Center for New Words; WGBH Forum Network; Azadeh Moaveni: Honeymoon in Tehran

Good evening I'm Melissa and on behalf of her bookstore I'd like to welcome you all to tonight's event with time reporter and author The dame of any of her discussion of her second memoir honeymoon in Tehran two years of love and danger in Iran in which she chronicles her return to Tehran in 2005 to cover Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's election for Time magazine. And as the title suggest or lives other newsworthy events veiny is the author of 2005 Lipstick Jihad A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America an American in Iran called a guided tour through the underground youth culture in Tehran and illuminating book by Tani in the New York Times. She is also the co-author with around your body winner of the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize of the 2006 study Iran Awakening. One Woman's Journey to reclaim her life and country. A New York Times Notable Book of the year. Veiny has lived and reported throughout the Middle East and speaks with Parsi an Arabic fluently as one

of the few American correspondents allowed to work continuously in Iran since 1990. She has reported widely on youth culture women's rights and Islamic reform. Her time the New York Times Book Review The Washington Post and in the Los Angeles Times. She currently lives for their husband. Son in London Absurdistan author Gary Shteyngart writes of her new memoir sharp and written with ferociously brilliant reporting honeymoon in Tehran. More of a nice nuanced perspective on her ancestors homeland is without peer. And Vali Nasr our author of The Shia Revival writes honeymoon in Tehran is a timely well written and intimate exploration of the Soul of Iran with an eye for detail and a feel for her subject matter more veiny has brought to life a country that is at once immensely important to the west and deeply misunderstood. Honest perceptive and nuanced this tale of love and anguish in the Islamic

Republic is brimming with poignant political insight. Please welcome to day Amy. Thank you. Thank you very much for that kind introduction and thank you to the Harvard bookstore and the Center for New words for hosting me here. It's great to be back in the U.S. in a little while. And thank you all of you for sharing your time with me and for coming to hear me talk about Iraq. It seems like every time I come back to the U.S. I feel like there's a conversation in the U.S. about Iran. So it's getting to be like a permanent national conversation. It feels like. And that's partly because after September 11th there's an interest and a lot of inquiry into political Islam and of course Iran after the revolution is a

big piece of that issue and partly now because we have a new president who is reshaping the country of Iran policy. And there is a growing belief in Washington that the policy of the last several years if you can really call it a policy just a refusal to deal with Iran a growing sense that that's been a failure and they're actually what we've seen going on in the Middle East in the last several years has emboldened Iran. So Iran is on the national agenda. It's the subject of many books which is which is very encouraging to me because even though I feel like the misconceptions about Iran are so difficult to knock away in this country there seems to be an appetite for thinking about Iran and reading about Iran. So at the same time that's encouraging. Because Iran is sort of at the forefront of our national security dialogue right now and for the

simple reason that it's one of the most powerful countries and important countries in the Middle East I think it's important to think about and talk about what the real ambitions and attitudes and experiences of Iranian people are. And that's why I wrote my first book which was a book about youth culture. Lipstick Jihad and that's why I'm back today because after I wrote that book I went back to Iran and spent another couple of years living there. And experienced what the generation that I wrote about in Lipstick Jihad is is now confronting because I was in my early 20s when I wrote that book and I wrote about very young people's late teens and early 20s and I moved back and was in my late 20s or early 30s myself and so were my friends and much of that generation and the concerns had shifted. You know it was no longer simply you know can we can we date openly and

hold hands in the street and can we blog on the internet and go to movies and have underground rock parties and concerts and these sorts of things. But you know more more serious 30 something concerns can we find affordable apartments something that everyone is concerned with everywhere. Can we afford to live independently from our parents and get married. The concerns of other generations of going into early adulthood. So those are the themes that that I write about in my book. But I sort of start with its premise because I went back to cover an election the presidential election of 2005 which was the election that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won an unknown figure at that time but now of course well-known to the world and even Everyone can try to pronounce his name which is significant I think. So I went back

