Tehran is a modern city, and really fairly nice. \u00a0(Wikimedia Commons public domain photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
When I went to Iran at the invitation of the authorities there, I knew that a faction in the government welcomed my arrival. But I wondered whether that faction would be in the ascendant when I actually arrived and throughout my stay. \u00a0There were, and evidently still are, fiercely competing groups within the regime. \u00a0At that time, the relatively moderate\u00a0Mohammad Khatami, a cleric, was serving as Iran\u2019s fifth president, but the hardliners had recently managed to put his personally chosen friend, newly appointed as the mayor of Tehran, into prison on trumped up charges of corruption. \u00a0They were sending Khatami a very clear message.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
So, among other things, although I might have been able to take my wife with me \u2014 and, overwhelmingly, prefer to do so \u2014 I didn\u2019t even invite her on this trip. \u00a0I would have been sufficiently depressed had I<\/em> ended up imprisoned in a country that was hostile to mine and without American diplomatic representation, but I would have been really angry with myself for putting my wife<\/em> into such a situation and leaving our then small children without parents. \u00a0In retrospect, I rather regret that decision. \u00a0Everything went fine, and she would have loved the trip. \u00a0But prudence is a virtue.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Anyway, we were always accompanied by security personnel, ostensibly \u2014 and, perhaps, really \u2014 intended principally to protect us.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
I recall the first evening of the trip. \u00a0We were brought to a formal dinner at which we were obliged to listen to one of the senior clerics \u2014 I can\u2019t recall whether he was an ayatollah or not \u2014 drone on and on about Aristotelian metaphysics. \u00a0Thoroughly jet-lagged, I\u2019m sure that I wasn\u2019t the only foreigner in the audience to find the program interminable and almost unendurable. \u00a0At one point, I arose from my seat and went to stand in the back of the rather large banquet hall. \u00a0A Foreign Ministry official immediately came over to me and said, \u201cPlease sit down, sir.\u201d \u00a0I replied that I was very tired, and that I needed to stand for a few minutes. \u00a0\u201cI said \u2018Please sit down, sir,'\u201d he responded, in a forceful whisper. \u00a0I sat down.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
But we were treated very well. \u00a0Every time we went out in the city, our little convoy had a police and military escort. \u00a0We never had to wait for a red light, because we were simply waved on through while ordinary citizens were obliged to wait. \u00a0I remember thinking that, in this respect at least, it would be really nice to be a third-world dictator.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
When we were let off at Mehrabad Airport for our flight out of Iran, though, we were exposed to people who pretty clearly didn\u2019t approve of our having been in Iran. \u00a0I was happy when we took off, and then when I was certain that we had left Iranian airspace. \u00a0Later, when I saw the film Argo<\/em>, its last portion reminded me very powerfully of my own departure from Tehran.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 When I went to Iran at the invitation of the authorities there, I knew that a faction in the government welcomed my arrival. But I wondered whether that faction would be in the ascendant when I actually arrived and throughout my stay. \u00a0There were, and evidently still are, fiercely competing groups within the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a>