“Your family has been very kind to me.”
“Women must wear hijab in Tehran,” she said, tightening her own. “No more relaxed as on train.” Her comment made me think that a headscarf can make a Western woman mysterious, intriguing and unknowable—but of course that is a whimsical notion; here, the politically charged hijab does that for a nation, a custom of modesty for half the population, and a reminder of the frequent public seclusion of women, away from men. I find no enchantment in repression.
With the warmth of departing friends in her eyes, I felt a goodbye hug coming on. It didn’t happen. She said, “We could hug you goodbye but it is wrong here. We cannot.”
Kamelia stood beside her, adding more explanation. “If I carry my bag walking in front of you and I trip, you cannot help me back up. You are not my husband or brother or father. If you touched me, it would be trouble for me if official saw it to happen.”
Hamid said, “I could help you, Kamelia. But please don’t trip.” While smiling in acceptance of what was, he burst into four-finger slapping on his wrist while humming an Iranian ditty, his farewell song.
“Thank you.” I shook Father’s hand. In his eyes was an understanding of time’s oddness, gigantic changes of fortune, an acceptance of the present and hope for the future.
“Mother …” I called. She looked my way and I danced a little. The shuffle startled the family members who’d welcomed them home, and brought giggles from Mona and Kamelia. Mother’s eyes shone.
Mona handed me a piece of paper. “This is my email. Hamid’s is there too. He will send you finger-snapping video. You must send us yours.”
And that is how we parted.
Inside the station, everyone made away as fast as they could clear luggage. I looked around for a driver I expected to meet me, despite the late hour, having made that arrangement through the hotel when I booked my room. I hoped he’d also be my guide while I was in Tehran. A disheveled young man came up to me, stretching his way out of a sleep he’d taken waiting for my ever-delayed train.
“I am Aref.” Before I could respond, he said, “You are Rick.”
“And you probably want to go home and sleep,” I said.
His careless yawn widened, with no attempt at stifling. “I will take you to the Enghelab Hotel. You are there two nights, though one is slipping from you.”
As we drove down Enghelab Avenue, he said, “Today is your day. You and Tehran. I will find you at breakfast. At seven. Is that okay?”
“Three hours sleep is all you’ll have?” I asked.
“Is okay for you? Is okay for me.”
Four hours later, as promised, Aref walked into the Enghelab Hotel’s lobby and over to a staff member, asking after me. I’d barely helped myself to the breakfast buffet. A waiter poured coffee into my mug. Seeing Aref approach, I asked for a second cup.
Aref sat down. “Our coffee will not wake you up, Rick, but it won’t let you sleep. Coffee in Iran is excellent.”
“Good morning.”
“If you like coffee, you should drink here this morning. Coffee houses, they are not popular with government. They are where people talk politics.”
As we drove away from the Enghelab, Aref’s thoughts ran out loud. “You are from America? Or Europe?” He did not want an answer. He was working out mentally what he should show me. “You want to see where the Shah lived, yes? Niavaran Palace. We can walk at the market to start. We will walk into the mountains at end of day.”
When I’d awoken earlier, I found I’d left the curtains in my room open when I’d fallen asleep. The mountains north of the city made an impressive view. It surprised me how close they were, the size of them. I knew it was false, but I hadn’t dissuaded myself from the notion of Persia as a giant expanse of desert. Tehran represents too much turmoil to be under the wing of such beautiful mountains, I’d thought. Their majesty became more evident when we got stuck in northbound traffic on Vali Asr.
The morning’s great assault on my senses was not the smell of food or a sense of weather or even colorful attire. It was the intense din of cars and trucks. The city’s architecture had conjured up an echo chamber. Tehran, city of noise.
The Grand Bazaar was visually hectic. No one moved slowly, and there was no loitering or meaningless gawking. Everyone went about their shopping, selling, or bartering in a purposeful way. Deals were concluded quickly. Spices were measured, packed, and wrapped, then exchanged for coins. If a bargain went sour midway in the bantering, the goods were smartly shelved without a grudge.
