Nothings happens after you learn things you didn't know about Iran before.
My son studies in an international school in Tehran. One day I asked his classmate "Jose Antonio" if he had learned any Farsi during his 5 years of residence? "Only cursing Sir" he said. My son interfered and said "he also knows "baaghaali polo". I asked Jose why only cursing and baghaali polo? "My Iranian classmates talk Farsi only when they want to curse, so teachers don't understand them, and I know baaghaali polo because it is so delicious" said Jose Antonio. Right now any reasonable blogger would reward you with a photo of the meal so you could understand what the F is baaghaali polo. But I write it in Farsi for you. you can copy and paste it to your search engine and find tones of photos:
باقالی پلو
After this instructive memoir I want to write the main article and I hope you will understand the connection between it and the story I just wrote.
The web is full of articles Iranians write about Iran. "Things you must...in Iran", "Things you must not...in Iran", "10 things... about Iran", and so on. All of them tries to show you Iran as a middle eastern country with modern citizens who think differently from the government authorities and people live a very western lifestyle. Blogs are full of photos showing Iranian youth dancing in private parties, laughing to the camera lenses while walking in modern mega malls with Western brands' billboards in the background.
When you search for Iranian cuisine you see tones of pictures like this:
The most disgusting and embarrassing articles are those tries to describe differences between Iranian and Arabs and insists to call us Iranians "Persians".
For a long time I was a supporter of these demonstrations. Whenever a tourist asked me for suggestions I insisted him to go some places like Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, If they wanted to visit an old caravansary in Dasht-e Kavir I suggested to go City Theater Hall and watch a good play from Bertolt Brecht instead. "You can experience desert with Dubai Safari tours with better facilities." I used to tell them. Yes my friends; I was trying hard to show a non-exotic image of my country to foreigners. But now I am behind that. After visiting countries around the world and learning the way the presented their culture to tourists I was changing step by step and finally a specific event changed me forever. During his campaign to show the world that electing president Rouhani is a meaningless change in Iran, the Israeli P.M. said Iranian youth want the right to put on jeans pants! That was the funniest thing I've ever heard about my country, But I got embarrassed after my fellow Iranians began to post their photos with jeans! F.U.C.K me. he is travelling around the world mocking our choice, trying to put more sanctions on us or even drag us into a war for fictitious reasons and all you do is publishing your pictures with jeans?!!! Common, what kind of silly reaction is this to his silly statement? Should I always prove myself to the world?!!
The reality is that Iran is a country with lots of great and lots of bad things. For example it has a very strong history of literature and has lots of top class world famous poets but the only thing some Iranian juveniles can teach their friend after five years is not Hafiz or Rumi, but street talking! Is it good? Is it bad? of course it's not important, every country has its cons and pros. Now I've learnt to tell them that Kebab is not a common Iranian Cuisine, It's better for you to try "Dam Pokhtak", "Gheyme" and things we really eat daily. We don't have clubs or bars like lots of countries but have people like to party a lot and enjoy having guests anytime. The architecture of our mosques are really unique in whole Islamic world , not only because of our history but also because of the different Islamic sect we believe and yes, The desert is better in Iran than other Persian Gulf countries because of its caravansaries and ancient oasis. If you want to visit Iran, visit Iran but be prepared to see a country with both warm people and cons waiting to snatch foreigners by any means... like all countries around the world!