Episode 157
Shadows of Tehran and a Life Between Worlds | Author Nick Berg
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In this episode of 'Talk with History,' we interview Nick Berg, the author of the book 'Shadows of Tehran.'
Nick shares his gripping life story, from growing up in Iran and escaping an execution order to joining the U.S. Army and adapting to American culture. He delves into how his real-life experiences and extensive research shaped his historical fiction novel, which covers the Iranian Revolution, the Iran-Iraq War, and his subsequent life in America. This compelling discussion also offers perspectives on current world events and the ongoing struggles within Iran. Join us as we explore historical events through the unique lens of someone who lived them.
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Transcript
Welcome to Talk with History.
Speaker:Today we're doing something a little bit different.
Speaker:We're interviewing.
Speaker:Book author Nick Berg with a very timely book interview the
Speaker:book's name is Shadows of Tehran.
Speaker:Now Nick is actually Iranian, born and raised.
Speaker:He was there all the way up until he was 19 from the Iran Revolution
Speaker:through the early eighties.
Speaker:When.
Speaker:He actually had an execution order out on him, and he had to escape
Speaker:the country to come to America.
Speaker:So we got the chance to interview Nick, talk about his life and
Speaker:how he wrote himself into the character of this historical fiction
Speaker:book called Shadows of Tehran.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:And it was in a great interview.
Speaker:Nick's background is duality.
Speaker:He is half American and half Iranian.
Speaker:And so coming to America and then learning the culture here and then
Speaker:joining the US military and everything the military gave him as far as perspective.
Speaker:With the way the world is happening right now, this book would be a
Speaker:great background to understand the world in Iran and America.
Speaker:From the revolution to where we find ourselves today.
Speaker:So stick around with us because there's more interesting stories, in
Speaker:this interview than I can even count.
Speaker:So we hope you enjoy our interview with Nick Berg, author of Shadows of Tehran.
Speaker:If they shoot you in order your family to get your body, you have
Speaker:to pay for the bullets, which is a exuberant amount of money to get the
Speaker:body of the person they just executed.
Speaker:I was actually picked up in the middle of the street and
Speaker:thrown into the Iranian army.
Speaker:So the way I got outta the country was through the Turkish border and
Speaker:so getting in the middle of the sheep and crossing the border, basically,
Speaker:, didn't know anybody, had $50 in my pocket and landed in Detroit and sat
Speaker:on the bench at the airport figuring out, okay, now what, what am I gonna do
Speaker:my image of America was, I'm gonna go to Detroit, I'm gonna join a gang, and
Speaker:I'm gonna break dancing the streets.
Speaker:And I rented a bed over there, put my suitcase, locked it up, and went
Speaker:walking the streets to find a job
Speaker:you want three meals a day as good paycheck, medical benefits.
Speaker:You want a think about signing up for the Army?
Speaker:And they opened the door, and this was August 1st.
Speaker:Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2nd,
Speaker:Oh wow.
Speaker:and we opened the door and this rush of hot air hit me.
Speaker:So we're here with, with author and veteran.
Speaker:Man of many talents, Nick Berg.
Speaker:Nick, thanks so much for, for joining us and, and we're here to talk about,
Speaker:your book, Shadows of Tehran, as well as anything else that comes up during
Speaker:the podcast because as Jenn was saying before we started the official chat here
Speaker:is she's been looking forward to it.
Speaker:To talking to you, and again, as someone who served yourself for about 11 years
Speaker:in the Army, Jenn's a former Navy pilot.
Speaker:I'm, I'm still in.
Speaker:Just super excited to, to talk with someone else who's, writing about, a
Speaker:little bit about your life and kind of some of the history behind that.
Speaker:So can you tell us and, and our listeners and our watchers first a little bit
Speaker:about the book and then we'll just jump off the springboard from there.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:So the book is actually based on my life and it's, it's been.
Speaker:About two years since I started writing this book.
Speaker:And what started the book was all my friends keep saying, oh, you got such a
Speaker:great story, you gotta write this down.
Speaker:And so finally I decided, okay, I'm gonna write it down.
Speaker:And English is my third language.
Speaker:So I'm, I was really trying hard to make sure I understand how to write it
Speaker:for English, English within audience.
Speaker:So I had a. Book coach to help me write the book.
Speaker:He's a 10 times London Times bestseller
Speaker:Oh, cool.
Speaker:he helped me write this book throughout the whole process.
Speaker:But I learned so much writing the book.
Speaker:So you grew up in Iran, you escaped when you were 19, came over to
Speaker:America and, and, and joined the Army.
