http://blog.z-word.com/2010/06/iranian-bank-mellis-women-only-branch/ Commentary about Zionism, anti-Zionism, antisemitism and the conflict in the Middle East Thu, 24 May 2012 03:13:48 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5-RC1.1 http://blog.z-word.com/2010/06/iranian-bank-mellis-women-only-branch/#comment-11913 ganselmi Wed, 09 Jun 2010 00:48:38 +0000 http://blog.z-word.com/?p=1612#comment-11913 Right before I left Iran as a teenager, the regime introduced women-only buses to the streets of Tehran. I vividly remember one instance involving one such bus. My mother, grandmother, and I were waiting for a bus at a bus stop on a busy highway. Unlucky for us, one of these women-only buses showed up. My mother and grandmother, of course, weren't going to leave me on that highway many miles away from our neighborhood. So they nonchalantly got on the bus and had me follow along. (The law made an exemption for "children" accompanying women, of course). But the bus driver immediately noticed: I was no child! I was an awkward teen carrying all of the awkward physical indicia of the transition to manhood. But my grandmother insisted that I was a child of no more than 8 and pushed our way down the aisle. The driver didn't seriously object and we went on our marry way. Of course, in the back of the bus, we (my kin and many of the women) on the bus laughed our asses off - at the ridiculousness of the law, at the regime for making Iranians do such ridiculous things, and the absurdity of it all. The kind of cynical laughter only people who have lived through totalitarian regimes have "enjoyed." Right before I left Iran as a teenager, the regime introduced women-only buses to the streets of Tehran. I vividly remember one instance involving one such bus. My mother, grandmother, and I were waiting for a bus at a bus stop on a busy highway. Unlucky for us, one of these women-only buses showed up. My mother and grandmother, of course, weren’t going to leave me on that highway many miles away from our neighborhood. So they nonchalantly got on the bus and had me follow along. (The law made an exemption for “children” accompanying women, of course). But the bus driver immediately noticed: I was no child! I was an awkward teen carrying all of the awkward physical indicia of the transition to manhood. But my grandmother insisted that I was a child of no more than 8 and pushed our way down the aisle. The driver didn’t seriously object and we went on our marry way. Of course, in the back of the bus, we (my kin and many of the women) on the bus laughed our asses off - at the ridiculousness of the law, at the regime for making Iranians do such ridiculous things, and the absurdity of it all. The kind of cynical laughter only people who have lived through totalitarian regimes have “enjoyed.”

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