Dancing headscarves :)

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When I got off the Kamaz tanker that had taken me from the armenian city of Areni to the Iranian border, I knew that I was enjoying my last moments of freedom before entering a country where the laws are very different from any place I had been to before. At the armenian passport control I knew that I had to put on my headscarf, so I went to the bathroom and put it on as best as I could, so that it covered all of my hair and neck. I was nervous and constantly putting it back in place, afraid that my skin would stick out from somewhere. I didn't want to be refused entry on grounds of 'unproperly put headscarf' hehe. At the border, I met four friendly looking Iranian men carrying large luggages and tons of wallnuts. I thought, 'this is my chance' and striked a conversation with them (I like wallnuts...). 'Salam... chetori? Ok that's all I learned in farsi 101... where are you going? No I am not ukranian, I am french, but my passport is dutch... I am going to Tabriz. Are you going there too? Huh? YOU TABRİZ!!???? Ah Tabriz YES YES! Ok.. can I go with you? Ok no problem!'. Ah it wasn't that hard to get a ride! In the car I am just happy, excited to be finaly inside of Iran, and still wondering if I am going to be arrested for something. I am still holding on tightly to my headscarf, but at some point I open my window to fill my lungs with some fresh post-border iranian air and pfiouuuf... it flies of my head. One of the men taps me on my shoulder and points at my exposed hair saying 'police police!'. Huh.. I am going to have to be careful from now on...

During the first days I first found it kind of stylish and cool to wear a headscarf, but at the same time I felt very self conscious and I was always nervous that it would fly away. But as time went, I learned how to adapt to the obligation of wearing something around my head every time I went out. I discovered how putting a large clip on the back of my head helps holding the scarf, which helped me to stop worrying about it and encouraged me to get out in the morning. I also learned that the police was more lenient than I thought regarding scarves and I saw many girls wearing them 10 cm behind their foreheads, with curled or dyed hair stylishly and purposefully sticking out.

There are different fashions, and Masty encouraged me to loosen my hair and put it out in front of my scarf, but you know me I am so conservative I didn't dare. And as a tourist it is always good to avoid provocation ;) Check out the pictures with the different scarve styles from good-iranian-girl.com. The first one is the first picture I took in Iran, in the car with my border friends wearing the scarf really tight. The woman in the chador doing sports is what my never reached ideal of a proper outfit which I passionately pursued but never achieved although they tried to make me look like that when I had to enter official buildings. I guess I will always remain a liberal but not too rebel iranian girl ;).

 

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Finaly, you can admire the dancing headscarves, with lale and niky after coming back from university. That's what happens when you try to restrict crazy young people...