to the reporter for Time to report on that election. And one of the reasons that I stayed I was living in Beirut at the time but moved back to Teheran was to chronicle his rise and his emergence because it was something that took the political establishment in Iran by surprise it took the world by surprise because the conception had been that Iran is a nation of very moderate secular leaning young people who were looking for change or looking for a more open society more social political and various other sorts of freedoms. So how is it that this extremely conservative fundamentalists have been elected so this was sort of a puzzle to the west. So I went back partly to report about that and that's sort of one of the threads that go through this book. How did this all come to be and and I. Have to confess

that because everyone was predicting that that Rafsanjani would win and that Ahmadinejad had no chance and he wasn't even figuring on the polls. I actually left before the vote. Something that they tell you never to do and something that I learned I should never do again because he wasn't figuring in the polls and no one expected it. And I with watching from afar in Beirut and he sort of came in at the very last moment and positioned himself very cannily at the populist sort of dealing with economic issues and promising people better quality of life. And after eight years of reform government which had created much more cultural space and really opened up the sort of daily the daily Iranian the daily life that Iranians sort of felt the most suffocated by. After eight years of seeing a lot of change in the culture in the social sphere people wanted to see economic change. They wanted better quality of life they wanted more job opportunity and they felt like

that had been neglected. And so here was a man promising that. And that appealed to a lot of people. And so he won on a policy of economic change. He didn't say a thing about foreign policy he didn't mention that he was going to deny the holocaust on the world stage or through the. Make a point of being defiant over the nuclear program. So Iranians were as surprised as the rest of the world when they ended up with this very brazen and defiant and corrigible president. So I sort of chronicle his rise because as he was first elected. A significant number of the population hadn't voted and they sort of thought of this man as a joke because he had been mayor of Tehran and he hadn't been a significant or particularly successful mayor and so he started out as something that you know that most weren't just made fun of through s m s jokes about him and internet email jokes sort of spreading about him on the Internet. And in the very in the course of that first year he very

cannily. It sort of branded himself as a nationalist. He made a point of he made the nuclear program the cornerstone of his presidency and really tapped into a strain of nationalism that I think had been very dormant in Iran. Iranians are a proud people with a very ancient civilization and feel feel very acutely the condition that their country is in and the prior status that it holds in the world. And there was a longing to feel proud again and empowered. And I think you tapped into that by by insisting that Iran had the right to have this kind of nuclear technology especially when other countries in the region had it and it was presented of course in sort of these narrow and very politicized terms that it resonated. And of course that was sort of a honeymoon period in which he would consider the national hero and and he sort of took a number of other steps to endear himself to secular Iranians who of course are very suspicious of him.

He lifted the ban on women attending football matches or soccer matches here. He would say of course that was reversed by the ayatollah but he still sort of for a brief time gave off the perception that he was trying to create real change not just for traditional religious Iranians but the broader spectrum of the middle class. So that's why I've lasted up until let's say in the middle of 2006 2007 by which point the West had reacted very suspiciously and are now happily to this position on the nuclear program and went back to being a joke because it was clear that it had failed. This this kind of defiant part because it hadn't been accompanied by any diplomacy and the economy was just tanking and this was before the world economy collapsed which just made everything a bit worse. And so he returned to being a joke that something Iranians felt burdened by and disappointed in. That's

sort of one thread of my book. The other reason that I stayed in Iran at the beginning. Of the middle of 2005 was that I met the man that I would later marry. And we began dating and sort of had a courtship that I think was very. In certain ways embodied how you Iranian young people at that time spent time together and got to know each other in Teheran we went hiking in the mountains and went to cafes and the mountains are obviously not obviously to all of you but to Iranians because the mountains are a place where young people can escape the eyes of the morality police when you're walking down the street in Tehran and you're a sort of a young couple and you want to hold hands or is always the danger of that. The morality police will spot you and although it sort of sounds like Saudi Arabia and very disturbing for a long time the morality police sort of eased back and they were not a real

