Among the Ruins

by Ausma Zehanat Khan

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  For the green birds of June.

  Don’t give up, don’t give in—you are many.

  For Nader, who hopes one day to return.

  For my Iranian family, who share the dignity and beauty

  of their culture with ceaseless generosity.

  And for Sane, whose father asked us to remember.

  May you and the others find justice and peace.

  A Time Line of Modern Iran

  1905–1911

  After a promising beginning, Iran’s Constitutional Revolution is thwarted by Russian and British intrigue. With some democratic concessions, the Qajar Dynasty emerges as Iran’s preeminent power. The ideals of this democratic moment remain a reference point for democracy advocates in Iran throughout the twentieth century.

  1925

  Reza Khan, a military officer in Persia’s Cossack Brigade, names himself Shah of Persia after staging a coup against the Qajar Dynasty. His authoritarian rule is characterized by an ambitious campaign to modernize the country, similar to the secularizing and modernizing polices of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk in Turkey.

  1935

  Persia is officially renamed Iran. By the mid-1930s, political dissent against the Shah’s authoritarian policies begins to emerge.

  1941

  Reza Shah declares Iran a neutral power during the Second World War, but his refusal to break ties with Germany leads to his ouster by Allied forces. Russia and Britain jointly occupy Iran. Reza Shah’s son, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, succeeds to the throne. Parliament is allowed to function and civil society is revitalized. With the backing of the Great Powers, a brief period of political opening begins.

  1951

  Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh is democratically elected. Mossadegh attempts to nationalize the British-owned oil industry. He is removed from power by the Shah, but regains office through an outpouring of popular support. Mohammad Reza Shah exits Iran. Iran’s confrontation with Britain leads to an economic blockade.

  1953

  A CIA coup topples the Mossadegh government. Mohammad Reza Shah returns to Iran. A new pro-Western, modernizing authoritarian regime emerges. Iran’s second democratic opening of the twentieth century comes to an end.

  1957

  American and Israeli intelligence officers work with Mohammad Reza Shah to set up SAVAK, an Iranian intelligence organization later blamed for the torture and execution of thousands of political prisoners.

  1963

  The Shah implements “The White Revolution,” an aggressive campaign of social and economic Westernization that is met with intense popular opposition. Popular religious nationalist Ayatollah Khomeini is arrested and sent into exile, in one of many crackdowns on the Shah of Iran’s opponents. By the late 1960s, the Shah relies regularly on SAVAK to quell political dissent.

  1976

  In one of a series of reforms that alienates a largely religious populace, the Shah replaces the Islamic calendar with an “imperial” calendar, dated from the founding of the Persian Empire. The Shah’s close alliance with the West is buttressed by growing corruption, and together with widespread political repression undermines the legitimacy of his rule.

  1978

  Mass demonstrations and strikes erupt in response to the Shah’s rule. Martial law is imposed.

  1979

  January 16 The Shah flees Iran amid intensifying unrest.

  February 1 Ayatollah Khomeini returns from his exile in France. He emerges as the leader of the revolution.

  April 1 After a national referendum, Iran declares itself an “Islamic Republic.”

  November 4 Students storm the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, taking fifty-two Americans hostage. They demand that the Shah return from the United States to face trial in Iran. Khomeini applauds their actions. A crisis is ignited between the United States and Iran.

  1980

  April The United States and Iran sever diplomatic ties over the hostage crisis. The U.S. Embassy becomes a training ground for the Revolutionary Guards Corps.

  July Mohammad Reza Shah dies in exile in Egypt.

  September Iraq invades Iran. The eight-year war that follows claims more than a million lives on both sides.

  1981

  American hostages are released after 444 days of captivity. Supporters of Khomeini win the post-revolutionary power struggle, and take full control of the country.

  1985

  The United States covertly seeks to sell arms to Iran in exchange for the release of hostages held by Iran-backed militants in Lebanon, prompting the Iran-Contra scandal.

  1988

  Iran accepts United Nations Security Council Resolution 598, leading to a cease-fire in the Iran-Iraq War.

  1989

  February Indian author Salman Rushdie’s book The Satanic Verses causes uproar among fundamentalist Muslims, and Ayatollah Khomeini places a fatwa (religious edict) on the writer, calling his book “blasphemous against Islam.” A three-million-dollar bounty is placed on Rushdie’s head.

  June Khomeini dies. An elected body of senior clerics known as the Assembly of Experts chooses the outgoing president of the Islamic Republic, Ali Khamenei, to succeed Khomeini as Iran’s Supreme Leader.

  August Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, the speaker of the National Assembly, becomes president of Iran.

  1993

  Rafsanjani wins re-election.

  1995

  The United States imposes oil and trade sanctions on Iran, accusing Iran of sponsoring terrorism, committing human rights abuses, and seeking to sabotage the Arab-Israeli peace process.

  1997

  Political reformer, Mohammad Khatami, is elected to Iran’s presidency in a landslide victory. Khatami promises social and economic reforms.

