Iranians in London

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Hello, I'm James Reynolds.

Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service.

In BBC conversations, we bring people together to share their experiences.

This time, I'm in central London to meet Iranians.

This area of London, just north of Oxford Street,

one of the city's busiest shopping areas has almost every international cuisine.

You could possibly imagine if you want Chinese,

Indian, Turkish, even Scandinavian, you can find a restaurant or a cafe right around here.

That reflects the rich cultural diversity of the UK's capital,

home to immigrants from around the world for hundreds of years.

A few days ago, I came to a Persian restaurant here,

Narun, where we brought together five Iranians to discuss events of the past week,

their hopes for the future, and to sample some food and drink from the country.

You'll hear from Reza, he's the co-owner of the restaurant.

Rahab, she's lived in the UK for three years after coming here for her master's degree.

Amira is a freelance journalist and content creator.

Ed van works in London after leaving Iran five years ago,

and 26-year-old Kayley, she grew up in the US and Iran and now lives here in the UK.

We began our conversation with their reaction to the start of the Israeli and American

air strikes on Iran a week ago.

Seeing that Iranian people experience joy makes me experience joy,

and seeing them nervous and scared and sad makes me feel the same.

So I feel like my emotions since Saturday have very closely echoed those of the Iranian people.

My phone hadn't been on charge so I woke up to like put it on charge to get ready for the day ahead

and glanced at it and a friend of mine had messaged me saying,

my love, I'm so sorry to hear.

And she didn't say what happened, but I knew what it was about.

So it's like a deep breath and going to see what exactly has happened,

how bad is it, and then obviously saw the news and just kind of was in a bit of a spiral of the

news and trying to get through to family in Iran, talking to family here.

It was very overwhelming.

Were you able to contact your family inside Iran?

Until a certain point and then it kind of went quiet.

Which, you know, we're all familiar with, we've been there before.

If I'm what's it like to be an Iranian watching events in your own country,

but having to watch those events from a long, long way away?

Perspectives are very different depending on when you left Iran or if you've ever lived in Iran.

The Iran that I lived in for 25 years is very different to the Iran right now.

I mean, for a lot of me, I would not be able to imagine women going out in the streets without

wearing a hijab and that was something very unusual at the time I was living in Iran.

It has changed a lot, but I think what happened on Saturday,

I was very hopeful and I'm still very hopeful that it would bring change.

And Reza, the owner of Narun, your business is open.

I can see you three of your staff members carefully arranging the tables.

So your business continues, but where is your mind at the moment?

Yeah, I mean, just thinking a lot with my family back at home, my friends,

we have to keep business going as usual.

But I employ quite a lot of Iranian staff as well who are all connected to Iran.

And everyone is having these sort of mixed emotions that everyone's talking about.

It's really hard for everyone to stay focused and go about our day as usual.

But I think we can all be understanding of that this is not normal circumstances.

And we're just trying to support each other as much as possible.

One of the things that we can all relate to is a very big sense of survivor's guilt.

And that is big when you've just left Iran, I think, because

the people who you've spent all your days with a few years ago,

now they're there and they're experiencing that uncertainty and that stress.

And you're sat here trying to convince your nervous system that you're not the one being

attacked, but at the same time going through that emotional rollercoaster during the day.

So I think that for me was the biggest thing ever since Saturday morning,

just thinking about what you can do, how you can help if there's anything you can do,

and trying to share that experience as much as you can with your friends and family in Iran.

I think for me it's just I went there every summer and I never really appreciated it when I went.

Like it was always my friends went to Spain or Portugal and I can't believe I'm saying I'm

jealous of friends going to Cornwall, no offense, but like it's amazing that I was going to Iran,

but I never had that appreciation when I was younger and I've not been back for 10 years now.

So for a long time it was all I've not been able to be there because of that reason.

And now it's like, okay, I don't know when I'll be able to go back because of a whole new reason.

Can I also add to that, I think one of the things that I always noticed growing up was,

for example, seeing all of my friends being able to spend the summers with their families

or have their grandma come over for a weekend, things like that, and I kind of would always ask myself,

why can't I just go see my grandparents for a couple of weeks?

And I mean you can say that it's the distance of the place between the US and Iran, but it was far

more than that. And I think that was something that always kind of shaped my perceptions of the world

as I was growing up. How often did you go? What were you able to do? Every couple of years, yeah.

