Outreach in Iran

Ive just recently returned from a truly remarkable trip to Iran, and I thought it would be good to share some
of my experiences there. Before the trip, the most common reaction I received when I told people where I
was going was what do you want to go there for?, and the implication was that I was slightly crazy to go to
such a (presumed) dangerous and hostile country. In fact, I went not really knowing what to expect myself,
but trusting that Spirit was at work in leading me there, and that there was something which I could
contribute by making the journey.
The trip itself came about as a result of a visit here in 2002 by Pupak Haghighi, a woman who lives in
England but who is half Iranian and who participated in the Restore the Earth! conference over Easter that
year. When she had returned to Iran for a visit the previous year, she had been shocked to find that some of
the forests she grew up amongst there in the north of the country had been cut down. That inspired her to
envision a project, called Trees of Consciousness, to restore some of those forests, and she invited me to
go to Iran with her to help promote and develop this.
As someone living outside of her native country she had found it hard to plan our trip (and the project) from
a distance, and she went to Iran a week ahead of me to set things up for our journey together. However, her
main contact person pulled out of the trip the day before I landed in Tehran, so I arrived to find the plans in
disarray. Although this seemed like a major setback, it actually provided a perfect opportunity for us, and
especially Pupak, to open up to Spirit and spontaneity, and it was this which more than anything turned the
trip into a profound and magical experience.
Each day unfolded in its own way, usually as a result of numerous telephone calls the previous day, and the
generosity of the people we met, and the contacts they provided the whole journey was very clearly
guided from a deeper/higher level. The people we met were the most hospitable I have ever encountered,
and all were very friendly, from cab drivers and farmers to government officials. We never had to pay for
accommodation during the whole trip, and we only had to pay for any meals on the last day, back in Tehran.
Anyway, arriving in Tehran, I discovered that its a huge, burgeoning city with a population of 14 million
people, vast panoramas of ugly concrete buildings and air thats almost as badly polluted as Hong Kong,
which I had visited two months previously. Located at an elevation of 1,200 metres, the citys weather was
crisp and sunny, and when the visibility was good, there are great views of the snow-covered Alborz
Mountains immediately to the north. And it was to the north that we were going, after spending less than 24
hours in the city.
There were 4 of us who travelled together for the 8 days I was in Iran, and we certainly made an unusual
combination by any reckoning! - Pupak (who is half Iranian, half Japanese and lives in England), Effat (a 52
year old Iranian woman who also lives in England and who has been eating a pure raw food diet for 19
years), Mohammed (a 31 year old Iranian man who is a devout Moslem, speaks no English and who spent
most of the trip talking on his mobile phone) plus me. Many of our journeys were long and late in the day we set out from Tehran at 6 pm on the first day, to begin a 9 hour journey, and eventually reached our
destination about 8 am the next day, after having driven most of the night. The driver of the car which
Pupak had organised (whom none of us knew) called ahead to his wife at 11 pm, as our route would take

us past his house an hour later, and when we reached there at midnight she had a wonderful meal
prepared for us - 4 complete strangers. This was typical of the warmth and hospitality which we
encountered, often from people with very few material possessions. We regularly were fed dinner at
midnight, and were treated as guests of honour everywhere we went.
Iran is teeming with people - 70 million - and the land is one of contrasts: arid desert in the region around
Tehran, but in the north where we spent most of our time it is lush and green, and rained much of the time
we were there the weather was very reminiscent of Scotland in fact! The north slopes of the Alborz
Mountains face the Caspian Sea, and are full of beautiful broadleafed forests - oaks, beeches, hornbeams
etc. The whole area looks very much like parts of eastern Europe, and the forests look just like those of
England, although the individual species of oak and beech etc are different, and there are a few unique
endemic tree species as well.
We had a lot of contact with people, from farmers and foresters to government officials, and we led two
compost-making workshops, as Pupak was very keen to promote the concept of organic agriculture. All the
farming in Iran at present is chemically-based, and although many of the people know it is not good for their
health, and that of the land, they dont know what the alternatives are. The first of those compost-making
sessions in particular was a powerful alchemical experience, and the transformative effect of the compost
process worked its magic on the people who took part. They included local farmers and landowners,
workers from neighbouring Turkmenistan, agriculture students and a government official responsible for
overseeing 20,000 small farms. Normally they would not have anything to do with each other, because of
the stratified nature of Iranian society, but they all had a great time making the compost heap together,
including the government official in his business suit, and were reluctant to let us go at the end!
Pupak and I both felt a great sense of receptivity and openness to the ideas of organic agriculture, forest
restoration and lifestyles more in balance with the Earth. Iran has been substantially isolated from the West
since the Islamic revolution in 1979, but it is beginning to open up again now, and theres a real eagerness
to reach out and learn from others. In many ways, is focussed on getting the materialistic lifestyle and
consumer products of the West, but theres also a desire in many of the people we met at least to get
something deeper. Iranian culture traditionally is profoundly spiritual and I had a number of very meaningful
conversations with people there, on a similar level as were used to here at Findhorn. These included
discussions with a distinguished scholar who has translated many Buddhist texts into Farsi, the language of
Iran, and with some people of the Bahai faith, which is officially banned by the Islamic government (and
punishable, at least in principle by a jail term or even death), but which has over 1 million adherents in the
country.
Contrary to the common perception of Iran in the West, the people were without exception very warm,
welcoming and interested in us as foreigners. Parts of the country still felt as though they are in the dark
ages though - we witnessed a procession in one town which marked the culmination of an annual 40 days
of mourning for an Imam (a revered religious leader) who died 1,400 years ago. Lines of men marched
through the streets, beating their chests and chanting to the funereal rhythm of accompanying dirge music.
Women and children followed at the rear of the procession, and the women are obliged by Islamic law to
cover themselves completely in public with the full length black chador - a robe which covers everything
except their face. For the women, this gives a literal dark age appearance to modern life in Iran, although
the strict dress code is being gradually undermined by the more daring urban population in Tehran.

