Contradiction and Hypocrisy in ‘Saudi Arabia Exposed’

Contradiction is common in many governments, and the Middle East is no exception: interpretations of the Qu’ran seem to have secret agendas and rules apply only to plebians, not the rulers (cue Gaddahfi and family partying it up with expensive booze, while alcohol was officially illegal in Libya). Nowhere do contradiction and hypocrisy reign supreme, as uchecked and unscrutinized as the royal Al-Saud family, as  in Saudi Arabia.

“Their behavior does not reach the self-concious level of hypocrsy, of believing one thing and doing another, for it is a set of dissonant beliefs that they do not even recognize coexist at the same time.” (p. 93)

So remarks John R. Bradley in Saudi Arabia Exposed: A Kingdom in Crisis, an aptly-named book which provides a first-hand inside look at Saudi Arabia’s people, culture and policies that goes beyond the usual news headliners that the Western world reads. The book uncovers many issues and realities that often get lost in the women’s-rights and Al-Saud and Wahhabi rhetoric (although he does discuss these as well).

I hate the West, I love the West….I hate the West, I love the West…

The most amazing realities Bradley uncovers involve the young Saudi adults (men, of course) that he teaches. One young man, Fahd, doesn’t want his siblings to meet his ‘Western guest’ because they will be yelled at for associating with infidels and be made fun of at school. “Of course, I think it’s stupid. But what can I do?” is Fahd’s reply when Bradley challenges him to stand up to such xenophobic behavior. The idea of someone being made fun of for having a foreign guest is ridiculous, although in the Saudi’s defense it’s not like Americans are simply innocent in our treatment of people different than us (look at the Trayvon Martin case).

19-year old Mohammed is an equally pampered and isolated young man living in his own private wing of the house who is an outrageous study in hypocritical extremes. Mohammed read’s Al-Qaeda political magazines and yet eats nothing but American junk food.He sit’s in online chatrooms, first defending Palestine and Islam and then taking time out to tease lesbianson other chat sites. He obliviously refers to the hypocrisys in his own life when he says, “They had everything [the 9/11 terrorists] and they gave it up for Allah.” Indeed, it can only make one scratch their head andwonder how a person who is so “confident” in his beliefs and who prefers to speak English (“A language he loved and was desperate to improve his proficiency in)” (p. 89) can, at the same time, support and admire people who made it their life’s mission to kill Americans, who denounce the very culture he also enjoys.

How can this hypocrisy exist? In Saudi Arabia it reaches extreme levels, namely because these youths admire an organization that aims to kill people, but the love-hate relationship with the West, and particularly America, is apparent in other non-Muslim countries. Witness in France: the French youth might laugh at America like their parents, but they still stand in line at McDonald’s, copy hip-hop style and blast our Top 40 music in their clubs. Youth around the world are similar simply because they embrace American music, style and movies and demand freedom and the right to be themselves (both which are at the heart of American culture), but non-American youth seem to be much more focused on American politics than young Americans themselves, as witnessed to how they let their opinions of our government taint their views.

Nevertheless, the idea that the person sitting in front of you sharing a cigarette and tea with you is also someone that cries for the  9/11 “martyrs” is rather discomforting, a truth that Bradley admits:

“It was difficult not to be insulted, for was not the implication that I, and others like me, are dirty, dangerous, contagious, unsafe?” (p.98)

This is an unsettling feeling that one gets being around people who are in some way quite different than yourself: there’s always a slight feeling that a divide exists, that the dominant group is somehow not as yielding as it should be. I myself have experienced this many a time, in different contexts. Why am I here, if I’m so different, if my views are so bad? you think.  Mohammed’s answer to this question is that the author is “different” from other Americans.

