Vozara Prison was one of the most notorious prisons in Tehran. It was full of criminals, drug dealers, rapists, and thieves. But it was also full of women and men who had done nothing more than play some music or hold hands with their loved one in public. I had heard so many harrowing stories about this prison, and I was about to finally see it for myself. It hadn’t hit me yet that this was the beginning of my own story.
I had done nothing wrong. I was scared, sober, and dressed in a skirt that would have been considered an acceptable length in most Western social circles. I had broken lots of rules as a teenager, bent laws, and pushed back. But ultimately, I was just a child, used to the sun and the protection of my loving family and my magical Iran. Now, I was being walked into a cold prison, past the stares of hard-faced officials and violent criminals, like a witch on her way to the gallows.
Inside the jail, the walls and floors were made of concrete. Nearly one hundred women from all different backgrounds and age groups congregated within those walls. They were dressed in dark-colored clothing, headscarves, and manteaus. Some wore chadors, while others were dressed less conservatively—like my friends and me.
I noticed a very young girl who could not have been more than ten years old. She wore what appeared to be a navy school uniform. When she looked up, I was blown away by the fear and anger flashing through her eyes. I couldn’t tell if her expression was from pain, disgust, or a toxic mixture of both.
My eyes fell on a woman kneeling in the corner, weeping into a black chador. Her face was streaked with black mascara from the tears streaming down her stunning, but distraught, face. As I studied her more closely, I saw white puffy lace peeking out from the bottom of the black fabric. Then it hit me—this was a bride on her wedding day. Her mother and family attempted to comfort her, but her sobs were uncontrollable. This was supposed to be the happiest day of her life. I’m not sure it’s even possible to console such a shattered bride.
To my right were jail cells and never-ending hallways connecting to even more jail cells. To my left was a little hallway that led to an area stacked with dirty pads and toilet paper, empty food cans, and other garbage. A strong stench emanated from the communal squat toilets. We were ordered to sit in this hallway and wait. We got situated a few feet away from the bride and her family.
Even then, sitting next to a crying bride, we still had hope that our parents would come to our rescue. We didn’t know when our verdict would be delivered or what it would be. The uncertainty made the entire situation even more tense. But there weren’t many possible outcomes: we would either be exonerated, forced to pay a bond, tortured, or locked up. I prayed for the first outcome. For the hundredth time that evening, I wished that I hadn’t pressured my parents to allow me to attend the party. It was my fault that Aria was in jail.
At first we played word games to kill time. Being among all my friends helped me imagine that we were having our own slumber party. A few hours passed, and there was no sign of anyone coming. Happily, the bride and her family were released shortly after we arrived, having had to pay a large indemnity. She wished us luck and shuffled away, the train of her wedding dress dragging along the filthy floor. I wished I could hold onto the lacy train and whisk myself far away.
Like clockwork, every ten to fifteen minutes someone would trample over us to get to the bathroom, which was located right down the hallway from where we were seated. Five squat toilets were lined up—each one dirtier than the next. Squat toilets were common in Iran, but I had never seen any as filthy as these. It was extremely uncomfortable seeing women use them out in the open. My friends and I were forced to go to the bathroom in pairs, since the handcuffs remained on our wrists. One would squat while the other stood in front; at least we could use each other as a way to cover ourselves for privacy. The combination of odors emanating from the jail was rancid, not to mention the rats, cockroaches, and ants scurrying all around us.
We began talking to two girls sitting close to us, who both had male names, Majid and Behrouz. They gave us insider information about the other prisoners, almost a running commentary on the other inmates and the guards. You would never believe they were girls. They wore sneakers, baggy jeans, and fairly large T-shirts and had male haircuts. I don’t know how they entered the facility without their scarves, but they had managed to circumvent the system. In a way, that daring stance captivated me. I was covering myself as much as I could, even though there were no men around anymore.
I noticed the young girl again when she passed us to go to the bathroom. I wanted to talk to her; she was just a child, and I felt the need to protect her. So I asked her in a concerned tone whether she was alone. To my surprise, she snapped that it was not any of my business and snarled some very graphic curse words in Farsi, which I do not dare to repeat. I wondered what kind of upbringing she’d had that made her capable of spewing such vulgarity. Later we found out from Majid and Behrouz that she had run away from her home in Shiraz, a city in central Iran. During her long journey to Tehran, she was raped by a police officer and was now living in jail until someone claimed her. I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that a ten-year-old could run away from home. But worse than that, I couldn’t understand what kind of sick person—a police officer, no less—could be capable of raping a ten-year-old.
