On the kitchen table, there were unmarked bottles of aragh saghi — literally, dog alcohol — a moonshine made from raisins. People were dancing, drinking, and discussing whether it was time to call a drug dealer.
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Before I embarked on my month-long trip to Iran, Iranian friends suggested I use social media to guide my travels through the Islamic Republic. Even during the first two weeks, which I spent on an organised tour, writing a feature for another publication, I was able to fill a few holes in the standard group itinerary with meaningful interactions outside the comfortable but limiting tourist bubble. It started in the ancient Silk Road city of Isfahan when I accepted an offer from Alireza, a year-old auto parts dealer who had contacted me through couchsurfing.
He invited me to dinner with his family. When I arrived at his home, I was welcomed with a generous meal and curious questions from family and friends gathered around a fire in the leafy courtyard. In particular, they wanted to know about the image of Iran abroad. This had been the recurring theme from people who had approached us in the street, often stopping simply to express their gratitude to us for visiting Iran. I had grown used to Iranians going out of their way to point out that any anti-western propaganda we encountered was an embarrassment to them.
On a walk around downtown Tehran on the day of my arrival, I had paused to photograph a large sign on the side of a storey building. It depicted Barack Obama on par with Shemr, the seventh-century villain who killed the beloved Imam Husayn, grandson of the prophet Muhammad. This apologetic attitude continued on Instagram after I posted the photo, and applied the hashtags seeyouiniran and tehranlive. Along with their messages came invitations to show me around in Tehran. After we finally cleared our plates, Afshin called friends who arrived in a car to drive us all to a mountain park, where we watched the shimmering city lights, talked politics and religion, and smoked weed.
It was my first glimpse of a different side of Iran: It was generous, warm, fun and defiant. In the following weeks, I travelled independently, relying on the advice and generosity of ordinary Iranians through Facebook , Instagram, and the hugely popular instant messaging app Telegram Messenger, which many believe is better secured against government monitoring than WhatsApp.
Exploring the real Iran, with social media as your guide
Why would a word you write matter? Quit smoking, start smoking, quit again, start again. And watch it come out, more and more in every draft: Let your truth come out hard and fast and untranslatable because no one else will see it anyway. Four years later, after all sorts of troubles, it is your first novel and it is published and you are Miss Literary Iranian-America , a friend jokes.
First Iranian-American novelist , a journalist mistakenly writes, while another calls your debut novel the first work that is entirely Iranian-American, all diaspora with no Iran setting, which gets closer to the truth but you want to think still not close enough. Who can even tally who they ignored before you?
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When they ask you to represent the Iranian diaspora in Los Angeles, start by explaining you grew up a half hour and many realities away from Tehrangeles, that your family could never afford those areas, that you were raised in a tiny apartment in the low-income district of a small suburb, with no Iranian people. When they ask you to do it anyway, go through with it.
Try to speak of other things. Say fair enough and start smoking again. Around Persian New Year, months after your first novel comes out, start to run out of money again. Old problem but maybe now a new solution, you think. Ask friends if they know someone at the most respected newspaper of the country—the venerable paper where they gave you a very good review of your debut novel. Pitch a piece on Iranians celebrating Persian New Year that Think to yourself when was there ever a good time to be Iranian here and pitch it anyway.
Hear nothing back and tell yourself you and your Iranian-America are not yet worthy of that newspaper. Be more shocked than gracious a few months later, when out of nowhere, an editor at another section of that very paper writes you and mentions he is a fan of your work and would you like to contribute an essay to this author series on summer? But when you sit down to write, surprise yourself: Feel slightly defeated— writing what I know was never my thing, you know you used to whisper—but a part of you anticipates they will want this and they do.
How to Write Iranian-America, or The Last Essay
Behold the awe of everyone around you, behold your own awe: You are in your dream paper, an essayist suddenly. Editors who never heard of you or your novel start asking for your essays of Iranian-America.
Be amazed at how your formula sometimes helps you work out some things, be amazed at how it sometimes seems to help others. Iranian-Americans from all over the country write you and thank you, and you tell everyone this was a nice run—you did your part—and now you will go back to what you were meant to write: They ask and you keep writing it. Tell yourself this is your new life every time an essay comes out in that venerable paper of yours—you start to call it yours , because three-figure checks must mean love if two-figure checks mean like, or so you tell yourself. Occasionally try to remind them you were a journalist before all this, a writer who wrote about music and art and fashion and books but no one remembers or cares anymore.
During an interview someone asks you why essays, and you remind them you write fiction and they ask again why essays, and you joke about them finding you, and they ask again why essays, and you stumble on another answer: Afterwards, bum the few cigarettes the interviewer offers and smoke through a silence you did your best to create. Start to wish other Iranian-Americans would write essays; even try to introduce the few who seem interested to editors but the editors always ask for more essays from you.
How many essays can you write, you wonder, but every time one comes out you start to see how they see it, and you see more. Step back from yourself and spin absolutely everything from the lens of Iranian-Americana. Hear the editor in your head long before your real editor asks you if you can include your Iranian-American family in it, and catch yourself saying yes of course , and do it, and never imagine years later you will teach that own essay of yours as a mistake. You were not just writing Iranian-America, maybe you were helping them create it.
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By this point your parents know why you are asking when you call, by this point they have gotten used to the fact that you will write about them and anything else Iranian-America. They want feelings, not facts, you know this by now. Writing Iranian-America turns out to have some downsides, but you think you know how to handle it.
When Iranians write you and say you are not Iranian enough for them, thank them, and when others say you are too Iranian for them, thank them too. Too pro-IRI and too Royalist, too anti-Iranian and too nationalistic, too relatable and not relatable enough, maybe neo-con and maybe communist—and where is your name from?
Catapult | How to Write Iranian-America, or The Last Essay | Porochista Khakpour
Are you really Iranian? Why are you not married? Are both your parents really Iranian? Totally people want to keep you as a foreigner happy, so probably they wont object, at least in most cases! Smoking is OK for girls, although it is not as common as it is for boys. In many cafes and parks you will see girls smoke. Especially in big cities like Tehran, nobody cares and you wont attract any attention. If you want my honest opinion, go out for dinner at the restaurants in the " Darakeh " in the north of Tehran , on foothills, order Kabab Iranian Dish , and enjoy your cigarettes there after your meal.
Even you can have Hookah!! Unfortunately I'l be in Tehran for just a few hours before I start my tour of the country, so no time to check out your tip on the Darakeh restaurants. Just another question regarding the execution of my awful habit whilst I'm in Iran I dont smoke but because of very much available various types of cigarettes, cigars and pipes' tobacco, I know there will be any brand that you want, such as Marlboro, Marlboro light, Winston Red, White, Green, Purple D , Camel, Alpine, Capitan Black, etc.
However I've no idea about the quality as a non-smoker guy. Price is much much cheaper. I think it is because of very low tax rates imposed by government, as well as smuggling from Turkey , Kurdistan and Persian golf boarders. I pretty sure you will buy some more packs to smoke in the Netherlands. No need to think about alternative choices.