  2000

  Pro-reform candidates and allies of President Khatami win 189 of the 290 seats in parliament, setting the stage for reformers to control the legislature for the first time since the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

  2001

  President Khatami wins re-election. Conservatives begin a crackdown on the Reform Movement through their control of the courts and the Revolutionary Guards Corps.

  2002

  In his January State of the Union speech, American President George W. Bush refers to Iran as part of an “axis of evil,” accusing Iran of pursuing weapons of mass destruction. The speech is met with anger in Iran.

  2003

  Iran admits to plutonium production, but the International Atomic Energy Agency finds no evidence of the development of nuclear weapons. Iran agrees to rigorous U.N. inspections of nuclear facilities.

  2004

  Conservatives reclaim control of Iran’s parliament after controversial elections are boycotted by reformists. The new Iranian government declares its intention of restarting a nuclear program.

  2005

  Hardline mayor of Tehran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, campaigns as a champion of the poor and pledges to return t
o the values of the 1979 Revolution. He defeats one of Iran’s elder statesmen in the presidential election.

  2007

  The United States announces new economic sanctions targeted at Iran’s military and its disputed nuclear program.

  2009

  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is declared the landslide victor in presidential elections, sparking protests by supporters of reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who was widely expected to win. The Green Movement is launched and protests rock Iran for the next six months. Severe repression and mass arrests crush the movement.

  2010

  Iran’s relationship with the international community deteriorates further over its nuclear program. Additional international sanctions are imposed.

  2011

  Fearing the spread of the Arab Spring, the Iranian regime places Green Movement leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi, Zahra Rahnavard, and Mehdi Karroubi under house arrest. The regime welcomes popular revolt in Bahrain, Egypt, and Tunisia but opposes it in Syria, where it backs Assad’s rule.

  2013

  Hassan Rouhani is elected on a reformist platform that promises to end Iran’s hostile relationship with the West. Nuclear negotiations between Iran and the P5 + 1 begin. Civil society restrictions are slightly eased.

  2015

  A nuclear agreement is reached. Sanctions against Iran are gradually lifted, but Iranian hardliners crack down on civil society. Iran’s Supreme Leader rejects diplomatic relations with the United States. Leaders of the Green Movement remain under house arrest.

  Who killed these youngsters in their own country? I wish they would answer.

  Parvin Fahimi, mother of Sohrab Arabi

  Killed June 15, 2009, age 19

  1

  esfahan nesf-e jahan.

  Esfahan is half the world. Wouldn’t you agree, Inspector Khattak? You’ve been in my city for weeks now, abandoning the urgency of Tehran for Esfahan’s twilight peace. Exploring its attractions, ambling along its boulevards, pausing to read in the gardens of Chahar Bagh. How many times have I seen you under the plane trees, a book in your hands, occasionally lifting your head into the wind? I thought you were reading in your own language, perhaps making a study of a tour book that would tell you about the secret passages behind the Grand Mosque, or the Shaking Minarets of Junban. But when I drew closer, I saw you had set yourself a more delicate task, taking your time to uncover the mysteries of the great Persian poets. But not Rumi for you, no. He’s too often misquoted by too many would-be Sufis. And if we’re honest with each other, as I hope we will always be, English translations are so utterly without grace, so empty of any meaning. I knew a man of your reputation could not be content with translations of Rumi, so I thought, perhaps Sadi or Hafiz? It is Hafiz who extends the invitation, after all: I lay my wings as a bridge.

  Yes, Inspector Khattak, think of these letters as a bridge. Between my world and yours, between my thoughts and yours, between my suffering and your unattainable freedom. If you had a taste for irony, you would conclude we are bound up together, chained.

  But you aren’t reading Hafiz either. You’ve brought your own book, you travel your own closed circuit. You carry the words of our exiles, a dangerous book to carry on your person—but so many books are dangerous in Iran, so many paragraphs treason, these letters I write to you folly. Hide them for they will condemn us.

  Don’t be frightened, Inspector Khattak. I can’t be anything but glad that you’ve come—come to take up my burden—

  You will soon have a story to tell.

  2

  The small town of Varzaneh was a two-hour bus ride from the imperial capital of Esfahan. The bus wound through sand dunes along a rugged road, the early morning light describing the dunes in dust-pink whorls. Esa had been told to visit Varzaneh by Nasih, the proprietor of his guesthouse in Esfahan.

  “I see you in the teahouses or gardens all day,” Nasih said. “You need a change of scene. There are places to visit nearby, but if you want to see something a little different, take the bus to Varzaneh, and visit the Salt Lake. You’ll like the pigeon towers, and you must walk along the Old Bridge. The people are friendly, though only a few may understand your Persian.”

  Esa smiled.

  “Is my Farsi as unintelligible as that?”

  “You have an accent,” Nasih said. “I can’t place it, but I like it. Go.” And then surprising Khattak with his knowledge of the English proverb, “A change is as good as a rest.”

