IRAN. 2018. Ali, 28 years old, Bachelor in Computer engineering.

I went to see the protests out of curiosity. I went there and got excited. I don’t want to change anything; I want to help my country to improve. But there were also strange people in the protests; the way they talked and their appearance. To me they seemed strange. Some might have been intelligence services faceless in plain clothes I was scared too but I was there to help people. Many of them were teenagers who asked me to join them but I was not brave enough.

I think the new generation is brave and smart. The lower class is kind of invisible, even us, the middle class, don’t see them and care about them. I think the main target of starting these protests was the president and all the economic problems. It’s not something new in our country, the salaries are low and costs of living are higher each day.

The social media, mainly Telegram had a strong impact as we cannot forget the fact that a telegram channel could reach to 1,300,000 followers in 72 hours which is something really unprecedented and unbelievable.

I am pessimistic about Iran’s future, not in personal and private sphere but in term of the society and public domain . people are gloomy and bitter all over the country, you don’t see many people on the streets even on weekends, it seems that they don’t enjoy their lives and they are really nervous and angry. It shows an abnormal situation in a society.

When protests broke out in dozens of cities in Iran recently, everybody had different opinions, but no one wanted to come in front of my camera. Afraid.