Majid and Behrouz talked to us all the time. It was like they wanted something from us or they were fascinated by our situation. They would leave our side and then come back and report everything that was happening. I couldn’t tell if they were trying to scare us more, or if they were genuinely trying to help us make sense of everything that was going on.
The night was long and noisy from girls crying, praying, and pleading with the prison guards to bring them food, water, or drugs. We didn’t have access to water or food, and none was offered. Some women ate tuna fish out of cans and drank water from white plastic cups, but we didn’t have any cash to bribe the guards for food. I could tell that some women had been there for a long time from their tiny, emaciated frames.
At all hours, we heard bloodcurdling screams coming from a small window that was sheltered by black metal bars. Some girls in the holding cell told us that behind that little window lay a torture room. I couldn’t help but wonder if the screams were from the women that were leaving the jail. Every time a cellmate left the holding area, she never returned.
The most traumatizing noise came from the girls screaming from the cells on the other side of the jail. Majid and Behrouz told us that female guards were raping the girls with glass soda bottles as punishment for bad behavior. What kind of woman could perform such an animalistic act on another woman? Something horrible must have happened to these women in their lifetimes that made them capable of executing something so barbaric. Sitting in a Tehran prison jolted me from my normal, safe way of life. I felt like I had been dropped into some alternate universe. At sixteen years old, I was getting a huge wake-up call.
The hours ticked by, and at some point night gave way to day. A female guard informed us that a few of our mothers had been cleared to visit us in jail, but we only had a few minutes to talk with them. When they came in it was apparent that they had not slept. Their devastated expressions broke my heart. I was the one responsible for what my parents were feeling, for all the things that I had put them through just to live my life the way I wanted. All those fights, all the times they grounded me. They didn’t do it to take my freedom away. They did it to protect me from the thick, metal bars that I was now standing behind.
We now had water, snacks, and warm, comfortable clothes. We were famished and dehydrated, but what we really craved was reassuring news. We bombarded them with questions from all directions: “Where are the boys?” “Why is it taking so long to get us out of here?” “When will we see you again?” They promised us that we would be released by no later than the following day. I believed them.
Back at our spot in the hallway, we put on the sweaters and other clothing that they had brought us, pulling them over what we were already wearing. Being fashionable was the furthest thing from my mind. I needed warmth and comfort. I was relieved that they had also brought us sneakers, so we could finally slip into shoes and shed our painful high heels. I couldn’t help but notice that the government officials had forgotten to remove our shoelaces.
Five times a day when the adhan called us to prayer, everyone had to stand up. Immediately afterward, the guards would choose some girls and send them into a room to get lashed. I felt my heart race faster and faster with each adhan. It became routine—I would stand up and wait my turn, but every time I stood, I was told to wait until the next adhan. Instead of feeling the warm grace that comes with the song of prayer, I felt horror and panic. They were forcing faith, religion, and their rules on us. However, my mind and soul was rejecting all of it. To this day, every time I hear the adhan, the hair on my body stands on end.
We were not playing games or laughing anymore. The slumber party had ended long ago. We felt dirty, tired, and doubtful. I could not imagine how some of the other women felt, especially the ones who had been there for weeks. We were all weak and getting weaker, and every hour that passed, our spirits diminished. My anxiety and paranoia were affecting every reasonable thought that tried to enter my brain. I couldn’t keep it from going to dark places, but I knew I had to stay composed. I didn’t want the other prisoners or guards to know how I felt. It took every ounce of strength I had to stand firm, and especially not to cry. In that moment, I needed to survive; I could cry later.
I became extremely sensitive to sounds. I could hear the pitter-patter of rats and cockroaches approaching me. I would shut my eyes, but I was in the state of consciousness between being awake and asleep, which led to hallucinations and horrible nightmares. Even if I did get to sleep, there was always the possibility of getting raped or robbed. My friends and I created a system where we took turns sleeping around the clock. At night we tied our shoelaces together because we were scared the other prisoners would steal our shoes. We always stayed huddled together, and it certainly helped that there were fifteen of us.
We had been in this bleak pit for five long days and nights before we finally found out our fate. By that point, the sensations had run together until we almost didn’t notice the staring women, vulgar stories, and screams echoing from the jail cells. Two female officials came to the entrance of the hallway and fixated on us. They summoned us using Maryam’s last name and ordered us to stand and follow them. We all looked at each other with the same glimmer of hope. We were all thinking the same thing—freedom. Some women cheered and clapped for us as we walked away.
