Travelogue: Turkey

Istanbul straddles the two continents of Europe and Asia and though I'm sure you've heard this cliche before, its seeped into the national consciousness in the form of a struggle between the cutures of east and west. The most obvious manisfestation is in the bodies of the very Turkish women, whether they be shrouded and well-covered or brazenly bared. Upon having returned from the country where the fight for Islam is won, I now view the covered women with the contempt of a native Turk. How could they do this voluntarily? Who are these people who would sacrifice freedom as though it were a sickness to be cured of?

I have been Indian in India, Nepali in Nepal, Turkish in Turkey, and in Iran it was no different. I was Iranian from the moment I stepped off the plane and put on my silk headscarf (awkardly and in a manner that had me adjusting it every five seconds). Over the course of my stay in Iran, I was regularly harassed and once, arrested, by authorities because of my looks. My looks have often caused me trouble, but hardly of the sort I got into in a little town called Khomeini-shahr. In Tehran, the authorities were hard on me with my dress (I must wear a proper rapoosh, not an oversized shirt like the other tourists). In Khomeini-shar, I was out and out accused of criminal activity and the impersonification of an American tourtist. I was physically attacked in the street, temporarily imprisoned by a mob, and then interrogated by police for hours. The sight of a chador (the dress of my attacker) still brings both fear and contempt.

That is the worst of the story, though, and I try not to think of the darkest or most political moments like the moment when I ripped off the rapoosh and hijab before the offended eyes of my fellow bus passengers, or the times museum officials shamefully asked that I tie my scarf tighter. Instead I try to think of the kindness of the fruit sellers, hotel staff, taxisists, friends of friends, and total strangers who bought me numerous metro tickets, gifts, free rides, and valuable advice. The food was also damn good.

In the Hagia Sophia today (a site claimed both by Christian and Muslim crusaders), I thought of how utterly detached all of this from my own history. These are not my idols, and this is not my religious war or my history. Nonetheless, I debated religious philosophy on the campuses of Tehran universities with young men who idolized the so-called "martyrs" of suicide bombers. I sat in the art galleries of elite young men who rather burn his photographic exhibits than see them converted into what he called "chador art." I slurped saffron pudding in the French salon of a rather fierce Iranian businesswoman. Politics is in everything... in your clothes, in the metro, in your fucking chai... even in the faces of a 4 year old whose its anyone's guess whether he will be led by Islamists or secularists.

Apart from my studies, I was sorely missing points of refererence. The real ones, the ones that vividly flash in your mind during moments of high stress. I thought of Rosa Parks when I had to ride in the back of the bus and, more superficially, of a thorough rectal exam when in the women's metro car during rush hour at the Imam Khomeini metro station. I remembered my great aunt Cuca who also wore a chador (or some other Mexican version of the black cloak) and scared me shitless as a child visiting her tiny Zacatecas village.

Today, gazing on the mosaics and murals of the bygone Byzantine era, I couldn't help but be amazed by how much this is not my fight. I came to Iran to write articles, to be the passive observer and instead I was made an emissary of the noxious West... to be asked why hollywood movies have naked women, to explain Clinton's blow job, to answer for Bush's mistakes. The funniest thing about it all is that I am hardly representative of my countrymen, I have no interest in changing the world (for good or otherwise... particularly with feiry media statements censuring one side or the other), and I don't know a damn thing about religion. I think everyone who comes to Iran comes to this conclusion... that it is someone else's fight. These Iranians say "mind your own business" and we travel across the world to hear it better.

It's truly a beautiful country torn apart by sanctions, bad press, and a seriously fucked up government... but then again what Latin American country isn't? There is a direct flight from Tehran to Caracas... can you guess why? haha.

In an act of rebellion (indulgent, i know, seeing as how I don't even LIVE there), I loudly "spread sin in sacred places" with the blondest most blue-eyed Swiss backpacker in the country. A couple of days in the Caspian pissing off Allah and I recovered well enough to be back in the seat of Islamic power continually answering the question of why the hell a Mexican-American girl is doing alone in Iran. Apparently to get arrested and get laid? Ok, more like to write some articles that will bring no more light to the table other than (in the words of Rodney King) "can't we all just get along?"