The Ayatollah Begs To Differ Part 5

Hojjatoleslam Mohammad Sadoughi (second from right), the Friday Prayer Leader of Yazd and the Supreme Leader's representative in the province, with fellow clerics at a mosque, Yazd, 2007 A ten-story mural on a wall in downtown Tehran, by the side of a major elevated highway. The English is not a direct translation-the Farsi actually reads "Death to America." to America."

The former U.S. emba.s.sy in Tehran, now a museum and a Revolutionary Guards barracks, displaying an unsubtle message Revolutionary Guards at Friday prayers, Tehran, 2007. The Guards, Iran's elite military branch, are recruited from the religious and working cla.s.ses. They report directly to the Supreme Leader and are fiercely loyal to the principles of the Islamic Revolution (of which they are the guardians). (Scott Peterson/Getty Images) A newsstand in midtown Tehran, displaying the mult.i.tude of Iran's dailies on the sidewalk in the morning, giving commuters a peak at the headlines President Ahmadinejad greets a member of Neturei Karta, the Brooklyn-based anti-Zionist Orthodox Jewish group, with a traditional Muslim kiss, at the notorious Tehran Holocaust Conference, December 2006. (Atta Kenare/AFP/Getty Images)

I rode back to Yazd in Mrs. Sadoughi's car. She had been unable to witness the pageantry, she told me, because it was far too crowded in the women's section for her to make her way to the front. Lacking Revolutionary Guard escorts, or even someone to a.s.sist her, Maryam Khatami, wife of the Imam Jomeh of Yazd and sister of the former president, was just another anonymous chador-clad woman in the crowd. Islamic sensibilities, certainly in this case, strangely seem to show a lack of concern for the safety and well-being of the wives of dignitaries, and I witnessed the same situation in New York when President Ahmadinejad's wife, who had accompanied him on a trip to the UN in 2006, wandered about the halls of the General a.s.sembly in a black chador with no Iranian security (but with a lone U.S. female agent) visible. I say "strangely" because the Prophet Mohammad was married to Khadijah, his boss boss, who became the first convert to Islam, and Mohammad's bloodline has been pa.s.sed down solely through his daughter daughter Fatima, wife of Ali, the first Imam of the s.h.i.+as and their very raison d'etre as a sect. But Maryam Khatami seemed unperturbed by the lack of attention given her by any of her husband's guards, who are provided by the state to all Imam Jomehs, and in previous and subsequent conversations with her over tea, a water pipe, and plates of fruit, it was manifest that her view of Islam is formed by her study of the great Islamic philosophers and thinkers and not by blind obedience to the theocracy. Daughter of an Ayatollah, sister of a cleric president, daughter-in-law of a martyred conservative Ayatollah, and wife of the Imam Jomeh on whose thinking she has undoubtedly had quite an effect, Mrs. Sadoughi comfortably holds forth not just on Islamic philosophy but also on Greek and Western philosophy and thought, far more readily than I, and, inside her home at least, is not one to play second fiddle to anyone. Fatima, wife of Ali, the first Imam of the s.h.i.+as and their very raison d'etre as a sect. But Maryam Khatami seemed unperturbed by the lack of attention given her by any of her husband's guards, who are provided by the state to all Imam Jomehs, and in previous and subsequent conversations with her over tea, a water pipe, and plates of fruit, it was manifest that her view of Islam is formed by her study of the great Islamic philosophers and thinkers and not by blind obedience to the theocracy. Daughter of an Ayatollah, sister of a cleric president, daughter-in-law of a martyred conservative Ayatollah, and wife of the Imam Jomeh on whose thinking she has undoubtedly had quite an effect, Mrs. Sadoughi comfortably holds forth not just on Islamic philosophy but also on Greek and Western philosophy and thought, far more readily than I, and, inside her home at least, is not one to play second fiddle to anyone.

In one particular conversation on Sufism and philosophy, and knowing that I was writing a book, she ventured that perhaps my subject matter was somewhat pedestrian. "You should write a book on your grandfather," she admonished me. "He was a great thinker, and not enough people know his works or know of him."

"You're right," I said, with a modest and embarra.s.sed smile that signified proper ta'arouf.

"Really," she pressed on, "young people especially need to know him."

"I don't think I'm qualified," I said. "I'm by no means an expert on the Philosophy of Illumination, if I even quite understand it."2 "You should do some research," she replied. "If you want to do something good good, write a book on Agha-ye a.s.sar, and get his works translated into English." Her husband listened as she spoke but ventured no opinion.

"Chashm," I said-"Upon my eyes"-another Persian expression of ta'arouf that is the polite and correct way to say "okay." She looked at me knowing full well that it also meant I agreed with her but was in no way promising to actually do anything about it. I said-"Upon my eyes"-another Persian expression of ta'arouf that is the polite and correct way to say "okay." She looked at me knowing full well that it also meant I agreed with her but was in no way promising to actually do anything about it.

"Really," she said softly. She smiled widely, and that was that.

Friday prayers the week of Tasua and Ashura take on added significance, with larger-than-normal crowds showing up at mosque (although it has never been an absolute obligation for Muslims to go to mosque, even on the Sabbath). In 2007, Friday prayers also coincided with the start of the ten-day celebrations of the Islamic Revolution of 1979, commemorating the ten days from Ayatollah Khomeini's arrival in Tehran to the successful victory of his revolt against the Shah, lending the prayers even more weight and gravitas. In Yazd, the a.s.sembly on Fridays is held at the Molla Esmaeil Mosque, built by Esmaeil Aqdi, a famous Yazdi scholar and mullah of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. (The mosque was completed in A A.H. 1222, which corresponds to 1807 C C.E.) I had discovered two years earlier, and there is no way to verify it because Iranians didn't have surnames, let alone birth certificates or even records of births prior to the reign of Reza Shah in the 1920s, that I am a descendant of his and, more interesting, that he was a Jew: a brilliant mathematician and scholar who not only converted to Islam but became a mullah. In my father's village of Ardakan, moreover, some people apparently still think of my family as "the Jews." During my Ashura week visit to my cousin Fatemeh's house, where a few people I hadn't met before seemed to drop in from time to time, as is not unusual in small towns in Iran, I was introduced to one older woman who asked, "Majd? Ardakani Majd?"

"Yes, Majd-e-Ardakani," I replied, using my grandfather's original name (which just means "Majd from Ardakan," and Majd actually being the single name of my great-great-grandfather).

"Oh," she said. "The Jews."

