The story of my life that I am going to share with you mostly happens in the Universities. I would rather start from my early childhood at the time of war between Iran and Iraq when I was only 4. I remember the frightened face of my mother vividly when we heard the alarm sound on the radio, and we rushed to our basement which was considered to be a safe place from missile attacks by Iraqis, but unlike my mother, I used to get excited in this moment of stress. As a child, I had no understanding of what was happening. I thought it is a game in which upon hearing the alarms, we should run to the basement as fast as we can. I was not aware of the danger threatening us, the threat of death by missiles. My family and I were lucky. We survived all missile attacks for six months. When I finished primary school, my father decided to immigrate to his home town, where his parents lived. As the oldest son, my father shouldered the responsibility to take care of his aged parents. It cast a shadow over my mother’s life. She had to get along with a cantankerous and touchy mother-in-law. There were many conflicts between them, but my mother always used to be the first one to forgive and forget to sacrifice herself for her family. At that time, as a teenager, I get accustomed to leading a happy life amidst my family's conflicts. I was jubilant, very energetic, and hardworking with excellent marks in my high school. My teachers and school principal always admired me. We had a great relationship based on rapport and respect.
Everything seemed to be perfect in my life before entering the University. Having graduated from high school, I had to take the university entrance exam, which I believe is an unfair exam on account of assessing all talent and abilities of students just in a 4-hour exam in a multiple-choice form. Due to my inability to stress management, I got an average score in the exam. In Iran, studying in some majors like medicine, dentistry, as well as some engineering majors requires high marks in the entrance exam. With the score I got in the exam, I was able to choose chemistry, my favorite subject in high school. University was found to be entirely different from high school. Instead of gentle, loving, and friendly teachers of high school, we had strict professors of the university, who were mostly self-absorbed. I was not familiar with sitting in the same class with boys. In Iran, before entering university, schools are same-sex. I felt shy to ask questions in the presence of boys. They used to make fun of female students. Over time I faced more significant challenges in the university. Some male students bullied me, and I received negative comments about my big nose from them. Living in a society obsessed with beauty standards, it sometimes becomes hard for those unable to follow such holier than thou beauty standards. I tried to forget about being ridiculed by boys, about insult hurled at me, but to be honest, I was not successful at it. My self-confidence and self-esteem were shattered. Sometimes I cried a lot during bedtime. My parents, especially my mother, went mad at me when I told her that I am not satisfied with my nose. They told me that they think my nose is beautiful, that I have a lovely complexion, and those making negative comments about my nose must be ignored, but it was not encouraging at all. Finally, I decided to go to a plastic surgeon, but what the doctor told me was out of surprise. Your nose is meaty! Nose job will not be effective. Accept your nose whatever it is. It does not seem that bad; the doctor said all those sentences to me. What I heard in the plastic surgeon office dashed all my hopes about being perfect and not being ridiculed by boys. I graduated from university. I was depressed. I did not know what to do in the future. I could not make my mind up. I felt ugly at 22. I decided to stay at home to find solutions to problems that I ran into. To be away from society, home allowed me to receive less negative energy from toxic people. To think about the meaning of life and my potentials.
Gradually I could gain more positivity and power. One day when I was meditating, I heard an inner voice telling me to ask God for help, pray, but how could I pray? I was an atheist. The voice inside me replied, pray, it is worth a try; you will lose nothing, pray. Although I found it unreasonable to pray, I trusted my intuition, and then I found a great mysterious feeling inside myself. It was like all fears and disappointment flew away. I was in a state of euphoria. I no longer was an atheist. I could see the beauty in my face. I could discover my superpower, my self-confidence. Since that time, I have not faced any person bullying me because of my nose. I learned the hard way when I trust in God, and I change my focus from unwanted to what I want, many positive changes took place. It was a turning point in my life.