presence in public life but that was one of the other things that that apologized for my bronchitis. One of the other things that changed under God not at the beginning because I think that there was a very subtle shift. And that was why there was this period where he did endure himself to Iranians but around two thousand and seven. There was a real campaign for the various llama sized daily life because by that point Iranian young people and really the whole population in different ways had begun to rebel had made a practice of rebelling. Young women wore more things that flooded the official dress code they wore their veils back and they wore their coats tight and short and people of all walks of life watched Western movies and listened to the band music and had satellite television. And for all intents and purposes had a very Western style secular

life within the home and by secular and I'm just going to preempt this because this always comes up by secular I don't mean that they didn't believe in God in that they were atheists and sort of so Western that they were sort of no longer faithful but secular in the sense that they believe that there should be a separation between religion and government that there should not be. That they didn't that a theocracy was not the sort of surest route to accountable government. And I also think I write about this in the book secular in the sense that. I saw and middle class young people and middle class 30 and 40 somethings. Sort of. I see this is for a more modern approach to religion and I write about it is Islam Lite because I would see people especially in my neighborhood they would fast during Ramadan and they would observe many sort of religious rituals and anniversaries. And yet when

the month of Ramadan was over they would go back to going to their parties and drinking alcohol. And they would you know very often the same person would pray and drink at the same time. And in the West this is a very sort of common way of being you can have your faith and sort of your secular lifestyle. And this is something that I saw in Iran around me more and more middle class urban Teheran especially. So my husband and I decided that we wanted to get married and this is this is another theme in my book this is there's a whole chapter dedicated to weddings and my wedding and it's called the Persian brides handbook because I was thoroughly unprepared for the phenomenon that is the Iranian wedding because if you think that in America weddings are extravagant or there has developed this tendency towards the extravagant sort of superlative wedding. And then in Iran it's sort of all of that and then exponentially more so.

We started going around to a wedding coordinator who would offer sort of all of the traditional packages that a wedding coordinator offer there would be flowers and photography and catering. But it was all sort of incredibly over-the-top. I remember meeting according to her and this is in the mall who insisted on having 15 different entrees at the weddings that he coordinated and we said Well could we have two or three. And with very fine that and he said you know I'm going to undermine the quality of my organization you know that's ridiculous. And there was of course always the security detail aspect of the wedding coordinator. And this is because in Iran. Reception of homeless men and women have to be segregated because it's not obviously in abidance with proper Islamic practice for men and women to listen to music and dance and for the cohort in each other's presence.

So if you want to have a wedding in a public reception hall there the room for them and then a room for the women and that props acceptable to traditional families who believe in that kind of gender segregation to begin with. But for the majority of middle class urban Iran that's not that's not part of their value system. And so a lot of couples young couples and and this was certainly the case with us decided to have a wedding at home so that we could have a mix and private party. Of course this is this this becomes an issue because the police come knocking at the door and they come knocking at the door mainly because they want to bride because they know that no one wants their son or daughter's wedding to be raided and will do most anything to avoid that happening. And there will be the person sort of appointed to handle the bride and usually things sort of are handled very smoothly but the wedding coordinator will take care of this for you. They will have their security detail

and the really sort of wedding coordinator who will make sure that their security people are wearing suits and have her very discreet sort of head of state. Sort of communication system so that no one actually feels like there is a security detail to the wedding and all of this. I know a little bit outrageous but it's actually something that middle class in Iran and even working class Iran aspires to. And it's become such a trend these kind of excessive weddings that it's become a concern to the government because young people can't afford it. Families cannot afford it and they'll go into debt to do this. And so around when we were getting married there with the government campaign to encourage a modest wedding. And it was covered in newspapers and the government threw a party for young people who were going to have modest weddings and wedding arrangements.

