Inside the Hot Zone: Kevin's Iran Diary

For a behind-the-scenes glimpse into his personal experiences reporting from around the world, Kevin Sites will post occasional diary entries. These are not news dispatches.

Mahmoudi - 12.28.05
I pull the passport out of my jacket pocket. It is red and has a golden harp embossed on it with both the Gaelic and English spellings of Ireland just above it. In countries that have no formal relations with the U.S., or bad relations -- or both -- this is my ace. It took nearly two months to get the visa, but within minutes, I have passed through passport control and into

Iran.

I have been here twice before, both times on my way to war. In 2001 I tried to get into

Afghanistan through Iran's western border. Unsuccessful. I came again in 2003 trying to get into

Iraq through the northwestern border. Successful. But I had other things on my mind then. Neither time did I give Iran much though beyond its use to me a transit point.

Near the luggage carousels I see a man holding up a homemade sign with my name -- sort of -- in black marker on a sheet of white paper. It says, "Kavein Sites." But the man holding the sign is someone I am surprised to see and whom I have not seen in four years: Ibrahim Mahmoudi, the same driver I had when I was here in 2001 en route to Afghanistan.

Mahmoudi gives me a big hug and kisses me on both cheeks repeatedly.

"Mr. Kevin, Mr. Kevin," he says, "I am so happy to see you."

To see a friendly face right away, to find someone genuinely happy to see me on this journey, has driven up my expectations for the trip. Mahmoudi has been driving foreign correspondents around Iran for nearly 30 years. He knows it better than the secret police.

(Over the roller coaster ride of the next week he will repeatedly make me laugh on the bad days and bring me roses as a New Year's gift, a ten-pound bag of pistachios, drawings made by his daughter and a beautiful ornamental dagger -- without reason. I joke with my fixer, Darius, that with all the gifts from Mahmoudi, I feel like we are going steady.) 

An Iranian record dealer shows off his impressive collection.   Kevin brings his game to a Tehran street ball court.   A group of Iranian youth speak out about their lives.

Flea Market - 12.29.05
You can tell a lot about a culture by the things they buy and sell, so we decide to check out a flea market that's held every Friday in downtown parking garage: five floors of trinkets, carpets, art, books, garbage and treasures that somebody, or nobody, wants.

As I'm shooting video a record seller named Ali begins talking to me in broken English, excitedly telling me his life story: how he used to work at a record store called Beethoven's which was shut down in 1978, just before the Islamic Revolution. Now he sells he records here.

There's been a recent presidential decree banning the performance of western music, but Ali says he can sell pretty much whatever he wants here. He got deeply into music at the age of 12, he says, after his father died. He flips through some of his albums: classic rock like Cat Stevens and Iron Butterfly, jazz from Milt Jackson, even old commercial pop like The Monkees.

Ali says he has 10,000 vinyl records at this home. He says about half is a collection that he will never sell: albums from Eric Clapton, Dire Straits, The Beatles.

"Music is my life," he says with a smile that seems to have shaken off thousand of disappointments in his lifetime.

'Dizzee' Lunch - 12.29.05
We go to a restaurant that serves traditional Persian meals -- like something called dizzee, a stew of mashed goat and chick peas. I order it, even though I've learned to hate goat and lamb after countless meals featuring the four-legged garbage disposals. I am glad for the experience but doubt I will be ordering it again.

Credentials - 12.31.05
I have to get press credentials from the Iranian government's Ministry of Culture and Guidance, or Ershad. At the office I see ABC's Bob Woodruff and his crew who are also covering Iran for the week.

Woodruff, along with Elizabeth Vargas, was named to replace the late Peter Jennings, who died of lung cancer last year, as the anchors of World News Tonight. An English language daily, The Iranian News, has reported a front page story that Woodruff and team are in town. However, they've included a color photograph of Peter Jennings, with the single word, 'Woodruff' as a caption underneath.