We had some very special days out in the forests, which were in that brilliant bright green flush of new
spring leaves. One day in particular a series of events led us to going on the wrong road in the forest, and
to our 4 wheel drive Nissan jeep getting stuck with one of its front wheels two feet up in the air and no
traction on either of its back wheels. Just as the vehicle had got stuck though we saw a large bird of prey
sitting in a tree beside the forest road, and then two smaller birds ahead on the road itself. These two birds
turned out to be hoopoes, beautiful birds in the woodpecker family, and this was very exciting for Pupak,
whose name means hoopoe in Farsi. She had never seen her namesake bird in the wild before, and these
two, which flew on a little ahead of her as she walked towards them down the track, seemed to be a
powerful symbol of what she and we were doing on this journey for the forests of Iran. It was certainly a
magical moment for all of us then, and was one of the times when the presence of Spirit overlighting our
journey was palpable and immediate.
We didnt have an opportunity to visit the areas where Pupak had seen the forests cut down, and in the
areas which we visited, the forests appeared to be being managed quite well, and this was confirmed by
conversations we had with the local foresters. However, in the drier parts of Iran, such as the
mountainsides which face south towards Tehran, the dry forests have been largely cleared, and it is
perhaps there where the restoration efforts need to be focussed.
At the end, back in Tehran, by a series of remarkable events, I gave two talks about Trees for Life, the work
of forest restoration, and the vision for the Restoring the Earth project - one at a university, to senior
forestry professors, forestry department officials and a few NGO representatives, and the other to members
of the country's NGO network. Both were very successful, and resulted in numerous requests for me to
return to Iran for more meetings, talks etc. There was also a great interest amongst the NGO
representatives about the Global Ecovillage Network - the groups there are all relatively new, are still
finding their way and what they can do in Irans hierarchical and government-controlled society, and they
would benefit greatly from more interchange with Western NGOs.
My final experience in Iran was quite surreal, but nonetheless important, as it illustrates another side to the
country, contrasting sharply with much of what we saw, but which is probably representative of a significant
part of the population (which is mainly young). Pupak and I were in a taxi on the way to the airport for my
flight home, and it was about 11 pm, as my plane was departing at 2.45 am. We drove past numerous highrise concrete apartment buildings, many of them under construction, and, illuminated by multicoloured
lights, they created a futuristic-looking landscape - the sort of thing you might see in a science fiction film.
The taxi driver put on his favourite music, which turned out to be Western electronic music called psycho
trance and which has a heavy driving beat to it. It was blaring loud in our ears as we stared at the view
outside, and then the vocals began - a singer endlessly repeating the words destroy your brain! I burst out
laughing, as it seemed so unreal, improbable and out of context with everything we had experienced in the
previous 8 days. Like everywhere else, Iran is rushing headlong into the future, and its up to those of alive
today to decide whether that future is a techno-industrial one, or one in which spiritual values and care for
the Earth are the defining cultural qualities.
Ive returned inspired and deeply grateful for the experience of this trip, and if anyone wants to know more
about Iran and my journey, please feel free to talk to me about it!
with love, Alan W. F.