And and I didn't attend this party but I read about it in the newspaper. And and it was it was quite astonishing to me as well this this party that was thrown because it was sort of had the flavor of an Islamic disco there were sort of portraits everywhere saying stunned there was a mole who came to read from the Koran and the party favorite was a book by the Ayatollah Khomeini a about marriage. And in this nation of well a capital city of several million people 300 people attended which just goes to show you that the government is aware that it has that it has a social crisis on its hands but it doesn't know how to address it because all of the tools that it has available to it are sort of within this ideological Islamic context. So how are you going to convince sort of the secular urban middle class not to covet this kind of wedding when all you can

offer is an Islamic disco. And it was it was curious to me you know why this preoccupation with consumption and lavish weddings. And I'm not sure if I have sort of the definitive offer chiller but I sort of explore it in the book and I think it has to do with how in a country that's not a meritocracy. The route to economic success to social status are so haphazard. You know if you go to college and you become an engineer or if you get a doctorate it's still very likely that you could never afford to get married until I mean until your mid 30s or even later. I have good friends both of whom are engineers who've been engaged for four years and I can't get married because they can't afford an apartment in Teheran. Real estate is just incredibly expensive so much so that. The inability of young couples

to be able to afford an independent apartment is now one of the leading causes of divorce in Iran because couple of will get married thinking well you know we'll get married and then we'll spend a year earning money and then we'll move in together. But of course you know the prices go up during that year and of course their salaries aren't adjusted to that and so they end up either having to live together with one of the in-laws which you can imagine is not a very comfortable arrangement or they wait. And a lot of times of course you know a marriage can't withstand that sort of a union that doesn't even exist under one roof. So it's one of the many social crises that the government is dealing with not really aware of but unable to really to deal with. I write about this in just one fun anecdote that I also mentioned to you because I realize that the sort of political overview of Iran is a little bit heavy sometimes for

people who are not sort of middle east types or a regional specialist so I don't want you to think that the book is all about Ahmadinejad and the nuclear program. So there's a fine chapter about weddings and there's also and I think this is sort of another illustration of the government trying to cope and this time a little bit more skillfully with these rising divorce rates. When we went to get married when we went to go through our blood tests and doing the sort of official things that you need to do. We were escorted to classes pre-marriage classes that the government runs and men and women were separated and I was quite confused as to what was going to go on in these classes. And at first I tried to get out of it because I thought it was going to be a birth control lesson. Wish it was. I said Well I went to school in the U.S. so they taught me that in elementary school. But they said no no you have to go. So I wanted sat down and was very impressed actually by the quality of the

information about reproductive health. The emergency contraceptive pill was the first thing they talked about at the vailable of pharmacies and it was really important that they communicated this to two young women many of whom aren't going to be getting this information perhaps in school or through their families. Does the fear of little pack of different types of birth control pills. And then most interesting to me was sort of the segue of the conversation into advice about press about marriage. And it's and it's striking if you consider that sort of 30 years ago the policy of the state was you know to populate the country to have many children and to sort of create a plentiful Islamic revolution and marriage was sort of the saying that the sort of the sacred institution of all of this. And so the teacher said Well I just want you to remember that you shouldn't have children the first couple of years because your marriage might not work. And then if you're going to get divorced and you have a

child you know it's going to be hard for you to remarry so counseling these young women to to have children later so that if their marriages didn't work they would stand a fair chance of being able to build a life again with another partner. And the conversation said wait again into. Sexual relations in marriage which is what I sort of started paying attention and I thought you know this is very interesting what's going to go on here. And the woman the teacher began talking about how it's really important for women to also enjoy sex in marriage and that they should that they should tell their husbands that they had that right if their husbands didn't seem to be aware of that on their own. And explain that there are physiological differences women's bodies and it's sort of a different process for women. And it was striking to me how forthright everyone was in the class I mean it was it was a very mixed group there were a couple of women in Chaudhary and it was just obviously a real cross-section of

