Right before Easter, I read this article on iranian.com by Hoder nagging about airport security and how Iranians are harassed in airports. I was in a bit of disbelief that an adult had written such a piece. A commentator though pointed out that it was an allegory. I wanted to comment back that only people with narrative skills should write allegories because it really didn’t come through. The article suggested through a link that we should be upset at the American government or Western governments. Off course I disagree.
So Easter came and I was to travel by airplane to Belgium. In the following link you can see my travel pictures I took in this trip of Antwerp:
http://dariotravelweb5.googlepages.com/travelantwerpindex.html
The day before the trip, I had received in the mail one of those RUMI designed iranian t-shirts I had ordered by mail. Several companies do that sort of design. They are very expensive if you count shipping. But I had to get a couple. They have rumi writings in farsi (arabic) letters written all over them.
So the next day I wore the tshirt, forgetting that it was my travel day. Over the flashy red farsi script Rumi t-shirt, I had a sweater which happened to have a zipper. Then on top of that a jacket. Since it is really cold in Europe, it never occured to me that anyone would get to see the tshirt as I never expected having to take out my sweater in this cold weather.
I get to the security checkpoing in the airport, take out my jacket and start moving towards the security machine, when this lady with a smile tells me: “Esto tambien por favor” (This too, please) pointing at my zippable sweater. o o .. it dawned on me that I’m wearing a flashy red arabic script tshirt underneath. So then I was left with that on and completely nervous and trying to cover as much of it with my arms I passed the security checkpoint and quickly covered up as I got on the other side.
Days later, to get the plain back I had to cross from Belgium to Netherlands by train. So the train crosses Holland’s borders and two cops ask me for my passport, which is not iranian. However I was born iran. One of the cops calls central and for 15 minutes I have to wait nervously until somebody from “central” tells him its ok. In the meantime I hear them say things to each other in dutch where I could figure out the word Iran. I was nervous that through miscommunication something would go wrong. For example, imagine that “central” wouldn’t get the ID card numbers right and they would have to retain me and eventualy I could miss my return flight.
In both of these cases I got upset, but my anger was geared towards the islamic republic, its sympathizers and those who dont voice their dissagreement with them. It is not a coincidence that people of Middle Eastern background are given this treatment. Its just a natural response. If hijackers, plane crashers and terrrorists are mainly Middle Eastern, then it is simply a natural reaction to put extra security caution on them. In other words if I lost my return flight it would be the fault of the likes of Ahmadinejad and their sympathizers.
By
irannostalgia.com
