Lost in Translation

I was burning the midnight oil when the call came urgently asking me to come to Tehran in the morning and translate this woman's speech into English at a religious institute. Seeing as they even made it easy on me by faxing me a copy of her speech, I decided it wouldn't kill me to use up the rest of the midnight oil to help their cause.

A bit after sunrise, after I had finally succeeded in hacking prhases such as "the weeping flowers and blossoms of the Resistance" and "the illegitimate Zionist cancer aggressor" into what I felt was acceptable English, my friend and I headed for the religious institute in Tehran. (As usual, once we got near Tehran and began coughing on the thick pollution and languishing in the heavy traffic, I regretted that I had ever wanted to go there, and wished someone would put me back in Qom) As we marveled at the size and stature of the institute, a guide greeted us warmly and told us not to worry because the bus would soon come to take us where we were going.

Where were we going? We looked at each other and at various placards that said "DEATH TO ISRAEL!", and it dawned on me that we were headed for a demonstration. Since I had sworn off demonstrations, I was a bit annoyed; but since I believed in the cause, I didn't say anything.

Scores and scores of black-chadored women -- as well as a handful of men -- met us at the demonstration. As I took in the old women carrying pictures of their martyrs, and the young women wearing kefiyyahs over their faces with (presumably) mock-up explosives strapped to their chests, I realized that this demonstration was unlike any other that I had hitherto been to. This was a real demonstration.

"Death to America! Death to Israel!" roared through the crowd.

"Woe to you, Israel," incited a lady from up front, "if Khamene'i declares war on you!"

"Death to America! Death to Israel!" For the first time since I had come here, I realized how the revolutionary spirit had swept through the country and ousted the shah. As I listened to them chant, I really felt that I too was going to go fight the jihad, and Israel would be demolished. I felt an immense sense of my own responsibility, and decided that I would do everything I could to deliver a stirring translation.

"It's your turn," my guide whispered, leading me up to the stage. "Speak loud. Don't be shy. Let it all out!"

I noticed I was the only one at the microphone. "Where's the lady I'm translating for?" I asked.

"Oh," she said to me conspiratorially, "we thought it would be better if you just gave a speech yourself."

Gulp. I looked out at the crowd, and the crowd looked back at me. I would have said that I couldn't believe what was happening -- except that I have learned that everything that can happen in Iran does. I grabbed my translation and looked for help. "The Zionist cancer. The useless U.N." There was no way those words were going to come out of my mouth with a billion TV reporters pointing their cameras at the token American who hated Israel. I looked at the translation again. "Islamic unity. Boycott Israeli goods." I could work with that.

All of a sudden, as if time stopped for a moment, I caught a glance of that often-circulated picture of Israeli soldiers beating a woman and her children. I decided then and there that I was going to ignore the crowd and the translation and everything else and just do what I could to speak for that child.

I took a deep breath. (Actually, I also prayed) "Allahu akbar!" I called out.

"Allahu akbar!" they replied.

"Allahu akbar!" I repeated.

"Allahu akbar!" they called back.

Thank God, thank God, this was easier than I thought. Calling out one more "Allahu akbar!" so I could take a microsecond and wrack my brain for any tidbits of Sayyid Nasrullah's speeches that I could remember, I plunged in.

As I was describing the second Qana massacre, I caught sight of an American reporter in the crowd. She had interviewed me yesterday, and I had done my best to present myself in a calm and rational fashion. In fact, I had even invited her to the program at which I would be translating. Now, she had the privilege to see my other side, the side that yelled about the "Zionist enemy". I decided that I had best pretend that she was not there, and hoped she wouldn't write about it back home.

And in no time, it was over. With the mantra of "never again" going through my mind, I stepped down from the podium.

"Good job!" my guide congratulated me. "We were worried about you. You seemed so quiet when we met you. We didn't think you could do it!"

I muttered my thanks and escaped from various newscameras on the pretext that I couldn't speak Farsi or that I wasn't allowed to interview. ("But we have a translator!")