"I'd heard that," I said after a momentary pause, a little surprised. I looked at Fatemeh's father, my late aunt's ninety-year-old husband and coincidentally also President Khatami's uncle, who had rather triumphantly told me on a previous trip to Yazd that while his family was descended from the Zoroastrians (whom we had been discussing and who have always been a large minority in the region), I was descended from Jews. He said it somewhat gleefully because Iranians, whether pious Muslims or not, take great pride in their Aryan ancestry and revile the ancient Arabs who invaded their land, bringing them Islam, an Islam that they then molded to their Zoroastrian character. Even Seyyeds, descendants of the Prophet Mohammad, take pleasure in noting that their descent is through a Persian princess who married Mohammad's grandson Hossein, whom they so faithfully mourn each year at Moharram. "Your ancestor is Molla Esmaeil," he had said to me, and then he had gone on to explain who Esmaeil was. "G.o.d knows why he converted, though!" he had added at the end of his story.

"Yes, everybody knows that," he said, noticing my attention. "But tell me," he continued, "why are you really here? Have you come to do a little spying?"

"No!" I said with a laugh. "I like it here."

"Come on," he said jovially, "n.o.body likes it here, especially if you're from America. What's there to like?"

"Plenty," I replied, "and of course I'm going to partic.i.p.ate in Ashura."

"No. You've come to write a report," he insisted with a broad grin. "Have you written it yet? Did you investigate the uranium plant in Ardakan?"3 "Yes, that's right," I said. "I'm finis.h.i.+ng my report on it soon." He laughed, and I smiled. I knew he was only half-joking, though, for to someone like him, who has lived all his life in Ardakan and Yazd but has also seen Europe and America, the thought that anyone from those continents would find what he considers a backward place interesting enough to visit more than once, a place that would hardly merit a check mark for "worth a detour" if there were a Guide Michelin Guide Michelin for Yazd province, was absolutely preposterous. for Yazd province, was absolutely preposterous.

The Molla Esmaeil Mosque is anything but grand or ornate, although it does have its charms. Tall old walls surround the structure, so it's hard to even see it from the street that runs adjacent to the bazaar. A large crowd, the women separated from the men by a rope that ran along one side of the tented courtyard, had already gathered two hours before the noon prayer, and yet another round of chest-and chain-beating ceremonies by various delegations marched along a path through the crowd kept clear by police and Revolutionary Guards. A man with what looked like an old insecticide sprayer attached to his back wandered around, spraying rose water on the congregants and marchers, one of whom, a toothless old man in clerical garb standing in front of me, was in desperate need of it to mask the body odor that caused me to back away when it hit me. A ma.s.sive poster on one wall dominated all the other banners strewn about: a picture of a boy, perhaps ten or so and wearing a camouflage T-s.h.i.+rt, holding a photograph of Sheik Ha.s.san Nasrallah of Lebanon and making the victory sign with the fingers of his other hand held in the air. In large black letters underneath were the words "The Party of G.o.d Is Victorious." Hezbollah does indeed mean "party of G.o.d," although the sentence did not employ that group's moniker, one that has become almost a brand and that has lost its connotation in languages other than Arabic. The sign used the Persian khoda khoda for "G.o.d" rather than the Arabic for "G.o.d" rather than the Arabic allah allah, and spelled out "party of" instead of using the conjunctive o-. o-. It couldn't be any clearer that it wasn't a party or a political group or an army that was victorious (in the 2006 war with Israel): it was It couldn't be any clearer that it wasn't a party or a political group or an army that was victorious (in the 2006 war with Israel): it was G.o.d G.o.d.

Standing by the rope separating the women, who were all sitting on the floor, some trying to control their young children, from the men, who were preening about hitting themselves, I took out my camera and started taking photos. When I aimed at the women's section, a young woman in full black hijab marched up to me. "Why are you taking pictures of the women?" she asked angrily. Sadoughi's son, Mohammad, jumped in.

"He's a writer," he said. "It's all right."

The woman looked skeptical. "But why is he taking pictures of women?"

"What difference does it make?" said Mohammad. "You don't seem to mind the television crews up there." He pointed in the direction of the state TV cameras in the back of the courtyard. "He's from the media too."

"It's still not right," said the woman suspiciously as she stepped away, still staring at me. She stopped and leaned against a wall, keeping me in her view.

"I'm sorry," I said to Mohammad. "I hope I'm not causing any problems."

"Don't worry," he said, waving his hand. "It's ridiculous. Take as many pictures as you like." I put my camera away and headed for the exit. "I think I'll go outside for a break," I said.

"I'll come too," said Mohammad. We left the tented courtyard through a narrow pa.s.sageway that led to the entrance of the mosque, a small courtyard drenched in the yellowish light of a fierce desert sun bouncing off the ancient mud and straw of the twenty-foot-high walls that fully enclosed it. Men loitered about, some smoking and others just leaning against the walls, waiting to enter the mosque when the actual prayers would begin.

"Right there," said Mohammad, pointing to the center of the courtyard, "is where my grandfather was martyred." Ayatollah Sadoughi, the current Imam Jomeh's father and a conservative ally of Khomeini's during the revolution, was killed by Mohammad Reza Ebrahimzadeh, a suicide bomber from the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), on July 2, 1982, during a wave of a.s.sa.s.sinations and terrorist operations against the Islamic Republic's early leaders.h.i.+p in a counterrevolutionary bid to a.s.sume power. "My father was standing right behind him," he continued, "and he witnessed the whole thing." Mohammad, who had just been born then, showed no grief, but he was solemn.

"Those days are long past," I said, "and I don't suppose there's much of a terrorist threat these days, is there?"

"No," said Mohammad, fingering his Motorola walkie-talkie, an item illegal for Iranians to own unless they're with the armed forces, the police, or other government security services. "I suppose not."

We lingered for a while; Mohammad went off and sat alone on a ledge built into the wall, and I walked around, thinking about how tenuous the clerics' hold on power had been in the very early years after the revolution.

The Mujahedin had been an armed guerrilla group that were allies of Khomeini in bringing down the Shah, but had resented being excluded from power and had waged a bitter campaign, at first from within but eventually from their base provided them by Saddam Hussein in Iraq, against the Islamic Republic. A number of senior Ayatollahs, and even the republic's second president, Mohammad Ali Rajai, were killed during their campaign, and the current Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, was injured in a bomb attack. Non-suicide operations were often carried out by men who fled as pa.s.sengers on the backs of motorcycles, the most powerful of which were banned as a result and the reason that today still no motorcycle with an engine larger than 150 cc can be bought in Iran. But the Ayatollahs' system had survived, and it was hard to imagine how anyone could have thought differently, particularly if he had bothered to attend a Friday prayer meeting at his local mosque, and especially during Moharram.

