Armenian Life in Iran

At age eighty-six, Sheram Rostamian sits at home remembering his life as a young child on foreign land. He lives in Glendale, California with his wife and has four kids along with nine grandchildren. He was born in a small village in Iran known as Cameron near Tehran. He was self employed as a carpenter. Currently, he’s enjoying his retirements and spending more time with his grandchildren. While sitting on his favorite chair and drinking tea, he talks about his life in Iran: 

 I was born in a small village called Cameron, near Tehran. My grandparents were taken forcefully to Iran by the former King Shah Abbas. It was nearly 425 years ago that he took a good amount of Armenians from Armenia and transported them forcefully into Iran. It was near the Isfahan region. From there my family moved to a different state of Iran. We went to Cameron, while others went to different parts of the country.  Armenians lived in nearly five major states of Iran. King Shah Abbas was very peaceful, he took care of the Armenians, and he respected us. I was born and raised during the time of Pahlavi. I was a soldier in the Persian army for about 3 years. The army treated us horribly but their training was tough and the sergeants were strict. Fortunately, I didn’t fight in any wars, but right after I left the Persian Army, Iran was involved in World War II.

Time went by and in other words, life was pretty good in the days of Reza Shah. “Under Reza Shah's 16 year rule, many roads along with the Trans-Iranian Railway were built, modern education was introduced and the University of Tehran was established, and for the first time the systematic dispatch of Iranian students to Europe was started. Industrialization of country was stepped-up, and achievements were great. By the mid 1930's Reza Shah's dictatorial style of rule caused dissatisfaction in Iran. And in 1935 the country’s name changed from Persia to Iran.  In World War II, the Allies protested his rapprochement with the Germans, and in 1941 British and Russian forces invaded and occupied Iran. Forced to abdicate in favor of his son, Mohammad Reza Shah, Reza Shah died in exile in Johannesburg of South Africa around 1944.¹”

Muhammad Reza Shah took the throne after his father’s death at the age of twenty-two. He ruled for thirty-five years. The king married a Turkish lady, she was his third wife, and they had two girls and two boys. Just like his father, he wanted to modernize and westernize the country, life was strolling on until around 1979, the Shah left the country and Ayatollah Khomeini, a religious leader and dictator, took over. He was a major enemy of the United States. He changed Iran’s government to an All-Islamic administration.

During Khomeini’s time, Iran and its bordering neighbor Iraq started a long, pointless war. Khomeini was planning to convert Iraq to Sunni Islam. The two countries went to war and a lot of innocent civilian and soldiers lost their life for no reason.  At the end, Khomeini did not succeed. 

Unlike many countries at the time, almost everyone in Iran had the right to vote. We had the right to vote for whatever we believed was the right thing. When we first journeyed from Armenia to Iran, for years our women covered their heads and their mouths with Oshkhams, because we lived in an Islamic country and had to obey the law. Bishop Khoren, a well respected Armenian Bishop, came from Armenia to Iran at about nearly ninety years ago, he requested from the Iranian government to allow Armenian women not to wear the Oshkhams because we were Christian and not Muslim.  Being a well respected religious leader, his request was granted. So the Iranian government gave the Armenian women the right to reveal their faces.   

Back in old times, our law enforcement was not fair. Policemen took advantage of their badges.  For instance, if someone committed a felony, there were no judicial systems to put them on trial; this task was usually handled by law a enforcer right on the spot.  When someone stole something, committed a crime, or disobeyed the Muslim religion they were hung. The ceremonies were usually held in a vast area for everyone to go and see. The criminal was usually left hanging for days and people went and walked around it and they saw what happened to him. Besides hanging people, Iran had prisons, and every crime had its own punishment, it all depended on what you did. The prisons in Iran were never clean; it was in poor conditions all the time. I remember very well, whenever there was a torture or hanging, my friends and I would sneak out of the house and go to watch a person get tortured. My worst experience was when my friends and I went to see one of our friend’s relative getting hanged. It was a horrifying moment because we were right under the guy that was being hanged and I pictured myself in his positions and with tears in my eyes I quickly ran home to my mother. 

There were many newspapers in Iran. The most popular newspapers were in Armenian, Persian and English.  One of the many Armenian newspapers we had was called Alik. The newspapers were controlled by the government. We Armenians had our own underground newspaper groups in almost every part of Iran, and in a sort of underhanded way we got the truth to our people. The government did not allow the truth to be heard by us. 

Back in the early 1900s we had no television, but almost about fifty years ago the government began to broadcast the news on television. As time went by, we Armenians broadcasted our own news channels. The Armenian channels tried to telecast the truth as much as possible, but the program was on only half- an- hour a day and the government had certain restrictions on many of the information.

Religion was not the greatest issue that interfered with our lives. The thing that got in the way of our everyday life was the trouble women went through. Women had to always dress and act in a specific matter. If women were out of dress code, they suffered severe consequences. For example they were hung. 

My father and I owned a carpeting business. We went around town building  houses and fixing broken things. It earned more than enough to survive.  Fortunate enough, money was not an issue between family members. 

Well, when I was growing up in Iran life was very relaxing. The air was very clean. But, after Khomeini came and turned everything upside and made Iran revolve around only Islam life became very hard for us. We Armenians lived in Iran for 425 years, we lived a great life. But after Khomeini, life for women became difficult. In Iran we didn’t have the same freedoms as we do in America. We had no freedom of speech and for most of the time we had no freedom of religion. We had to dress and act the way Khomeini wanted us too. That’s why we left Iran for America. And it was also for our children’s education. Your father along with his brothers received great education here in America, education that they were not able to get in Iran.

            Interviewed by Shant Rostamian

1. iranchamber.com