December 27, 2002 - Billings Gazette: RPCV David Jaynes returns to Iran on goodwill tour

Peace Corps Online: Peace Corps News: Headlines: Peace Corps Headlines - 2002: 12 December 2002 Peace Corps Headlines: December 27, 2002 - Billings Gazette: RPCV David Jaynes returns to Iran on goodwill tour

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RPCV David Jaynes returns to Iran on goodwill tour





Caption: David Jaynes looks over a map of Iran, where he traveled in October as part of a goodwill tour.

Read and comment on this story from the Billings Gazette on RPCV David Jaynes who took part in the NPCA's goodwill tour of Iran in November. Jaynes first traveled to Iran with his wife, Mari, in 1973 as Peace Corps volunteers. The couple spent a year and a half in Shiraz, a city in southern Iran where the wine of the same name was made for more than a millennium until the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Jaynes said Iranians are generous and would do anything to help a stranger in need. "They may not have much, but they'd give you everything," he said. "We all think highly of Iran."

We previously published an account of this goodwill trip by another member of the group at:

Read the story at:

Billings man goes on Peace Corps goodwill tour to Iran*

* This link was active on the date it was posted. PCOL is not responsible for broken links which may have changed.



Billings man goes on Peace Corps goodwill tour to Iran

By CLAIR JOHNSON

Of The Gazette Staff

Labeled by President Bush part of an "axis of evil," Iran has not had diplomatic relations with the United States since 1979, when militant students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.

But a group of former Peace Corps volunteers that included a Billings man is hoping its recent goodwill tour to the country will forge new friendships.

David Jaynes, assistant manager for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's Billings Field Office, along with 21 others from around the country spent two weeks in late October visiting several cities and meeting with Iranians. Jaynes, who has worked in the Billings office for 18 years, is moving to Miles City next month to become the manager of BLM's field office there.

People stateside wondered if he was going into a war zone.

"Our lives were threatened every day," Jaynes said. "But only when we crossed the street."

The Iranians couldn't have been friendlier, he said. "They love Americans. They don't love American government," he said.

The trip was organized by the Peace Corps and Friendship Force, an organization that arranges exchange visits between American and foreign families. The two groups worked together to find former Peace Corps volunteers who had worked in Iran who would return as goodwill ambassadors, Jaynes said.

The goal was to meet people, to build relationships and to see if there were projects the Peace Corps and Iranian non-governmental organizations could work on together.



Caption: David Jaynes poses with a caretaker in front of a Zoroastrian fire temple. Zoroastrianism is an ancient religion that predated the 7th century Muslim conquest of Persia. Photo courtesy David Jaynes

A dozen members of the American group, including Jaynes, had been to Iran before.

Jaynes first traveled to Iran with his wife, Mari, in 1973 as Peace Corps volunteers. The couple spent a year and a half in Shiraz, a city in southern Iran where the wine of the same name was made for more than a millennium until the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Alcohol had been available to non-Muslims until then; now all alcohol is prohibited in the country.

Jaynes worked at the soil institute - kind of like an Iranian BLM - on vegetation mapping and grazing management. His wife taught English at a tribal school.

Jaynes' Farsi was a little rusty at first on his return trip, but by the second week "it was clicking pretty good," he said. Three of his fellow travelers were still fluent in the country's language.

The Americans started their visit in Tehran where they reached their hotel at 3 a.m. and were told that they would not be visiting anyone's house as they had thought. The group also was assigned a "minder" who accompanied them on their travels.

After touring Tehran for a day, the group flew to Shiraz for two nights, then drove to the city of Yazd in the central Iran. Near Shiraz, the Americans toured Persepolis, the ancient center of the Persian Empire founded by King Darius the Great, who reigned from 522 to 486 B.C. Alexander the Great burned Persepolis in 331 BC.

From Yazd, the group traveled to Isfahan before flying back to Tehran. From there, the group boarded a bus and drove to Rasht, a city on the Caspian Sea, and nearby Hamadan. After two more nights in Tehran, the group flew home.

All along the way, the Americans talked to Iranians, including ordinary citizens in parks and children and representatives of various organizations. Jaynes gave away postcards of Montana.

The Iranians asked lots of questions.

"They all want to come to America," Jaynes said. "They'd like to be friends again as long as we're not in their business." The Iranians want jobs and visas to stay in foreign countries.

In Yazd, the Americans visited a library and talked to a group working to get Internet connections for rural areas. Jaynes said that job could be a possible project.

In Isfahan, the group toured a privately funded school for the blind to see if there may be a possible project with the school. The school, he said, is trying to train students to use computers but most of the programs are in English. The school wants to get more programs in Farsi.

In Tehran, the Americans met with groups working on environmental issues and law reform.

Iran today compared with 1973 is "much more restrictive, of course," Jaynes said. It was once a cultural tradition for women to cover their heads and arms with a hejab; it is now the law.

But Iran has loosened up a little in the past five years. Men and women now can be seen holding hands in public, Jaynes said.

More than half of Iran's population is under age 30 and many are unhappy with how the country is being run by the mullahs, the conservative religious leaders, he said. Many want a separation of church and state.



The Sei-o-sepol, or 33 Arches, is a famous bridge near Isfahan. Once the main road into Shiraz, the bridge is now a walking bridge. Photo courtesy David Jaynes

Reminders of Iran's eight-year war with neighboring Iraq, which ended in 1988, are posted on billboards through out the country. The posters bear the faces of men in each community who were killed in the war, Jaynes said. Iranian casualties numbered in the hundreds of thousands. "It made me sick," Jaynes said of the losses that recalled his own experience with war. Jaynes served in Vietnam in 1968 as a rifleman in the infantry.

On the last day, the group came across police at a road block for a religious event in Tehran. Jaynes took a picture and immediately drew the attention of two officers toting submachine guns. The officers asked Jaynes what he was doing and explained in Farsi that he couldn't take photographs. When Jaynes said they were Americans, the officers left the group alone and gave them directions. As the Americans started to leave, one of the officers stopped them to ask a question.

"We want to know about your laser guns," the officer said.

Jaynes said they responded, "No, that's James Bond."

On another occasion, a flute maker approached Jaynes and the group's leader and asked where they were staying. He wanted to give the leader a flute. Jaynes said they got back to the hotel late after a long day and received a call from the lobby that they had a visitor. "It was this man," Jaynes said.

The man had a large, beautiful flute worth probably hundreds of dollars, he said. The flute maker played for about 20 minutes before giving it to the leader and saying goodbye.

Jaynes said Iranians are generous and would do anything to help a stranger in need. "They may not have much, but they'd give you everything," he said. "We all think highly of Iran."

Clair Johnson can be reached at 657-1282 or at cjohnson@billingsgazette.com

Copyright © The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises.
More Information about the Peace Corps in Iran



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This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - Iran; Peace

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