by Lois Pryce
‘It is because of the sanctions,’ muttered the angry customer, forgetting his missing parcel for a moment. He pointed a bony finger in my direction. ‘It is you people that have made all the problems.’
Eman shot me a surreptitious roll of the eyes.
‘Well, not me, exactly …’ I pointed out.
‘Please, do not take any notice of him,’ Laleh whispered in my ear.
‘The sanctions, they are hurting the wrong people, that is the problem,’ said Eman, stepping in as moderator. ‘The Iranian people are suffering; even the well off. The working families cannot survive like they used to.’
‘The cost of food, even milk and bread, is so much now,’ said Laleh. ‘Me, my mother, my father, we all work two jobs.’
Eman nodded. ‘There is so much poverty now in Iran, in just a few years. It is breaking us, as a nation. Something must change soon …’
His jolly demeanour struggled for a moment. I got the impression he was speaking from personal experience.
‘My wife, she is sick,’ he went on, confirming my thoughts, ‘we can no longer get the medicine she needs. I am lucky because I know other ways to get it, I have contacts, but now it costs so much!’
‘Because it is being smuggled in?’
‘Yes, and people are making money out of this problem, of course, and out of all people’s problems. Sometimes they sell cheap medicine, from India or China, and they are very bad, they cause bad effects, make people even more ill. But people are desperate. They will do anything. This is what happens. Many people suffer, a few people get rich. Always the same story in Iran.’
‘And you know who these people are, the ones who get rich? The police, the mullahs! The sanctions are good business for them!’ said the angry customer. ‘The people who make the trouble make the sanctions, and the sanctions make them rich! How is this right?’
Everyone at the table nodded and murmured in agreement. More tales of the problems caused by the sanctions emerged from everyone. It wasn’t the big issues surrounding business and international trade that concerned them, it was the small details of everyday life: the German-made kitchenware that Eman’s wife liked but which was no longer available, the poor-quality cosmetics from Asia that gave Laleh a rash, or the cheap Chinese eyedrops that gave Dariush’s father an infection.
‘It was not so bad when it was just US sanctions, we are used to that,’ Eman said. ‘We have those since 1979! But now, the last few years with Britain too, and the European countries, and Canada, Australia, Japan. So many problems now for us; our aircraft cannot refuel in Europe, the airlines cannot buy parts so the aeroplanes are very dangerous. It is so many things, everything is affected!’
‘Well, it is looking as though the nuclear deal will work out, so hopefully sanctions will be lifted,’ I said.
‘It will take a long time to recover but—’
Eman paused for a mouthful of rice. The angry customer filled the space.
‘Yes, maybe you will lift the sanctions but why should we always do what you say?’ He jabbed another angry finger at me. ‘Why should we be bossed about by you and America all the time?’
I didn’t have a chance to reply because Eman was shouting through his rice.
‘Yes, yes, I agree with you my friend, but this nuclear business, it is a big waste of money! Do you know how much the government spend on this? Millions of dollars! Why? Just to annoy America! But look around us, people starving, it makes me angry. We need more hospitals, better schools, clean air. My nephew in Tehran, he cannot breathe, his chest is hurting all the time. This is my children’s future, all this money wasted on this stupid nuclear business. Why?’ He banged his fist on the table.
‘It is not for America to tell us what we can do!’ shouted the other man. ‘Israel has nuclear weapons! So do you!’ He pointed at me. ‘America is holding us to ransom with these sanctions! Now they have the whole world against us!’
The two of them launched into Persian, voices rising, arms waving, but as usual in Iranian arguments, it simmered down as quickly as it started with no apparent fallout, and the conversation and eating resumed as if this was all part of usual lunchbreak activity.
‘I used to live in England,’ the angry customer said to me, taking a more conciliatory tone, ‘in the 1970s. St Austell in Cornwall, do you know this place?’
‘Yes, I used to go on holiday there as a child. Did you like it?’
