by Shane Bauer
As a way to create space, I suggest that we partition the room into two halves. Shane agrees easily.
We sit down next to each other to unstitch a hem on one of our new blankets. As we work, we laugh at ourselves and joke about how the guards will interpret our partition. Then we hang the fabric between two nails on the wall to make a clothesline across the cell. Next, we drape a blanket over the clothesline and place it so that we can’t see each other from our regular sitting positions.
A guard peeks into the cell. He sees the partition and bangs his fists together, asking in Farsi, “Are you guys fighting?” We chuckle when we hear this. We’re not fighting, but I love not always being within Shane’s peripheral vision. I love not having him in mine. By dividing the room in half, I feel more free.
89. Shane
We are in hava khori kucheek and I am cutting Josh’s hair. We’ve been asking the guards to let us do this for two weeks, and now that we finally have an electric razor, it is taking forever. Josh’s hair is so thick and this machine is so old that I can’t just mow through it. Every time I push into a clump of hair, the motor slows and almost dies. We tried asking for scissors, like we always do, but the guards won’t allow it. Instead, they just peek in from time to time and giggle at us in our shirtless state, covered as we are in little specks of hair.
Josh has Mike Davis’s Planet of Slums and he is testing me on random facts as I slowly chip away at his hair. What are the ten largest cities in the world? What are the largest slums?
In the adjacent bathroom, we hear the shower turn on. We both dart over to the window. Josh pushes it open slightly. “Salaam,” he whispers. The window opens fully. “Salaam,” says the man on the other side, smiling. He is naked and shrouded in a cloud of steam. We exchange pleasantries, and he tells us he is a Kurd, from Iraq. He speaks only a smattering of Arabic, which, between that and Farsi, allows us to communicate a little beyond the basics.
He knows who we are. “Aren’t you the one who is married?” he asks me.
“I am not married—we are engaged,” I say.
“Her name is Sarah, right? Where is she?” he asks. I tell him she was freed.
He nods. “That’s very good,” he says.
I ask him why he is here.
“I’m a member of al-Qaeda,” he says matter-of-factly. “I am from a village near Ahmed Awa, where you were captured,” he says. “My cellmate is a journalist, also Kurdish, and he talked to some people there. He said Iranian agents paid some Kurds there to tell the Iranian media you were spies.” I’m not sure I believe this—though it could explain the Press TV story my mom told me about when she visited in May, when Sarah is reported to have told an Iraqi Kurd she was Iranian and on her way home. Still, I am impressed by how angry he is about it.
“Everyone knows you guys are innocent. You shouldn’t be here. This regime is playing politics with you.” We talk about his case. He hasn’t been to court. He doesn’t seem to expect that he will ever go to court.
“What is your religion?” he asks.
“Christian,” I say, lying.
“What about him?” he asks, pointing to Josh.
I translate to Josh. I always let him take that question.
“Yahudi,” he says. The prisoner nods.
“Jews and Christians are our brothers. They are People of the Book.” He says this in a tone a Mustang owner would use to concede the merits of a less exciting but admittedly reliable vehicle. “But Islam,” he says, drawing out the word and smiling. “Islam is light!” He is beaming. “Why don’t you convert to Islam?” The limits of our shared language are starting to show. “With Islam, you will sleep better at night,” he says, putting his head on his upturned hand as if it were a pillow.
“Inshallah,” I say, my usual response to conversion attempts. It’s such an easy, noncommittal statement and it’s hard for a religious person to argue with.
He gives us one more beseeching, almost motherly look, a last invitation to cross to the side of Islam. I smile by way of declining politely. “God willing, you will be free soon,” he says.
“You too,” I say. He waves goodbye and closes the window.
90. Josh
I wake bleary-eyed to the sound of the rattling breakfast cart. I look over toward Shane. He looks like he’s been up for hours already. Our next hearing is set for today, May 11. When he visited last week, my interrogator wouldn’t admit that we were scheduled to have another hearing until I let on that I already knew about it from the letters.