I turned around one last time to look at the hallway where I had sat for what felt like months, but was actually less than a week. How was I just robbed of those days of my life? I felt that during those days, someone hit the pause button and, upon my release, hit play. I promised myself I would never return. I locked eyes with the ten-year-old girl. She just stared back vacantly. There was so much I wanted to say to her, so much I wanted to ask her. I wished I could’ve taken her with me. I wondered if she felt the same heartbreak I did.
We walked out of the jail area, and the guards locked the door behind us. I could finally breathe again. We walked up the never-ending spiral staircase. This time I wasn’t walking down the pit into hell, I was freed from it. There I was, only days after my birthday party, a forever-changed woman. I could finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.
When I stepped outside, the bright sun was blinding. It felt like someone had stabbed a dagger into my eyes, and I couldn’t see two steps in front of me. As my friends and I attempted to adjust and get our bearings, the guards ordered us to board the bus. It felt insanely good to finally sit on a padded chair. I watched people in the bustling streets carry on with their daily lives—people chatting and drinking at juice bars, children in their uniforms walking home from school, and professionals leaving work. It was a typical day for most.
The bus finally arrived at a building in the middle of the city surrounded by a hectic atmosphere. The officials told us to wait in the bus until further notice. I placed my hand on Neda’s arm and said in a sarcastic tone, “I’m sad that you won’t be next to me anymore.” We looked at each other and smiled.
When we entered the building, we soon learned we weren’t free after all, that we had been brought to the courthouse for sentencing. I was craving courage in the darkness to be able to see the light. This was better than jail, but I was still terrified to face my sentence, whatever it was.
We were immediately escorted to a room with large glass windows and found the boys from the party already inside. I saw Aria and a flash of heat warmed my heart. I was so happy he was okay, and we shared a hopeful smile. My male friends looked exhausted and miserable. It was quite shocking to see that their physical appearances had been altered, obviously against their will. Ramin, who had entered the jail with long hair down to his neck, was now bald. The religious police claimed that a ponytail was illegal in Iran, so they shaved his head. Shahab no longer had his long, trendy beard. I later found out that a government official had torn it off with a key, saying that it misrepresented a man of Islam.
In the bland white room that was devoid of decorations on the walls, I noticed a middle-aged man with a turban sitting at an old gray metal desk. Behind him were shelves filled with foreign VHS tapes, music cassette tapes, bottles of alcohol, a guitar, some makeup, and other substances banned under the Islamic Republic. Arranged as a wall of shame, these were objects confiscated by the religious police during previous arrests. It displayed items they believed only bad and unfaithful people used—heathens and criminals, like me and my friends.
Through a glass window, I could see our shattered parents entering a special waiting area to learn our fate. They sat mutely as we listened, nervous and empty, to the judge, a cleric who was an expert in Islamic studies, lecture us about our wrongdoings and why we shouldn’t act like such reckless teenagers. I thought to myself, Who in the world are you to tell me how to act? It’s none of your business, and more importantly, I didn’t do anything wrong. I knew in my heart that the reason we were being punished conflicted with what I’d grown up trusting and believing in. So I held on to my faith. That is what my parents would have wanted me to do.
The judge went on and on. In my state of anger, I was picturing how I would punish him. I wanted to send him to jail and reprimand him. I wanted to break that guitar on his head. My mind also jumped to my father and the thought of how he would react to this entire situation once we got home. In a way, I wanted to stay locked in jail forever because I didn’t want to face him, or my mother for that matter. They were going to be so disappointed and say “I told you so” over and over again. Were our friends in school going to revere us, or were they going to judge us and think we were in the wrong? Would I get expelled—again?
Guilt began to take over, but it was crazy for me to all of a sudden feel so guilty for a crime I never committed—or did I? I began to think my friends and family would forever perceive me as a criminal. The awful brand of being jailed could even make it impossible to find love or get married. Thought after thought continued to race through my head, until suddenly I heard, from somewhere beyond my inner consciousness, the dreaded word.
“SHALAGH!”
Lashes.
I felt like I had been punched in the gut. This was a sentence that I never thought would really happen to us.