Teheran and all of these women were just raising their hand saying You know what happens if I do this and it was a such a frank discussion and it was indicative to me of how so many social taboos in Iran are eroding. Even though the Islamic government has done its best to sort of keep the sort of model Islamic way of life the sort of path of its people but because the realities of a failing economy which means that people marry later which means that young people will have premarital sex. And in so many ways not only are these things changing but the taboos about even talking about them are also eroding. Yeah. I write about. I write about Iran U.S. relations and I write about people's attitudes toward America as well because I think it's been fascinating to me sort of living in Iran and spending so much time there since 2000 to see

how the attitudes toward America have actually really shifted. And it just sort of it reinforces how both how central Iran U.S. relations are to both countries domestic constituencies and how much the U.S. is a symbol for the Iranian people of so many things that they covet in life lifestyle freedom accountable government the rule of law but also but also the way that people respond to America is very often an indication of how they feel about their own government. So when adding a dog with ascendent and riding high and people were repeating his slogans about the nuclear program and he was a hero I found that affection for the U.S. had really plummeted. People felt like the U.S. was talking down to Iran why should Iran have no nuclear program when Pakistan can and when Israel can. And

Valentine's Day which sort of middle class Tehran tries to mimic by buying chocolates and little hearts. And that's been sort of one of the things that annoys the government because they think it's sort of a fetish for American ism. During that year we're admitting there's a lot with riding high and America with writing Valentine's Day in the sort of traditional American way wasn't as appealing that year. People started sending text messages to each other about our mighty day which is their Austrian or a pretty Islamic goddess. And for reminding each other that there was an Iranian or Persian tradition of a day of love. And this sort of. The sense that that people were so resentful of the USA they didn't even feel like being enthusiastic about American popular culture and consumer culture any longer. That sort of shifted again once the economy started to

deteriorate in Atlanta Dodd's popularity started to decline because people felt well. If he still defiant towards the U.S. you know being enthusiastic about the U.S. is one way of registering our discontent with him. And so it seemed to me that the U.S. stock was sort of going back up and it's all very it's all very complicated in a way but. I think important to sort of think about and understand because I think that it's very often your own is it either caricature or as a sort of anti-American passion of fanaticism or of this pro-American the sort of the last pro-American society in the Middle East I mean that's very often sort of touted by people in Washington who want to make sure that the administration is conciliatory toward Iran. And I think that the truth is sort of more layered than lies somewhere in between. And I write about it to sort of try and texture this

idea that it's sort of either one or the other. But certainly when when I was last there and in my recent trip I felt as though generally though optimism is well not exactly optimism but hope and and sort of a sense that with a new president in Washington there might be some prospect for improved ties between Iran and the U.S.. There was one last thing I wanted to to mention because I think that it's sort of another one of these aspects of Iran that gets misunderstood and that's when I write about this in terms of the year 2000 and six. I was living in Iran during the Israeli Lebanese war conflict or whatever you would like to call it of that year. And because Iran is a supporter of Hamas Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah I think that many

Americans think that this is backed by the Iranian people that Iranians are very much supportive of their government's position and backing for these militant groups when it's really very much the opposite. The Iranian government a big show of being supportive of Hezbollah during that conflict and with sending sending relief to the Lebanese civilians who have been hurt and was making a big sort of propaganda show of this. And one morning I went to go buy bread at the local bakery. And I arrived there and it was close was very odd because it's absolutely always open and all the neighbors were more gathering around sort of everyone wondering if the going to open was closed and then finally it became obvious that there was no bread that day and people began sort of speculating as to why and everyone decided that the reason was that the government had said all the country's flour to Lebanon to help the Lebanese who were so angry. You know what are we going to give them next are we going to send a few be that and plasma TVs and and why are we

helping you know the Lebanese and and Hezbollah when you know we have so much so much poverty here at home. When it turned out that obviously the country flower had not gone to Lebanon that the bakery was remodel and sawing a new oven. But this is just sort of illustrates for you how resentful people are these kind of ideological this ideological position and a sort of strategic alliance with these kind of militant groups that's become sort of how you run conducts itself in the region but something that Iranians resent because it they think and they are correct in thinking this that it it undermines their economy and their standing in the world. So I've talked a lot into sort of meaning to give you a sense of everything that the book sort of has threaded through it and what it contains. And

