The journey of a lifetime
Traveling to Iran, which is in a way, my pilgrimage

April 20, 2006
iranian.com

Life is a beautiful thing.  I say this cliché to remind myself because I forget it from time to time.  With all that is going on in the world, especially in our neck of the woods, the Middle East, it’s easy to forget such a basic tenet. Momentous occasions, however, such as the childbirth, graduation day, or wedding day bring to life that very belief about the beauty of life.  I look forward to many such events, but there is one that equals in magnitude for me that is atypical. 

For the past 4 years, I’ve been yearning to make a trip to my homeland that I’ve only dreamed and read about and this spring I am making my dream a reality and visiting Iran.  I’m sure for many it may seem silly to group a journey in the same playing field as such monumental occasions like childbirth, but if you give me a moment to explain, I will show you why it’s such grand occurrence for me.

I left Iran with my family as a baby.  The only memory I have of Iran is of being in a room with the lights off while the town siren was sounding.  It was a piercing noise that brought to bear the urgency of the occasion - Tehran and other civilian cities were being bomb during the notorious Iran-Iraq War.  The room I was in included many people; I’m sure most were family, but I don’t remember exactly who was there.  I know for certain, however, my grandmother was present as she was crying out of fear.  In an attempt to alleviate the horror that had overwhelmed her, I walked to her and hugged her.  Sadly enough, this memory is all the recollection I have of my homeland.

We came to America in the early eighties and we embraced the “land of opportunity.”  The land of opportunity, however, did not embrace us for the most part.  With the hostage crisis in Iran where 52 Americans were held in captivity for 444 days, the backlash that Middle Easterners and Iranians in particular experienced paralleled the post-September 11th xenophobic hysteria.  “Over here we play cowboys and Iranians” was a common bumper sticker and northern Orange County is not particularly known for its tolerance.  As such, growing up my name was “Paul” and my Iranian identity was ever so distant, at least that was the case outside of home. No name change could have made life any easier on my brother as he had an even harder time blending in. 

As I grew older and did away with the conformity I acquired in grade school, I did a lot of soul searching, and going to college only heightened that quest.  The availability of Persian language and Iranian political science courses facilitated my personal journey to find a sense of self.  I subsequently double-majored in Middle Eastern Studies with an emphasis on Iran and Political Science.  After a while, Iran became an obsession, so much so, that I taught a student-run two-unit course on Iran’s twentieth century political history for three semesters.  Moreover, my friends and I formed an Iranian student group.

I acquired more than twenty documentaries on Iran and read dozens of books on Iranian history.  To further humor my fascination, I compiled a complete collection of Time magazines with Iran-themed covers through eBay.  My oldest magazine has Reza Shah on the cover from 1934.  The hardest and priciest issue to get hold of was the one when Dr. Mossadegh became the “Man of the Year” in 1952. Interestingly enough, despite all these Iranian projects and activities I haven’t been to Iran since I was a baby.  I simply haven’t had the opportunity to go, but this spring I will be experiencing one of the most anticipated events of my life.

In regards to my pre-travel notions, I think it’s fair to say that many people have painted the most interesting and often times conflicting image of Iran for me.  Some go and just party and come back and tell me how Iran is this huge rave.  And then religious Iranians go to Iran and attend only to religious-themed events and upon their return they tell me how Iran is so deeply pious. 

I know Tehran is not representative of all of Iran and I know that north Tehran and south Tehran, Sanandaj, Mashhad, Tabriz, and Ahvaz, etc. all have their distinct qualities. Iran is a country of 70 million people and I’m sure like most countries, a great many different elements exist in different regions of Iran.  My Persian literature professor, Dr. Pirnazar, summed up Iran well when she said, “Iran is a mosaic.” Thus, when I write my next article from Iran, I know not to claim all of Iran is this or that and I will do my best to avoid sweeping generalizations.

In any case, I look forward to traveling to Iran with great intensity, which is in a way, my pilgrimage.  I look forward to supplanting my war memory with many new more positive memories. I look forward to going back to Iran and seeing the homeland I’ve only known through documentaries, books, and stories. -- March 23, 2006

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