Sharif University of Technology – Prof Dr. Vafai

On Saturday the 19^th we met Dr. Vafai for the third time. The second meeting was more informal and we were unsecure about its result. This is why we wanted to talk to him again before start blogging anything.

We are very confident that SUT is the right University for us, even though they focus on technical studies. SUT has a good international reputation and stands for academic excellence. This is also recognized and supported by the government.

What we agreed on is to start our joint activities by bringing 4-5 students to Germany for an internship in the next summer. During this internship we could show the students how AIESEC works and provide them with the necessary skills to build a local committee. Dr. Vafai is also willing to raise summer internships at his university. After the internship we would go back to Iran with the students to help them to found a local committee.

To make this work we need a letter from the University of Cologne to ask for cooperation in scientific education including project activities and exchange. We would like AIESEC Germany to co-sign this agreement. With this letter we would be good to go for the next year at least and could figure out in that time together with the students how to best register AIESEC as an organization in Iran.

GTZ – German Iran Development Cooperation - Prof. Dr. Khosrow Saidi

On Saturday the 19^th we met Prof. Dr. Saidi from GTZ. He has studied in Germany in Stuttgart-Hohenheim where he also was head of the student council. He is now head of the local branch of GTZ and supports German Iranian acitivities on infrastructure and vocational training. He had the best understanding so far of what we exactly want and where the major problems are. His counsel was to cooperate with an Iranian Student Organization. This would provide us and the Iranian students who will form the local committee with a good infratructure and a plattform to realize projects and exchange.To found a partnership with an existing Iranian student councel we have to compare the profiles of both organisations to find out if the aims, visions and values are compatible. He could not tell us which student organization would be the right one, but he said there are some which are close to the German AstA or Fachschaft who care for students needs in terms of housing, provide counsel to them and are non political. Additionally he asked some interesting questions on what the motivation for Iranian students could be to join AIESEC.

German Language Institute – Dr. Alfred Walter

Dr. Walter is head of the German Language Institute and works for the german embassy at the same time. He has been in Tehran for nine months now. He knows the most important aspects of AIESEC and supports the idea of building AIESEC in Iran very much. During our meeting he expressed his concern about our timing. He experienced on the one hand less interest in international relations of the new government and consequently activities are reduced. And on the other hand insecurity about how the international relations will develop after sanctions might be deployed on Iran. He concluded that it might be a good idea to postpone asking for an approval as once we will get a no, this would hardly change in the next years.

His view of the government economic strategy is that invest strongly into engineering, physics and chemistry to gain economic independence and to be an exporter of consumer goods in the long run. He was not sure wether the government in the long run also feels a need for well qualified international managers.

Bayrischer Rundfunk – Peter Mezger

On Tuesday the 15^th we had our first contact with a media representative. We met Mr.Peter Mezger from the “Bayerischer Rundfunk” and his assistant Mr.Safei-Rad ., in the lobby oft the former Hilton hotel.

Since we are at the beginning of our way to build AIESEc in Iran , we could offer hardly any newsworthy material, but Mr.Mezger stated to be interested in our project, and that we could turn to him for advice and whenever we think that an event concerning BIA could require media presence.

Mr.Mezger and Mr.Safei-Rad themselves are in the process of building a foreign correspondency in Tehran and therfore could share with us,experiences and difficulties that could be facing us in near future as well.

Mr.Safei-Rad provided us with contacts that can support us at our aim to recieve an official status for AIESEC in Iran.

German Embassy

On Wenesday the 9th we finally had our appointment at the German embassy.We met with Mrs. Haller and Mrs Zangeneh. Many central issues concerning Visa for Iranian students were solved.
Unlike Mrs. Marin from the Chamber of Commerce assumed , it is not a problem to receive a German Visa for Iranian students as AIESEC is well know to the embassy. If they did not serve their military service they can make a deposit and get a three months passport.

Moreover the German embassy offered us any possible support in order to receive the approval at the ministry of higher education.
Summing up we can say that essential questions were eliminated and a new supporter of our project BIA were found.

