While waiting for word from the Cultural Heritage Foundation and an update from Parliament, I headed to the oft-praised land of Kurdistan for an overnight trip, a city about 2 hours east of Kirkuk, Iraq. A musician friend with an unusually high pitched and studdered laugh had special ordered a Persian Oud four months back from a man in Kurdistan who makes handmade instruments.

We drove through Qasvin on the way west and as we passed through, I sorrowfully waved and said, “Bon voyage Charlie, have a wonderful trip!” ( I was thinking about Sandra in Herb Gardner’s A Thousand Clowns, as she waves off her imaginal friend Charlie from a New York city dock. I don’t know why. )

I then immediately thought about the moment the mayor of Qazvin placed flower wreaths around me and Tyler’s neck nearly 3 years back, while a crowd surrounding us chanted “Nuclear Energy Is Iran’s Obvious Right” and several quacking reporters fed us puffy top Donahue microphones for dinner. This was one of the more memorable days in our first attempt to run Iran.

The road to Kurdistan offers magnificent landscapes, endless terrain of rolling green hills, farmland, quirky sheepherders, and views of the towering Zagros mountains in the background. For over 250 km, we drove the path of the intended run. I envisioned exhausted legs and mythical strides coming to a rejuvenating halt while overlooking the majesty of this land of nature’s replete and diverse contemplations. Several vantage points along the way allowed for panamoric views of far off mud hut communities nestled in valleys with bee hive concentrated proximity. At times an uncommon spectacle of endless uninhabited land, slight elevation shifts presented miles of visibility and a Foucoultian Panopticon.
Kuridstan is a unique part of Iran that effortlessly transforms memories into dreams of an ancient caliber, and in a manner reminiscent of canned apricots pouring out of its viscous solution. Tis a land where man’s jugular vein is injected with natures remembrance of meandering play, where the charm of earths contours and variegated qualities of endlessness and charismatic noisiness hover in through your eyes and lungs and ears and decisively annihilate desires for text messaging. I imagined traversing this land as an Amerigo Vespucci ( or a pompously youthful Benvenuto Cellini) and experiencing an immediate overwhelming solace as I got off my horse to exclaim, “mmmm…I think I’ll chillax here for a couple of years.”

But I couldn’t. There were more visa battles ahead on Tehran turf. And I didn’t have a horse or a tent. Or Immodium AD.

We made it to our populated destination after 7 hours of driving (and a few unexpected and sudden bowel…)

The instrument maker was a man in his early thirties who crafted instruments in a small shack adjacent to his home. His shack reminded me of Williamsburgh, Virginia, in its rustic glory and crowded old-school- work-shack air, packed with fastidiously organized tools of all sorts. The walls were refreshingly chalky and tan. The soft spoken lanky instrument maker (whose name I could never remember for more than 42 seconds probably because of his airy presence) invited us in to his home where his wife offered us tea. The house was decorated with several wood carvings of an ecstatic nature: birds, dogs, intoxicated beings and plants all of a Hafezian conciousness. He later revealed that his wife is a wood sculpter. She spoke very little, and she seemed to have a thing for dalmations as there were several of them scattered about.

We stayed in a hotel that night as the new Oud was to be polished, strung and ready for pick up by the next morning. The night was devoted to reciting Shams-I Tabrizi poems while my friend plucked away at his weathered Oud in a haze of chin-shaky drunkeness.
The next morning I noticed incredulously tall dudes and lots of them walking in the hallways in packs; among them were a few African Americans that weren’t genetically Iranian by any means.

In the tomato-scrambled-eggs section of the breakfast buffet, I noticed I was standing near a black gentleman and broke the awkward buffet silence with, “hey, you speak English?”

“Yea man, I’m from Chicago bro.”

He stared at me as if grossly deceived. The combo of laid back American accent and bearded brown man in slippers may have thrown him off.
I stared at him like I just discovered a black dude from Chicago in Kurdistan.

“Dude, what’re you doing out here in da cradle bra?”

“There’s a lot of us out here this year….I’m on one of the basketball teams… 7 month contract.”

“You’re telling me you play basketball out here?”

“Yea man.”

“So the sanctions and all haven’t affected basketball recruits?”

“Not really. Actually this year we have the most Americans on Iranian basketball teams than ever before.”

“That’s awesome. . .How’s the country treating you?”

“It’s cool man! Everyone’s real kind. ..I’m having a good time .” He reached for a couple more hardboiled eggs and cherry syrup packets with spiderman intentionality.

Wakkim was a jolly fellow who couldn’t seem to speak more than a few words of Farsi but appeared delightfully entertained by the world around him.

I wondered how much these dudes are getting paid to bounce some balls. I flagged down one of the couches as he was eyeing a mound of pastries like TI85 would.

“hello sir, can you tell me how much the Americans get paid monthly.”

“Its decent.” (Still eyeing the mound of pastries.)

“Roughly?”

“um…Around 27k a month.”

“You mean about $27K a month?”

“Yes.” He dove for the pastries like a vulture.

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