“On the way home, I turned onto a street demonstration where people were yelling and burning tires. I told my son it was a street repair crew, but I don’t think he believed me. With the windows down we were suffocating on the rubber smoke. Even with the windows up, John and I were coughing and gagging from the smell of burning rubber. I was afraid to open the windows again because the demonstrators had surrounded the car and were pounding on the hood, the sides, and trunk. I was trying to determine what to do, when a well dressed Iranian man banged on the driver’s side window and yelled in English, “Follow me!” He yelled something in Farsi to the crowd, and they let him guide me to a side street. All of a sudden, it was almost quiet. The smell of burning rubber dissipated, and the demonstration continued to move down the street I had just left.”

This is a journal of what happened when a husband and father moved his family to Tehran, Iran in 1978. What was supposed to be just a foreign assignment evolved into being a witness to a revolution – and the last ruling days of the Shah of Iran.

Goodbye Iran tells of ordinary daily life interspersed with demonstrations and riots through the eyes of the author, his wife, company security notices and various news media.
You will observe how Iranians live is different than the western world; it isn’t wrong, it’s just different. You will also see when people want change, they can accomplish it against tremendous odds.

Iran is transformed to a new rule of government, one which impacts all aspects of everyday life. In the end the Shah of Iran, and the author, leave never to return again.
Khoda Hafez…Goodbye Iran