We were every year and now it's just it seems so like it's such a long time ago, but yeah,

and like I get what you mean because like kids like my friends were being picked up by their

grandparents at school and that was just a non-reality for us. I keep thinking that even if we do

go back right now, we will just not see the same city or the same people. So just seeing all the

videos and photos of places that I used to drive by or go to and how they've drastically changed

and are still changing during the attacks that maybe that's a concept we will not see face to face

again. We just have to accept. Especially during Christmas time, I mean in Iran we don't

celebrate Christmas but seeing friends going to families and spend time with them during holiday

is just that sense of oh why can't I go to my parents and see them spend time with my family.

I mean we celebrate Nauru's as well, but yeah. And that's on the 20th of March this year. Yeah,

exactly. It's very nice, but yeah we don't have that opportunity to spend time with family members

or with our parents. The kind stuff here, bringing four or five different dishes here, Reza,

would you like to describe what we're being served? Yeah, absolutely, so I thought

we have in this conversation we should have a tuck into a little bit of nice Persian food as well.

We have a couple of traditional Persian appetizers. We have some Kashgabad Amjoon which is a pan-fried

Obergine with walnuts and way sauce. Mastakhiar which is Greek-style yoghurt with finely diced cucumbers.

You've got Mirza Ghassami coming from the north of Iran which is a smoked Obergine dish with

tomatoes, garlic and with egg. Here you have some Solodolovia which is like a chicken potato salad.

So these are all very dishes that all Iranians are very familiar with and nice, nice appetite.

I hope you can try and enjoy it. Of course I should say as you were describing that almost

each of our other guests took out their phones to take pictures of this food.

It looks so good. I can't do a podcast without having some feed around me from a television

or even any to name myself. People don't know who said that. I think you didn't do justice to

the olives. I think they're a very staple. Why don't you why don't you tell us about the Zaytun Parvade?

Well yeah this is a side dish we have with a lot of our food is called Zaytun Parvade and you

basically marinate olives in a mix of pomegranate molasses, herbs, walnuts, crushed walnuts,

and I would recommend it to anyone who can get their hands on because it's just such a

single side dish. We are having a photo session here at the moment, although we are radio

program but everyone is making sure to get as many photos as possible. As you prepare this food

and as you serve it and get people to eat, if you close your eyes, are you almost back in Iran?

Does it taste the same as it tastes back home or not? You know I think especially food plays a

huge role for us Iranians. I think all of my earliest memories I remember, you know we have this

big culture of being around a dining table and all eating together that areas which I'm from,

you know my mother's from Esfahan, my father's from Shiraz and I think both cities with not just

great deal of history and culture and literature but in terms of food I think they're just

really amazing places and one of the things that I always missed growing up here in the UK was

just this type of feeling of being around this type of food all the time. I mean obviously you go to

an Iranian restaurant maybe once a month with your family but you know I think just being able to

have this and be a place where Iranians can come together here and try to enjoy it with their

friends and their families. It's what we always want to do from the beginning and I'm so proud

that that's actually what's turned into. Can I say as well, Iranian food is some of my favorite cuisine

in the entire world if not my favorite absolute favorite. I love it but I think the thing that

makes it so special for me is having it with all of my friends. Kaley, Erfan, Amira, Rahe and Reza

sharing their meal with me in the Narun restaurant here in central London more from that conversation

in just a moment. I'm James Reynolds, you're listening to The Documentary from the BBC World Service.

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Let's rejoin our conversation now and the meal with dessert still to come. Many people who've

left Iran tend to oppose the regime. It's difficult to gauge how much support the government has,

although one Dutch study suggested it's around 20% of the population.

I wanted to hear why our guests decided to leave the country.

We'll hear firstly from Rahe. Moving abroad to study has become an inevitable

part of your progression through life in Iran. I think when we were children,

air fun is nodding as well. When we were children, we would each have one or two

relatives who live abroad and there would be these exotic onto always brings us gifts and souvenirs.

I think one of the first waves started in 2009 after the green movement didn't get any

where because it started in university. Universities played a very big role in what happened back then

and a lot of students were banned from entering universities or continuing their studies.

So what do they do when they're not allowed to continue their studies? They move abroad to study.

To the point that even one of the best universities in Tehran for engineering,

Sharif University is known as West Terminal because it's known that when you finish your studies

there you immediately move to a Western country to continue. So it's kind of like you grow up,

you graduate, you move abroad, you get married, you have children, that's one of the steps.