‘Ah, yes. I loved it. Cornwall, it is very beautiful. That was a good time …’ His grizzled expression turned momentarily tranquil at the memory.
‘Why did you come back to Iran?’
‘Because in Iran in the seventies, there was a lot of money being made, from oil.’ He shrugged and his scowling features returned. He looked me in the eye. ‘And I wanted some of it.’
I nodded.
‘But you were still trying to control it,’ he said, back to his combative self.
‘Not me. The British government, or technically, the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.’
I looked him in the eye, wanting him to concede the point. Unlike every other Iranian I had met, he was unable, or refused, to make this distinction. For me this was the most important theme of my journey; the government and its people are separate entities. Making this separation felt important, on both sides. This was the whole ethos of Habib’s note that had inspired me to come here.
‘You were stealing our oil for years, we made you rich. Very rich. I know because my father worked at Abadan in the 1950s, it was a terrible place to work. If you were Iranian.’
Everything he said was true and I agreed that yes, he was right, the British had been the first to send prospectors here and had made an awful lot of money out of Iranian oil for a very long time. And they had not looked after their Iranian workforce. In the oilfields and refineries of Abadan, the native workers had lived in squalor, shacked up in tin huts on dirt streets with no running water, while the British employees had enjoyed all the usual pleasures of a colonial outpost, with swimming pools, tennis courts and shady gardens. But was I supposed to apologise for this now? Then Eman kindly chipped in and pointed out, so I didn’t have to, that I was just trying to eat my lunch and send a few mouse mats home. But the other guy was on a roll.
‘It was the same with Africa, you stole from them too, made money from their rubber, their sugar, their cocoa. And look at the Falkland Islands! You think you can have whatever you want! Just think what we could have done with all that oil money! Our money! Think what Iran could be like now. Imagine Iran if Mosaddegh had been allowed to rule, like we wanted!’
I nodded again, sympathetically, not sure what else to do. I felt as though I had been teleported into a PressTV documentary. I took a sip of my carbonated malt beverage and wished it was a little more potent than 0.0 per cent.
‘And your NHS?’ the man continued. ‘Your National Health Service that you all love so much, yes? Yes? It is so great, so famous, yes?’
‘Yes, of course,’ I said, experiencing a simultaneous stir of pride and homesickness at the mention of our most beloved institution.
He jabbed his finger again. ‘That was paid for in Abadan. We paid for it. With our oil.’
This conversation was my first experience of blatant anti-British sentiment, but it didn’t surprise me. I was surprised it hadn’t happened sooner. The guy had a point and it was easy to understand why any Iranian would be aggrieved at how things had gone down between our two nations.
His father was no doubt one of the thousands of workers exploited by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, which ran the Abadan oilfields like its own independent state. There were some outsiders, including other western diplomats and American politicians, who had warned Britain that the situation at Abadan was ‘deplorable’ and foresaw the inevitable uprising. In 1951 an Israeli employee at Abadan wrote a scathing report in the Jerusalem Post, describing the terrible living conditions of the Persian workers and how he had tried to convince his British colleagues to impr
ove their lot. Their response was that, ‘We English have had hundreds of years of experience on how to treat the natives. Socialism is all right back home, but out here you have to be the master.’ Really, it wasn’t any wonder this man was still angry.
For the first half of the twentieth century the British had maintained total control of Iran’s oil, cutting private deals with tribal leaders of the region and only employing Iranian workers in menial jobs. The Iranian government was kept firmly out of the loop, not even allowed access to the company accounts or details of the production quota; they had no idea how much money was being made or even how much oil was being produced. The British already had a history of slippery business deals in Iran, so this arrangement only served to strengthen Iranians’ mistrust of their imperial masters. With anti-colonial sentiment on the rise across the world in the 1950s, it was just a matter of time before Iran made a stand, and Prime Minister Mosaddegh, considered an incorruptible and compassionate leader, even by his adversaries, was the man for the job. He took the plunge and nationalised Iran’s oil industry. The British reacted with an onslaught of sanctions, embargoes, industrial sabotage and a fleet of warships to the Persian Gulf, but to no avail. It eventually took the incredibly risky and expensive US-and British-backed coup to get rid of Mosaddegh. The British had successfully secured what they perceived as ‘their’ oil, but in the process, had unwittingly sowed the seeds of the 1979 revolution.
