The Iranian Features
February 7-11, 2000 / Bahman 15-19, 1378
Today
* Revolution:
Imbaba
* Novel: Conspiracy at Desert One -4
Recent
* Revolution: Night has
fallen
* Novel:
Conspiracy at Desert One -3
* Life:
First city
* Novel:
Conspiracy at Desert One -2
* Wine:
High spirits
* Novel:
Conspiracy at Desert One -1
* Cover
story: Conspiracy at Desert One
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Friday
February 11, 2000
Revolution
Imbaba
No wonder Egyptians loved Iranians so much
Written & photographed by Dokhi Fassihian
February 11, 2000
The Iranian
I was studying Arabic in Cairo during the summer of 1997. Living among
Egyptians was an extraordinary experience. They welcomed me as their own
and would never believe it when I told them I wasn't Egyptian. When they
found out I was Iranian, they treated me like a queen. I got the best tables
at restaurants; gifts at the bazaar, free feluka rides on the Nile, free
taxi rides. Egyptians mean it when they tarof; their friendliness and warmth
is full of sincerity.
"We haven't seen Iranians for ten years," a bazaar merchant
told me. "Only Farah Diba and her entourage come to visit the Shah's
tomb every year, and they usually just visit the jewelery stores."
>>>
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Novel
Conspiracy at Desert One
A novel
By Bernace Charles
The Iranian
Chapter Four >>>
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Thursday
February 10, 2000
Revolution
Night has fallen
A revolution puts friends on separate paths
By Gelareh Asayesh
February 10, 2000
The Iranian
I am remembering when I first met her, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
Her parents were studying there, just as mine were. They lived in university
housing, as we did. We played blindman's buff in the room she shared with
her sister, their prison-striped bunk beds identical to the one my sister
and I shared. When her family returned to Iran shortly after we did, Elham
came to Iran-Suisse. She was an instant hit among my classmates, with her
long hair and slim grace and the touch of American sophistication that
had somehow eluded me. Though we were the same age, she always seemed older
perhaps because she was the oldest of three children, used to responsibility.
Our paths separated when my family returned to America. I heard that
she organized demonstrations at school, that she had joined the Mujahedeen,
that she was on the run. When I was in college, she was in prison. When
I was working for the Baltimore Sun, she was enrolled in university in
Ahwaz, struggling to make up for lost time. She is a medical student now,
close to attaining her first year of residency. It is a wonderful achievement,
but her family rarely mentions it. The well-traveled, educated parents,
the beautiful sister, the young brother with his skeptical eyes, seem subtly
distanced from Elham. Elham and her black veil stand out in a household
that is as Western as any I have seen. But it was not the family that changed,
it was Elham >>>
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Novel
Conspiracy at Desert One
A novel
By Bernace Charles
The Iranian
Chapter Three >>>
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Wednesday
February 9, 2000
Life
First city
Honolulu is home now - among other homes
By Majid Tehranian
February 9, 2000
The Iranian
I live in Honolulu. But my journey began in Mashhad, Iran, where I was
born eons ago. Today as I listened to the murmur of the rain falling on
rooftops, looking out my window at the misty Diamond Head and the roaring
Pacific beyond, a feeling of nostalgia set in. I was banished to paradise
in 1981 to stay here only for a year. Life' s mysterious design had brought
and kept me here. It is home now, among other homes - Mashhad, Tehran,
Hanover, Cambridge, Oxford, Paris, and now Honolulu - seven cities in all.
I had wandered from city to city as a migrating bird. But I had no destination
in mind. The journey was the thing ...
The most vivid memory of my childhood is the piercing pain I felt in
my toes when I was walking with my mother along the narrow, stone-laden
streets of Mashhad. It had snowed heavily the night before, and streets
were filled with slush, penetrating into my little shoes and toes as we
walked fast to reach home from my grandparents' house >>>
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Novel
Conspiracy at Desert One
A novel
By Bernace Charles
The Iranian
Chapter Two
As Wes exited the parking area, no other cars were on the highway. As
he drove across the dam, he knew something frightening but exciting had
entered his life. A rush of adrenaline sent his mind whirling and forced
him to forget his sorrow. Life was a pain-filled void and now he sensed
his life might have a new meaning; it might take a different direction.
It was nine years since he had been in Israel. He was then researching
the history on the West Bank. Now, Walker turned on the car 's interior
light and unfolded the paper given to him. After reading a Chicago telephone
number, a woman's name, and a street address in The Old City of Jerusalem,
Wes turned his Cadillac to the side of the Keystone Highway. Blessed with
a photographic memory, he lighted the paper with a gold-platted, cigarette
lighter, and dropped the paper into the car's ashtray >>>
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Tuesday
February 8, 2000
Wine
High spirits
Shiraz wine: from Persia to Australia
By Cyrus Kadivar
February 8, 2000
The Iranian
One ancient Persian legend says that Jamshid, a grape-loving king, stored
ripe grapes in a cellar so he could enjoy grapes all year long.
One day he sent his slaves to fetch him some grapes. When they did not
return he decided to go to the cellar himself only to find that they had
been knocked out by the carbon dioxide gas emanating from some bruised
fermenting grapes. One of the king's rejected, distraught mistresses decided
to drink this poisoned potion, only to leave the cellar singing and dancing
in high spirits >>>
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Novel
Conspiracy at Desert One
A novel
By Bernace Charles
February 8, 2000
The Iranian
Chapter One
1999
Tulsa, Oklahoma.
The voice through the telephone carried a guttural sound. "Meet
with me, Walker. You need the story . . . the story needs you."
Wesley Walker, a native of Tulsa, Oklahoma, and a man carrying the disputable
distinction of being a writer of fiction answered, "I'm not interested.
No one is. A military blunder is exactly that. It's a poor history."
Again, the words sounded as coming through a long, dark tunnel. The
shaft shaped them. "There was more to it, Mr. Walker . . . thirty
minutes . . . it's all I need . . . it's all you need to hear the story.
Men played a deadly game . . . the game caught them short. Meet me in the
vista parking lot at the Keystone Dam.">>>
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Monday
February 7, 2000
Cover story
Conspiracy at Desert One
A novel
By Bernace Charles
February 7, 2000
The Iranian
Conspiracy at Desert One is the first story serialized in The
Iranian. New parts of this unpublished novel will be posted here every
day (except weekends).
Introduction
Following April 25, 1980, Iranian Revolutionary Guards arrested Laleh
Sanders, an American photojournalist in Tehran. The Iranian Press charged
her with spying for America. She then disappeared for ten months before
allowed to leave Iran. Why? President Carter claimed to have no knowledge
of her at a press conference. Who was Laleh Sanders and what role did she
play in preventing the American rescue-effort from reaching Tehran?
>>>
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