Shi'i or Sunni? Part 1

When I meet people in Iran, they all start with an interrogation to figure out who I am and what I am doing in Iran. They are incredibly curious at this foreign woman in Iran who at first glance could pass for an Iranian, but has a funny accent when she speaks Persian and is obviously from some faraway country. In the past two months and a half months that I have been in Iran, I have met a lot of people from every walk of life - from university professors to taxi drivers. Almost everyone asks me the same questions in the same order, including one question which I am incredibly uncomfortable with.

It goes something like this:

Question number one: "Where are you from?"
Answer: Amreeka

Question number two: "Are you Muslim?
Answer: Yes

Question number three: "Sunni or Shi'i?"
Answer: Uhhh, it's a long story...

Question number four: Are  you married or single" - with lots more questions about my personal living circumstances...

...and so on, until the questions get very personal, onto how much rent I pay per month in the US, where I bought my clothes and how much they cost, and what my parents do for a living.

I never felt particularly "Sunni" until I came to Iran, but I have come to embrace my "Sunni-ness" as a mode of defense as a religious minority and in the face of multiple verbal attacks/criticisms I have faced in Iran for my particular religious beliefs and practices.

In places like Egypt, where I lived for a long time, no one ever asked me if I was Sunni or Shi'i, I was just Muslim as was everyone else although it goes without saying that most Egyptians follow some variation of Sunni Islam. The kind of Islam I practice is similar to the kind found in Egypt, an Islam that includes love of ahl al-bayt and self-identification as a Muslim, but not specifically Sunni, rather just Muslim. Muslims in the US don't tend to ask each other about their denominational affiliations either, so undergoing constant interrogation about my specific beliefs really unsettled me.

While Sunnis are a majority among Muslims, Shi'is are a minority making up only about 10% of the total Muslim population in the world. They are profoundly aware of their minority status among other Muslim-majority countries and make sure that Iranian non-Shi'is are aware of their minority status in Iran.

During the first few weeks in Iran, I prayed with my hands at my sides, which is a practice of Shi'i Muslims, Sunnis pray with one hand on top of the other, either on their chest or stomach ara. I told myself it was ok to practice dissimulation, or taqiyyah, in order to avoid any confrontation, besides in the Sunni Maliki school of law, madhhab, there is a choice to pray with one's hands up or to the side. When I arrived in Iran, I really had no idea about the current situation there, and so took many precautions, perhaps sometimes more than necessary, before I felt comfortable in the country and understood local customs and traditions...

Couchsurfing in Iran

If you haven’t heard of CouchSurfing before, you can visit the website and check it out. It has been around for a few years and provides another way for travelers to explore new countries and even their own country. I only heard about it when I read an article on from the NY Times (LINK), and signed up for the site. Since I have based in Shiraz, I really wanted to travel around, but I only know two Americans here, both of whom were busy with their research, and my Iranian women friends do not travel alone without their families for such extended periods of time. So basically I was on my own, I could either just stay in Shiraz for the whole time, or if I wanted to venture out, it would have to be alone.

I quickly found out that Iranians are very active on the site (probably the most active in the Middle East!) and found female hosts in a number of cities. I ended up staying with families in Qom, Zanjan, and Tehran (for one night, when I moved to a friend’s apartment for the rest of my stay there) and meeting up with locals in Esfahan, Tabriz, which made my experience much more enjoyable. I couldn’t find female hosts everywhere I went, so sometimes I had to stay in cheap hotels, which are really terrible and dirty in Iran, so staying with families was a welcome change from hotels. I especially enjoyed meeting up with local women, all of whom were highly educated and enjoyed showing me around their beautiful cities.

So, couchsurfing really works and you can use it in the most unexpected places – like Iran!