A few minutes before midday, Mohammad and I went inside the mosque, to where the actual prayers were to be held, and Mohammad escorted me to the front row, right in front of the lectern where his father would deliver his sermon. The room was filling up with rows of men kneeling, waiting for the Imam Jomeh to arrive, and making last-minute calls on their cell phones. I wondered what they could possibly be discussing, and it occurred to me that not a few may have been talking to others in the same hall or perhaps to their wives in the women's section, for on Fridays, absolutely no business is conducted in the country and not even newspapers are published. It reminded me, though, to silence my own phone. I sat waiting, saying h.e.l.lo to every man who walked up to Mohammad to pay his respects, until one of Sadoughi's guards showed up and stood right in front of me. "Befarmaeed vozou, Haj-Agha," "Befarmaeed vozou, Haj-Agha," he said, gesturing with one outstretched arm while holding the other over his heart in the Iranian custom of showing respect. he said, gesturing with one outstretched arm while holding the other over his heart in the Iranian custom of showing respect. "Vozou?" "Vozou?" He was pointing in the direction of a private area where dignitaries would perform their ablutions before prayer-the He was pointing in the direction of a private area where dignitaries would perform their ablutions before prayer-the vozou vozou, or was.h.i.+ng of the hands, forearms, feet, and forehead with water-and he had referred to me as a hajji, someone who has made the pilgrimage to Mecca, which he a.s.sumed that I, being of a certain age, certainly had. I was about to stand up when Mohammad held my arm firmly.

"He's going to take photographs," he said to the guard. "He's working." He must have sensed my slight hesitation and wished to spare me any embarra.s.sment, even though I had never told him that I was not accustomed to praying. "He'll pray later," he added, just to ensure that my Islamic credentials remained bona fide with his father's guards. (s.h.i.+as, unlike Sunnis, can perform their dawn, noon, or evening prayers either at the time itself or at any time up to the next mandated prayer. Which is one reason why driving around any Iranian city at prayer time, there is no break in traffic. Unlike Muslim cabbies in New York City, many of whom will pull over, usually to a gas station, and pray right on time, not even pious Iranian taxi drivers will pause when their radio broadcasts the thrice-daily call to prayer.) Taking my cue, I took out my camera and stood up. "You can go anywhere with your camera," said Mohammad as the guard excused himself for his own vozou and left us. I was somewhat relieved that I wouldn't have to stay in one place throughout the prayers, mimicking my neighbors' gestures-sitting, kneeling, standing, and muttering, certainly in my case, unintelligible Arabic pa.s.sages from the Koran.

The Imam Jomeh, Sadoughi, arrived as I started to wander, surrounded by his other guards and trailed by a large group of mullahs. He disappeared into a room next to the lectern and the mullahs arranged themselves on the floor in front, while I stood against the wall with my camera in my hands. When Sadoughi emerged a few moments later, in lieu of the cane he usually walks with, he had an automatic rifle, holding on to the tip of the barrel and bringing the b.u.t.t down on the stone floor with every step. He positioned himself behind the microphone and held on to the rifle, leaning on it ever so slightly now and then, and began his sermon.

Friday prayer sermons in Iran, the world's only state other than the Vatican that is run by clerics, tend to be more political than religious in nature, and this Friday, falling as it did at the beginning of the Ten-Day Dawn, was doubly so. Sadoughi recounted the story of leaving Paris and arriving in Tehran with Khomeini on his chartered Air France 747, himself sitting in the seat behind Khomeini, and the crowd listened intently. It was a story I had already heard; Sadoughi had told it to me himself with great excitement over tea one day, and I suspect he had also told it in previous years to the very men before us. Khomeini's character, his fearlessness, and the glory of his revolution were the thrust of the speech, as well as his selfless dedication to his people. Women and children, Sadoughi said, were originally barred from the flight, as it was considered too dangerous. The women at Neauphle-le-Chateau, the suburban Parisian village where Khomeini was based, however, objected strenuously, and Khomeini relented, warning them, however, that the plane could be shot down in Iranian airs.p.a.ce by the Shah's government even though the Shah had already fled into exile. (Neauphle-le-Chateau was deemed important enough to the revolution to be memorialized by a street name in Tehran, in the neighborhood where I stay and linking two major shopping avenues, but it took me many walks along it to finally decipher the meaning of the street signs, which inexplicably mangled, Persian-style, the village's name to "Nofel Loshato." We may honor a foreign and impure town, the authorities seemed to be saying, specifically to the French, but we'll spell it our our way.) When Khomeini and his entourage finally circled Tehran's Mehrabad Airport, Sadoughi said, they were initially denied permission to land as they approached, and when the plane banked sharply, everyone thought they might be under attack. Khomeini, however, was calm and expressionless, a testament, the Imam Jomeh implied, to his faith in G.o.d's will. Sadoughi also talked about the need for unity in the face of new threats-threats he didn't need to spell out but were clearly a reference to the United States-his rifle with its loaded magazine (I was told) emphasizing the point that he, and other clerics, stood ready to defend the Islamic Republic from any enemy. way.) When Khomeini and his entourage finally circled Tehran's Mehrabad Airport, Sadoughi said, they were initially denied permission to land as they approached, and when the plane banked sharply, everyone thought they might be under attack. Khomeini, however, was calm and expressionless, a testament, the Imam Jomeh implied, to his faith in G.o.d's will. Sadoughi also talked about the need for unity in the face of new threats-threats he didn't need to spell out but were clearly a reference to the United States-his rifle with its loaded magazine (I was told) emphasizing the point that he, and other clerics, stood ready to defend the Islamic Republic from any enemy.

He made no mention of Ahmadinejad or the current government, and he didn't need to: as the representative of the Supreme Leader, he was speaking for the velayat-e-faqih, not any elected government that by its nature would be temporary. It wasn't a fiery speech, nor was it angry or hostile, and in fact at times when he talked about Khomeini and the revolution, it was anything but, but then again Sadoughi is not a firebrand and is, after all, close to Khatami, his brother-in-law in whose cabinet he once served as a vice president.4 However, as we on the outside and those in Iran need reminding every now and then, the most charming (and Sadoughi is certainly a charming man), the most moderate, and even the most liberal reformist clerics are united in their firm belief that the revolution was pure, that Khomeini's views on a political system were sound, and that any democracy in Iran will always be an Islamic one. However, as we on the outside and those in Iran need reminding every now and then, the most charming (and Sadoughi is certainly a charming man), the most moderate, and even the most liberal reformist clerics are united in their firm belief that the revolution was pure, that Khomeini's views on a political system were sound, and that any democracy in Iran will always be an Islamic one.

When Sadoughi finished his sermon, he handed his rifle to a guard and stood, like everyone else, facing Mecca to lead the prayers. I stood facing him, from behind the lectern he had just vacated, and dutifully took pictures while his guards watched me, occasionally nodding their approval whenever I leaned forward to get a close-up. When the prayers were over, Mohammad stood up and signaled that I was to follow him. We left by a side entrance with his father and the guards, leaving the other mullahs behind, and were driven the short distance to Sadoughi's office, a few doors down from his house. The office, on an impossibly narrow street designed for horses and donkeys and covered by sun-s.h.i.+elding archways over the tall mud walls on either side, had been Sadoughi's father's office and was in a building perhaps two hundred years old. We walked inside and into a square room, the walls covered entirely in intricate hand-carved mirror tiles depicting flowers, birds, geometric Islamic shapes, and calligraphic pa.s.sages from the Koran. Stained-gla.s.s arched windows that touched the ceiling let light in, but allowed no view of the outside. An old attendant rushed to fetch some tea, and then set the huge Persian carpet with a plastic tablecloth and three place settings. "You'll have lunch with us," said Mohammad.