Why is he different? Because he attempts to create a dialogue between two cultures that view each other often warily? Because he dares to go beyond his religious and ethnic social group? (Oh, what a concept!) “I somehow was an exception, perhaps as a useful guest or even as a protected subordinate,”  Bradley hypothesizes. The reasons run the gamut (and, when considering Fahd’s response, it’s important to note that he is willing to ‘risk’ his own reputation to host his horrible house guest) but Mohammed’s is the best: “I get to know our enemy better.” (p. 99)

Flower Power Men

“The revelation that if one travels into the Asir mountains to find Al-Qaeda supporters, one ends up encouintering men who wear flowers in their hair and cultivate a passion for perfume.” (p. 65)

A “flower youth” in Saudi Arabia, sourced from facesofthearth.tumblr

The passage  Bradley devotes to Saudi “Flower men” was tantalizingly short (or at the very least, devoid of  a much-desired photo). The idea of grown men wearing wreathes of flowers in their hair a la little flower girls at a wedding is, well, intriguing, especially when one considers that feminity is discouraged in men. As Bradley is quoted above, more of that juxtaposition/contradiction that was mentioned before is blatantly evidenced here, where in the same land die-hard fundamentalists cohabit with men whose

“Headbands of these faun-like young men were a riot of fresh and dried flowers showing their vitality and character. Friendly and giggling continuously throughout a brief conversation, they finally scampered away, swinging their thighs and glancing back suggestively over their shoulders.” (p. 64)

Vibrant wreathes of flowers as men’s hair pieces seems positively boring when one considers the much-more lascivious behavior of the youths Bradley describes above. Again, it is kind of hard to imagine such open-minded men living  in the land of Wahhabi die-hards, but apparently it is perfectly okay for men to make open passes at each other, as long as every one agrees to look the other way, which leads us to…..

I’m Gay and They Know it

“The holding of hands and even exchange of light kisses among men is carried normal” (p. 154)

Sourced from articles.dailynynews.com

Men holding hands or putting their arms around each other is not restricted to friendships in the Middle East: in Egypt, I was (pleasantly!) surprised to see young men doing this with their friends, because in our macho tough-man American culture, no man can hold hands with his friend without being called gay and ‘freaking out’ his friends. In most male friendships in the Arab world, this behavior is simply akin to that which girls do with their girlfriends and probably stems from the fact that in some places, male-female contact is quite limited, particularly in Saudi Arabia. Bradley expounds the theory that an ”all-male world made if anything more of a man out of a young man than the promiscous mingling with women, which many felt had a polluting, emasculating influence” (p. 161).

You can almost see the terrible logic behind such a theory (why is acting like a woman so bad? To paraphrase Madonna, it’s as if you’re saying being a girl is degrading). But because this seems to be a dominant theme in Wahhabism, men are stuck with men, and inevitably some of these men become Gay-or, at least,  take a stab at it because they have no chance at relations with a woman.  Jeddah is host to several gay discos, a fact I was surprised to learn, as dancing is forbidden under Wahhabism as  surely is the type of music that would be playing at  a disco; how on Earth did anyone even have the guts to build them in a country where alcohol is illegal? The idea of a disco in Saudi Arabia is just another example of the many contradictions of the country, and begs the question: what if women wanted a (obviously) women-only disco?

Only then would the state take notice: because they were forced to (again, that also begs the question: WHY is the state taking a blind eye?). Why are people content to just look away from something that, if asked about an interview, they would publicly condemn? The fact the government denies such acts is perhaps not so strange only when one brings into context the idea Bradley observes in which the people deny

“….just as they state that Islam treats all Muslims as equals as they casually exploit foreign Muslims because they happen to be from South Asia.” (p. 157)

Demeaning Demeanors

The fact that many Saudi Arabians look down upon upon their own Muslim “brothers and sisters” says a lot about warped perceptions and how the true meaning of the Qu’ran is abused and propaganda’d for even an individual’s agenda. Indian Muslims in retrospect are viewed no differently than Arab Muslims in the Qu’ran, and yet the thousands of Indian, Bangladeshi and Pakistani workers who turn up in the country looking for work are treated like  the garbage they’re forced to sweep off the streets. The abuse their fellow Muslims inflict on them is particularly surprising when one considers the positions of other foreigners-and non-Muslims at that-in the countr

According to Bradley, Americans are at the top of the food chain, even higher than Saudis themselves. That either indicates that the Saudi’s are majorly trying to suck up to the USA or that they’re selective in who they decide to show their renowned hospitality for. Saudis, Europeans and other Arabs follow (in that order), which perhaps suggests that the Saudi’s are financially motivated in their relations than religiously (again, not what you’d expect from the land of Mecca). South Asians (such as Indians)are at the bottom of the list (I couldn’t help wondering where  other cultures not mentioned (such as Africans or Asians) would show up on this racist hierarchy, or if they even live  in Saudi Arabia).