so I think now perhaps we can move to question to see if there's anything more specific that you'd like to talk about. I think that's a great question because Hodge Tammy's decision to run in this election will make it actually make it a much more profound election and an interesting one. I think he certainly stands a chance. When I was there in December and the candidates were running polls he was running two to one. I had a guy who initiated the polling but the candidates have done show that in cities and in the judge's disapproval rating is 80 to 90 percent. So although it's very true that he does have a constituency in the provinces. Iran is 70 percent of Iran is urban. So when you're sort of crunching the numbers the fact that he's become so unpopular in cities is

actually going to make a difference to the election. So I think that there's certainly every chance a hard time he will do very well. I think it's also going to come down to voter turnout because people are after. The lection feel that their vote doesn't count anymore. And I asked a lot of people in December when I was there in January are you going to vote what you think and notice a lot of apathy. You know this this sense that the political process is flawed that the votes are fixed and that the change through the system has just shown itself to be so in consequential. But I think it's a question of will the silent majority come out to vote or not. Which which is which I think it sort of up in the air. But I think even if the turnout is low even if it's low that the last four years have just been so dispiriting. I found Iran so much more despairing in this last trip than I had when I found it since 1995 in this city. And so

even though people are frustrated we're frustrated because I mean felt like you didn't do nearly enough. They would they would prefer that they would take that given what they were faced with afterwards. And I think you're definitely quite right that hard times should and likely will make more of a point of the economy because even though Ahmadinejad didn't do anything really for the most part other than ruining the economy the fact that he talked about it and made it made that a point and won around the country sort of speaking in small towns and promising to do it made a difference because they felt they felt to people that their needs were being attended to. So I think that that's something that the reformists around me realize with one of their weaknesses. The last time around but the really fascinating question. And I write about it to some extent in the heart and a little bit again here. I think it really comes down to clash because it's certainly true that and I and I've read the Jacki

Lyden story the report that you're talking about it's certainly true that upper middle class women under the Shah of Iran had just a remarkable and very full degree of legal rights and protection under the law. Something that they completely lost after the revolution. Upper middle class women who are in parliament they worked I mean that was that was a class that had already made it in Iraq in terms of sort of what percentage of the population that was so obviously very small the majority of women from traditional more traditional backgrounds more middle class backgrounds were. More likely to stay home or not go to college because their families felt as though the city environment was corrupt. And so you had nowhere near the sort of levels of university enrollment for example for women that you have now.

So what would did come about with the revolution was with the transformation for traditional religious middle class working class women who families finally felt comfortable letting them go to university letting them sleep in a dorm because it was in a former country and there was nothing to worry about. And there had been under the Shah of Iran so. So in that sense the revolution really did lead to the education and the. I wouldn't say empowerment that it sounds jargony but the sort of the shift in the sort of traditional attitudes about women among that much more sizable class. Although although it's certainly the case that families resisted and it was sort of has always been a battle for women from traditional background that they're sort of permitted to go to college there's really little tolerance for them to go get a job after work than those who go back into the family.

And it's something that the government has been ambivalent about too because although they sort of make a propaganda point and sort of a point of pride for the system that all of these traditional women go to university they're not entirely happy with and comfortable with the raise expectations that that kind of education and that kind of participation in the workforce brings with it. Because when you're working alongside your husband 10 hours a day and you've gone to college then you're not going to be subservient in the home anymore with all those sort of meant to be a traditional unparallel channel for women. The parallel channel for traditional women it actually ended up really creating an entirely new and much more assertive set of expectations. So I guess that was a very long winded way of saying that. But it's it's had a it's had a really profound effect on the larger