"And you'll have to excuse the meal," said the Imam Jomeh, "but it's gheimeh gheimeh provided by the neighbors." During Ashura week, it is customary for families with means to provide free food in their neighborhood, not just for the poor, but for anyone who wishes to indulge, and in this case a meal had been brought over by them for their spiritual guide. Gheimeh, a stew of lamb and split peas, along with rice, is a dish traditionally prepared during Moharram, and the three of us sat on the floor, cross-legged, eating the watery stew in silence. Sadoughi had had an exhausting Ashura week, and in the morning he had fulfilled his duties as the representative of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution by giving a speech on the glory of that revolution. Now was a time to eat Allah's gift of food in his martyred father's office, facing a framed photograph of Ayatollah Khomeini prominently displayed on a ledge, and reflect on the suffering of provided by the neighbors." During Ashura week, it is customary for families with means to provide free food in their neighborhood, not just for the poor, but for anyone who wishes to indulge, and in this case a meal had been brought over by them for their spiritual guide. Gheimeh, a stew of lamb and split peas, along with rice, is a dish traditionally prepared during Moharram, and the three of us sat on the floor, cross-legged, eating the watery stew in silence. Sadoughi had had an exhausting Ashura week, and in the morning he had fulfilled his duties as the representative of the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution by giving a speech on the glory of that revolution. Now was a time to eat Allah's gift of food in his martyred father's office, facing a framed photograph of Ayatollah Khomeini prominently displayed on a ledge, and reflect on the suffering of Ahl'ul'bayt Ahl'ul'bayt, the "People of the House," or the Prophet Mohammad's family, for whom the nation mourned. Hossein and his family, grandson and descendants of the Prophet, died by the sword to save Islam, s.h.i.+as believe. s.h.i.+sm survived against the odds-s.h.i.+a Iran is testament to that-and throughout s.h.i.+a history the shedding of blood, or martyrdom, has been central to the faith and has contributed to its allure.

In Baghdad, the infamous Swords of Qadisiyyah monument (also known as the "Hands of Victory") is formed by two ma.s.sive swords held by hands resting on the helmets of dead Iranian soldiers, most of them pockmarked by bullet holes. Conceived by Saddam Hussein before his war with Iran ended and intended to serve as a symbol of Iraq's victory over the Persians, which never came, it was, and still is, a reminder for Persians that despite their heavy bloodletting in that conflict, their willingness to sacrifice means that the sword will not always be victorious. Apart from the empty symbolism that most Iraqis recognized at the time despite the propaganda of the Baathist regime, few can help but see that Saddam and his swords are long gone, Iraq is barely a nation, and s.h.i.+a Iran is more powerful than it has been in centuries. Or, as one Tehran daily, in an attempt to sum up s.h.i.+a, and by extension Iranian, philosophy for its English-speaking readers, proclaimed, in a bold headline splashed across its front page on the first day of Moharram 2007: "VICTORY OF BLOOD OVER THE SWORD."

PAIRIDAEZA: THE PERSIAN GARDEN.

On March 21, the first day of spring of 1935 and Noruz, the Persian New Year, "Persia" suddenly became "Iran." And Francophones discovered that "Perse" no longer existed. Of course Iran had always been "Iran" to Iranians, or Persians if you prefer, but in the non-Persian-speaking world the country was known by variations on the Greek name "Persis." In 1935, Reza Shah Pahlavi, the semiliterate army officer who had ousted the last Shah of the Qajar dynasty and whose own dynasty would not outlive his son, was in a warm embrace with the Third Reich. A great admirer of Germany, which he thought had far more benign intentions than Russia or Britain in the Middle East, he was also a fierce nationalist and strict fascist for whom Hitler's National Socialism held great appeal. Reza Shah had been busy since his self-coronation hiring German engineers and architects to build Iran's railroad system as well as the government buildings in downtown Tehran, and they still stand today: soaring, pristine fascist architecture-monuments to the resurgent Iranian nationalism of the 1930s.

It is said that Reza Shah's amba.s.sador to Berlin in the mid-1930s, probably with advice and nudges from German ministers, put forth to the Foreign Ministry and his king that Persia should be known to the outside world as "Iran," a word meaning "land of the Aryans" and used by inhabitants of the land since at least Sa.s.sanid times (226 C C.E.). In an article in the January 26, 1936, issue of the New York Times New York Times, Oliver McKee stated, "At the suggestion of the Persian Legation in Berlin, the Teheran government...subst.i.tuted Iran for Persia as the official name of the country. Its decision was influenced by the n.a.z.i revival of interest in the so-called Aryan races, cradled in ancient Persia. As the Ministry of Foreign Affairs set forth in its memorandum on the subject, 'Perse,' the French designation of Persia, connoted the weakness and tottering independence of the country in the nineteenth century, when it was a p.a.w.n on the chessboard of European imperialistic rivalry. 'Iran,' by contrast, conjured up memories of the vigor and splendor of its historic past." That explanation would come as a surprise to many Iranians today, particularly in the diaspora, for they have the exact opposite view: that "Persia" connotes a glorious past they would like to be identified with, while "Iran," disconnected from that exotic and romantic place in the minds of Westerners, says nothing to the world but Islamic fundamentalism. At the time, however, in the mid-1930s, hardly any Iranians, except for the handful of intellectuals who had some sort of contact with the outside world, really noticed or cared much. Iran was Iran to them, and few, except perhaps for carpet traders in the bazaars, had ever even come across the word "Persian."

This disconnect for many Westerners between Iran and Persia (still prevalent today in many instances) provided cover for not a few Iranian exiles in the early days of the revolution, days that saw Iran hold fifty-two American diplomats hostage, to the obvious disapproval of nearly the entire world. Iran and Iranians now projected an image not only of Islamic fundamentalism and religious extremism but also of violence against Western interests. Iranians in the West, perhaps unduly fearful of a hostile reaction, often said they were "Persian" or from "Persia" to disa.s.sociate themselves from the angry flag-burning mobs seen on nightly television broadcasts throughout the world. In America some Iranians-excuse me, Persians- Persians-went further and changed their first names (unofficially in most cases) to something more English, although for some curious reason, probably a slight sense of guilt at not exhibiting obligatory Iranian pride, they felt compelled to come up with names that were as close as possible to the original, even if that meant only using the first letter of the Iranian name. Mohammads became Moes or Michaels, Hosseins became Henrys or Harrys, and numerous Fereydouns and Faramarzes simply became Freds. Iranian women in the West, who by virtue of their penchant for heavy makeup and a lack of any Islamic-inspired attire in their wardrobe, seemed less inspired to change their names, which at any rate were less identifiably Iranian (or Muslim) than their male counterparts'. I suppose I thought myself fortunate in not having a name that was too obviously Iranian, but I was far too conceited and contrary, I confess, to call myself Persian instead of Iranian, let alone think about changing my name. (One of my American friends did, however, take to calling me Hank, though as more of a joke than anything else.) I do remember admiring the name of an Iranian commentator on the first Iranian television program in the States in the early 1980s: Davoud Ramzi. He could, I thought, legitimately call himself David (Davoud is Persian for David), and a mere change of spelling would render his name American or English. Yes, I thought, what a stroke of fortune to be named David Ramsay, and have it be your real name too!

