Tehran, February, 1979  “So you’re a bachelor,” I ventured.  “Why do you say that, agha?”  “You wear the brown of a bachelor.”  “That is a custom for the maghrebi—the westerners. The Berbers. For me it is a good color to disguise the filth I encounter here. For example, that dog.”  “Nice taqiyah!” I was complimenting his white cap. White linen doubled over with a kind of gold filigree.  “It is an araqchin, agha.”   “Why are you sitting here?” I asked. I had had enough of the xenophobic vocabulary lesson. He’s irritated me so I decided to be irritable in return.  “I am making illustrations of the bustle and tragedy of these people. These Emricani and the Irani. Maybe some are from Afghanistan as well. They are always in the wrong place. Always the wrong time, those…

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