spectrum. Female society is it's a really an interesting question because it does sort of seem like all of these variables are lined up for that kind of change and yet get it is through the prospects for that a reality that are sort of lagging behind. I sort of think that it's going to take a generation or two to sort of have the structural change that's really necessary because as long as this sort of generation of Ayatollah says and power there's a real resistance sort of ingrained and that's a top layer of the establishment towards sort of the legislative sorts of reform that would be necessary to sort of secularized the government or to sort of shift more towards the republic aspect of government. And and also very much sort of I think that there's very much a lack of consensus within the regime about which direction to go and the regime is

so sort of intricate and these power centers and institutions so able to sort of check one another that even though they're as influential through proper parliamentary majority that set of ministries that backs more secular government or more liberal government. These unelected clerical institutions veto it because they have a very different vision of the country. And so really the problem that actually ingrained in the Constitution itself because there is dual sovereignty elected versus unelected religious leadership. And so that's something that I think is going to take them a couple of political generations to work out. And Khatami I think that he's not the most gifted statesman in terms of maneuvering against sort of domestic factions. But I also do think that this time around he'll be empowered in a different way. I mean he will

he will have the benefit of people very real frustration with the economy behind him and he'll certainly have sort of a more powerful mandate than he had the last time around. So it will be interesting to see what he does with that. The question was What are the impacts of the current financial crisis on Iran. Well. Well to begin with I should start by saying that during the era of high oil high oil prices before the financial crisis Iran was not able to benefit from the high cost of oil because the multilateral sanctions that have then and acted against it because of the nuclear program have become very costly for the government. So even though the the price per barrel was very high and Iran with able to spend at a much lower sort of amount per barrel and not to the sort of technical way of putting it but basically all of the money that they

were able to to get from high oil prices they had to spend to make up for what they had what they were losing because of sanctions. So they didn't sort of they were not flushed by the air of high oil the way that other countries in the Middle East were to help sort of get them through more smoothly the global crisis. But the economy is just in the cutely suffering. You can see it in Teheran real estate which is sort of. Is seems to double every five years anyway but actually sort of doubled with it and prices went up by 200 percent within the space of one of year of the year a year and a half. You can see it in sort of people's ability and their spending ability I mean families who used to be able to eat meat once or twice a week can't afford it anymore because meat is now very very expensive compared to people's incomes. I was just

back there and December and I had a pizza menu from the year before and I ordered pizza for my son and one of his friends and according to the menu it should have been something like the equivalent of seven or eight dollars. And the guy rings the bell and he says oh it's going to be sort of the equivalent of $15. And that's just in the space of one year. So people's quality of life is really really just been gouged by the combination of these sanctions and the economic collapse it's affecting the already. Hobble the Iranian economy. Well I'm a great fan of almost all of the of the ones that I've read think Persepolis is just so incredibly unique and so moving and everyone that I know who's read it and just sort of ended up in tears and sort of feels like you know that was it that was sort of my experience. It's almost painful. How how beautifully sort of

captured in that form. I think that Azar Nafisi is is quite amazing. You know she's a controversial figure but I think she's done a great service. Because she has made Americans aware through her through her very significant following in readership that Iran has a very distinguished and long standing literary tradition although people sort of mainstream America may know that there is a sort of Hindu classics like about God. No one's heard of the Shahnameh. No one knows that Iran has he's great at that poem that said and this very rich literary tradition that is really a part of people's daily life. I mean it's not just a matter of sort of an academic or an intellectual elite. You know people who can read know about the protagonists of the literature and I think that she writes about that tradition very beautifully and does a great service by sharing with with her American audience the sort of rich Iranian civilization.

And I just started another novel called The Septembers of Shiraz and I'm only a couple of chopper through it. But I think that it's really in chanting and I'm anxious to finish it so. So I'm I really enjoy and I think it's I think it's wonderful that there's been this sort of flowering of Iranian-American writing in the past few years. Thank you to everyone for coming. Thank you.