Snooty demeanors don’t end with the racist organizing of social groups, either, in Saudi Arabia. Much like their spoiled US neighbors, the Saudis highly frown upon “what they consider demeaning work such as taxi driving” (p. 131) and refuse to hold such menial jobs–or, in fact, hold any jobs at all. Indeed, the same issue that occurs here in America, where nobody wants to do the laborious jobs such as farming, carpentry, plumbing, or menial jobs such as being a waiter, is occurring in Saudi Arabia. Why does this phenomena start to occur? Because a society becomes so materialistically wealthy that it’s members decide they’re too good to do anything, even if they’re sorely lacking money and are about to be thrown on the street? Like Americans, the Saudis are lucky because they do have people willing to take on these menial tasks: foreign workers happy to have any job, even if they don’t get paid for several months. But how can one have a just society where most of the workers are treated  little better than slaves?

To Conclude: Will the Al-Saud soften their colours?

Like any other people, the Saudis are overshadowed and unfairly grouped with the ruling government and religious establishment, as Saudi Arabia Exposed shows us. Saudis like to speak English, go to clubs, dress non-traditionally, debate the state and-in the case of the Flower Men-really break traditional molds. Saudi culture is not black-and-white, rigid and unchanging, as one might have thought. Bradley includes an interesting quote from the infamous T. E. Lawrence, and it is one that, in light of this discussion on contradiction and hypocrisy, is particularly fitting:

“They were a people of primary colors, or rather of black and white….They were a dogmatic people, despising doubt….They knew only truth and untruth, belief and unbelief, without our hestiating retinue of finer shades….Their thoughts were at ease only in extremes….” T.E. Lawrence in Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1926) (p. 93)

Lawrence spent  a good deal of his life living and intimately working in the Middle East, so it should be safe to say that he was fair in his analysis. When it concerns religion, especially the religious establishment, then yes, Saudis-and religious people throughout the world, for that matter-come across as extremely black-and-white, sure of their religion and the morals that it expounds. Good and evil are strictly laid out in religion, and even those grayer areas are “ignored,” doubt outlawed. Perhaps the Saudi government and Wahhabi officials want to rule in black and white because it makes the country easier to control, but I do believe that the Saudis are more “colourful” than that and hopefully (as we have seen recently with women’s rights) the establishment will lighten up and this intriguing country can open up.

S-L-M

Arabian Music Through Music Videos, Pt. 1

Forget video killing the radio star: MTV has since killed the video star, what with the fact that it no longer plays anything remotely resembling, well, music! Music videos are still being made—and at high quality, if you take a gander at Lady Gaga’s over-the-top glamorous vids—but where are people watching them? Online? Singers may have gone “underground” with their music videos, but in the Arab world, there are countless channels that play music non-stop. And their music videos are anything but dull or cliché.

            Rotana Cinema is a huge media production company in Egypt, running several channels on TV and producing both films, television programs and music. Recently, I witnessed a “Top 20” countdown of music videos on Rotana, a concept that was born in America with MTV’s Total Request Live (TRL) program. The host was a woman with overlong extensions, a pleasant demeanor and definite collagen lip implants; like many other female personalities on TV, she could certainly use her lips as a life preserver if necessary. Myriam Fares and the never-dying Amr Diab were in the top 10, but the top 2 positions when to (2^nd) a sheikh with a white headscarf and sporting a long robe accompanied by drums and a backup male choir; at number 1, a relatively young man with dark hair singing infront of a full orchestra a sad-sounding ballad.

