Free The Ministry of Guidance Invites You to Not Stay: An American Family in Iran by Hooman Majd Page B

kindness ,” he admonished, emphasizing the word as he put his hands in his pockets and paced slowly. He shook his head as I walked away, but I wondered if he, and perhapshis zealot buddies, would be waiting for us when we came back out of the coffee shop, to teach me and my wife a lesson in mohabat , or kindness, that he thought I didn’t comprehend.
    The fact that everybody—even strangers on the street—would give advice on what our son should and shouldn’t be doing initially annoyed Karri, but ultimately it proved a comfort. It reinforced the idea that Iranians are obsessive about health and well-being. I’ve always maintained that Iranians are the world’s biggest hypochondriacs—after the French, perhaps, and Karri—and that they take not just love, but self-love and vanity, to extremes. Yes, life may be shameful; yes, we may not be able to do anything about the environment and the noxious fumes from our cars, bikes, and furnaces; those are realities that we refuse to take responsibility for, but why not be healthy, and look good, in one’s shame? There is almost nothing an Iranian won’t go to the doctor for, no fever that isn’t debilitating and in need of antibiotics, no pain that doesn’t require an X-ray, if not an MRI, and no pill that they won’t take if told it is good, and it doesn’t matter what for .
    Pharmacies, all spotless and modern, stand on every corner in Tehran exactly as in France, and twenty-four-hour drugstores dot the city, for that emergency dose of whatever medicine one might need, plus every imaginable cosmetic ointment, cream, or makeup item, domestic and imported, required for primping and youth maintenance. Viagra and Cialis may be two of the most popular drugs in the wee hours of the morning, for they are sold without prescription and advertised prominently in every pharmacy, usually next to the huge display of condoms near the front door. Their presence came as a shock to Karri, who had not imagined open condom sales in a country that essentially forbids sensuality and in a culture that frowns on explicit mentions of sex. (Self-diagnosis is another common trait of Iranians, and perhaps of other hypochondriacs, and few wouldthink that they needed a doctor to write a prescription for erectile dysfunction.) The sheer number of pharmacies, and the astounding number of doctors, as evidenced by the numerous medical buildings in every neighborhood, sometimes whole blocks of them, advertising their practitioners’ specialties on signs outside, gave peace of mind to Karri early on, as did the fact that in my family we have doctors and pharmacists who obtained their advanced degrees in Europe.
    That said, Karri also took to carrying an amulet to ward off the evil eye, as instructed by countless strangers every day—who would exclaim upon sight of Khash, “ Khoda hefzesh koneh! ” (“May god protect him!,” among the first words in Farsi that Karri learned and understood). Merchants gave them to her to pin on Khash, even as they implored us also to burn espand , a wild rue, to protect him (presumably in case god forgot, or was too busy that day). Later on, when we were well established as residents of Tehran, my optician, an Esfahani, actually bought some espand for us, perhaps not believing we ever would, and gave us precise instructions for its use, which I tried to follow at Karri’s insistence. Pre-Islamic Iranian superstition, as well as Islam’s acceptance of the notion of the evil eye, makes every Iranian bazaar or trinket shop into talisman and espand central, and they, along with the thousands of pharmacies, clinics, doctors’ offices, and medicinal herb stores, make Tehran a hypochondriac’s delight.
    Our first days passed in a tumult of errands and outings and welcome parties, but most afternoons found me standing peacefully in the gated courtyard of Khosro’s house, sometimes holding Khash in my arms while watching the school across the road as classes let out.