These
are some facts that I found out in Iran (you may find some of them trivial). They
are not in any order:
The
Persian language is an Indo-European language brought by Turks from Central
Asia.
Iran
means land of aliens. It changed its name from
Persia (Persia encompassed a smaller area) to Iran in 1936.
Theocracy
system ended the monarchy system (the Revolution).
Iran
is a third of the size of the USA and is as large as Western Europe with a
population of 80 million.
Its main industries:
oil, petro-chemical, car manufacturing and handicrafts.
Main fruits: citrus, apples,
nuts, pears, peaches, kiwis, pomegranates.
They have caviar from Caspian Sea
sturgeons.
Winter is the rainy season.
The most popular car is
Peugeot as it is also produced in Iran (as is Kia).
Unemployment is 15% in the cities, 30% in rural areas and inflation is at 9%.
Iran embraced Shia 500
years ago, imported Shia mullahs from Lebanon to teach Shiism. Nevertheless,
there are 6 million Sunnis in Iran. There are also 60,000 Zoroastrians (some are
now in Mumbai, India).
Shia Muslims performed prayers
three times a day: Dawn, noon and afternoon, dusk and evening.
The Supreme Leader is
commander of military and judiciary. The President is elected for four years
and can be re-elected for second term. There are 86 mullahs. There is a Guardian
council and there is also an Expediency council (you can google them up).
Iran has a national
service for 20 months at age of 18.
Age of marriage is 18
but on average, Iranian men and women get married when they are 30 and 27 respectively.
A woman can initiate
divorce if husband is in jail or has left home for more than 6 months or
addicted to drugs.
No polygamy is allowed
although a man can take a second wife if the first wife approves of it
(generally they don’t practise polygamy there).
Ayatollah means son of
God and is an honorific title for clerics. Those in black-turbans are direct
descendants of Prophet Muhammad while those in white-turbans are not direct
descendants.
Tehran was founded 1796
and it was chosen as capital as it has favourable access to water and
transportation with Caucasus (Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan). It remained
capital throughout 19th Century. The population in Tehran is 10 million,
and there are 3 million cars. Isfahan and Shiraz were capitals before Tehran.
British and Russia
dominated Iran, and caught in their power struggle, Iran underwent tremendous
stagnation. Iran waged two wars against Russia in 19th Century where
they lost badly and lost all Caucasus to Russia.
Modernisation started in
1930s during the reign of the father of the last King of Iran.
Iran has 4 sanctions:
first by US Congress because of its anti-Israeli policies; second by successive
US Administration also because of anti-Israeli policies and Hezbollah
especially during the Obama administration on banking and oil; third by United
Nations because Iran was building nuclear weapon; fourth by European Union.
President Rouhani held talks with the US and made a deal and UN and EU
sanctions were lifted. Sanctions started when they held hostages of the US
Embassy.
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