Soleyman
Bezik, 66 years old, has lived in Iran during and after the Revolution and has
seen the protesters fight for what they thought was right. He was born on 1939 April 25, in a village in Iran. He
moved to the capital, Tehran, when he was six or seven years old.
He attended very little school and had to work to help his father support
the family, under the leadership of king Shah and later on under Ayatollah
Khomeini.
I
was born on 1939 April 25 in Iran, Bulvar (a village in Iran).
I lived there until I was six or seven years old and on 1946 my family
decided to move to Armenia which didn’t work out so we decided to move to
Tehran. I attended very little
about two years of school. Where we
were taught by a priest in a church.
I didn’t serve in the military because I had four siblings and my dad was the only one working so I had to help him out to support the family. I worked until the king said whoever hasn’t attended military can pay three hundred to’man (Persian money) to get the papers not to go to the military. So I went and paid three hundred to’man and bought the papers. However if I didn’t attend the military or buy the papers the government would arrest me and I couldn’t work. In Iran people had to serve in the military for two years. In the military they were taught how to use weapons and had different trainings, only males were to attend the military.
The revolution started in 1979. During the revolution specific things happened, people came on the streets and yelled “We don’t want a king, we don’t want a king.” This occurred because Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini promised the people that the prices for things would drop, oil belonged to the people and they would receive it for free, electricity belonged to the people. When people heard his promises everyone went on the streets yellowed with joy and happiness that Khomeini was coming. The people on the streets screamed “Khomeini, Khomeini we want you we love you, we don’t want a king we want Khomeini.” During the revolution people burned down the banks, movie theaters, liquor stores, café restaurants. They broke the windows of stores. During the revolution stores were open to buy food from because the people helped each other out. The people in every town gathered in the Islamic church and decided that a few people would help the others out when supplies arrived, so people didn’t have to pay a lot of money for things.
The king at that time was Mohammad Reza Shah. He fought back against the people but not a lot, he fought back against the college students, and he killed many people. However, since the whole streets were filled with people he couldn’t kill them all. Many of the soldiers came on the people’s side and helped them. The people burned down the tanks the government buildings; they got the weapons and trashed the streets. Many people lost their lives specially teenagers. The government brought them out of colleges and arrested them, killed them. There are still many in jail and many ran away from the country.
The king stopped fighting back when they had all filled the streets, the soldiers had gone to the people’s side and his colleagues had told him they wouldn’t fight against the people. So he left the country with his family to Egypt. During the revolution I was married with three children. My life style wasn’t affected by the protesting; the only difference was that the schools wouldn’t let the students learn Armenian a lot. Armenian schools had decreased the time for students to learn Armenian, before it was six, seven or eight hours a week now it was an hour, two hours or half an hour a week.
When Khomeini came to Iran from France, he got in a car and went to the cemetery to pray for the people who had lost their lives. It took hours until his car was able to go from the airport to the cemetery. There were people welcoming his arrival and they did a great job as well. The first President after the revolution was Bani Sadr. Khomeini’s new laws were that women had to cover their bodies. They had to cover their hair. Café restaurants were shutdown. If the people wanted to have a wedding they had to do it at home with the women separated from the men. The men couldn’t wear short sleeve shirts or shorts. If the hair of a female showed they would cut it off. If anyone was seen out of dress code they were given a warning and told if you break the dress code again we will arrest you. I remember seeing a young women being taken away in a police car because she had on makeup and her hair was showing under the cover.
Young men and women were not really allowed to go out together, if they did they would be stopped by the officers and asked if they were siblings, married or engaged. If not the officers would arrest them and their parents had to bail them out, and sign a paper that they would not be seen together again.
When the people found out about the new laws they didn’t fight back because they had agreed to the laws, if they disagreed with something they couldn’t do anything about it, and if they went on the streets and protested they would be arrested. The people weren’t allowed to say whatever they wanted about the government and if they wanted to say something they had to ask for permission first. They had to say pretty much only good things about the government. The people didn’t have any freedom of speech. Khomeini and the government were the people who controlled the media and journalists weren’t allowed to write whatever they wanted in the newspapers, if they did they would be sent to jail. Living other this kind of a regime there wasn’t much you could do about it but follow the laws made by the government.
After the revolution the prices went up of course. Khomeini had said oil would be free, water would be free other things would be free. However, instead of it being free prices increased, oil which was the cheapest thing was now two or three to’man everything increased. Schools changed a lot, before boys and girls attended the same school but now boys and girls had to be separated. After students graduated from high school they served in the military and whoever could went to college and attended college in the military. Whoever had the money would go learn different languages. There were classes at night which taught English, German, languages like these.
When the war with Iraq started in 1980 we would go to the basement and hide whenever there were loud noises. We could go camping and stay there. We didn’t work when the government said there was going to be bombings we would go hide in the basement. And when there were any explosions we would go and see what had happened how many people had lost their lives. Many people died in other places even Armenians died in the military. There are still people missing from the war. The prices for things increased and it was harder to find supplies. Of course many people got sick because of the ideas of having bombs fly over your head. The civilization was damaged because of the war. Because Iran had a lot of weapons from when they had over thrown the king. The government would get weapons from other countries. They got money from people and bought weapons, which helped stop the Iraqis. Iraq had captured a lot of land but Iran got them to fall back.
Interviewed by Rene Arakelian