The Rotana Cinema Logo

            The differences, stylistically, between the artists on this Top Countdown highlights the varied tastes in Arab music. “Popular music” in the United States is solely relegated to any music aimed at teenagers and the younger generations; if you can still find a Top 20 countdown, most of the songs will be rap, r&b, hip-hop, pop, a watered-down version of techno or, more likely, dubstep; a few country songs and an occasional rock song or oddball (see: Adele). There are so many more genres of music in the United States, but this is what one usually hears on the radio and certainly on TV. In the Arab world, however, all musical tastes are admired in popular music.

Amr Diab in his Top-20 video for song "Benadeek", from ahlasoot.com

            Arabic music can first be divided into two main styles: traditional and modern. Traditional has all of the ethnic flavor you might expect to hear on a Putumayo CD; the songs use the same words, lyrical style and instrumental style as ones of the generations before them. I witnessed this type of music in action several times when I went to sit under the big circus-style tent at one of the military clubs here in Egypt; the singer was a older man who stood on stage accompanied by several men playing instruments, and he sung a very traditional-sounding music.

            Modern music can be divided into two groups: that which is more ‘Arabic’ flavored and that which is more Western. The ‘Arabic’ flavored songs are a mixture of old and new, perhaps pairing ballad-style singing with a more pop-ish instrumental or vice versa. The Western-style Arabic music is very poppy, with techno or trance undertones. Indeed, there are many trance/techno DJ’s that are cropping up in the Middle East. Rap and r&b-style music is mostly non-existant, save in countries like Morocco and Tunisia where artists combine Arabic lyrics with French lyrics to form what is dubbed “rai ‘n b” (a style I adore), although there are some underground rap preformers in Egypt. Rock is admittedly harder to come by, although if the Iranian film No one Knows about Persian Cats is any indication, rock music does exist, it is just underground.

            As I do not understand Arabic, I cannot give a critique on the lyrics in Arabic songs, and therefore my critique shall be on the style of Arabic music videos. The music video is an interesting medium of art because it manages to mix music with visuals in a unique interpretation. Music videos in the United States are often extremely fast-paced, exhilarating rides in which we are barraged with a thousand and one mini-clips and still shots, usually of very attractive people. Whereas Michael Jackson, the high auteur of music videos, got purposefully “ugly” in Thriller, the music video of today usually centers on very, very attractive people, usually dancing the night away in a club. The more enterprenuring ones feature some high-stakes car chase a la Hollywood films, or mini-dramas enacted, but one thing is clear: there always has to be plenty of close-ups of young, flawless people, their perfect bodies, bare skin, and sexual tension, if not outright sex.

            There are two main differences between American music videos and Arabic music videos. The first is that the overall editing pace of the videos in Arabic is slower: the storyline is much more important in Arabic music videos, and as a result we don’t have as many mini-clips and shots. The second difference is that there is no kissing or sex in Arabic music videos: whereas American music videos are rife with sex, the most anyone will do in an Arabic music video is give a hug, or touch each other’s face.

            That is not to say that Arabic music videos are devoid of sexual tension or all of the “flawless, pretty” people that fill American music videos. Au contraire, in Arabic music videos it is perhaps even worse. The women—whether they are the artist or simply models in the video—are constantly seen primping, preening, and basically luxuriating in their general loveliness. The amount of loveliness in this videos is almost disgusting to watch; after watching an hour of Arabic music videos, I feel like ugliness would be more than welcome. Everyone is perfect looking, male and female; everything is perfect-looking. Arabic music videos are like fairy tales  in which everything appears to be wonderful, and even if the heroine sheds a tear, the ending is always  happy.

Coming next: Part II: Unrealistic Representation in Arabic Music Videos

Dreams of World’s Long Lost

“The question of the real Iran kept coming up in discussions between my parents and friends. Which was more legitimate: the ancient traditions with which the Shah propped up his power, or the strict Islamic principals of Khomeini?” (p. 119)

The Empress Farah Pahlavi of Iran and her children, courtesy of theimageworks.com

Iran was once a country where Western law ruled the land, not blown-up exaggerated Islamic shariah law. Women were at one point banned from wearing the veil, not as they are today, where they are banned from going bare in public. Art, music, friendship, religion and, most importantly of all, freedom flourished.

