When I first visited Tehran many decades ago, I was struck by the friendly, casual sophistication of the Iranians I encountered, as well as their good-natured tolerance of my broken Farsi.
Later on, after my time as a Peace Corps Volunteer in neighboring Afghanistan, the urbanites of Iran’s largest city easily discerned that my Farsi had deteriorated (in their eyes) into the country bumpkin dialect known as Dari spoken by the Afghans.
Every Iranian in the big city seemed well-educated and well-informed about life in the U.S.
Back in the U.S.A., one of the first stories I wrote for our new magazine SunDance in San Francisco got me in touch with Iranian dissident students attending college here and protesting against the corrupt leader of their country, Shah Reza Pahlavi.
The Iranian leader was planning a visit to the U.S. and the students were making secret plans to embarrass him with protests. I made connections through my Peace Corps network and attended one of their planning meetings.
Everybody wore masks, hoping to avoid being identified by the Shah’s dreaded imperial police, SAVAK, which was known to have infiltrated some of the student groups in order to disrupt their actions.
And while in my piece for SunDance I was careful not to name any of my Iranian sources, I did name an American source who had witnessed some of the Shah’s authoritarian tactics when he had been a teacher at Tehran University.
That was a serious journalistic error, because the man thought he had been speaking with me off the record, though I didn’t find that out until some 20 years later.
On that occasion, I was just settling in for what was supposed to be a romantic Valentine’s Day dinner at Berkeley’s Chez Panisse, when the maitre d’ came over to reintroduce himself.
“Remember me? I’m Steve and I was working in an Iranian rug store when you quoted me in your article in SunDance. I lost my job because of your article. The owners fired me out of fear of SAVAK,” he said.
I was mortified and deeply embarrassed. Talk about a buzzkill.
“Man, I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize—.” My face turned bright red.
He just grinned. “Don’t feel too bad about it. ‘Cause it’s all worked out for both of us. I’ve followed your career at Rolling Stone and so on; and as for me, I’ve got my dream job here at Chez Panisse.”
At that point, the night got a whole lot better.
My understanding source and genial restaurant host, Steve Crumley, passed away in 2023.
HEADLINES:
Satellite images show the damage at Iran's deeply buried Fordow nuclear site after massive US strikes (Business Insider)
Iran says US strikes betrayed diplomacy, warns of consequences (Al Jazeera)
With His Eyes on History, Benjamin Netanyahu Aims for Political Resurrection (New Yorker)
U.S. Officials Say Strikes Caused ‘Severe Damage’ to Iranian Nuclear Sites (NYT)
Iran condemns US strikes on nuclear sites as Trump talks of 'regime change' (BBC)
Trump asks why there would not be 'regime change' in Iran (Reuters)
The Dangerous Consequences of Donald Trump’s Strikes in Iran (New Yorker)
Trump strikes Iran hard, and the world waits for what comes next (WP)
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