As a young, smart, beautiful, self-confident girl, I made a decision to study for the master exam. This time I got excellent marks enabling me to study at the best university in my country. But again, new obstacles appeared. It was 2010 when I wanted to apply for the universities to be admitted as a master student. 2010 was a very gloomy year for some Iranians; the year in which people protested against the result of the election won by Mahmoud Ahmadi Nezhad. Many protesters were arrested tortured and even killed. Witnessing all these unrest and insecurities, my father forced me to choose the university in our home town for my master's study. He was apprehensive that going to the university in the capital city Tehran may put me in serious trouble as I may attend street rallies led by university students, so to save my life, my father kept me in his home town. My heart was broken. I studied very well to gain high marks, but I was not allowed to make a choice for my future.
I entered a research group of a wealthy professor in my city, famous for being generous and kind to his students. But there were also some negative aspects to work in this research group which I discovered later. My supervisor was an extremely religious person who wanted female students to wear a complete hijab. He did not want to see even one strand of our hair. There is a saying from Islamic extremists that the best form of hijab is Chador, a long, ordinarily black cloth covering all body and head, which only leaves the face exposed. My supervisor showed more respect for girls in our research group wearing Chador. It was disappointing. Another demerit of working in that research group was gender discrimination experienced by female students. Even girls wearing Chador admit that they have not been treated equally by our supervisor. In this research group, male students are given more possibilities to publish more papers and after graduation from Ph.D. are strongly supported to become university professors, something that cannot happen for female students unless they are married to those boys favoured by the supervisor. But my master supervisor was a kind and supportive male chauvinist who helped me to publish two papers which became very useful in my academic life. He has also written many recommendation letters for me. I am grateful for what he did for me, but he did not admit me for Ph.D.; instead, there were boys with lower marks who were accepted in his group to study in the Ph.D. program. He never told me which supervisor was better to choose for my Ph.D. He did not find a Ph.D. position for me abroad while he did all these favors to his male students, and I was sure that later after graduation, boys will be strongly supported to find academic jobs. My supervisor frequently used to say that women are inferior to men, and the most top female students never can compete with their male counterparts. I got offended I have never been told before that I am inferior to men. We have always been under the shadow of male students even those who had low-quality degrees and were less successful than female students. Consequently, we had a lesser chance of recruitment by the university. This misogyny was hard to endure. As a feminist, I could not accept the gender stereotypes imposed by this masculine academic society. Some male professors make a case for gender discrimination in the light of some gender stereotypes like only men are breadwinners. My supervisor always could find a link to introduce male students to professors outside in Iran, but this favor was never done for me because I was a girl who did not believe in wearing hijab.
Although it was terrifying to live and study alone in another country, I started to apply to different universities. I needed a high score in IELTS, which did not happen when I sat for the IELTS exam for the first time. I got 6. It was a total disaster. I was disappointed, and I almost gave up studying for the IELTS.
There were two main fears for me when I graduated from the master's degree. My First fear was about improving the IELTS score. I was afraid that spending time and money on improving my IELTS score might be futile. My second fear was about visa rejection. I thought even if I can get a high score in IELTS, I may not receive a visa. So I decided to have a backup plan, and it was taking a national Ph.D. entrance exam in Iran. I was admitted to a famous university known for having unfair supervisors. I entered a research group in which money was always tight, and even lab glasswares were in short supply. At that time, when I registered for the Iranian university, I thought that it would not take too much time to bring a high IELTS score and to be admitted to a prestigious foreign university. I also thought that putting the title of the Ph.D. student in my resume will improve it. Not until two years after starting Ph.D. did I get IELTS 7 because I was occupied with taking courses and studying for the Ph.D. comprehensive exam. While I was In the second year of Ph.D. in Iran, a close relative living in Germany witnessing how hard I try to find a Ph.D. position decided to help me. He sent me an invitation letter making it possible to go to Germany. In Germany, I contacted many professors both by email and phone. I also had several interviews in person. What was seen to be out of surprise for the German professors was that how a girl from Iran can enter Germany. They heard that life for girls in Iran is miserable. I got many rejections, mostly due to a lack of funding. But two famous professors from prestigious German institutes acceded to be my supervisor for DAAD application. Unfortunately, I