Notes from the Bahrain International Airport

 Here I am, sitting in the prayer room of the international wing of the Bahrain Airport, in a room of sleeping ladies, a group of Iraqi women who are obviously villagers by the cotton print dresses they wear under their chadors and make-shift cotton belts. They were all covered with their black chadors that covered their snoring bodies. There are about 20 of them, all joining in a great snoring chorus, their bodies heaving on the red prayer carpet. Slowly, one by one, the women woke up, waking up their friends in their loud and coarse Arabic. And then the strangest thing I ever saw – one old woman took out a cigarette and lit up right in the masjid and just smoked away until others complained in indignation. And even stranger, the group of women were on their way to Makkah for Umrah!

Outside, every gate is full of nationals from various countries who have some sort of connection with the Gulf or who are transiting through, like I was. The Bengalis heading to Dhaka, small dark men wearing prayer caps who look exhausted and relieved to leave the Gulf, sit quietly, staring at the passersby. The Filipinos heading to Manila look like a lively bunch, talking loudly and excitedly. The Egyptians heading to Cairo are a mixed bunch, some show influence of having imbibed Gulf-style Islam in their clothing, others wear typical Egyptian clothes, women wear the standard hijab and abaya (or long, flowing robe) and many of the men wear gallabayas. The Gulf Arabs, in their long, starched and ironed white robes flow along the halls, the only way to distinguish between various nationalities is by the way they tie their kufiyas or the kind of scarves they wear. Gulf women wear fabulously expensive and glamorous jilbabs, black robes with crystals encrusted along the sleeves and front, red ruffles lining the front and back, and long, pointy high heels to match their luxurious clothing. A group of men and women from who-knows-where are dressed for Umrah, the men wear white ihram, or white terry-cloth for their pilgrimage to Makkah.

Wandering around the airport, you never know what language to speak, next to me, there’s a woman who looks Iranian in her long black chador, I’ll try Persian with her. One of the transfer agents looks South Asian, guess that means I’ll have to speak English with him, and the ticket agent looks like some sort of Arab, so I’ll try Arabic with him and see how that goes. This airport seems like some kind of Muslim United Nations, I must admit, I love people watching, and this is a great place to do it. Seven hours in the airport is a long time, inshallah, I’ll be able to amuse myself during this time…then on to Umm al-Dunya, Egypt, for a couple of days!

Images from Sanandaj, capitol of Iranian province of Kurdistan

In the bazaar

Selling rosaries on the sidewalk

Hat seller

In the Museum of Kurdish Culture

Kurdish Iran/Turkish Iran

This might be surprising, but a whole lot of people in Iran are not actually Persian and don’t speak Persian as their first language. When students in the US study Persian, we somehow assume that it is the first language of everyone who calls themselves Iranian and lives within the border of Iran. While the majority of people in Iran can claim Persian as their mother tongue, many other languages are spoken by people who are Iranian but claim other ethnicities, such as Kurdish, Azeri Turk, Lor, Arab, Balochi, Qashqa’i and Bakhtiar Turkic, Turkmen, and more. All of these ethnicities have their own mother tongues, Azeri Turk making up the largest population, with more than 30% of Iranians speaking Azeri Turkic at home.

When I went through Western Iran, particular the majority Azeri Turk towns of Hamadan, Zanjan, and Tabriz, Azeri Turkish was much more prevalent than Persian, although everyone spoke Persian. Everywhere I went, I heard very little Persian, and people tried to speak to me in Azeri. In Sanandaj, the capitol of Kurdistan province, people used Kurdish as their first language, only reverting to Persian with non-Kurds, I often had to ask people to speak to me in Persian when they first addressed me in Kurdish.

Iran is a vastly diverse country, from the North to South, West to East, not only are the people diverse, but also the landscape and environment. From the steamy ports of the Southern Gulf region to the cool mountain forests of the North, dramatic sparse and rocky area of the West and fertile plains of the East, and the scorching deserts of central Iran. Mashallah, Iran is such a beautiful country, if only more people could discover its true nature and see beyond it bad media image and its crazy leaders.

Khalid Islambuli and Iran: Martyr or Terrorist?