Later on that day, my friend and I were blinking back sleep at Tehran airport when, all of a sudden, "Death to America!" blared over a giant set of TV's. It looked even larger on TV. I noted with considerable relief that they had declined to broadcast the American's speech, but the sound still sent chills through me. The anger, the passion, the determination -- it was real.

And now I was a part of it.

Camera Moment

From Iraq, but even more relevant in the here and now...

Camera Moments (when I didn't have my camera)

* Way back when, when we chosen ones with the tickets were in our special seating at the commemoration of the anniversary of Imam Khomeini, a wizened old lady -- whom I took to be a villager -- decided that she was going to join us too. Since she didn't have a ticket, she made the logical decision to climb the freshly painted crowd control fence. I watched in admiration -- and the security in consternation -- as she made her methodical way up the fence, her well-worn chador blowing back to reveal a shock of repeatedly hennaed hair. But was most striking to me was her dress. Unlike the somewhat masculine coat-and-pants which you have to wear under your chador to be fashionable in the cities, bits and pieces of her long, brilliant, emerald green dress flashed by as she climbed. Far from being simplistic, her dress swished and swirled to reveal layers upon layers of bright green fabric -- some with patterns, and some with lace.
I really envied her and for a moment wished that I was living wherever she was living so I didn't have to wear the ugly coat-and-pants under my chador anymore. I felt genuinely sorry for her when the security -- consisting of girls in their early 20's -- removed her from the fence, and I wished that I could have traded her seat with mine.

* The other night, I chanced upon another, even more elderly woman at the shrine of Hazrat Masoumah (saa). The distinctive blue tattoos covering her face and hands (and which, many years ago, I used to think was a strange sort of hopefully incommunicable face disease) as well as her gossamer black shawl immediately pegged her as another villager -- this time from Iraq. Something about her struck me, and I watched for a moment as she raised her wrinkled hands and in a very thick accent prayed to God to utterly and completely destroy Israel.

And, on a lighter note...

* A middle-aged man of average build walking down the street in Tehran with a T-shirt featuring a photo of Arnold Schwartzeneggar and screaming GOVERNATOR!!! (I never even saw that one in California)

Guess What I Did Yesterday?

Seeing as I was bummed out about the war in Lebanon and other various and sundry things, when my friends (who happen to be Lebanese) asked me if I wanted to go SWIMMING!, I uttered a faint, "Yes...."

Aside from what was on my mind, I was also a little hesitant to go swimming in Qom because someone had told me about several women who had been in a private pool here and died of chlorine inhalation. But someone else later correct her and said that they had merely been hospitalized. Neither option seemed appealing to me -- but, as it turned out, the trip to the swimming pool was much more treacherous than the destination itself.

We got to the swimming pool visa Qom's famous female-run taxi service. (See http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2002/sep/06/irans_first_female/) Since I tend to get more than my fair share of stares and date invitations from male taxi drivers, I was looking forward to an uneventful ride. Was I mistaken. I should have realized we were in for something when I saw the driver. The first thing I noticed was that she had an ATTITUDE. Not an attitude, but an ATTITUDE. It wasn't just the bright red scarf the size of Rhode Island, or the chador draped loosely off of one shoulder, or even the Southern California Persian pop music blasting out of the taxi. It was the way she walked, the way she talked -- and, most alarmingly, the way she drove. Lanes had no meaning for her. She would speed up and slow down for no good reason and cut off poor men who would flip her off from behind their car windows. For the first time in my life, I felt a true sense of fear on the road here, and it occurred to me that maybe the occasional pick up line was not so bad after all.

After some impromptu prayers on my part, we made it to THE POOL! (Forgive me for sounding un-hawzah-like, but I have to share my excitement... we're allowed to have some fun, aren't we?) The pool was not just A POOL. It was a pool with DIVING BOARDS and a WATER SLIDE!!! I wanted to run straight in, but the caretakes made us go through not one, not two, not three, but FIVE salty showers as well as a foot washing pool to enter. (Hey, at least we know we were clean)

It was great... for a while. And then, the masses arrived. Hordes of Iranian women -- some young, some old, but, surprisingly, mostly old -- descended on the showers. Suddenly, someone pulled out a boom box and began blasting vaguely familiar American music and leading the crowd in water aerobics. I was doubly shocked. For one thing, I had no idea you were allowed to blast music in public places in Qom, and I had somewhat naively assumed that all the amplifiers they sold in the bazaar were for religious gatherings. And I also had no clue that people did water aerobics in Iran. But the good thing about water is, you can escape. All you have to do is go down... and it is the quietest place in the world.