could not receive a DAAD scholarship for the Ph.D. program, but a professor, my supervisor, for the DAAD application suggested me to apply again, but this time for the DAAD scholarship allocated to the international Ph.D. students in their sabbatical leave. To apply for this funding, I required an agreement from my Iranian supervisor. As I mentioned before, I was a Ph.D. student at an Iranian university infamous for having unfair supervisors. My supervisor believed that I don’t deserve to be supported and to apply for the DAAD scholarship. He always used to say that his Ph.D. students are nothing. I think he even dared to question my numeracy and literacy. It was an awful moment to be rejected by my Iranian Ph.D. supervisor. I felt I missed my male chauvinist master supervisor, who has written me many recommendation letters. When I heard no from my supervisor, I had no incentive to continue my Ph.D. in Iran. At that time, I completed one project, although I was not interested in my project topic. Finally, the historical moment that I had always been waiting for arrived. A Canadian professor replied to my email. She was interested in my resume. We made an appointment for a skype interview. I was excited. I have never had a skype interview with a Canadian professor. I looked up for an empty room inside the dormitory where I could hold my skype interview. I did not want anyone in my Iranian university to find out about my Ph.D. application. When I saw my Canadian supervisor for the first time on skype, I liked her. She was very nice. I felt that she could understand how much I had been through in my Iranian university. She encouraged me to apply for the Ph.D. position. It took several months to be admitted to the Canadian University. The next step was going to the Candian embassy. What I did before going to the Canadian embassy to apply for the student visa was taking the second Ph.D. exam called comprehensive exam II. I did not want to take a risk. I was a third-year Ph.D. student, and I was not sure that the Canadian embassy would issue me with a visa. It took two months for me to receive a visa. It was the end of December 2015. I took one-semester leave from my Iranian university. I had a compelling reason for just taking leave from university instead of withdrawing, and it was a law asking me to pay a heavy fine for leaving my Ph.D., a quite unreasonable law. Based on this law, I had to defray a high amount of money equal to 10000 $ to the university that not only did not pay me but forced me to pay for some parts of my research expenses. It is worth mentioning that it is considered to be illegal to force graduates students of the Iranian state universities to pay for their research, it’s a law broken by some supervisors.
It was time to say goodbye to my family, to pack my suitcase, to leave my country. It was tough for me to leave my family. I was stressed. I remember I cried in my grandmother's arm vividly. When I was going to Canada, my parents swelled with pride. I had a long haul flight to arrive at the Canadian airport. My uncle's old friends did me a favor and picked me up. I spent several days at their home. It was just 5 minutes walk to reach the university from their home. They made me feel at home. When I met with my new female labmates, I wanted to kiss them as a sign of respect, but they were taken aback. They told me it is not appropriate to kiss people, the same sex. I heard about it before, but at this moment, I had first-hand knowledge of it. My worst experience at the beginning of the first semester was what I heard from a labmate. She told me If I knew you are coming to this group, I would never let you make a wrong decision to enter this group. She told me you made a big mistake in entering this research group because the supervisor is very unfair, and research projects in this group are not fulfilling. I saw a fourth-year Ph.D. student in this group who had difficulties to graduate. Some of my labmates told me were we in your shoes we would leave this group. Another horrible experience was receiving an email from a female labmate sexually attacked. In the email, she wrote that how and where she was sexually attacked and sent to the hospital. I had never been before in close contact with a girl who was sexually attacked and sent to the hospital. I witnessed how hard it was for her to recover to come back to work. I could not believe that sexual violence exists in Canada. It was horrifying. What made this situation worse was striking up a conversation with a negative Iranian male student at the university. He regretted leaving Iran and coming to Canada. He told me Canada is not the place he imagined in his mind; there are no job positions. I became depressed. I needed to make a change. Due to my depression, I could not study well for the exam, and I got a B- score, considered to be below the minimum requirement to remain in the program. Because of this score, my supervisor decided to transfer me to the master's program, but I resisted it. As a third-year Ph.D. student in Iran, I could not accept to be a master student in Canada. I went to the head of the department. What I heard from the professor, the head of the department was calming. He told me it was not your supervisor who admitted you to the Ph.D. program. It was a committee, so that committee must make the decision transferring you to the master’s program. The committee was held. They decided to keep me in the Ph.D. program and asked me to take more courses to improve my score. In the second semester, my situation got better. I was a teaching assistant. My TA instructor was a nice person. She helped me to do TA.
