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While in Tehran, we were zipped smoothly around by Majid, our driver. Majid nav-
igated our eight-seater bus like a motor scooter, weaving in and out of traffic that stayed
in its lanes like rocks in a landslide. To illustrate how clueless I was in Iran, for three
days I called him “Najaf.” And whenever a bit of filming went well and we triumphantly
returned to the car, I gave him an enthusiastic thumbs-up. But finally Majid patiently ex-
plained that I'd been confusing his name with a city in Iraq…and that giving someone a
thumbs-up in Iran is like giving them the finger.
While the traffic is enough to make you scream, people are incredibly good-humored
on the road. I never heard angry horns honking. While stalled in a Tehran jam, people in a
neighboring car saw me sitting patiently in the back of our van: a foreigner stuck in their
traffic. They rolled down their window and handed Majid a bouquet of flowers, saying,
“Give this to your visitor and apologize for our traffic.” When the traffic jam broke up, we
moved on—with a bouquet from strangers on my lap.
But traffic can be aggravating, too. Later, as we struggled to drive along a horribly
congested street, Majid suddenly declared, “Death to traffic.” This outburst caught my
attention. I said, “I thought it was 'Death to America.'” He explained, “No, right now,
it's 'Death to traffic.'” I asked him to explain. He said, “Here in Iran, when something
frustrates us and we have no control over it, this is what we say. 'Death to traffic. Death
to…whatever.'”
The casual tone of Majid's telling aside made me think differently about one of
the biggest concerns many Americans have about Iranians: Their penchant for declaring
“Death to” this and that. Did Majid literally want to kill all those drivers that were in our
way?
The experience made me wonder if Iranians' “Death to” curses are not so different
from Westerners who exclaim, “Damn those French” or “Damn this traffic jam.” If we
say, “Damn those teenagers,” do we really want them to die and burn in hell for eternity?
No. Just turn down the music.
Don't get me wrong: All those “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” murals are
impossible to justify. But they seemed so incongruous with the gregarious people I met.
Do the Iranians literally wish “death” to the US and Israel? Or is it a mix of language
barrier, international road rage, fear, frustration—and the seductive clarity of a catchy slo-
gan?
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