It’s been a tough week. I’m hopeful and nervous. Everything feels a little tense. I have a little too much energy at hava khori. And I barely sleep at night. I wasn’t so nervous before our first trial, but for some reason, this one has me on edge.
The news occasionally reports executions at Evin Prison. I’m not worried about that prospect. We have too much international attention. I’m expecting a twenty-year sentence, maybe twenty-five. They’ll prance us around the media and boast to their people about how tough they treat conspiring foreigners. Then they’ll hopefully release us afterward and boast about how compassionate they are.
In letters, everyone seems to be almost expecting our release with this trial. Reading and rereading Sarah’s March 14 letter, I gain even more hope. In it she details how foreigners have been released from Iran:
Two German journalists . . . Twenty months was then commuted to a $50,000 fine . . . A French woman . . . released on bail . . . convicted to two five-year terms, which was immediately commuted to a $285,000 fine . . . Three Belgian bikers were detained three months in 2009 . . . A dual-national woman sentenced to eight years . . . detained for one hundred days.
Compared to my mother, I feel like a cynic. But Shane thinks I’m too hopeful. I watch him repress his hope. It’s been a while since I allowed myself to dream of freedom, and the dream feels good. I try my best to follow the advice of The Myth of Freedom, a Buddhist book my friends sent me: allow my hope to exist, acknowledge it, and observe it, but do not get attached. It says that the attachment to hope—not the optimism itself—creates suffering. But it’s difficult to not be attached to freedom.
I eat my breakfast and I wait. At one point, I take yesterday’s chicken wishbone off the radiator and present it to Shane. We tug at different ends. Its head flies off, neither of us winning.
No one arrives to take us to court by 11 a.m. “We still have a few hours. They may still come,” I tell Shane, though I know he doesn’t believe me.
At 2 p.m., I say, “It seems improbable, but it’s not yet impossible.”
The guards won’t tell us anything.
At 5 p.m. we go to hava khori. “Maybe there was a political breakthrough,” I hypothesize. But of course, I have no idea why we weren’t called.
91. Sarah
“Okay, this is too much,” Josh’s mom, Laura, says. “Too much!”
It’s May 11 and we’re on a family conference call. We just found out from our lawyer that the trial was canceled by Judge Salavati because Shane and Josh “didn’t appear in court.” This is the exact same excuse given by the court for canceling the trial last November. The difference is that not a single person outside of Evin Prison has seen or heard from Shane or Josh since February 6, more than three months.
“How can they not even show us the boys?” Laura continues. “They could be hurt; they could be hospitalized. How can they not even let them talk to their mothers?”
This is our biggest wake-up call yet. We have no way of knowing for sure if Josh and Shane are even alive. At the very least, we fear they are hunger-striking. It feels like we’re back where we started, that trial dates could be canceled and postponed for years to come. This time, the Iranian government went too far, and our families are ready to fight back.
“I think it’s time we change our strategy,” Cindy says. “We need to get their attention.”
“I feel certain they started hunger-striking when they found out the trial was canceled,” I say
, then add, “If I were still there . . . that’s what I’d be doing.”
“We’ve been talking about the idea of starting a public hunger strike ourselves,” Cindy says, then adds, “I think the time is now.”
“I agree, Mom,” Shane’s sister Nicole says. “I think the moms should start it—that will be big in the media.” Shane’s other sister, Shannon, agrees.
“We can also have Sarah start talking about the prison abuse, sexual harassment” Alex says, then adds, “That kind of stuff really embarrasses the Iranian government.”
“Let’s look at one item at a time here,” Paul Holmes, our media advisor, interjects. “First, I say we vote on the hunger-strike idea. We can start with Laura and Cindy—they can fast for a few days and do interviews. Then Sarah can join, do more media, then anyone else in the families can continue to join as others drop out. We can call it a rolling hunger strike. I’m confident that will get coverage.”