Likewise, Egypt was once a country were Westerner’s were welcomed, not viewed with suspicious eyes or bombarded with questions.Women were more apt to be seen in fancy Parisian-style wear, and the langage du jour was French or English or Italian, not Arabic. As in Iran, the rich and simply comfortable were able to-and encouraged-to enjoy life, drinking and attending parties.

To be sure, neither of these countries were perfect. 1940s and 1950s Cairo saw intense corruption at the hands of King Farouk. Iran’s attempts to quell religion were just as wrong as it’s attempts now to quell individualism and freedom of choice, and the Shah was not innocent in his rule. But, given the choice, I would have lived in either of these eras in a heartbeat, as they are vastly more alluring than the current climates in either one of these magnificent countries.

Things I’ve Been Silent About, acclaimed writer Azar Nafisi’s autobiography about her life in Tehran and being the daughter of two political figures, is a shocking portrait of pre- and post- Revolution Iran. Her recounting of a lovely, if a bit-spoiled childhood growing up in Tehran is almost unbelievable when one contrasts it with modern life in the city today. Although Nafisi has been accused of painting Tehran in black and white and being a promoter of colonialism, the fact remains that this is what life was like in Tehran; her life was one shared by many others.

Things I’ve Been Silent About’s literary counterpart is none other than The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit, an autobiographical look at author Lucette Lagnado’s family’s history in Cairo and their subsequent exodus from Egypt. The two books are immensely similar. Two young women grow up in cosmopolitan, worldly cities, only to one day more or less be forced to leave the countrys that they loved and cherished: Nafisi permanently moved to the USA with her family after watching Iran crumble before her, and being subjected to house arrest of a sort; Lagnado’s family was more or less compelled to leave Egypt when she was only seven. The reason? They were Jewish.

It was rather interesting to read an account of Jewish life in Cairo. Jewish life in Cairo–does that even exist anymore? There might still be a few Jewish families left, but they most likely practice their faith in secrecy behind closed doors. Lagnado’s book gave us a look at what the Middle East would look like if the governments were more accepting of all their citizens. During the 1940s and 1950s, Cairo seemed to rival any European destination for glamour, prestige, and diversity. Lagnado describes her father schmoozing with British soldiers, her mother conversing in Italian, Americans and Eastern Europeans wandering around in addition to the traditional Egyptians. Her family was Jewish, but they weren’t frowned upon nor ostracized, nor was anyone else (though she does admit that Arabs often weren’t allowed into places like Groppi’s, the upscale bakery that sounds like it would have put Paris’ Laduree to shame).

“Suzette [Lagnado's sister] remembered an exuberant culture where religion mattered, but so did going out at night and reveling in all the LEvant offered. Our father, who now all but lived at shul, was the prime example of this dual existence, where faith and ritual had in no way hindered his ability to lead a rich and pleasure-filled life. In Egypt, it was easy to be religious and worldly at the same time, but that seemed an impossibility here in America.” (p. 227)

Women on the beach in Alexandria, Egypt; courtesy of foreignpolicy.com

Religious and worldly at the same time–this is the key that Middle Eastern countries are missing. Because the wave of radical Islam has swept over so much of the land, I feel that most people have forgotten that it is possible to follow their faith, and still enjoy themselves on Earth. It was actually depressing to realize that Cairo was the city of my dreams–French-speaking, lively, raucous, fancy, open-minded–once upon a time. To compare Lagnado’s Cairo with the Cairo I have experienced was almost impossible.

In fact, Lagnado describes a situation that takes place in Brooklyn that sounds more akin to what I have experienced in Cairo than anything else she describes that actually takes place in Egypt. Her sister Suzette attends a wedding in a sleeveless dress, only to have the older women run over to her with a jacket to cover herself, as they find the outfit inappropriate. The strangeness of this act is not lost on Suzette, who recalls these very women wearing all sorts of baring fashions back in Egypt.

