around fifty, with a mustache and baggy jeans, asks to see my ticket. I pass it to him. He points to my Adidas sunglasses. “How much?” he wants to know. Unasked, he then explains the difficulties of being a Muslim. “No whiskey, no beer, no digi digi.” What he means by the latter he shows me by pushing his right index finger in and out of the ring made from his left index finger and thumb. “Go Thailand, China—digi digi no problem for Muslim.” Again the gesture, t
hen he moves on to the next passenger.
People who think Iran is a country of prudes are wrong. In religious programs on TV they go into great detail about the torment of male abstinence. Men are seen as wild beasts who can hardly control their sexual energies. An extremely comfortable perspective for those with the Y chromosome because then it is up to the women not to provoke them. If they do so, then they have to face the consequences. The obvious question of why such easily corruptible beasts have the last word in all matters is not asked in the Islamic Republic.
At the moment, a video clip from a popular TV talk show is a hit (also among the younger generation, who think of it as a curiosity and pass it around on their cell phones). In the clip Ayatollah Khamenei demands Iranians procreate. “Every couple should have five children, even better eight or fourteen,” says the supreme leader, sitting in front of an image of a mosque. “Start today! Say ‘Ya Ali’ and ‘Ya Zahra’ and get going! “Ya Ali”—“In the name of Ali”—is a phrase that is often used before performing difficult tasks or unpleasant duties. Imagine the U.S. president giving such a pep talk to the nation on the Ellen DeGeneres Show.
The film on the onboard TV is somewhat more innocent. It is about a rich guy who falls in love with a poor thief. The family is against the match, but with a bit of shrewdness and some histrionics she is eventually able to win over everybody and outmaneuver her wealthy but boring rival. “Iranian films always have a happy ending,” an acquaintance from Tehran once told me. “Because the reality is already bad enough.”
ABBAS ABAD
Population: 11,256
Province: Mazandran
FUN
THE MOST BRAZEN character I meet in all my travels in Iran is fifty-three, has a mustache and a khaki vest, and is named Mohamed. His nickname, with which he signs off his e-mails, suits him far better: “Funman.” We meet in front of an ice cream parlor in Abbas Abad, a small town on the Caspian Sea, which consists mostly of a main street and the rows of houses bordering it.