Lifting the Veil [antikvár]

Introduction We were driving southwards out of Tehran towards the old city of Rey, once the capital of Persia. At the head of our convoy was a Mercedes with the splendid figure of a black-robed mullah sitting in the back seat. One by one in the heat haze the cars turned into the yard of the Sadi Tile and Ceramic Factory. The mullah had been invited to lead the midday prayers here, and we were going to film him as he did it. For a few minutes nothing happened. The mullah sat in his Mercedes while someone went to tell the management he had arrived. At last a little deputation came out and welcomed him with the requisite degree of ceremony. He indicated us with a sweeping gesture and the deputation shook hands with the males in our team. When they came to Tira Shubart they gave her an embarrassed little half-bow; since she was a woman it would be unlslamic to touch her. There was nothing intentionally rude about their greeting; on the contrary, they were positively ingratiating. It was just that they weren't used to having distinguished guests who happened to be female. The awkward moment passed, and they led us into a grimy office building, up the stairs and into a room with a long table. The six of us sat on one side, the twelve people from the factory sat on the other. In the middle of the table were samples of the tiles the factory produced; boring, run-of-the-mill stuff which owed nothing to Iran's artistic heritage. A dish of apples, grapes and cucumbers had been set out for us, and an elderly man hobbled in with a brass tray bearing glasses of tea. At this point someone realised that one member of our group was a descendant of the Qajar dynasty, which was overthrown by Reza Shah in the 1920s; and that put an end to all discussion of British television or the manufacture of tiles. The managers, who had all been factory workers before the overthrow of the Shah in 1979, questioned him with exaggerated respect about his genealogy and royal connections. It was like watching Bolsheviks brought face to face with a Romanov; except that most Iranians instinctively feel that the Qajars were the true royal family and that Reza Shah, who had started out as a mere soldier, and his son Mohammed who was overthrown in 1979, were upstarts. The managers, you knew, would go