“That was when she’d sworn to herself that she would leave, and have nothing to do anymorewith this community of expatriats who called themselves Egyptians but bore no resemblence whatsoever to the people she had known back in Egypt.” (p. 228)

It is a strange phenomenon, how people can suddenly forget the traditions and habits that they grew up with. Often times we change because of a great life-altering in our lives; in this case, the Jewish-Egyptians in Brooklyn were most likely changed because they had been uprooted from their homes and might have looked to more traditional interpretations of their faith, since faith was the only thing they had left. In any case, the situation reminds me of my experience dressing every day in Cairo, and how dumbfounded I was when I was told that my husband’s mother wore mini skirts in 1960s Cairo, but now wore a hijab. What was the life-altering event, I wondered, that caused her to shed her old ways? Why is it, in the case of the Middle East, that people have become so traditional and so strongly seem to reject most facets of the “modern world,” whereas people elsewhere in the world don’t put up such a fight?

Granted, I realized that the worlds that Nafisi and Lagnado had lived in were highly privledged worlds; the average Iranian or Egyptian didn’t have an endless parade of servants calling cars for them, or trips to custom tailors, or dinners with the leading politicians of the country. Nafisi and Lagnado, one could say, lived highly westernized lives; Nafisi’s book doesn’t so much as make one mention of her own Islamic faith, in that as I read the book I truly felt as though I was reading the autobiography of a Western girl with a family problems, albeit family problems that included her prominent father being jailed. As Nafisi claims,

“Political dissent in Iran is treated as a form of criminality; most offenders are tried on bogus charges and there is little room for defense.” (p. 140)

Isn’t this the case in most Islamic countries nowadays? Disagree with the regime, and you’re branded for life; the police will never leave you alone. Nafisi’s father was indeed jailed on bogus charges,and indeed had little room to defend himself. Although Lagnado’s family doesn’t have run-ins with the law, there is one incident that occurs which sparks their final decision to leave Egypt, in which her older sister is arrested for hanging out with foreign sailors. She didn’t do anything wrong, except fraternize with foreigners: at that point in time, Egypt was slowly becoming xenophobic and wary of those who bore any resemblance to the colonizers who had once lived in the land. Lagnado, reporting on her recent visit to Egypt (she was granted entry, despite signing papers never to return), describes a realization she makes about Egyptians:

“Malaka Nazli hadn’t simply been a place I realized but a state of mind. It was where you could find an extraordinary, breathtaking level of humanity. What it lacked in privacy, what it failed to provide by way of modern comforts–hot runningwater, showers, electric stoves, refrigerators, telephones–it more than made up for in mercy and compassion and tenderness and grace, those  ethereal qualities that make and keep us human.” (p. 332)

Her realization is important for several reasons, namely, that it shows that the people of Cairo hadn’t changed since her family had fled many years ago. This statement shows that in their hearts, the people of Cairo–and any other Islamic country–are still kind, empathizing human beings, and that it is the governments that try to dictate what the people want, that try to change society, that try to set the morals and values even when they are in strict contradiction to those that already existed. This is true in Iran–did Nafisi and her friends allow their hearts to be changed by the repressive revolutionary regime? No–it is true in Egypt, as Lagnado shows (after all, the new occupants of her old neighborhood building Malaka Nazli are all Muslim and yet they show her respect and true kindness) and it is most likely true in every other Islamic country where regimes have taken over regardless of what the people were or wanted.

Beyond what these two autobiographies teach the reader politically and culturally, at their heart they are open revelations of a family’s intimacy and secrets. Both Nafisi and Lagnado were deeply affected and moved by their overbearing and strong-willed parents, and their lives were shaped not only by society and increasingly oppresive governments but also by their families. In the end, it was their families that gave them a sense of who they were; it was their families that kept the traditions and cultures that they had held so dear alive. The ending quote of Things That I’ve Been Silent About sums it up best:

“After the Islamic Revolution I came to realize the fragility of our mundane existence, the ease with which all that you call home, all that gives you an identiy, a sense of self and belonging, can be taken away from you. I learned that what my father had given me through his stories was a way to make a home for myself that was not dependent on geography or nationality or anything that other people can take away from me. These stories could not gaurd me againstthe pain i felt at my parents loss; they did not offer consolation or closure. it was only after their deaths that i came to realize that they each in their own way had given me a portable home that safegaurds memory and is a constant resistance against the tyranny of man and of time.” (p. 314)