Perhaps as a defense for having referred to themselves as Persian for so long, some Iranians in the diaspora now argue for "Persia" to return as the English name for their country. It is a debate held almost exclusively outside Iran (for most of those who continue to live in the Islamic Republic generally couldn't care less), but in the age of the Internet the issue reverberates among at least the intellectual cla.s.ses inside the country as well. Iranian Web sites and blogs are filled with reasons why "Persia" makes perfect sense and why "Persian" should be the language (not "Farsi," the Persian word for it). Oddly, they have never suggested that the Shahs of Persia be referred to as kings, which, after all, is exactly what "Shah" means. Some argue that "Germany" is "Deutschland" in German, "j.a.pan" is "Nippon" in j.a.panese, and many European countries have different names from those used in English. Of course what's missing from the argument is that the countries that have different names in different languages tend to be the industrialized, powerful nations of the world that do not suffer from a national inferiority complex, one often brought about by the behavior of more powerful nations toward them. Egypt, or Misr, as it is correctly known in the Arab world, is perhaps the glaring exception, but in that case a link to the famous Egypt of the Pharaohs and pyramids is more obviously advantageous, as ancient Egyptian history is almost as well-known in the West as Roman or Greek, partly for biblical reasons and partly because of Elizabeth Taylor. The same cannot be said for Persian history, much to the dismay of Iranians both inside and outside the country, and a critical component of the superiority/inferiority complexes the nation suffers.

All Iranians who study at Iranian schools learn about their great empire and are immensely proud of not only its cultural accomplishments but also its awe-inspiring power at various times throughout history, although in the early days after the revolution teachers were discouraged from delving too far into Iran's pre-Islamic past and were given curricula that emphasized Islamic teachings and history. Nonetheless, even then most students' knowledge of their country's past, supplemented as it was in the home, formed their opinion that Iran was the equal, if not the better, of Rome and Athens. On the other hand, hardly anyone in the West studies Persian history at school, and even study of ancient history at college tends not to include Persian history, other than in its relation to the Greek wars. For this reason, what has has been written about the ancient Persians and their empires is mostly known through the Greeks, who, as fierce rivals, were not likely to write glowing reviews. Alexander the Great, whom most people been written about the ancient Persians and their empires is mostly known through the Greeks, who, as fierce rivals, were not likely to write glowing reviews. Alexander the Great, whom most people do do know, is sort of an ancient hero in the West and a true villain in Iran, a barbarian who, when he conquered Persia, was such a brute and ignoramus that he burned magnificent libraries along with the greatest city in the world, Persepolis, to the ground. But in a good example of the Persian superiority complex, even this villain is shown to have ultimately had the wisdom to recognize the superiority of the Persians by settling down (until his death) in Persia and marrying a blue-blooded Persian. What could be a better endors.e.m.e.nt of the greatest civilization known to man? know, is sort of an ancient hero in the West and a true villain in Iran, a barbarian who, when he conquered Persia, was such a brute and ignoramus that he burned magnificent libraries along with the greatest city in the world, Persepolis, to the ground. But in a good example of the Persian superiority complex, even this villain is shown to have ultimately had the wisdom to recognize the superiority of the Persians by settling down (until his death) in Persia and marrying a blue-blooded Persian. What could be a better endors.e.m.e.nt of the greatest civilization known to man?

Regardless of how Iranians feel about the question of their country's name, and I am willing to concede that "Persian Emba.s.sy," "Persian government," and "Persian people" do sound a little better in English, most particularly if "Iran" is, as is sometimes the case with Americans, p.r.o.nounced "Eye-ran." Perhaps it's the "purr-" in "Persian," as soft a sound as anyone can make in the English language, or perhaps it's that most things Persian are beautiful and valuable, such as cats and carpets, to say nothing of the poetry and most things Iranian are, well, we needn't go into that. But one has to wonder if Iran had never demanded that the rest of the world call it by its proper name, and the Persian Persian Islamic Revolution had still left a bitter taste in Westerners' mouths, whether Islamic Revolution had still left a bitter taste in Westerners' mouths, whether Persians Persians abroad might not be insisting that they are, in fact, abroad might not be insisting that they are, in fact, Iranian. Iranian. Despite the country's perceived name change (rather than name Despite the country's perceived name change (rather than name correction correction), some things will forever remain Persian in Anglo-American minds: Persian cats (like Siamese, rather than Thai, cats, or Pekingese, rather than Beijing-ese, dogs), carpets, and of course, the least known in the West, Persian gardens.

I use "Persian" and "Iranian" interchangeably, mainly because "Persian" often better distinguishes for readers the Indo-European Iranians from their neighboring Semitic Arabs. It is notable that Arabs, when and if they wish to disparage Iranians, more often than not will also refer to them as Persians: the "other," and, because they're s.h.i.+a, the infidel. Some Sunni Arabs in Iraq have taken it one step further, calling all s.h.i.+as, including Iraqi s.h.i.+as, "Safavids," the name of the Persian dynasty that made s.h.i.+sm the state religion of Iran, and a clear move in sectarian times to a.s.sociate non-Sunni Arabs with the non-Arab Persians. s.h.i.+a Islam, however, because of its beloved saint Imam Hossein, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammad and an Arab, conveniently bridges the Arab-Iranian schism through Hossein's wife, a Persian princess he wisely (as far as Persians are concerned) wed and who bore him the half-Iranian great-grandchildren of the last Prophet of Allah.1 The often contradictory Iranian att.i.tudes toward Arabs can be difficult to explain. What can one make of Iranians who shed genuine tears for an Arab who died fourteen hundred years ago, who pray in Arabic three times a day, and yet who will in an instant derisively dismiss the Arab people, certainly those from the peninsula, as malakh-khor malakh-khor, "locust eaters"? As one deputy foreign minister once said to me, lips curled in a grimace of disgust and right before he excused himself to pray (in Arabic),2 "Iranians long ago became Muslims, but they didn't become "Iranians long ago became Muslims, but they didn't become Arabs Arabs." His scorn was meant, of course, for desert Arabs who brought Islam to the world, and not necessarily Syrian, Egyptian, or Lebanese Arabs, whom the Iranians place a few degrees higher on the social scale than their desert brethren. The disconnect between Arab and Muslim for Iranians is not unlike the disconnect between certain anti-Semitic Christians and Jews-a disconnect that conveniently ignores not only that Christ was a Jew but also that Christianity, at least at its inception, was a Jewish sect. (The peculiar Iranian disconnect can work both ways, though, for many Arabs today, or at least Arab governments, would rather Israel remain the dominant power in their region than witness, Allah forbid! Allah forbid!, a Persian ascent to the position.) The intellectual and fiercely secular cla.s.ses of Iranian society, a minority limited to enclaves within the biggest cities, are today more likely than ever to embrace their pre-Muslim, their Persian Persian, roots for obvious reasons, but there is a sense even among religious Iranians that the Arab invasion that brought them Islam brought them nothing else of any value and may have, in fact, initially hindered Persian progress in the arts and sciences. Compared with Persia and its self-described glorious empire, an empire that had cultivated the deserts of Iran with an underground irrigation system, qanat qanat, which allowed them to build their beloved gardens just about anywhere a millennium before the invading Arab Muslims of centuries ago arrived, Arabs, according to Iranians, were an uncultured lot, barely literate, and their brute force persuaded the Iranians to convert to their religion but not their way of life. Why Allah would choose, in His infinite wisdom, to reveal His Word to an illiterate Arab in the desert is not a subject of debate in Iran, but then again, even for Iranians, Allah putatively works in mysterious ways.