  So Khattak had found himself on the first bus out of Esfahan, bumping along the eastern road to a town that seemed as if the desert had swallowed it up and spit it back out again, the dun-colored dwellings absorbed into the surrounding terrain. He had dutifully listened to the guide’s explanation of Varzaneh’s attractions: its history of Zoroastrianism, its faithful adherence to the middle Persian language, the craftsmanship of women skilled in weaving the traditional tablecloth of the sofreh.

  “You must go down to the river, you will see them laying the sofreh out.”

  Khattak had visited the six-hundred-year-old Jame Masjid first, standing beneath the minaret the guide had boasted of, its sand-colored brick rising to a height of sixty-five feet, over the old town and dunes. At its summit, the diamond-patterned brickwork was interrupted by a pair of loudspeakers, out of place in this desert setting. Some distance from the spire, the blue dome made a modest statement, patterns of desert and sky echoed in the old mosque’s architecture and in the inlaid tilework of the blue mihrab.

  Khattak paused to read the inscription surrounding the mihrab. Shah Rukh, the son of Tamerlane the conqueror, had captured Esfahan in 1417, inscribing his plea for heirs on the mihrab’s blue kashani tiles. When Esa finished reading, he noticed a screen of tiny, symmetrical crosses reflecting a pattern on the floor, the crosses picked out against a wash of light.

  As he turned, two women in white chadors stepped over the pattern, the crosses mottling the fabric of their shawls. It was an arresting image—the blue mihrab, the sandy walls, the rose-gold crosses on a field of white. It took him a moment to realize the women had turned from the screen to face him, the dials of their faces framed by their shawls.

  The woman on the left stared back at him, her dark eyes huge in a clear, young face. She was indescribably lovely with high arched brows and softly flushed cheeks, but he was struck most by an impression of sorrow.

  She’s damaged, he thought. And just as quickly, I haven’t come here to solve anyone’s problems but my own.

  He didn’t know what prompted the thought. The woman didn’t speak to him, didn’t ask for anything, but neither did she look away, as if the space between them was weighted with intangible desires. She was looking at him, he couldn’t be sure she was seeing him.

  He transferred his gaze to her companion. She might have been in her twenties, though it was difficult to tell with the enveloping chador that left her face half-hidden. She smiled at him, her glance bold and inquisitive, her eyes and lips tilted up at the corners, a cast to her features that hinted at an impish nature. There was a beauty mark beside her left eyebrow, and underneath this a tiny sickle-shaped scar.

  The call to the mid-day prayer sounded. He remembered his manners and glanced away, murmuring a greeting. The women murmured back, one reaching for the other’s hand. They disappeared down a narrow arcade, their figures diminishing under a succession of arches, elegant in their simplicity. He wasn’t thinking of the arches, or the light or the splendid mihrab.

  He was left with the impression of dolorous eyes.

  * * *

  Later, in the chaikhaneh teahouse across from the mosque, Esa drank tea from a gold-rimmed glass, a sugar cube between his teeth. He liked strong, milky chai, but he’d learned to adapt in the weeks he’d spent in Iran. He could hear the muted sound of the river rushing past, a gently throbbing loneliness. He felt the welling sweetness of the air against his face, and wanted nothing more than to relax into its embrace. But he knew why he’d followe
d Nasih’s advice and come to Varzaneh. He was seeking a distraction from the letter.

  You will soon have a story to tell.

  It read to him like a threat. He’d had a sense of being watched, the letter confirmed it. Someone was following him through the streets of Esfahan, someone who’d come close enough to read the title of the book he carried in his pocket. He’d felt the shadow of a watcher ever since he’d arrived in Esfahan three weeks ago. He’d assumed it was an official minder, sent to act as his detail by a member of the Iranian government, even though he’d applied for a tourist visa with his Pakistani passport, instead of his Canadian one. He’d claimed an interest in making a pilgrimage to various sites of worship, and paid for a tour visiting the cities of Mashhad, Qom, and Shiraz. Esfahan, the city of poets, philosophers, pilgrims, and kings, had been last on his list. He’d thought to reflect on his experiences in the city’s peaceful gardens, but the arrival of the letter had changed that.

  Nasih had brought him a book on the Alborz Mountains, written in Farsi, the Persian language. Esa’s name was printed in a small, neat hand on the cover leaf. Pleased and surprised, he’d thanked Nasih for the gift.

  “No, no,” Nasih said. “I found it on the doorstep when I went to the market. I don’t know who left it for you.”

  Puzzled, Esa paged through the book in the privacy of the courtyard, stationed at his chair beneath the quince tree. When he’d opened the book, soft yellow rose petals had fallen out, along with the folded letter. Holding the letter to his face, he smelled the perfume of the roses. He wondered at first if the book with the rose petals was a gesture in some secret rite of courtship.

  But when he read the letter, he knew it for a threat.

  Whether from agents of the regime, or from a provocateur, the letter was intended to disrupt the peace he’d found in Esfahan’s early spring.

  We are bound together, chained.

  He didn’t want to be.

  He hoped the letter was a prank of some kind, meant to scare him, or perhaps to startle him out of his lethargy. Though lethargy was an unusual change of pace.