“Do not lose sight of me,” Aref said, “or you maybe never get out of here.” The maze had a rationale, but I could see myself disappearing in the labyrinth. The main stalls offered both perishable goods and expensive items, as many people used the market as a thoroughfare during their workday. The high volume of passersby was good for business. Off this main flow, and an aisle or two away, the rows of goods narrowed. Here you could find clothing or leather goods or mechanical parts; shoes, purses, wrenches. And everywhere, electronics in an abundance to rival what any advanced country would have on offer, underlying the strength of the black market economy, despite sanctions.
Tehran was a pedestrian no man’s land. Not one face I saw looked pleased with the day.
Back in the car, driving through Imam Khomeini Square, Aref mused, “To know my city you must be driven by the Azadi Tower, and it is there.” The giant arch, built in 1971 and 164 feet tall, rose from four stone strands angled to support a square pyramid-looking Islamic peak above eight thousand blocks of marble, all white. It commemorated a nicely rounded 2,500 years of existence. This marble monument was the tribute, a one-stop “Gateway to Iran.” It went through a name change after the Iranian Revolution in 1979, becoming the “Freedom” marker, Azadi.
“Shajarian,” Aref said when I asked about the music he was listening to. “Very popular but not with government. He sings against them. Does not like regime’s sneer at people.” “He” is Mohammad-Reza Shajarian. Hampered in attempts to perform in his own country, he has toured Europe with success. Challenging his homeland’s ban on women singing in front of men, Shajarian used a performance in Turkey to invite his daughter on stage. Later, holding the saghar, a string instrument he made, he commented, “Part of our music has been silenced. Look at this instrument. It has four strings. If you remove one of them, it plays like that. To play properly, we need that sound, the voice of a woman.”
Without discussion, Aref stopped the car in front of a building and got out. When I did too, he said, “National Museum of Iran. Go in.”
I walked along the array of unprotected exhibits.
“Special,” said Aref, indicating a well-protected area guarded by a security attendant.
I joined a queue, and waited in line until I was at the front and before me was the Cyrus Cylinder.
“It is a replica,” I said. “Rather impressive.”
“Not replica, Rick. It is Cyrus Cylinder.”
“Well, that is actually in the British Museum. I’m going to see the original in London in a couple of days.”
“Now, it is here,” Aref said, to my astonishment. “It should always be here. It is Iran’s. For time is on loan, as they say. From British Museum.”
The Cyrus Cylinder was in Tehran for seven months. Surprisingly to me, I found myself alone with the storytelling cylinder, no one behind me in line. Dating from the time when Persian emperor Cyrus the Great overthrew Babylon, it has been called the first declaration of human rights.
To see this monumental and historic document, especially the original, made me gasp. I felt witness to its chiseled cuneiform words. Here was a statement that had withstood many attempts to destroy the vision of peace it espoused. The depth of art and readability in this original notably exceeded that of the replica I had at home, a gift from the Iranian Olympian.
The Cyrus Cylinder, a baked clay tablet, is the most famous of cuneiform “documents.” It has been called the first charter of human
rights for nations and peoples. A replica of the 8.9 inch (22.5 cm) by 3.9 inch (10 cm) Persian/Iranian tablet at the United Nations headquarters is fittingly displayed in the passageway between the chamber for the Security Council and the chamber for the Economic and Social Council. It has been translated into all six official languages of the United Nations. Photo © The Trustees of the British Museum. All rights reserved.
The Cyrus Cylinder was a profound archeological find, documenting the emperor’s enlightened approach to governing in the twenty-nine years beginning 559 BCE. The cylinder, made of baked clay, once secured in a building’s structure so that all its sides showed, has been cracked by time and pitted by neglect, though the cuneiform is still readable today.
The British Museum’s Neil MacGregor escorted the Cyrus Cylinder to Iran, calling it “one of the greatest declarations of the human aspiration,” comparing it to America’s Constitution and England’s Magna Carta.
When we were finished, Aref and I walked toward the museum’s exit, nearing a gift shop. In its window was a poster showing a beautiful writing pen with a facsimile reproduction of the Cyrus Cylinder as part of the design.