The boys were sentenced to fifty lashes, and the girls were sentenced to forty lashes. I learned for the first time that there were different types of lashing. The cleric specified that we would keep our clothes on while we were lashed. He said that even though the fabric could get stuck in the wounds, it would be less painful than having our backs bare. Maybe I should have thanked him for his sympathy.
Most of my friends stayed silent as they heard the sentence, but some cried. Others were more audacious, trying to contest their punishments. I looked silently at my father through the soundproof glass window. I could tell he was a nervous wreck as he waited to learn the verdict. It made me sad to see my father break down because of something I had put him through. I showed him the number forty with my free hand. He placed his hands over his face and fell back onto the wooden bench behind him. I exchanged a look with my mother, and in that moment I could see her helplessness right through her eyes.
All the commotion made me feel light-headed. Our parents tried to tell us through the windows that it was going to be okay, but it was all hitting me like a ton of bricks. Suddenly, the noise of the hectic courthouse fell away from me. I was floating in the air with no gravitational force to tether me to reality; I was disconnected from my body. I thought about my best friend who had been handcuffed to me for the past five days. She was shaking and crying. How was such a tiny, fragile girl going to make it through this? I thought about the other women in jail and the lonely ten-year-old girl. I wondered what their punishments would be.
I was always one to stand up for my rights and fight for what I believed in, but I didn’t react that way this time. I knew no matter what I said, it wouldn’t matter. I especially didn’t want the judge to harshen our punishment even more. All I wanted was to get it over with—beat me up, and let’s all go home.
Inside the bus, some of the girls were in a state of shock, but some of them bawled. We were all petrified. Neda put her head on my shoulder, and I could feel her body shaking next to mine. I placed my head on top of hers and, without making a noise, let tears stream down my face, the first tears since the night of the party. I had held them inside for so long, but I had finally been broken down. I wanted to explode. I don’t know how long the bus ride was, but it was way too short. I wanted to stay on the bus for eternity. Couldn’t we just drive away? Far, far away…
Hundreds of people stood outside what I called the “punishment building,” waiting for their loved ones to exit. People cried, argued, and ran around frantically searching for friends and family. Some of the women waiting outside followed the Islamic dress code by fully covering themselves, while others showed their hair and wore form-fitting clothing. These women were brave to dress as they did right under the government officials’ noses. I once considered myself like one of these audacious women, rebelliously wearing what I pleased, but that little freedom-hungry girl inside me had been buried alive.
We entered the dark building and were placed into two separate lines—one for the guys, the other for the girls. There was a large open space with rooms all around and a few wooden benches in the corner. Some of our parents managed to enter the facility and were directed to wait by the benches. But our parents couldn’t just sit still. They ran around the building, desperately trying to stop the officials from lashing us. They begged the guards to overturn the verdict and offered money in hopes that they could change their minds. But it was to no avail; as time passed, one after another of my friends entered the punishment room. I could hear them screaming, and some of the girls in line prayed out loud in both Arabic and Farsi. I prayed to myself in Farsi as I watched my friends come back out, one by one, their clothing covered in blood.
I’m not a patient person, and I never have been. I don’t do well in situations where I have to wait and languish. I need resolutions, and I need them instantly. And in this situation, I had never been more afraid in my life. I became more and more light-headed at the sight of each girl and boy exiting the room. If you are going to torture me, I thought, don’t make me wait for it.
Finally, it was my turn. Still handcuffed together, Neda and I silently entered a concrete room with two beds on opposite ends. The beds were made out of black metal with flimsy mattresses that were now soiled with fresh and crusted blood. I wasn’t expecting to see pristine Ralph Lauren bedding, but it still repulsed me. Two intimidating women covered head to toe in black chadors stood by the beds, holding Holy Qurans under their arms and leather straps in their hands. I looked straight into the small hazel eyes of the woman who was about to lash me. Even though I thought she was an awful person, I could see pain and discomfort in her eyes. I wondered if she had a family. I wondered if she had a daughter…
The straps, I remember, consisted of three pieces of leather braided into one large, threatening whip. A round, fairly large bronze-looking bucket of water was perched next to one of the beds. This was used to douse the whip. When they took the handcuffs off, Neda immediately grabbed me and hugged me tightly. This was the first time we had been separated in five days, and it was the worst time to be separated. One of the punishers had to pull us apart because neither of us wanted to let go. We were told to lie facedown on the filthy beds, fully clothed. As we waited for the first lash to slice our skin, Neda screamed and cried out for help. I lay there confused and in a state of shock as I tried to listen to what was happening outside the doors.