So for a lot of us the question is just finding the destinations. And also obviously when you grow

up in Iran and you see that distance between yourself and what you're being taught in school,

you're being preached by the thought system that's in the country, then you start to find an

alternative for yourself, you start to think okay I don't think I would be able to express myself

here, I don't think I would be happy here so where do I go? And I always say I blame it on Harry

Potter and Sherlock Holmes the BBC version but that's why London was my choice. That's the picture

that was sold to me. But I always knew I wanted to move to London ever since I was 10.

Education is one road to get out of Iran and leave your life in a free country and

not deal with everyday challenges in Iran. For me especially as a queer-reniant living in a

free country, kind of define how you embrace yourself, your identity, your individuality. So it was,

for me it was a personal choice obviously. I haven't been back to Iran because I mean as soon as

I arrived I arrived in October 2019 and then a month after that we had bloody November in Iran

which was an uprising and then woman life freedom movement. So I've been very outspoken

politically that's my reason for not going back but also with the type of life I'm having I don't

think it's possible for me to leave under that repression. So when you left Iran,

when your fight took off, did you then think this is the last time I'm going to see my home country

for a while? I actually you know what it was at the time that Game of Thrones was really trendy at

the time and I was listening to one of Ramanjavadi soundtracks as the flight was taking off.

It was a moment of this is probably going to be the last time for quite a long time I'm seeing

Iran and I think the flight was for five six hours and at the whole time I was crying

knowing that probably that's going to be the last time for I'm seeing Iran for a long time yeah.

Can I ask what did you think of when you when you're flight first landed in London because

and have you been to London before because I've never been. Yeah and so how did you feel?

Well it landed in Heathrow Airport which is far from city center or I didn't see any

any elements of kind of anything around London looking but I studied up in the north so I had

to take a bus from Heathrow and you know what actually I because Iran is so vast and big

and you kind of think okay you know I can I don't have to take a train or anything or I can

can drive and I thought you know UK is not as big so I can just take a bus and go to North England

and I was on the bus for 12 hours. I was exhausted. I was like that was my biggest mistake so an

edfern as you left Iran knowing that you wouldn't see it again for the foreseeable future what has

the separation of your family been like. It's very difficult because I've lost a few members of

our extended family or among relatives and not being able to see them or saying goodbye to them

is very painful but also you know when you live with your parents you don't notice that they are

aging but when you see them after one or two or three years you actually notice they are aging

for me as someone who sees them once a year or once every two years so how many years I've

I have left to see them you are not able to make memories with them anymore or share that happiness

or sadness with them you are only saying them through your screen or your mobile talk to them

which is a very very hard experience and every time I see them once a year it's really hard to say

goodbye. I was in Iran about a year ago and it was quite clear to all of us that it was going to

be the last time I saw my grandmother who is the most special person in my life. She passed away

a couple of weeks ago and I think it's quite difficult to deal with issues like why can't I go

to her funeral? What is it about the world that prevents me from doing that? So I think we all know

that it's quite likely that we're going to see our family age quickly and not see them very many

times over our lives but it's something that we've had to deal with since we were born.

Yes it's true it's kind of like the last so the last time I went was 2016 but the time before

that in 2011 was when my grandfather passed away and I was very fortunate to be able to see him

that last time but it is just kind of that common terms with not seeing family members afterwards

and it's a very bizarre thing to come to terms with. Recently I was very lucky that one of my aunts

and uncles got visas to go visit family in Canada and it was just a no-brainer that I would go

and it was just again just surreal because it was just something I hadn't really had a timeline

of being able to do again at the time I'd seen them last was eight years ago in Iran and so yeah

you don't know when you'll see family again and I think right now it's a very weird feeling because

prior to this year obviously things have been going on for a lot longer but like let's use

2026 as a catalyst prior to this it was like oh I might not see my grandma before she

unfolds she passes she's very old now although she she's outliving all of us I think to an extent

but now it's it's very much like who knows what's going to happen now because of the situation we

don't know we really really don't know you know it's not just to do with the passport anymore

with moving abroad it's like we've all signed this unwritten agreements that this is a sorrow

we're going to face one or the other that were far away we can't go back we can't be with our

family and a tragedy like that happens and it's just a matter of time I told a friend recently

who lost a loved one that we're all in this together one day I'm going to lose people that I

might not be able to attend their funeral and I think that was a really heavy thing for me to come

to terms with and and the terror I cannot explain it to you but if anyone from Iran calls me

at an unusual hour my first thought is someone's dead they're calling me something bad has happened

so those like 10 seconds I get until I hear their voice and if their tone is happy I every time