 

 Before Hosni Mubarak, the current Pharoah governing Egypt since 1981, Anwar Saadat was the president of Egypt. Extremely popular in the West for his peace-making efforts with Israel in the late 1970s, many of Egypt’s neighbors were not fond of his bold moves, which they viewed as hypocritical and saw him as sleeping with the enemy. When optimistic and idealistic young movers of the Islamic revolution kicked the Shah out of Iran and claimed Iran as a modern Islamic Republic, relations between Egypt and Iran quickly deteriorated to breaking point. Previously, Saadat was good friends with the Shah and his family, and the two countries enjoyed excellent relations – when the Shah passed away from illness, his remains were sent back to Egypt, where he was buried in the same mausoleum and mosque and an important Sufi saint, Imam al-Rifa’i, in central Cairo.

In 1981, at a military ceremony, Anwar Saadat was assassinate by a young member of a budding terrorist organization, Islamic Jihad. Despite their differences, Egyptians mourned his death and the government has been careful to preserve his reputation until this day. The young assassin, Khalid Islambuli was quickly apprehended and was put to his death, receiving the death penalty for murdering the president of the state. Meanwhile, the government of the Iranian Islamic Republic embraced what they saw as Islambuli’s brave act of putting to death an oppressor, Saadat. His legacy was celebrated and they viewed him as a hero, fighting against the secular Egyptian government that worked so hard to appease the Israelis, while neglecting Islamic beliefs and doctrine. The Iranian government went so far as to name a main thoroughfare in central Tehran after Islambuli, naming it “Khiyaban Shahid Sarvan Khalid Islambuli,” which can literally be translated as “the Street of the Martyr, Officer Khalid Islambuli.” Not only did they name the street after Islambuli, but they also labeled him as a martyr  - when in reality he was killed after being judge guilty for the terrible crime he committed – and as an officer – as if the terrorist group, Islamic Jihad, were some sort of recognized and legitimate army. Kind of the equivalent of having a street in France, called Usama Bin Laden, as a way to insult the US.

Anyway, I have been told that the name of the street has changed in the past according to the state of Iranian-Egyptian relations, although some people I knew told me the name had been changed to something more respectful. I visited the street in July 2010 and found the name of Islambuli was still there…

A View of Khalid Islambuli Street - A Modern Thoroughfare in Central Tehran

The Pitfalls of Being a Vegetarian in Iran

I'm a vegetarian, I admit it, and I have been so for the past twelve or so years. I am in a constant state of defense when I tell Iranians I am a vegetarian, which means that I don't eat meat, poultry or fish (although I eat most dairy products and eggs, if I didn't, I would probably die of starvation in Iran!), they are in a state of shock. I have to offer them scientific and other reasons for why I don't eat meat and it still doesn't satisfy them...

I have been on the road for two weeks now and am starting to feel very weak. I am now in Qazvin, one of the ancient captiols of Iran, yesterday I was in Tabriz, I couldn't even find a single restaurant that had felafel sandwich, everything on the menu was meat, meat, meat...A tradition from Imam Ali states that one shouldn't let one's stomach become a slaughterhouse for dead animals, but that seems to be what Iranians are doing with their diet. At least based on what is availabale in restauarants/fastfood places and in the homes I have visited (mainly middle class), it appears that Iranians eat meat twice a day. I am sure that in the past it was much less and they were healthier, I have been told that Iranians have a lot of health problems, some of the same problems that people in the West have from their fatty and meat-based diet, diabetes, heart problems, kidney problems, etc.. Very sad indeed, maybe one day they will discover their rich heritage of vegetable-based dishes again and go a bit lighter on the meat.

On the road, I go for days living off of bread and cheese, and the occasional omelet (if I can find one!), tomatoes, some fruit and that's about all. I constantly am hungry, but am full from bread. With the weather here getting up to 115 or 120 degrees farenheit (more than 40 degrees celsius!), I need all of the energy I can get to survive the summer here. I can't remember the last time I had a full meal consisting of cooked vegetables or legumes and other balanced foods on my plate. Well actually, in Qom I stayed with a lovely family who cooked delicious vegetarian Indian meals for me, so at least two days out of these two weeks, I have eaten well, otherwise, my body is slowly tiring and is longing for vegetable-rich nutrients. Inshallah, soon I will be back in Shiraz where I am staying with a lovely family who know how to cook vegetables, I love traveling in Iran, but I don't think that vegetarians can travel in this country for more than two weeks at a time without falling sick from lack of nutrients in their diet.