Paul takes a vote and we unanimously agree on the rolling hunger strike, deciding to pass the torch indefinitely until we’re convinced that Shane and Josh are safe. Compared to our usual drawn-out battles, this decision is one of the easiest we’ve made yet.
92. Shane
We have five minutes. This will be our third phone call since we arrived here. It’s the end of May, six months since we have made a phone call, six months since I wrote down Sarah’s phone number and committed it to memory. This is my chance. As I dial her number, I know it will probably never happen again. You can only break the same rule once. They told me I could call family and, to them, family doesn’t include Sarah.
The phone rings and keeps ringing. How could it be possible that she doesn’t answer? The answering machine picks up. I start to speak. “Sarah, it’s me. I can’t believe you’re not there! I love you so much and I just want you to know that I’m good. I’m healthy. I’m strong mentally, emotionally . . . Things are good and things have really gotten a lot easier now that you’re free.” My voice is cracking. Keep it together. Don’t break down on the phone right now, I tell myself.
As I talk, Josh’s interrogator, standing next to me, is starting to look around nervously, as if for help. Dumb Guy is down the hall, putting Josh in our cell. Josh’s interrogator yells to him. I keep talking hurriedly, blocking them out. “I sound emotional now because it’s amazing to hear your voice. I love you so much, Sarah. You are incredible.” Dumb Guy is striding toward me. “I can’t wait to see you. I can’t wait to hear your music . . . Please send music. I love you, baby. Bye.”
“What is this?” Dumb Guy says. “What are you doing?! We told you to call family, Shane. Family!”
“I know, and that is what I did. I called family.”
“You broke the rules, Shane. You may never call Sarah again. Do you understand?”
“I understand.”
A part of me feels victorious and a part of me feels gutted.
93. Sarah
5-24-11 I usually leave my phone on vibrate because of the remote chance that you might call while I’m in acupuncture. This session put me into a deep trance and the phone must have dropped out of my hand. When I walked out of the session and got your message, it felt like I was still dreaming. Your voice shot through me like cold, dark water. I stood still for a long time, watching light rain fall on a grassy hill, in utter amazement at your strength and resilience. I heard so much life in your voice, I felt instantly so much closer to you and our future together. I’m a lot more stable out here. I don’t have highs and lows really, but I also don’t feel much joy. Your phone message gave me the permission to feel joy, real joy! The fact that you’re able to give me that, after all you’ve been through, astounds me. I surrendered right away to the fact that I missed your call, knowing how much it would mean for your dad, sisters, and friends to hear your message. Now I can listen to it every day until I see you again. Thank you, baby.
It doesn’t make sense that I missed the call; for the last ten months my phone has never left my sight. I sleep with it plastered to my head. I often wake up several times a night to double-check that no one’s called and check my e-mail. After Shane left me a message, he called his mom. In the midst of their short conversation, Shane told her they had “time for their tears.” This time they were hunger-striking for seventeen days. I never dreamed they would take it this far.
In a sense, the phone calls are our first tangible win, at least since I was released. When Laura and Cindy went public with their own hunger strike two days ago, Shane and Josh were allowed a call home the next day. The Iranian government gave in, so we now have proof that media pressure yields results. Now, it’s up to us to show them that two five-minute phone calls will not be enough to silence us again.
Our worst fear has always been that something we do on the outside will put Shane and Josh in greater danger. In the past, that fear has immobilized us. Yet, the opposite just happened—our bold move on the outside resulted in something positive for them. As small as it may be, it was a victory.
I realize that my mom got to the same point almost exactly a year ago. She got fed up with waiting around for other people to get me out of prison. She saw my breast lump and solitary confinement as an opportunity and, with the families backing her up, jumped on it. That strategy worked. When I asked the judge why I was being released before Shane and Josh, he said, “You’re a woman—in Iran we treat women well. Also, you’ve been in solitary confinement.”