S-L-M

Struggling for Song in “No One Knows About Persian Cats”

The other night I watched the film No One Knows About Persian Cats, a 2010 Iranian film released by IFC which, like most foreign films, is completely unknown to American viewers and thus totally dishonored.  The film, which highlights actual Iranian bands as it follows the loosely-scripted real-life story of the band Take It Easy Hospital (composed of Ashkan Kooshanejad and Negar Shaghaghi) as they try to get a backing band for their group in order to play in London, UK. Filmed in a documentary-cum-music-video style, with great shots of a country seldom seen to the West and an interesting soundtrack, the film blends Western ideas with universal wants on an all-too-Middle-Eastern background which presents an overall captivating but agenda-less work.

Box art for No one Knows about Persian Cats. Courtesy of the IFC website.

To an American who lives in a world of free speech, where every teenager with half an ounce of vocal or musical talent believes that they’re the next pop star, “Persian Cats” stands in an astonishing contrast. Here we have bands that, because of their lyrical content or style, are not allowed a permit, which is the only way one can legally play (even practice!) music in Iran. This sounds like it would crush the dream of every 14 year-old Iranian who dreams of thumping rock metal or gyrating like Britney Spears, but as the film shows, artists without permits will go to great lengths to continue their craft, even when the stakes are high (at the begining of the film, Ashkan and Negar are released from prison after being caught preforming without a permit). The camera follows the actors (it feels almost wrong to call them actors, and yet here they are, reinacting their story; perhaps docu-drama fits better?) as they tunnel through room after room, down multiple sets of stairs and alleyways, ducking into basements and past doors covered in sheets or up into tiny attics. What’s with the maze? The musicians have to find the most removed, isolated studios for their clandestine craft-thus underlining literally the meaning of “underground artists.” In the USA, “underground artists” mean artists that simply aren’t well known. In Iran, it means being oppressed musically and being forced literally, underground. One group even resorts to playing on a rooftop shack they built, and wait until their neighbors exit the building to commence the drums.
With some of the bands, one can easily see why the Iranian government would refuse them a permit. One band (which goes so far as to practice in a cowshed when their neighbors force them out) plays heavy death metal with Persian lyrics and death stares. Another one (which we meet on a floor of a construction site overlooking Tehran) is a rap group speaking about the injustices of poverty in their country. But some of them don’t seem so bad: take, for instance, the group that Hamed Behdad (Ashkan and Negars “manager”) sings in: it has a Persian rhythm to it, and male Persian dancers preform a clearly traditional dance as he sings.

The injustice that these bands cannot legally preform-let alone practice- is only tempered by the realization that, next door in Afghanistan, music itself was forbidden under Taliban rule, a fate that seems unbelievable. Ashkan and Negars band itself is pretty tame: Take it Easy Hospital (despite it’s emo name) is full of slightly-off-tune indie pop, the sort that contains lyrics that don’t seem to match up. Perhaps the Iranian government disliked the band simply because it is composed of a guy and a girl, who are in fact a couple, although the movie never, ever seems to make light of this.
Indeed, Negars presence in this movie seems, well, I wouldn’t say shocking but it certainly seems unusual. We find (or she finds herself) constantly surrounded by men: whether it’s in one of the clandestine meeting practice studios or

An image of the bands playing in a clandestine basement. Courtesy of the NY Times.

meeting with Hamed or riding on the back of a scooter, she is usually  the only girl ever present. As such, the viewer almost forgets that she is a girl, because no one seems to notice this distinction or make note of it. She wears black hipster glasses that underline her seriousness (she is always the voice of reasoning and practicality, gently nudging the boys along and verbalizing her and Ashkan’s wants in her soft-but-not-girly voice) and baggy clothes; perhaps if she dressed more overtly girlish or sexy her presence would be more formidable. Omnipresent is a large olive-coloured backpack that she wears in most scenes, as if to prove that she is a woman, for she is the burden bearer.