I think it just makes turns a couple of my hair grey when you're saying that just makes me think

of when my dad says that to me he's like every time I call him he's like are you okay and I'm like

yes just need to know like a password for something especially when like you're on it is so

full of events yeah that happen that it's not really that I'm thinkable that's something that

has happened exactly every time I just but for me I'm not maybe in that same mindset of thinking

because I've grown up here whereas he thinks kind of more similarly to you which is probably a reflex

from exactly exactly I think yeah I think my dad didn't get to go home when his parents passed

away I think they were they were here and you know I never met my grandma and I don't remember my

dad's dad unfortunately. Resa as the restaurant owner here I wonder how often you would host

the gatherings that I guess they're talking about were there people need to come together and cannot

go to a funeral in Iran but perhaps come here instead yeah I mean from the beginning this is the

kind of space that we wanted to create for the Iranian community more so than just a restaurant

but just a place that people can come together we recently hosted something as well where actually

a couple of you guys managed to come to it as well where it was just something for after everything

and happened this is just before the war had broken out on the like the 40th day after the protests

which is a symbolic day for Iranians it was just an event where it wasn't ticketed or anything

everyone was just welcome to come just to come here just to be around each other just to create

that kind of support network where people could feel like they're in a safe space that they can

speak to others who have lived a similar experience and I think you know going forward I think we'd

like to do more of these things and try to make this a space for that. It was a lovely event I did

have the pleasure of attending and it was so nice I think since the events of January specifically

it has been really difficult to feel happy you almost feel bad for feeling good and that was

really an evening that we could all come together feel whatever it is we wanted to feel good or bad

or sad or screaming or whatever it is and we are all singing songs together actually

how did you sing it? Some good singers on this team actually yeah is that a song we should

do about it? Oh it's just an all really really cheesy song it's every single wedding and it was

the first time I've been listening to a lot of Iranian music recently I don't think she has a

killer playlist she's shattered with me because I need to get into my modern I love it but I have

found it the playlist is a mix of every genre as well it's a bit of a crazy crazy playlist but

I haven't been able to listen to the happy songs on there since January and I think that was the

first night with all of you that I could actually listen to a happy song and dance.

So we have some suites accompanying the tea this is actually a Bach level and I mean we

pronounce it in Farsi Bach level but it's a very common suite in a lot of Arab countries Turkey

and also Iran a mix of pastry and nuts and rose water and syrup but I think the star of the show

is that bowl of Persian saffron ice cream that I'm now staring at I don't think if you can see it

I can see it looks incredibly tense so it is a beautiful mix of a plain ice cream with saffron

rose water pistachios cream crumbs I'm hoping so that at the crunch oh my god that I think in

far see we say more that was an endemic one I like that would bring a death person back alive

to add also to this that this is a homemade ice cream that my mother makes as well so

so even love as the secret ingredient but I still can't get there than that.

Ed van when you see the war at the moment what is your future fit?

Obviously these are on certain times what cannot be associated with anything pleasant or joyful but

I think it's a sheer desperation of people who did see it inevitable a foreign intervention

to bring at least some sort of change to and state or a government that is resisting that change

fighting it back but I think I personally my wish is to whether it's ideal or not or perfect

but my ideal would be to see a transition into secular democracy in Iran and that's what I'm hoping for.

I have young family members who are still in Iran and I also a lot of my not a lot of a few of my

university friends are still in Iran so when I think about the future and what I want to happen

in the future and because I've been in contact with them not the past few days but the past year

with everything that's happening in Iran I think what I want is an Iran where people can

dream and that dream takes place in Iran so you don't have to leave the country to be able to

dream and thrive and it breaks my heart every time I talk to the younger people that I know that

they tell me what does the future have for us like we can't think of thriving economically

or financially in any aspect even like one of my relatives is an athlete and he plays darts

and he wants to like do like international competitions but he's like well I can't afford it

it's really difficult to get a sponsor and I want him to be able to dream.

When you said you wanted an Iran where people can dream I wanted an Iran where people can thrive

where they and the country can prosper I've grown up all my life and my parents telling me this but

for the world to recognize and like for people to grow up knowing they come from a country with

so much to offer because I don't think that's been shown. Iranians in London, Rahe, Kaylee,

Erfan, Amira and Reza, our thanks to them for sharing their experiences and also to Reza

for providing the food and drink I can confirm that the homemade ice cream we had at the end

was indeed excellent. I'm James Reynolds you've been listening to the documentary from the BBC

World Service.