Meanwhile, back home, the newly formed National Health Service and welfare state were improving the lives of post-war Brits, but nobody was worrying too much about where the money was coming from. Although I had always been aware of these two facts – the great socialist post-war rebuild of Britain, and our exploitation of Iranian oil – I had never put them together or heard the link described as succinctly as it had been by my current dining companion. It was hard to find a case for an argument, so I kept quiet and let the angry customer keep up his anti-British rant.
This conversational turn obviously wasn’t part of Eman’s hospitality package and I could sense his embarrassment as he tried to butt in and pacify his wayward client. Fortunately, another colleague arrived at that moment with an update about the missing package, and my aggressor was temporarily distracted.
‘I am very sorry, madam. Very sorry,’ said Eman, suddenly coming over all formal. ‘Please, do not think this is what we feel of the British people in Iran. We understand this is not you. You must understand …’ He gave a theatrical glance around the tiny room and Laleh flashed me a supportive smile. Eman leaned in close. ‘This man, he is an opium addict. He is …’ Eman made the universal sign for loopiness, the twirling finger at the ear. ‘Crazy guy!’
‘And …’ He lowered his voice further. ‘His missing package, it was his son’s iPad, he is a student in France. Yesterday his son phones me from Paris, he says he thinks his father is lying! He thinks his father sold the iPad to buy opium and now he is pretending to him it has gone missing!’
Eman leaned back in his chair, shirt buttons straining, arms expanded, small shiny shoes dangling an inch off the floor, surveying his makeshift domain like a mini-Godfather. He shook his head. ‘Ah, the things we must do for money!’
‘Oh Eman-jan, it could be worse!’ said Laleh.
‘Look at poor dear Laleh, she would like to be an English teacher but it is not possible. So she must work here with me!’
‘Oh, you are not so horrible!’ she said and they both laughed.
‘Why did you not become a teacher?’
From our few exchanges I could tell her English was flawless and her gentle nature would have made her an ideal candidate.
‘I studied English for many years and I applied to be a teacher, but if you want to work for a school, one that is run by the state, they make many checks on you. Not just your qualifications, I mean they find out all about your life. They will investigate your internet history and they will find out about your family. They went to my neighbours to ask about me. I know this because my neighbours told me. They will watch you, see who your friends are and your political views.’
‘So, what happened?’
‘I was not considered suitable, not Islamic enough.’
‘In what way? What do you mean?’
‘It is hard to know. They do not tell you the reasons, they just say no. Maybe it is because I do not attend the mosque. Maybe because I do not agree with compulsory hijab and I am very open about this. So they could have found this out from looking at my Facebook or my messages.’
‘And that would be enough to stop you getting a job?’
‘Oh yes! Now, I can never teach in a public school.’
She gave a resigned shrug. I was amazed at how calmly she accepted that her life’s ambition had been thwarted by her government’s religious dictates. With typical Iranian resilience, she was just making the best of what had been thrown at her. But so much was beyond her control, I felt frustrated on her behalf and said as much.
‘You are lucky, you are free. You want to be a teacher, you study, now you are teacher. Simple,’ said Eman. ‘It is not the same for us.’
‘I teach private English lessons in the evenings, after I finish working here,’ said Laleh. ‘Some day I hope to come to England, I love your language. All my life I have loved it and studied it. I would like to see London, and to wear my hair free! Really, it is so stupid. I mean what do they think will happen if we have the choice to wear the scarf. That all the men will go crazy and out of control if they see hair! It is just hair!’