The Iranian government is very sensitive about its atrocious human rights record. With a high-profile case like ours, they put a lot of work into making it appear that Shane, Josh, and I have been held under good conditions. We realize that in addition to the incident of Shane’s beating, the only thing we can use for Josh is the inappropriate behavior he experienced from one of the guards, who habitually made groaning noises at him, even when he was in bed at night. After it happened, the three of us discussed it in hava khori and Josh was convinced he was being sexually harassed. We all agreed he should complain to Dumb Guy.
The families and I decide I will fly to London and break the news of prison abuse and harassment on BBC’s Hardtalk, both the English and the Farsi version, since this is a show with an international reach that’s also popular with Iranians.
Watching the families struggle with these tough decisions reminds me of the long, drawn-out debates Josh, Shane, and I often had in prison. I think about when Josh and Shane stood up to AK, when Shane told Dumb Guy never to touch him again, or when I slapped Maryam back and told her I wasn’t a child. By speaking truth to their lies and manipulation, we were able to take back some of our own power. We eventually realized that if we didn’t stand up to our captors, they would walk all over us. After nearly two years of dedicated but cautious advocacy, our campaign is coming to the same conclusion.
Many Iranians and Iranian Americans think our families have been too nice since the beginning and that’s why our ordeal has dragged out so long. They say the Iranian government will continue to stall indefinitely and it’s going to take a lot of pressure to make them act. In order to do this right, we have to go against the circumspect advice of our key diplomats—Salem, Qubad, and Livia. They’re diplomats, and we have no doubt that they are doing everything they can to help us, but their job is to keep the peace and appease both sides. That’s not our job. Our job is to make sure holding Shane and Josh has a cost. Our government hasn’t done that; now it’s up to us.
A week after going on Hardtalk in London, we’re back at the White House. This time, when we walk into Dennis Ross’s office, a thick tension permeates the room. I find an empty chair directly across from Ross and sit down.
“So,” he begins, looking directly at me, “what have you heard from Salem?”
“What have I heard?” I ask, allowing for a long, uncomfortable pause. “We came here to ask you the same question.”
No one says anything. Ross and I stare at each other with what feels like open hatred. For almost a minute, nobody mov
es.
“What is the point of these meetings if you have nothing to bring to the table?” Cindy asks.
“We want you to know that we’ve secretly passed on a message to Iran that we will hold them responsible for any harm that might come to Josh and Shane,” Ross says.
“What does that mean?” Cindy snaps back. “They’ve already been harmed! Anyway, what consequences? There have never been any consequences.”
“Not now,” Puneet Talwar responds nervously. “In the future.”
“We don’t need consequences in the future,” Cindy responds with steely resolve. “We need them now.”
“You’ve known for a long time exactly what will get them out,” I say. “If Shane and Josh were important to this administration, Shahrazad Gholikhan would be released from prison early, on good behavior. She’s close to the end of her sentence anyway—it shouldn’t be that hard.”
“Our lawyers tell us . . . ,” Puneet begins. Cindy suddenly stands up, then Alex and I join her.
“We’ve heard this before,” Cindy says, “and we don’t believe it. Unless you have something new to say, we’re leaving.”
The three of us walk out to the hallway. While we’re waiting to retrieve our cell phones, Alex suddenly looks at us sheepishly and says he’s changed his mind and will join us outside in a minute. Before we can object, he goes back inside.
I know he’s going back to play “good cop” and a part of me doesn’t blame him. After all, any one of our intermediaries might be able to get this job done, but only the U.S. government could do it for sure if it wanted to. In the last year, I’ve gone from feeling like the U.S. government truly regards us as a priority, granting us meetings at the highest levels, to feeling insulted by how manipulative and condescending its representatives are. The United States wants to avoid giving in to Iran at any cost. It doesn’t want to show weakness. Ironically, Iran has shown its strength anyway, simply by resisting pressure and holding Shane and Josh this long. All we can do at this point is continue to assert pressure in the media, in hopes that the United States, Iran, and all the other important players will want to wash their hands of this badly enough to act decisively.