One amazing thing that I did a lot in Canada was cycling, a sport that I could not do easily in Iran. As I was approaching the end of the second semester my relationship with my supervisor and one of my male labmates was getting worse. My male labmate disrespected me; he used to shout at me to tease me. I got offended. A male labmate had never disrespected me before. It was an unprecedented experience. I wanted to go to the security office even I thought about calling 911. Instead, I went to my supervisor to make a complaint about the abrasive manner of my male labmate but she believed that he is a gentleman and I have a behavioral problem. I found this comment very offensive. When my supervisor found some of our other lab members were in favor of me, she told me “do not burn the bridge for your male labmate”. I could not understand why my supervisor showed favoritism for that male labmate. Then I went to the ombudsperson that I think was a decoration. The advocacy center was another place in the university that I used to go frequently. People in the advocacy center were very nice. I decided to change my supervisor but one of the supervisors to whom I applied told me we normally do not accept students from other research groups if you want to change your research group, you should consider other departments or universities. Then I started to apply to other universities, but unfortunately, I only got rejected. I had a nasty shock I knew some Iranian students who were successful to change their research group but I was not. I thought it is the end of the world. The worst part of the scenario was when my supervisor changed my first committee meeting date without my notice. I supposed to have my first committee meeting at the end of September, but at the beginning of this month, my supervisor sent me an email that your committee meeting will be held tomorrow, and you have just two hours to send me your written proposal. At that time, when I was suddenly asked to attend my committee meeting, I was on leave from a Canadian university, but I think that my supervisor was impatient to announce my academic situation as unsatisfactory so she could not wait for me to come back to Canada to attend the committee meeting. Again I went to the advocacy center to sue about an unfair committee meeting held without my presence. A person in the advocacy center told me it is illegal to hold your committee meeting while you are on leave. Then I received an email that your committee meeting will be held upon coming back to Canada in January 2017. I was asked to take at least one course to attend my committee meeting to be TA and RA. To be honest I tired of going to the advocacy center so I came back to Iran to both apply for a new position and finish my Ph.D. My Iranian supervisor was furious at me. He punished me several times.
I could not understand what was wrong with me. I had a one-semester leave equal to nearly eight months, and I was allowed to do whatever I want during this time. But my supervisor constantly nagged me that why did you spend your sabbatical leave in Canada without my notice. He thought that I was doing some research in Canada related to my Ph.D. studies in Iran and did not want to accept it was another Ph.D. I supposed to graduate in one year, but my supervisor and university forced me to graduate in two years. I had tough times to graduate from my Ph.D. I brought my bike from home to ride it inside the university to vent my frustration. One evening when I was riding my bike, suddenly the man in the security office car stopped me. He asked me with a gentle voice who allowed you to ride your bike at the University? I replied in an assertive tone that It is one of my basic human rights to ride my bike wherever I want, I use a helmet, and I am skilled in bike riding, so there would be no problem. But the security officer of the university told me you could only ride your bike if the head of the security office permits you. I called the head of the security office. He told me they need to hold a meeting to decide if I can ride my bike inside the University or not. It took one day to be informed about their decision. They told me I could not ride my bike in the university because other girls may also want to follow me and ride their bikes while they do not wear complete hijab and probably a helmet so both Islam and their safety will be threatened. During these two years, I bottled up all my feelings, which increased my stress level. I considered two different options: suing my supervisor, or going to another country and seeking asylum. Having graduated from Ph.D., I came back home. My parents helped me to recover. I retook IELTS. Now I am working in the industry. The pay is not good, but the people at work are friendly. I need to find a postdoc position. I do not know how I can speak up for my right. I know I will never forget about my dream to come back to Canada to the city where I left an incomplete Ph.D. where I could freely go cycling where I had no headscarf where people are not shot in their heads just due to peaceful protest against the increase in gasoline price where no airplane carrying innocent people is hit by the missiles where there is no threat of war.
I hope you do not find this story verbose and prolix, but it is a real story of an Iranian girl who has always suffered from gender discrimination. I always wanted to share the story of my life with other people. I like to know what they think about my mistakes.
- Mahtab
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