A Reminder from Hamadan to Sanandaj

Currently I am wandering Western Iran, primarily inhabited by Turks/Azeris and Kurds. My journey began in Shiraz, I then made my way to Isfahan, Kashan, Qom, and then Hamadan. From Hamadan I took a shared taxi to Sanandaj, the capitol of the province of Kurdistan, I was in the front seat and had a prime view of the rolling fields of wheat and small Kurdish villages that were constructed out of mud. Taking pictures along the way, all of a sudden I noticed a huge traffic jam up ahead and knew there must be an accident. It had taken place literally a couple minutes ago and cars and freighter trucks were going in every direction, off and on the road.

Then we came upon the accident...what can I say...a gigantic freighter truck had smashed into the side of a little old Peugot...the car was literally unrecognizable, it looked as if it had been in a junkyard for years, crushed to pieces, the windshield caved in. At first I thought the driver had been rescued, because I did not see a body behind the steering wheel. But the ambulance and police had not yet arrived, so the driver still had to be inside. Then I noticed the dirt outside of the car, next to the driver's seat was not brown, rather it had mixed with the deep red blood of the driver, and there was so much. Then as the taxi moved forward, I spotted the lifeless corpse of the driver, a man who was wearing a white shirt and black trousers. I did not look too closely or for two long, I could not bear it. The body of the nameless man was crumpled, twisted in unnatural ways, hopelessly trapped in the car miles from any help.

Tens of men in their baggy Kurdish pants were just milling around just watching the tragedy, no one was moving to help the driver or to even check on him. Just a few minutes before the man was happily driving his car, perhaps on his way back home or on his way to work. But his life ended so quickly, so tragically, how many people were affected by his death? As we drove away, the driver chatted animatedly with the other passengers, talking about even worse accidents they had seen. He quickly zoomed off, once again engaging in the dangerous game of driving too quickly, without a seatbelt, and passing cars constantly. I had to work hard to control my emotions, so I would not collapse into tears. It was not just about the death of this man on the road from Hamadan to Sanandaj, but so much more.

We live our lives quickly and carelessly, but we forget that our lives can end so quickly, just like the driver of the Peugot, I am sure he never expected that he would pass away on that day, he expected he had so many more years to live, more time to watch his children grow up and get married, more time to enjoy life.

Inna lillah wa inna ilayhi raja'un - Surely we come from God and to him we return...

Twilight in Hamadan

Sitting in the cafe net/netcafe just off of the Bu Ali (Ibn Sina) square that holds the mausoleum and museum of Ibn Sina (Avicenna) the great Persian Muslim philosopher, scientist, doctor and homme universal, I noticed a girl on the computer next to me browsing websites about Twilight, that vampire movie. She was also in a video chat with two boys who looked American, and one of them looked remarkable similiar to that actor in Twilight. Here she was, this young Iranian girl, wearing a black manteau (tunic), and a black maghna'eh (type of headscarf worn in Iran) on video chat to some random guy in the US.

After a while she asked me a question in Persian, where she detected from my accent that I was not Iranian, she started asking me the usual questions. Here is my version of our conversation:

Her: Ah, America, I love it so much, I really want to visit Seattle
Me: Why Seattle, it's a nice city but not very famous.
Her: But it is, Twilight is there, it is so beautiful, I have to go there.
Me: What about other places in the US, like New York, Chicago, etc., have you heard of these places?
Her: No, just Seattle...

And our conversation went on like that for a while, she was obsessed with Seattle because Twilight is filmed there and is in love with the main actor (never having seen the movie, I don't know his name). When I was younger, there was also a different kind of vampire trend stemming from "Interview With the Vampire," with Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise. Some things never change!