It could only last so long though (especially the chlorine was rather strong), and eventually we had to go back to reality. But if I had to rate the experience, I'd give it a 10, and I'd recommend it to all!

Let's All Pray

The lastest news last night was that they tried to kill Sayyid Hassan Nasrullah in Lebanon. (First target the airport, then the sea routes, then the overland routes, then the leader) Sayyid Hassan is the backbone of the resistance. I'm not saying the Lebanese can't repel the Israeli onslaught without him, but he is the one who is giving the people courage and strength. We all know that life and death is in God's hands, but let's get together and pray anyway for his continuing health and safety.

Another Trip to Tehran

The other day, we went on another trip to see the rahbar. Unfortunately, I misconstrued "see" to mean "have an audience with" or "visit" -- whereas it really meant just physically "see" -- so as we waited for some missing buses, I hauled out my green, giant Farsi-English dictionary (which travelled from the Main Stacks in Berkeley to Los Angeles, parted from me, went to Qom, and then found me again eight years later) and began to write a plea regarding my visa problems (or, rather, "lack of visa" problems). I had hope since a friend of mine had dropped a letter on our last visit and had received an almost immediate response. My friend advised me that the appropriate way to address the rahbar is "Khedmat-e-Maqam-e-Ma'zam-e-Rahbari", so I used that as a good beginning. (Of course, being me, I messed that up and wrote "Khedmat-e-Maqam-e-Mu'azzam-e-Rahbari) Eventually, the buses appeared, and we set out to Tehran.

Not long after we passed the dry salt bed -- which still fascinates but also disturbs me after hearing that the Shah dragged the surviovrs of his attack on the Fayziyyeh to die there -- the police pulled us off the road. Fortunately, we were just missing an important paper, and they escorted us back to Qom where we drove from building to building looking for the elusive document. Eventually, it was procured, and we turned back to Tehran. I didn't mind the delay because I enjoy looking at the scenery and, anyway, I had to write my letter, but some others were upset.

As we entered Tehran, the giant buildings and cosmopolitan environment hit me. You would think I hadn't been raised in big cities in the West. I stared at the glitz and the glamour and the newsstands and the bookstores and the consumer goods and the women without chadors and the men with funny mustaches and the youth with greasy haircuts and the traffic and the chaos. I also choked on the thick pollution and decided I liked Qom better. Soon, as luscious green trees gave way to the University of Tehran, I felt again like I had just come out of the backwaters. Chadorless women and beardless men walked and talked and -- unlike in Qom, where being female is a legitimate cause for a great amount of unwanted attention -- no one noticed us. We piled into an auditorium, and I wondered whether the auditorium was the same as those in the West because the architect was trying to copy the West, or because the architect studied in the West, or whether auditoriums are simply functional structures and are the same the world over.
After another instance of myself not heeding a bit of personal advice about refusing to be interviewed on TV (that makes it the fourth time I have been broadcast since I got here), we headed off to see the rahbar. Unfortunately, due to our delays, we were too late. Many of my companions decided to take matters into their own hands and see the rahbar or else, but since the doorguard had already confiscated my letter, I had no real reason to take unnecessary risks, so I stayed my ground and joined a large, open-air congregation for maghrib prayers. Although I didn't know who the prayer leader was, I felt that he had a very charismatic and unusual voice -- not exactly Arabic, but lacking the usual Persian (and in my opnion annoying) accent in reciting the Qur'an. It was a voice that I consciously enjoyed and told myself I could listen to for quite a long time. Later, someone told me that the rahbar himself was leading prayers. Then, we sat under the open sky and listened to a majlis by some shaikh from Bahrain. (At least they told me he was from Bahrain) It was one of the better speeches that I have heard in a while, and I am still pondering some of his points -- one of which was that families should not send their girl children alone off to universities while they are young and at the peak of their emotional development and require a stable family structure to develop smoothly. I can't say I agree 100% because life is complicated, but he did give me some cause for thought.

