Customer Reviews

Transit Tehran: Young Iran and Its Inspirations

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Length:: 2:17 Mins

This is a short video on Transit Tehran. Transit Tehran: Young Iran and Its InspirationsTransit Tehran: Young Iran and Its Inspirations

"Transit Tehran: Young Iran and Its Inspirations", eds. Maul Halasa & Maziar Bahari, large-size paperback, 240 pgs, English, (2008: in German by Salis Verlag, Zurich; 2009 in English by Garnet Pub., UK). I wish I could write that this book is a really interesting, informative, expansive look at Tehran, Iran - but I can't. It contains 35 articles detailing something about Tehran as written by various authors. One photo caption contends: "Except for Thailand, Iran is the country with the highest number of sex change operations in the world. Transsexuals...end up unemployed or working as prostitutes" (19). Discusses the development of hip-hop in the 1990s, but limited info. 1990s: women forbidden to attend male-soccer games, but paradoxically women from foreign countries are allowed to visit the haram-stadium to support their foreign male-member team playing against the Iranian male team. Policewomen are trained to look for `bad hijab'; photos of female police training in chadors while rappelling down walls. Short articles, not really much `in depth'. Numerous photos, but few details or analysis. One very short article about prostitutes before the Revolution--some photos, dingy, hopeless, but no analysis. Lots of words, but little `meaning' or analysis in the text--wordy. A picture of `The Road to Freedom Monument' - so? The articles look for social-ills dirt, but not finding much. Recounts a methadone-treatment program in Tehran in 2003, about syringe exchanges - the author contends: "the country holds an infamous world record for drug use" (183). 5 photos of a family playing in the coastal waters, one young man half-clad holding the hands of his chardor-clad girlfriend playing in the ocean. An interesting fictional account of a dead Iranian soldier who recounts his death and burial in several Iraqi cemeteries until he is reburied in Tehran: "Sometimes it's sunny and sometimes it rains. An orange butterfly is sitting on a grassy patch with yellow flowers. Now it flits off and goes towards the old trees" (199). A group of clandestine photos taken of everyday life along Vali Asr street in Tehran: one showing a group of 20 people waiting for a bus, the chador-clad women waiting on the right-side of the bus-stop sign while the men wait on the left-side. Not one of the first 17 books that I would recommend reading about Tehran.