I could hear our mothers arguing with the officials, begging them to take it easy on us because we were only kids. A few seconds later, the guard at the door came inside and whispered something to the women. I buried my face into the palms of my hands and ground my teeth so hard it sounded as if they were screaming in my ears. I closed my eyes very tightly and tried as hard as I could to think about good memories. Despite trying to focus so hard on my family and positive thoughts, I started screaming with Neda at the top of my lungs.
Suddenly, I felt the leather whip, drenched in water, lash viciously across my back. The pain was excruciating, and I was so petrified that I lost my voice. I could hear the whip whooshing through the air back and forth, and my back felt like it had just caught on fire. It was burning. I thought I was going to pass out. There were no screams left inside me.
The woman whispered in my ear that she would be gentler, but that I needed to scream to make it believable that she was hurting me just as badly as the first time. I couldn’t begin to imagine how painful it must have been for the people who didn’t receive the gentler lashing.
And I didn’t need to make-believe. It was torture. When the whip sliced my skin, I whimpered. I was very light-headed, and all I could feel was an acute burning sensation on my back as the whip penetrated deeper and deeper. Forty lashes later, I lay there helplessly. It was finally over. It was all over. Time had run together like sand. It was over before I could even process what had just happened.
I was terrified when I stumbled out of that room. I was overwhelmed with emotion; I felt disrespected, insulted, humiliated, angry, and relieved all at once. My surroundings seemed to unravel in slow motion around me. As I walked away from the punishment room, feeling as though I had been swept away on dark clouds during a horrible storm, I forgot to even make sure Neda was okay. I could see all the familiar faces of our families waiting outside, looking absolutely devastated. I started bawling as soon as I saw my parents and apologized for what I thought I had done to them. I just wanted to be home. I needed to get out of there. I didn’t want to talk to anyone, especially about how I was feeling.
The car ride back to the house was extremely excruciating. I quickly realized how badly I was hurt when I couldn’t sit down properly in my seat. I had to lean forward and prop my body up with my elbow on the door handle. My parents said nothing as we pulled away. They were both concerned and miserable, anxious and angry. I could see it in quick, sudden flashes in the car mirrors. Maman kept looking into my eyes from the front seat, searching for answers. I think she didn’t even know how to ask if I was okay, because she knew that I wasn’t okay. They had done their best to raise Aria and me in a safe and healthy environment, but we had been punished right in front of their eyes, and they’d had no control over what happened to us. They had been powerless to do anything about it. I could hear my father’s voice in my head:
How many times did I tell you not to wear those short skirts?
How many times do I need to tell you that I don’t want you wearing makeup and attending these parties?
That was exactly what I didn’t want to hear from my parents, but I knew it would happen.
Did I get punished for hanging out with my friends? For wearing a miniskirt? Wearing makeup? Running away? Partying? All of it combined? All I knew for sure is that the punishment didn’t fit the so-called crime. As I gazed out of the car window at the fully covered women we passed along the way, I asked myself whether these women believed what happened to me was okay. Could a woman who was covered from head to toe accept someone like me—a woman who chose to express her individuality by not covering?
When I got home, I took a deep breath and looked at my back in the bathroom mirror. The wounds were still fresh. The lash marks were red swollen stripes across my skin, and as time passed they turned yellow, then blue. I stepped into the shower to wash off the blood and dirt from my ravaged body and clean myself. I sat in the bathtub with very little water and soaked my thoughts away. My mind drifted onto a journey of its own making, in and out of consciousness.
What does Islam really require, and how did religion come to play such a large role in the Iranian society? I realized that I wanted to explore my Iranian culture and the Muslim religion and find out what it was all about. I wanted to change my now distorted view of those who believed in all this, who believed that my torture was somehow okay and justified. They couldn’t all be bad people. And at the same time, I needed to know that I could once again wear a miniskirt without being lashed forty times.
In the days following the punishment, I had to learn how to cope: cope with the principal of my school, who suspended me; cope with my furious and devastated parents, who required more emotional support than I did; cope with the pain and fear associated with the lashes and the five days spent in jail. And I had to wrestle against getting lost in my thoughts about all those poor young girls who weren’t as fortunate as we were in our sentencing. I couldn’t stop thinking about the bride in her wedding dress, the cursing ten-year-old runaway, and the screams echoing from the other cells. Although I was finally out of prison, the prison wasn’t yet out of me.