Iran is, of course, smaller than an empire but still a geographically large country and counts among its inhabitants many of different ethnicities, including Arabs, who often complain of discrimination and oppression by those who are Fars, from the mid-and southern Iranian province (originally "Pars," but changed because Arabic doesn't have the p p sound) that was the heart of the ancient empire. Oddly, though the Arabs come in for much derision as culturally inferior and their claims of discrimination are not without merit, they are not, like other ethnicities or even inhabitants of provincial cities, the b.u.t.t of Persian humor. Much like the Polish in American jokes or the Irish in English jokes, the Turks of Iranian Azerbaijan seem to suffer the most in Persian jokes, followed closely by citizens of the northern city of Rasht, but perhaps it's the real scorn Iranians reserve for Arabs that makes them unworthy even of mockery. sound) that was the heart of the ancient empire. Oddly, though the Arabs come in for much derision as culturally inferior and their claims of discrimination are not without merit, they are not, like other ethnicities or even inhabitants of provincial cities, the b.u.t.t of Persian humor. Much like the Polish in American jokes or the Irish in English jokes, the Turks of Iranian Azerbaijan seem to suffer the most in Persian jokes, followed closely by citizens of the northern city of Rasht, but perhaps it's the real scorn Iranians reserve for Arabs that makes them unworthy even of mockery.

Iranians, as race conscious as any people on the planet, generally describe themselves as Fars, Turk, Kurd, Armenian, Arab, or Jew, although clearly today's Persians are a mixed lot, having suffered invasion after invasion over the millennia, and invasions that often resulted in the invaders putting down roots and taking local women as wives, as Alexander and his armies did, in Persia. But some secular Persian intellectuals (who would absolutely deny that they are in any way racist) will not only exhibit racism toward Arabs or other minorities but reserve a special hatred for Ayatollah Khomeini, not just because he founded the Islamic Republic, but because to them he wasn't even Persian Persian. Since his paternal grandfather was an Indian who immigrated to Iran (to the town of Khomein) in the early nineteenth century, some Iranians feel that his "tainted" blood means that a true Persian was not at the helm of the revolution, the most momentous event in their country's modern history, good or bad. And soon after that revolution, when the time came to change the symbol of Iran on its flag from the lion and sun (which the revolutionaries incorrectly a.s.sociated with the Shahs), Khomeini himself chose a symbol among those submitted by artists-a stylized "Allah"-which his opponents, at least the more race-conscious ones, continue to insist bears a remarkable similarity to the symbol of the Sikhs.

Some of Khomeini's enemies see it as proof of a foreign hand in the revolution, perhaps British because of their influence in India, or, worse, a secret conspiracy by an Indian religion to destroy Persia, and today when Iranian exiles and even some inside Iran want to disparage him, they sometimes refer to him as Hindi Hindi (which happened to be his grandfather's surname but is also Persian for "Indian"). One such Iranian in Tehran, when he found out where I was staying, insisted that I take a short walk in my neighborhood past the Sikh center of Tehran, a large white compound with a garden surrounded, naturally, by high walls. "Look at the logo on the gates of the walls, and then tell me that Khomeini (which happened to be his grandfather's surname but is also Persian for "Indian"). One such Iranian in Tehran, when he found out where I was staying, insisted that I take a short walk in my neighborhood past the Sikh center of Tehran, a large white compound with a garden surrounded, naturally, by high walls. "Look at the logo on the gates of the walls, and then tell me that Khomeini wasn't wasn't a Sikh," he said. I replied that I knew exactly what the Sikh emblem looked like (coming from New York, where it is often seen on the back windows of cabs and car service vehicles), but I did as he said anyway, curious about a Sikh center in Tehran, given that the religion is not one of the four-Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism-that is recognized by the state. I found that there was indeed a Sikh center, right in my neighborhood, and the emblem on the gates, I have to admit, does give one pause when viewing it in the Islamic Republic, where its own emblem is ubiquitous. But after a few moments reflecting on the coincidence of its uncanny similarity to the "Allah" of Iran, I moved on, reflecting instead on my compatriots' love of and insatiable appet.i.te for conspiracy theories. a Sikh," he said. I replied that I knew exactly what the Sikh emblem looked like (coming from New York, where it is often seen on the back windows of cabs and car service vehicles), but I did as he said anyway, curious about a Sikh center in Tehran, given that the religion is not one of the four-Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism-that is recognized by the state. I found that there was indeed a Sikh center, right in my neighborhood, and the emblem on the gates, I have to admit, does give one pause when viewing it in the Islamic Republic, where its own emblem is ubiquitous. But after a few moments reflecting on the coincidence of its uncanny similarity to the "Allah" of Iran, I moved on, reflecting instead on my compatriots' love of and insatiable appet.i.te for conspiracy theories.

Of all the criticisms one might make of Ayatollah Khomeini, his being a descendant of an Indian cannot, despite some of the more racist Iranians' insistence, be included, for if the main criterion for ruling Iran rightfully or for starting a revolution is pure Persian race, then Zoroastrians should be in charge of Iran. They, who still practice the ancient religion of Iran from before the Muslim invasion, can probably claim the "purest" Aryan bloodline of any Iranians, for they rarely marry outside the faith and are excommunicated if they do, but the rest of us are, whether we like it or not, a mixture of all the racial minorities in Iran, including minorities that no longer exist, such as Macedonian and Mongol. And most Iranians do not like it. But what Iranians, no matter their racial makeup, share is a deep cultural tie to the walled garden, figuratively and literally. The four-walled Persian garden, or pairidaeza pairidaeza in Old Persian ( in Old Persian (pairi for "around," for "around," daeza daeza for "wall"), has existed since the time of Cyrus the Great, more than twenty-five hundred years ago, and not only inspired the future grand gardens of Europe but gave its name to our definition of heaven: "paradise." for "wall"), has existed since the time of Cyrus the Great, more than twenty-five hundred years ago, and not only inspired the future grand gardens of Europe but gave its name to our definition of heaven: "paradise."

