
The piles of required documents were growing and I briefly considered buying a folder. Purchase of a folder turned out to be one of the requirements too. "Go buy a folder before I stamp this for you," I was told at the driving school.
I planned to write about the bureaucracy involved in getting an Iranian driver’s license, the four classroom sessions followed by ten 2-hour driving sessions; the visit to the eye doctor; the visit to bank to make multiple deposits; the visit to the photography studio; all the negotiations involved to prove that I have been exempted from military service; finding a substitute for my national ID card; filling out half-dozen forms and getting them stamped here and there; even the effort it took to figure out my postal code.
My story would’ve made the DMV in the U.S. look like ... eheeem ... the model of efficiency.
But now I am reluctant to make fun of the Iranian system because today the system worked. I failed the written exam, more than likely because I was too lazy to review the 180-page book.
The exam was difficult! Only 25 minutes for 30 questions, some cunningly designed to confuse:
Q: A car suddenly pulls in front of you from a side street. What should you do?
1. Flash your lights and get behind it.
2. Beep and pass it quickly.
3. Reduce your speed and get ready to stop.
4. Change lanes so you don’t hit it.
All of above applies. I don’t know how I could possibly pick just one.
I remembered our teacher during the first classroom session, a stiff no-nonsense retired colonel given to Patton-esq sermons on civilization.
“We are attempting to change this culture!” he roared.
I snickered at the time, but now I would give him the benefit of the doubt. Several other students failed too. We all have to keep taking the exam, at one-week intervals, until we pass and move on to the behind-the-wheel exam.

The list of documents required for a driver’s license (and not the recepie for the atom bomb), left; the wonderful women at the school; their helpfulness and willingness to overlook stupid-sounding things I sometimes unknowingly blurted out, kept me going.
Irony is everywhere; irony is coming out of my ears. The American with 27 years of driving experience and near-perfect record, can’t get the driver’s license of the country with the perhaps the world’s worst driving culture.
I tried to make an issue of the language. “You should have the exam in English too,” I protested, even though I had trouble with only a couple of the words. The examiner saw through my b.s. and told me to study harder.
It was the Iranian thing to do, though—to come up with any excuse to try to weasel my way through.
As I walked back home, I smiled as I remembered a relative's advice just the night before: “After a while, even the foreigner will start becoming a little Iranian. At first he resists. But a year later you see him driving against the traffic on a one-way street because he wants to get to his house quicker.
“Don’t try to change the system, Ali. Don’t compare us with America. When you come here, change your glasses and you’ll see things go smoother.
“And eventually,” he smiled, “you’ll start seeing a sort of chaotic order within the chaos.”