We try to get to the German Embassy

Yesterday, on Monday the 6th, we had an appointment at the german embassy at 10 a.m. Easy way. Lisa wanted to get us at our place and we should meet Abusar half an hour before the appointment at the german embassy. But then Lisa called, to say that she was not feeling good and could not go, our regular driver wanted to get us there, but then he figured out that is in the city centre where he does not have the permission to go. Abusar also had a hard time to get a taxi which has this permission. We arrived at the embassy in a hurry at 10.15 a.m. But our contact was not there yet. As we told them about our project and that we are students they asked us to come back at 2 pm. We spent our time in the office of Abusars uncle at Bank Maskan by working on our Proposal for SUT. At 2 pm we were back at the embassy. This time they welcomed us warmly: “Hi you must be the students from Freiburg!” Not exactly! They had mixed us up with another group of students and we will have to come back on Wednesday L

Appointment at the Chamber of Commerce

On Sunday the 6^th we met with Ms. Marin from the German Chamber of Commerce.

She works in the consulting section and will be Abusar´s supervisor until the end of September. Ms. Marin, who is married to an Iranian and speeks Farsi fluently, could tell us a lot about the stick and stones coming up our way.

The AHK itself, for instance, does not accept students from abroad, who don´t posses an Iranian Passport, just like Abusar does. Foreign students need an official invitation from the AHK, to get a business visa which means that Chamber of Commerce can be held responsible for the actions of the trainee during his stay in Iran. This is a risk the AHK, just like most of the other companies in Iran, don´t want to take.

An Iranian student who wants to go abroad for a traineeship faces some difficulties as well. We were told that Iranian men who didn’t absolve their military service yet, don´t receive their permission to go abroad and hence their passport. Moreover Mrs. Marin assumes that we will have a hard time getting visa for Iranian students, even for Germany. On our appointment with german embassy representatives on the 9^th we are going to inform ourselves in how far it is possible to get Iranian trainees to Germany. The reasoning behind german reluctance to give Visa to young men, students, is that they fear the students would just stay in Germany.

Even though getting trainees in and out of Iran is linked with bureaucratic obstacles, Mrs. Marin pointed out that one very important precondition is given, the demand for such a project by the Iranian students.

SUT – Appointment with Dr. Vafai

On Saturday the 5th we met Dr. Vafai from the Office of International Relations at Sharif University of Technology (SUT). SUT is the elite University of Iran. Only the top 800 Students out of 6 million have the chance to study at SUT. It offers a range of technical studies and an MBA and Master of Economics. About 37% of the graduates go into management positions afterwards.

After waiting 20 min for a couple of times, which summed up to a total of 2 hours, we finally met Dr. Vafai. Dr. Vafai was very interested in our idea and asked 5 students to join our meeting. He liked our presentation and due to his student activities in the United States he had a perfect understanding of what we need and what we want to do. He asked us to prepare a detailed proposal of how we want to start a partnership with SUT. We will propose a PBoX on the topic of energy to him. During the PBoX we will find and train the students who will later form the local committee. SUT could easily provide everything we need, but we need an approval of the Ministry of Higher Education and SUT wants exclusivity for Tehran.

We will meet Dr. Vafai and some more students to explain the proposal tomorrow.

Arriving in Tehran

Lisa and me (Jonas) arrived on Thursday the 3rd. We were welcomed by Marc, Abusar, Ali and Lisa’s family at the airport. My very first impression of Tehran was the insane traffic. I have experienced various driving styles. The Iranians are among the world elite of kamikaze drivers. Due to the traffic, cheap gas and lots of cars, the city is dirty and loud. It is a huge relief to visit the nearby mountains or one of the beautiful parks.

In comparison to Germany everything you want to do takes a lot of time. It took us some days to get internet and mobile phones started. It would have been impossible without the support of Abusar’s friends and relatives. If we meet somewhere we first have to drink tea with everybody and have a chat before we can start working. To get from one place another always takes 20 min, according to the driver, but then takes up to one hour. Every plan develops very dynamically. Appointments with a fixed time are rare.

But it is fun to enjoy life with Iranians: visiting tea houses, dining out or just sitting somewhere and listening to the omnipresent mobile phone jukebox.

Here we go!

Finally we are heading for Iran. Marc and Abusar already left on Sunday and sent some messages. They arrived safely. Abusar could convince the german chamber of commerce to support us with contacting companies.

Lisa and I will fly tomorrow morning.

Kind regards,

Jonas