My own childhood pairidaeza was my grandparents' home in Abbasabad-e-Einedoleh, in downtown Tehran. We visited some summers, and as my parents, who'd been living abroad since the 1950s, didn't own a house in Iran and my father's family was hundreds of miles away in the desert town of Yazd, we always stayed at my maternal grandparents' house, the house my mother was born in. My grandfather Seyyed Kazem a.s.sar spent most of his time in his rooms, reading or entertaining visitors who came often to see him, either students on a question of philosophy or neighbors for an estekhareh estekhareh, a peculiarly s.h.i.+a form of a reading, or divining answers to perplexing or simply mundane questions. He was a cleric but also a Sufi, and his estekhareh were well-known, and everyone I met, including my mother, believed with absolute certainty in the divinations. Sometimes he performed the estekhareh by closing his eyes and muttering prayers while he fingered his worry beads, stopping at a particular moment in the prayer and holding the beads up to count how many of them he had moved, thence proclaiming whether whatever was being contemplated was favorable or unfavorable. Other times he would hold a Koran in his hand and pray, again with eyes closed, and at the right moment stop and randomly open the book to a page, whereby he would ascertain from the pa.s.sage his finger pointed to what answer to give the pet.i.tioner.

I always feared becoming sick in Iran, for no matter my malady, my mother would, along with a visit to a doctor, consult her father and his estekhareh, which for me only meant succ.u.mbing to the forced drinking of drafts of vomit-inducing tinctures, the tastes of which remain in my throat today and the likes of which I have yet to experience in my adult life. I did come to believe in estekhareh myself, however, or at least the a.s.sar estekhareh, when my uncle Na.s.ser-who also visited some summers from his home in Paris, where he was a painter and to which he had run away after he had finished high school-was cured of a skin disorder on his hands by his father's prescription after a lengthy divination, which neither he nor his French wife believed could possibly help but, given the lack of success by his European doctors, believed would probably not hurt either. For the rest of his stay in Tehran, Na.s.ser would urinate on his hands every day, and his skin cleared up nicely before his return to France.

Kazem a.s.sar, though born of an Iraqi mother and therefore half-Arab, was Persian through and through when it came to love of his garden. Other than during meals, which he sometimes took alone in his library, the only times he seemed relaxed were when he went for his daily stroll in the garden, walking on the stone path in the shade of the walls in his clerical garb and turban, pausing to rest, and I presume reflect, every now and then in front of a mulberry bush or cherry tree. His manservant Ali would wash down the path with a hose every hot, dusty afternoon, briefly cooling the air and adding a very slight and momentary humidity that Tehran normally suffers without. My mother tells me that when my brother, Saman, was born, Kazem's first grandchild, he took great pleasure in pus.h.i.+ng his baby carriage around the garden, a novelty pleasure that apparently quickly wore off, for there are no stories, photographs, or memories of him doing the same for me, born a mere eighteen months later.

The garden, surrounded by what I remember as impossibly high mud walls, although they were probably only twelve or fifteen feet, was where my brother and I lived during the summers, playing all sorts of games, trying to climb a pine tree, or taking a dip in the small pond in the center. The purpose of the pond in Persian gardens is twofold: it provides aesthetic pleasure and peaceful tranquillity, and it serves as a place to perform the ablutions required before prayers. For children playing on a hot summer day, it was merely an opportunity to cool down. On the far side of the pond, there was a large stone-paved area under two towering pine trees that extended almost to the back wall of the garden, and it was here that every night wooden beds and cotton mattresses would be set up for the entire family to sleep under the stars. Air-conditioning was rare in those days, particularly in older houses, and quite unnecessary at night in the dry climate, and I remember how exciting it was for an apartment-dwelling child to crawl into a bed in a huge garden and look up at the sky. Almost everyone in the household slept outdoors together during the long, hot summers-beds in a row as if in an army barracks-but I was much too young to wonder about the s.e.x life of the adults and their lack of privacy at night. People must've had s.e.x, but I certainly don't remember hearing any sounds, so perhaps Persian modesty prevailed and s.e.x was quietly confined to daylight hours indoors, or else everyone of an age simply bit down hard on their tongues in the middle of the night.

s.e.x, of course, was never discussed in my home, but it has always been a major topic of anxiety in an Islamic country with an erotic past. s.e.x in Iran has had a "don't ask, don't tell" quality about it that is only just beginning to be dispelled, and this despite the common misperception that the Islamic state and the Ayatollahs frown on all matters relating to s.e.x. s.h.i.+a Islam has always been quite understanding of s.e.xual desire in both men and women; after all, it allows for temporary marriages as short as one hour, known as sigheh sigheh, for the very purpose of religiously sanctioned fun. Originally intended to alleviate the s.e.xual needs of widows (preferably war widows) as well as unmarried men, it can in fact be a legal device for young men and women to, as we might say, "hook up." It is hardly used, though, and Iranian society, once terrified of s.e.x crawling over the walls of private gardens, today seems to be more comfortable with a rather more open att.i.tude to s.e.x. Condoms are now advertised openly in Iran, and AIDS is not a taboo subject in a country that, under even the progressive Shahs and a Westernized wealthy cla.s.s in Tehran, was always a society in a state of s.e.xual hypocrisy. Women were expected to remain virgins until they married, and certainly not get pregnant, and yet women did have s.e.x with boyfriends, and sometimes some of them got pregnant. The plastic surgery practice of hymen reconstruction was so common in Tehran in prerevolutionary times that some doctors devoted their practice to it (and hymen-reconstruction expertise followed the large Iranian expatriate community to Los Angeles, where it is still performed), while abortion clinics were plentiful (and still are, discreetly, today). In a society where uttering the words khar-kosteh- khar-kosteh-literally "your sister f.u.c.ks"-is the very worst of insults, though often merely a statement of fact in the West, men and women know very well that almost everyone has a s.e.xual history, but there is never a reason to allow that history to be exposed outside of the home, and as long as appearances are maintained, all is forgiven.