Eman, Dariush and even the grumpy opium fiend nodded. At last we had found something we all agreed on.
I ended up hanging out at the office all afternoon, partly due to the archaic amount of documentation involved in sending anything out of Iran, but also at the insistence of Eman. He said it would be good for Laleh to have someone to practise English with and he didn’t seem to mind her work being interrupted. I couldn’t imagine this easy-going flexibility and impulsive hospitality in a British workplace, but perhaps it was another symptom of Iran’s ‘realness’, the human connectivity that Omid and Hossein valued so highly. Maybe it was a reaction to living under such an autocratic regime that, at a micro level, rules and regulations were fluid or non-existent. As long as everything got done in the end, then why worry about the details or how long it took? There was certainly no talk in Eman’s office of targets and deadlines or any such business-speak, but everyone was industrious and in good humour most of the time. Odd as it was, to be in glorious, glittering Isfahan and yet spending the day in a cramped Portakabin rather than in a sixteenth-century palace or a Persian garden, it was the happiest few hours of my time there.
Eman dropped me off later. He was contemplating the remainder of my journey to Shiraz and had fallen into a melancholy, reflective mood.
‘Shiraz is the true heart of Iran,’ he said. ‘This is where you will really know the Iranian people. Where do you go next?’
I told him I was heading west, into the Zagros Mountains, seeking out some fresh air and wilderness. The Iranian cities were starting to wear me down.
His eyes brightened. ‘The Zagros, this is the land of my people, the Bakhtiari.’
Bakhtiari was his surname, but they had once been the most powerful tribe in Iran.
‘Are there many Bakhtiari living nomadically these days?’ I asked him.
‘Some, but no, not so many now, not for many generations. But my grandfather used to tell me about the migration and how life was before Reza Shah. Now most of us live in cities but you will see, Bahktiari and Bahktiar, they are common names in Iran. We are still here!’
He fell silent, maybe thinking about the nomadic ways of his ancestors, because after a moment he burst out: ‘You are free, really free. You are lucky. It is so hard here now, working all the time, for what? But there is no way out, no choice.’
There was genuine pain in his voice.
‘And you know what makes me more angry? My friend, a shipping age
nt too, he tells me every week, the government people come to him, with crates to send to Lebanon and Syria. Last year, when we think the war is starting for real, it is thirty tonnes a week going out there! Thirty tonnes! He has no choice, he must do what they say. They write spare parts on the paperwork. He asks no questions but everyone knows. So much money, but what about the poor people who have nothing, who cannot eat? You know what the politicians say to them?’
He was driving very fast now and looking at me while he spoke rather than at the three lanes of cars, bikes, buses and trucks tearing around us.
‘They say, “Allah will provide.” And you know what I say to that?’
I could make a pretty good guess.
‘I say, “It’s bullshit!”’ He banged his fist on the steering wheel.
Like Eman, I felt overwhelmed by the hopelessness of it all. He was still talking, as if he couldn’t stop now he’d started.
‘My mother, she was twenty in 1979, she supported Khomeini, she wanted to throw out the Shah. But now she cries all the time. Ten times a day she says to me, what did I do? What did I do? It wasn’t meant to be like this. But there is nothing we can do.’
‘What do you think will happen in the future?’
‘Ah, nothing will change. People are broken, too scared now.’
He fell into silence for a while, then as we arrived at my hotel he tried one of his winning smiles but it failed to convince.
‘You are free,’ he said again. ‘We have to be careful with everything, who we speak to, what we say in public. I lived in Turkey for some time, I know this is not the same as life in the UK, but it was more free than here. We could enjoy life, I have known this freedom. I know how life can be.’
He turned to me and for a moment all his blustery, wide-boy swagger was gone, replaced by a despairing guilelessness that made him seem suddenly young and vulnerable.
‘I would like to go the cinema or a park without fear, like you can. That is what I would like most of all.’
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