1.2.06 - Poor Darius
Darius, my fixer, lived in the United States and Canada at one time and has a degree in engineering. He is an incredibly intelligent, well-spoken and kind man. He is also smart enough to know how to build an illegal satellite receiver, which he once did, but just as quickly dismantled. However, he is having problems nailing down a political interview for me.

I need someone from the government to answer questions about Iran's nuclear program, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's remarks about wiping

Israel off the map and questioning the holocaust, among a few other things.

Ahmadinejad has already declined our invitation and others seem to be ducking the controversy. I'm getting nervous and pushing Darius harder and harder. If we don't get an interview, I tell him, then we might as well be doing a travelogue on Iran. I get on the phone with Robert, Erin and Lisa back in California, my mission control team, fairly confident the line is tapped. I tell them that we're going to spike all of our coverage if we don't get an interview confirmed by Wednesday.

Hotel Gym - 1.02.06
In the basement of my hotel there is a small pool, an old pulley and plate-type weight machine and a couple of sticky treadmills. The "fitness center" is reserved for women during the day and men at night.

After a frustrating day, still with no political interview nailed down, I decide to work off the stress at the gym. I expect to have the place to myself, but am quickly disappointed. The pool is packed with Iranian men and there are even a few working out in the gym. I'm focused and don't really want to talk. I have turned my iPod up full blast.

Traveling around the world I have become used to getting stared at. It's a natural reaction anywhere in the world to those who obviously look different from the locals. It's usually just surprise, then simple curiosity. Rarely is it hostile, even in countries where anti-western feelings might be expected.

But today I feel like I'm getting the vibe. There are two men working out on the machines -- they have come straight from the pool and are still wearing their bathing suits. The weight benches and the floor are wet from their dripping. It annoys me and maybe that shows. But one of them, a  stern-looking guy with a full beard -- sometimes characteristic of more religiously conservative Muslims--seems to be giving me a disapproving look.

My normal approach anywhere is to engage people right away, take away their fear, suspicion or even their curiosity by breaking down the barriers by saying hello in their language with a full and unapologetic American accent.

In Arabic speaking countries, it's "marhaba" or "salam alaikum." But today I'm having none of it. I'm going about my business, and I find myself thinking things that I would expect from someone who has not had exposure to a great many people or cultures. In my mind, the bearded guy is a jihadist. In my imagination, I see him wearing a yellow Hezbollah headband that says "Allah Akbar" and waving an AK-47. In reality he is just lifting weights and not even paying attention to me anymore.

I do the same, but continue this strange and unspoken build-up of animosity toward him and others that filter into the room. I begin running on the treadmill, but my only thought is how much I hate being here at this moment. Not even the exercise is breaking down my stress. In fact, it seems to be feeding it. I run faster and faster.

After a few minutes another man comes into the weight room. He is on crutches. At first I think he must have sprained an ankle, but then I look more closely. From below his right knee his calve slides into what seems more flipper than foot -- a deformity from birth.

Yet the man puts his crutches aside and works out beside the others, who seem to know and like him quite a bit. He talks with the bearded one who, with easy kindness, helps him adjust the lat bar. They laugh and the man begins the exercise, raising and lowering a stack of plates while the bearded man holds down his shoulders.

At that moment I am ashamed for creating such an unprovoked scenario -- even in my head, even if no one was aware. What a dangerous place to be -- with that kind of ignorance. I leave the room privately humbled.

The Interview - 1.4.06
Darius says he's booked an interview with Kazem Jalali, an Iranian member of parliament and spokesman for the foreign affairs and national security committee.

On the day of the interview, there is confusion, missed calls and a doctor's appointment. We wait three and a half hours to see Mr. Jalali, uncertain whether the interview will actually take place. In the end, he is apologetic, invites us to his office and we talk for a brief 25 minutes -- discussing issues, it seems, the world is desperate to know about.

ALSO ON YAHOO!