Throughout the majlis, hordes of people banged on the door of the building next to us where the rahbar was locked inside. They pushed and yelled and clamored until, all of a sudden, the door opened, and a person on a stretcher came out. A mad rush ensued. Although the guards tried to push the crowd back, a few people managed to slip in anyway. I couldn't help recalling the Qur'anic ayah about seeking permission before entering someone's house and thinking that if someone really doesn't want you in their house, you shouldn't force yourself in -- particularly if you are sitting in a majlis commemorating the atatck on the house of Hazrat Fatimah (saa).

All in all, I enjoyed the summer night in the hills of Tehran -- even though I spent the whole time coughing and most definitely did not want to return any time soon. Soon, we set back home, and -- to my surprise -- some my companions informed me that, yes, they had been able to see the rahbar.

So What's it Like there, Anyway?

As much as I try, I can't paint a picture of what it is like to live in the women's hawzah. It's something you really have to live to experience. But since so many have asked, I will try.

Life here is very structured and organized. Every morning, about half an hour before dawn, they attempt to wake us up by blasting Qur'an and du'a. (This is generally ineffective since dawn happens to be around 3 AM and I even caught the lady responsible for awakening us struggling to get up from under a blanket the other day) Afterwards, we have a second, louder wake-up call at 6:45 AM, and classes start at 7 or 8. Classes continue until noon, at which time we have lunch and then are expecetd to do what the rest of Qom does in the hot afternoons -- namely, sleep. After that, classes resume, and we have the rest of the time to study, or take care of personal business. We do not have to cook and, with 16 girls per room to do the work, only do occasional chores. Coming from living on my own where I had to do everything myself, I really appreciate the easier pace of life here, but by the same token I still feel uncomfortable accepting the food and lodging they offer here.

I have mixed feelings about living here. On the one hand, the system is convenient and effective. But on the other, it seems strikingly similar to a convent -- which is prohibited by Islam -- and I feel it is cruel for some of the families to send their girls here since many of them -- particularly the ones from the Subcontinent -- are extremely depressed and homesick. A few told me with teary eyes that they were "chosen" for tabligh. Others from Turkey told me that they came here because, in their country, to go to university, they have to take off hijab. One girl I know here from Africa is here because she is an orphan and her family didn't know what to do with her. The only real sign of happiness I have seen here was the other day when a contingent of Pakistani girls was on their way home and decided to break out into the Pakistani national anthem. I think it would be psychologically healthier for most of the girls to remain with their families -- but, as I mentioned elsewhere, life is complicated, and ultimately it is an individual and a family choice.

Qom itself, while not a perfect city, is very peaceful, and is a welcome change from the hectic pace of living where I was before. Society is mostly pretty clean (although I heard some dude on the street whispering about a clandestine disco once). While it is still a very traditional city, it has also modernized a lot in the past few years and there has been a sudden appearance of pizza restaurants, rollerblades, and stylish jeans with the letter "D" embroidered on them in blue gems poking out of chadors. (Why"D"? I don't know. That just seems to be the popular letter) Gamenet can even be found in certain parts of the city (yes, I was tempted; no, I will not admit it in person). Since I had more than my fill of all of that in America (except for the jeans with the letter "D"), none of that is particularly interesting to me, but it does show how the city has changed even since the last time I was here. And it goes without saying that of course the religious infrastructure is the most prominent, and pretty much everywhere you see libraries, educational institutions, bookstores, mosques, and husainiyyahs.

But by far the best part of living here is being able to visit Hazrat Ma'soumah (saa) on a regular basis, and I hope everyone who would like to has the opportunity to come and do that too.

What is Wrong with this Sentence???

Israeli aircraft have fired rockets at the main runway of Beirut international airport in Lebanon, causing flights to be diverted. (from the BBC)

See the complete story and the video of the airport being blown up at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5175160.stm.