In Memory of Agha Ustad Bakhtiar Karimian

Nine years ago to this month, I found myself as a naive teenager wandering the Middle East looking for dervishes, especially the whirling kind. With my Canadian friend I had met along the way in eastern Turkey, I wandered through Iran, stopping in Isfahan for 10 days. We both had fallen in love with the city and the majesty of Midan Imam.

While my friend was off admiring the tile work in the mosques, I was wandering the bazaar asking where I could find a dervish. My search finally ended at the small shop of a mirror worker, ayaneh kari, Ustad Bakhtiar Karimian, who designed stain glass windows and intricate mirror designs. He was a round man, in his mid-sixties, with a full white head of hair and a huge mustache. His shop was in the far western corner of the gigantic Midan Imam of Isfahan, it was dark and old, full of mirrors and colored glass of every shape and size. I told him I was looking for the Truth and he received me graciously, considering I was an eighteen-year-old American backpacker, exceedingly graciously.

I sat and watch him work a little and then he took a small piece of a mirror and held it up with his hand and took another piece and put it on top of his heart. He did not not speak English and I spoke only a few words of Persian, yet I understood him perfectly when he described the state of the heart using the mirror as the analogy, the mirror is God and the heart must be pure and clean to be able to reflect God and be a manifestation of his reality. All this occurred through some kind of universal language, zaban-e dil, or the language of the heart. Ustad Bakhtiar then took me to lunch, I still clearly remember how every single person he passed put their hands to their heart and bowed deeply when they saw him and greeted him. He was obviously a man of great respect and reputation in the bazaar.

Coming back so many years later, my first task in Isfahan was to find Ustad Bakhtiar and to use my newly-acquired Persian skills to finish off where we had left. I went to the place where I saw the shop in my mind, but I didn't see any small and dark mirror shop, all of the shops were now open on both sides, and were bright, selling the usual Isfahani tourist items, block-printed cloth, silver work, camel bone art, blue enamel, and more. I walked around the entire length of the bazaar, which is probably around two kilometers long, thinking that perhaps my memory had failed me, all the while, I feared for the worse.

I finally went back to where I remember his shop was, and looked for an older shopkeeper to ask about him. Luckily the first man I asked immediately knew who I was talking about, and gave me the unfortunate news that I was two years two late, I could now find him in the graveyard, Bagh-e Rizvan, outside of Isfahan. Crestfallen, I sat in the square, I couldn't believe my luck. And my memory had not failed me, Ustad Bakhtiar's store had been in front of me the entire time, but it had been transformed into a bright and cheery store selling traditional Isfahan block-print cloth. Indeed, the outside of the store still bore a few remnants of Ustad Bakhtiar, it was decorated with his intricate mirror-work, and I smiled and took solace in the fact that his memory was not forgotten.

I still wanted to find his grave, but had no idea how I could do that. The bazaaris I spoke to offered vague information and couldn't tell me where he was buried. But later on in the day, when I met up with a friend, R. in the square, I told her my story, and she got on her cell phone. In a few minutes, she miraculously found a cousin of hers who knew not only knew Ustad Bakhtiar, but also knew where he was buried - it was more than a coincidence - you could call it many things.

We visited her cousin, a young man who had a small and humble shop in the bazaar, who kindly offered us juice and water and told me more about Ustad Bakhtiar. Later in the afternoon, we set off with three cars holding much of R.'s family and arrived to the cemetery which is about twenty minutes outside of Isfahan. We found the section where Ustad Bakhtiar was buried, especially reserved for great artists, poets, and writers. We quickly located his grave, and then men, removed some old flowers and washed the gravestone in water. I recited the Fatihah, the first chapter of the Qur'an, which Muslims read at graves, and told Ustadh Bakhtiar everything I had wanted to tell him and more.

On his gravestone, he was identified as "faqir ila Allah", literally, "one who is in need of God, or impoverished with God," but used to denote someone who has complete faith and trust in God, a true Sufi and 'arif, or person who has attained full knowledge of God.

To the memory of Agha Ustad Bakhtiar Karimian, May God Have Mercy on Him and May He Rest in Peace...