Negar seems free from restraint: there is no older brother or parent demanding to know where she is, that she come home; money doesn’t seem to be an objection, nor is the fact that she wanders around Tehran alone (as she does in the opening scene, where she arrives at a “real” recording studio and talks in her lost-and-delirious way with one of the studio producers). She even appears to have her own car, as evidenced by the fact that we  see her driving the band around. When a policeman pulls her and Ashkan over, he does not berate her for being in a car alone with a man: instead, he takes her dog away from her.
Thus, the Tehran that we are introduced to seems uneasy, unsure, a little bit lost. While there is an agenda, a plot to the film–the band is trying to get to London–and we are introduced to the themes/ideas of people struggling to speak freely, the film doesn’t push these ideas in one’s face. This is not a typical presentation of a clashes between ideals, East vs. West, old vs. new, although these forces do come out. Negars is a prime example: she wears a headscarf, but it is casually wrapped around her head so that her light-brown hair is clearly visible, as though she is torn between wanting to respect tradition and religion but also represent herself. In wearing the scarf undone, it appears that she is unsure of herself. Nader likes to speak English, and one day overhears Negars critiquing him for this, which is somewhat odd when one considers that her band preforms entirely in English.

Uneasiness seems to reign: perhaps it’s OK to sing in English, because it’s commercial and goes with their indie style better, but to speak English amongst Iranians is perhaps pretentious. The bands make some comments about the Americans, yet their music is clearly Western: modern rap, of the variety that the rap group preforms, was born in the urban frontiers of the USA; screamo-rock bears the influence of grunge a la Nirvana and Take it Easy Hospital’s brand of indie pop wouldn’t be out of place at a hipster bar in Brooklyn.The bands dream West, where they can play their music in the open, all except the rap group, which smartly states that their music “is for here, Tehran.” Indeed: their words speak to the public, to the government; their words critique their, Iranian, society, and would be out of place in the Western world of freedom. As I watched the movie, I couldn’t help but wonder what is the point? What is the point of making music if you’ll never get to play it for an audience? To never have your cries of social freedom and justice heard?
The answer is both literal and figurative. Negar and Ashkan defy the government by planning a secret concert in an underground room, always with the help of Hamed, himself a good study in the struggle of East vs. West. Hamed, who parrots bootleg DVDs and likes to drink alcohol–what does he get out of helping Negars and Ashkan? What is the point for helping struggling musicians who might never get anywhere? It certainly seems like they’ll be going nowhere, when the old man forgering their passports gets arrested. Hamed, who’s hopes and dreams seemed to be escaping back to London with the band, seems to question the reality of their musical struggle and subsequently gets drunk. No one knows about Persian Cats, as the film’s title suggests: no one knows about these bands, but to the bands, this does not matter. They seem determined that one day, some how, their words will break free of their cages and prisons and inspire the people they were meant for.
“I’ve been here alone/I’ve been here with you/…it’s a jungle out there,” go the lyrics in Take it Easy Hospital’s song “Human Jungle,” easily their best song (and, in my opinion, the best song in the movie; it certainly replayed in my ears after I’d finished watching). Is she talking about the tricky, dangerous jungle of Tehran, where police hide behind every corner, waiting for a bit of music to play? Is she talking about the jungle that is the world beyond Tehran, the West where the band has their eyes focused on? She could be talking about either one: no one knows, but it’s a fitting bit of lyricism.

At  the end of the film, when Negar and Ashkan go to rescue Nader from a party, the police arrive: to escape capture, Ashkan jumps out the window; the last we see of him, he’s being rushed to the ER. The very last image of the movie shows Negar appearing to back flip off a roof. It is a very vague scene that asks a million questions. Is she really on a roof? Is she trying to emulate Ashkan’s seemingly suicidal jump? If this was an American movie, the film would have ended with the band playing their planned concert triumphantly, basking in the glow of an audience. It would have ended on a note of hope and victory. Negars jump does not seem to be very hopeful: it seems like she has given up. Or has she? Perhaps she is escaping her cage.  No one knows.

S-L-M