“Aref, do they sell that pen here?”
He spoke to the clerk and returned. “Never. They are unsure why pen’s picture shows here, except it is a stunning poster … and display. Clerk says only two hundred pens were made.”
“Where can I get one?”
“You want a poster?”
“Aref …”
“You can get anything in Tehran.”
We left right away. He drove to a market and we went to a store that sold pens. They’d never heard of the Cyrus pen, but sent us to a store that retailed luxury watches and goods. They could not find it in their portfolios. They suggested a store on a curved street corner at the floor level of a building festooned with flags. As soon as we arrived, my son Sean’s penchant for flags distracted me, and I went off in search of Iran’s, finding dozens of different flags from around the country to choose from.
Aref then took me to the unlikeliest tobacco and souvenir store at the building’s base, and asked for the owner.
“Yes, he has heard of the pen,” said Aref. “He will see if he can find one. He wants us to come back tomorrow.”
“I fly out before sunrise.”
Aref resumed what sounded like negotiations. He rebounded with a price.
“How does he know the price?”
“Rick, it is his price. He needs to know you will pay that or why bother with effort. Will you pay?”
I dithered.
“Tomorrow is same price,” said an impatient Aref.
“Yes. I will pay.”
We returned in an hour. I passed over two hundred dollars worth of Iranian rial and was asked for US currency instead, the seller adjusting the price to encourage me. Aref had told me to be prepared for this. I was. Black markets have their beneficial place for travelers. The man placed a varnished box in my hands. I opened it to find the thick pen exactly as it looked on the poster, as well as a numbered certificate of assured authenticity, with a few English spelling mistakes.
We worked our way north in Tehran, the day partly cloudy. The air hung stale and a bit moist in the city center. I mistook its stillness for a dryness I smelled but could not feel. I was thinking of fresh mountain air and the exhilaration of climbing on what Aref promised would be an invigorating day’s-end hike. On the way, he talked like a tour guide with a few pre-plans in mind. “The last Shah was Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. You might know that. Before he was deposed, which happened with Iranian Revolution, the Imperial family was renowned for spiffy accommodations. You will see that now. It is Niavaran Palace.”
The pavilion was impressive. It took design pretensions from a colonial mindset, made them extravagant, and plunked them into a lot of yard.
Aref asked, “Do you like libraries? You should see this one. It is Farah Diba.”
“And Farah Diba means?”
“I am sorry to not explain. It is Exclusive Library of the Niavaran Palace. Private.” He walked me toward a modern three-story building. Mostly books behind glass, kept away from grubby hands, filled the library’s three floors. There was a railing on the third floor, opening to a square below. Custodians hung around the room’s corners.
As we were walking down to the lower floors, I saw the caretakers above leave their second-floor posts through back doors. I stopped mid-staircase. “Aref, you keep going. I want one more look around up there.”
With no one around, I went to a shelf and removed a book, taking it over to one of the Shah’s couches. I imagined the Shah sitting there, as though we were going to talk about books, his nose in a different one.
Outside, Aref walked ahead of me, shaking his head at my misdemeanor. “You need a cola.”
Aref made good on his promise that we’d have a short hike before dark. “We will go to the Alborz Mountains, to Darband,” he said. We had walked a mile on a mountain path of fresh air, peaks above us and the city spread below, when Aref turned to me. “I am tired, Rick. And my little boy, he is awake if I go home now. So I will.”
Nearing my hotel, he pointed half way down the side street, saying, “It is there you should have dinner. Food is good. It’s only a fifteen-minute walk from where you stay.”
Tired in my own way, I showered as soon as I hit the room. I lay on the floppy pillows and knew I had to resist their temptation. So I went to find dinner at Aref’s recommended place. I arrived to find an empty restaurant, decorated as if nothing had changed around the country for a century. In a touch of modernity, photographs of former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and his successor, Ali Khamenei, gazed down on me from the wall beside my table.