In 2006 and even into 2007, however, there was a single incident beyond the issue of AIDS that brought s.e.x out from behind the garden walls and right into the street, or, as some hard-line Islamists thought, the gutter. Television's most famous actress, Zahra Ebrahimi, a demure young lady who portrayed a pious, properly Muslim girl on a popular soap opera, was, much like Paris Hilton, the subject of a s.e.x video made by her boyfriend that found its way to every DVD and CD vendor in Iran. She immediately denied that the woman in the video was her, while her boyfriend initially fled the country, and then, when he returned, argued that they had performed a temporary marriage and therefore were not engaging in any illicit activity. Investigations were begun, the judiciary got involved, and then everyone in Iran, of course, had to see the video. Abdolgha.s.sem Gha.s.semzadeh, an editor at large of one of Iran's largest dailies, Ettelaat Ettelaat, and the son-in-law of a very senior cleric, told me an anecdote about the affair one afternoon in his offices at the paper. "One day," he said, tapping his pipe on the palm of his hand, "our reporters were excited by the news that the s.e.x video had grossed about four billion rials [approximately half a million dollars] in sales, and at the editorial meeting they were looking for the story to get placement on the front page." He paused while he puffed on his pipe for a few moments. "I said," he then continued, "absolutely not; under no circ.u.mstances! The story will be buried deep inside the paper."

"Why?" I asked him, a little confused.

"Because," he replied, "and I had to explain this to the reporters too, if we made the profit on the s.e.x video big news, Iran would be inundated with copycat videos by people hoping to make a killing with their own s.e.x videos."

"Really? So what happened?" I asked.

"It was buried in the paper, but my prediction was right anyway. A few weeks later, a video surfaced in the north of the country, but the couple had been too stupid to hide their faces, so the local police immediately identified them." He chuckled. "The problem was, of course, that they were married, so it wasn't clear if they had actually broken any laws."

"So did they make any money with their video?"

"Yes, of course!" said Gha.s.semzadeh. "Not as much; but they made money."

Despite the huge scandal and the impropriety in a society where not only Islam but also Persian culture deems that a woman must at least give the appearance of being chaste, the scandal faded away, no one was detained for long, and if the investigation even continued (as the government insisted), everyone, including the conservatives most outraged, lost interest. s.e.x, it seems, has made its way out of the garden with a big sigh, if not yet in rural Iran or among the poorest and most pious of Iranians, then at least in the urban centers, where Iranians of all cla.s.ses consume the news with a voracious appet.i.te.

Persian culture, the culture Iranians of all races deem superior to all others in the region and certainly superior to the locust eaters', places a remarkable emphasis on the home, privacy, and private life, and perhaps no other civilization has delineated public behavior from private quite as much. Traditional Iranian houses, with imposing walls surrounding them that afford absolute privacy from roving neighbors' and strangers' eyes, were built around gardens that Persians value as much as the homes themselves. Often, wealthier families built compounds around the gardens that housed extensions of the family or, if there was no room, bought up adjacent lots or houses and connected them if possible. Today in big cities such as Tehran, where houses have ceded much ground to apartments, Iranian sensibilities still exhibit themselves in the thousands of four-and five-story apartment buildings where every unit is occupied by either members of the same family or, at the very least, good friends. High-rise apartment buildings have gained some ground, but they tend to be inhabited by the most Westernized of city dwellers, some of whom own, or have lived in, similar apartments in Europe or America. It is perhaps because of the Iranian concept of the home and garden (and not the city or town it is in) as the defining center of life that Iranians find living in a society with such stringent rules of public behavior somewhat tolerable. Iranian society by and large cares very little about what goes on in the homes and gardens of private citizens, but the Islamic government cares very much how its citizens behave once they venture outside their walls.

Even in the early days of the revolution that brought mandated Islamic behavior to Iran, most Iranians felt secure enough in their homes to do as they pleased, whether it was Islamic behavior or not. Government or quasi-governmental raids on private homes where parties were being held and alcohol consumed were common enough in those days, but the truth is that the way the un-Islamic parties were known to the authorities was that they were loud enough to be heard on the streets or by neighbors, and not because the government was actively spying on the private lives of its citizens. (A bigger problem for partygoers then was the danger of being stopped on the drive home with alcohol on the breath.) Today, despite a deeply conservative government in power, there is no shortage of alcohol-and even drug-fueled parties in metropolitan areas, and there are, despite persistent fears of a crackdown, practically no attempts by the government to breach the walls of the Persian home.3 And it is behind those walls that one often finds the true Iranian character. And it is behind those walls that one often finds the true Iranian character.

The walls of the Persian garden are, in their figurative sense, movable. Anywhere there is privacy, a Persian feels surrounded by his walls and therefore at ease. And the very top levels of Islamic Iranian officialdom are no exception. In September 2006, former president Khatami made a private visit to the United States, symbolically significant because he was the highest-ranking Iranian official to be allowed into the United States on anything other than official UN business in more than twenty-seven years. His first stop was New York, where the Islamic Republic has its only diplomatic outpost (accredited to the UN) in America, and where he sat in the drawing room of a stately mansion on Fifth Avenue across from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, just minutes after arriving, courtesy of a full NYPD and State Department escort, at Kennedy Airport. The limestone mansion is the residence of Iran's amba.s.sador to the UN and is a little bit of Islamic Persia in Manhattan, complete with a flat-screen television in one room broadcasting live Iranian television and fanciful paintings of words from the Koran or the word "Allah" on the walls that seem to be the artwork of choice in government offices throughout Iran. The flagpole above the entrance on Fifth Avenue was bare, an indication of both Iranian hesitancy to draw attention to an Islamic Republic not particularly popular in the United States and traditional Persian guardedness when it comes to privacy behind the walls of the home. Khatami and his entourage, which included a number of his ex-amba.s.sadors, sat on ersatz Louis Quinze sofas and armchairs, a much-favored Iranian upscale furniture style that for some strange reason never lost its popularity despite a revolution that banished all symbols of grandeur as taghouti taghouti, or "royalist," but they were unguarded and relaxed in the privacy of their Persian home away from home. A number of staff from Iran's UN Mission were there too, thrilled, it seemed, to be hanging out with a president whom they had all wholeheartedly supported and who had probably made their lives easier, at least in terms of relations with other countries, in the eight years of his two terms.

The conversation was mostly about Khatami's schedule in America, and what he should or shouldn't agree to do, publicity-and otherwise. Jimmy Carter had sent a fax inviting Khatami down to Atlanta, and I seemed to be, as a consultant, adviser, and sometime translator for Khatami during his U.S. sojourn, the only advocate for a positive response. The Iranian diplomats-worried that Ahmadinejad's government and supporters, who all despised Khatami, would have a field day in attacking him for meeting with the U.S. president who had allowed the Shah to enter the United States after abandoning the Peac.o.c.k Throne (what led to the 1979 hostage crisis)-argued forcefully and successfully that the reform movement in Iran would suffer, but Khatami seemed genuinely disappointed.

Khatami's voluntary trip to the "Great Satan" had already come under fierce attack in the conservative Iranian press, and also in the conservative U.S. press and among conservative U.S. politicians, but the reformists hadn't lost their sense of humor or dari