I toyed with my new Cyrus Cylinder pen, gripping around the inscription to comfortably write notes. I read the pamphlet that came with it, recognizing Cyrus the Great as “father of the Iranian nation.” Inseparable from Cyrus building a sixth-century BCE empire linking a parcel of Greece to India and all the lands between to Libya and Egypt is the culinary cradle that resulted from trade in spices and techniques, herbs and talents. Persian cuisine is a history of flavors.
Some of the world’s earliest wines came from Persia; Shiraz is linked to the Persian city of that name. When the evening’s wine at the restaurant was poured, I was told, “This wine, it is the world in a glass.” The food was delicious, and my last dinner in Iran turned out to be a leisurely one. The restaurant was still empty when I paid my check and returned to the hotel, feeling temporarily Iranian myself through a combination of atmosphere, emotions, and tastes, and very satisfied with Aref’s recommendation.
NINETEEN
THE UNFINISHED QUEST
“We have often had to advance through error to truth.”
—George Smith, The Chaldean Account of Genesis
Boarding a plane in Iran for England, I knew my trip was winding down, and there was only one stop left: a long-awaited appointment to cap off my time in the Middle East. Now, my flight from Tehran behind me, I found myself in a black cab traveling through the streets of London. A tourism associate had opened a one-off establishment adjacent to a reputable gentleman’s club, wishing to attract foreign travelers with an open door policy: they’d let anyone in for a fee, contrary to the exclusiveness of the adjacent club. I paid the fee. The “club within a club” was located on the end curve of St. James’s Square and shared an entrance and dining facilities (but not its rooms) with facilities that harkened back to the days of early British exploration. It was access to their historic library and lounge that had most interested me.
The porter looked upon my arrival as a mistake. My orange and gray rucksack may have been the first such tote to cross their threshold. My hiking boots and cord pants were not to his approval. Standards went out the door as I went in.
“Don’t fret,” I assured him, without elaboration on where I had come from in such scruffy attire. Respecting their protocols, I promised, “Next t
ime you see me, I’ll be scrubbed up.”
He let me know I had a flight of stairs to climb—“two, actually”—above the club’s facilities to where my registration would be accepted.
Heading out to find a reputable pair of slacks and a jacket from Selfridges or Marks & Spencer, I took a short cut through Bond Street and happened on a sale at a bespoke menswear store with a rack display. Feeling rather post-explorer, I found a tweed suit reminiscent of the early 1900s, one Janice would for certain dissuade me from wearing. I slipped on the jacket, and the store’s manager came over to chat. The jacket fit, and when he asked my shirt’s neck size I said 17¼, because once that had been accurate. He said, “There’s no chance of that.” I’d been off by nearly an inch, all due to pre-trip fitness and travel-induced weight loss. All the clothes I needed were there—a shirt, the suit, and even a pair of loafers, all reduced below half price, and thus into the sphere of my budget. I left suited and suitable for the British Museum, even if they found me a bit of a sartorial throwback.
When I returned to the club so attired, the porter did not recognize me. “Good evening, sir, how might I help you?”
Able now to walk about the “real club’s” polished premises, I browsed the oak-shelved library, taking in paintings of naval engagements and shorelines and landscapes that were no longer holdings of the empire. To my delight, there was a map of Cyrus the Great’s empire when Persia ruled a vast area, including North Africa and up to the Balkans.
From the bookshelves I pulled the Encyclopedia of World Explorers, hoping to find a section on the German-cum-Russian Friedrich Parrot and his first ascent of Mount Ararat.
I pressed a waiter button and ordered a sherry, as it seemed the thing to do. It was brought to me on a silver tray and left beside a reading table, where I’d scoured the book for an entry about Parrot’s 1829 expedition. He was not mentioned. The adventurers documented for that time period reflected the greater geographical questions of the day, those that attracted funding and guided public support, particularly from the patrons of the London club on whose furniture I sat. Those included: 1829, Major Laing, a Scottish African explorer, reaches the legendary city of Timbuktu; 1831–1835, R. Fitzroy, a British seafarer and astronomer, accompanied by the young Charles Darwin, explores Patagonia; 1845, Unsuccessful quest for the Northwest Passage by the English Arctic explorer J. Franklin. The exploration of Mount Ararat was not rated among the great quests of the day.
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