Speaker:Not too long after that, but aside from your experience, like the
Speaker:first time, 19 years or so of your life there in Iran, what kind of
Speaker:research did you do for the book?
Speaker:Was there, were you just reaching out to friends and family
Speaker:getting their experiences over the period that you covered?
Speaker:Because I think you covered from.
Speaker:The seventies through through the eighties.
Speaker:And was it, was it past that, through the
Speaker:Yeah, it was about early 2000.
Speaker:Early two thousands.
Speaker:So did you do any further research or was it really mostly your
Speaker:experience and then people you knew?
Speaker:I did a lot of research actually to make sure that the events, because memory
Speaker:fails you a lot of times and you see things from a, from a perspective that you
Speaker:understand at the moment and at the time, but it might not be accurate historically.
Speaker:So I, I had to do a lot of research to make sure that historically
Speaker:is accurate because I'm writing it as a historical fiction.
Speaker:What wanted to do is to have to give a people person perspective of how
Speaker:people felt during these events, but the events themselves had to be authentic
Speaker:and had to be accurate in the process.
Speaker:I.
Speaker:So that, that's really neat because
Speaker:Yeah, so I, I understand.
Speaker:So you used a, a character.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You basically built a character based on yourself, but it wasn't you, but
Speaker:that's how you wrote this, which I, I really appreciate because that way you're
Speaker:right, you have to research then because, just because you lived it Scott and I
Speaker:lived Operation Iraqi Freedom operation during Freedom doesn't mean I remember.
Speaker:All of the specifics going on that the politics and the background, right?
Speaker:I'm so focused in on what I'm doing right then and where I'm at.
Speaker:I'm not thinking about all of the other factors that are
Speaker:happening around the world.
Speaker:And so those things are important if you're writing historical fiction,
Speaker:so I can definitely understand that.
Speaker:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:And a lot of people ask me a lot of times why did you write this as a memoir?
Speaker:Why are you writing it as a historical as a fiction?
Speaker:More than that?
Speaker:I think based on everything that I've been in my life, I
Speaker:didn't wanna justify anything.
Speaker:I didn't want it to be me, and I wanted to be a character, and I wanted
Speaker:to be a person separate from me.
Speaker:So going through the whole book, writing, the, the writing
Speaker:process was all about not me.
Speaker:I'm talking about Ricardo and I'm talking about his life in the process.
Speaker:How so did, was there anything like during your research, and I always
Speaker:find this interesting when we get to talk to authors, was there anything
Speaker:during your research that you learned or discovered that either surprised
Speaker:you or you hadn't really known before that kind of changed the way you saw.
Speaker:Some of that, that period of history that you actually lived through,
Speaker:but maybe not had known at the time?
Speaker:Yeah, there were some details detailed things that I wasn't aware
Speaker:of that during the research process I learned at the bigger context.
Speaker:It, it didn't, it was no surprises.
Speaker:Oh my God.
Speaker:Didn't happen the way I think it happened, but it was like understanding
Speaker:that, just like Jenn was saying, is that you're so focused around your,
Speaker:your piece of the pie on this, that you'd miss the bigger picture sometimes.
Speaker:So when we talk about your personal history and what you're using for the
Speaker:historical fiction is you're talking, you're living through the Iranian
Speaker:revolution, that it's kicks off what, in like the 77 but ends in 79 and
Speaker:you're living through this and you are, you have a duality of background
Speaker:because your mother is Iranian and your father is American is, and that's
Speaker:true for your character as well.
Speaker:Now in.
Speaker:I know in your real life, your father leaves when you're seven.
Speaker:Is that true for your character as well?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Now, what is that like in that culture for a father to leave
Speaker:and to be raised by a mother?
Speaker:Is that accepted in the Iranian culture or did you have Yeah,
Speaker:really.
Speaker:Tell me more.
Speaker:Yeah, so my mom, so my mom being a single mother was very difficult on her.
Speaker:And, and I tried to portray that in the book how difficult it was
Speaker:that every time she talked to anybody, any guy in the market or
Speaker:somewhere, they would look at her.
Speaker:The women would come and hold their husbands away, like
Speaker:she was trying to steal them.
Speaker:Oh wow.
Speaker:it it, the culture itself, even though that it was a, it's a modern
Speaker:culture, there's still a lot of those stigmas and stuff around single
Speaker:women, especially at that time.
Speaker:And then after the revolution happened and they took away a lot of
Speaker:the women's rights and those types of things, it became a lot worse.
Speaker:Now she was a single woman living in a house by herself under Islamic government.
Speaker:And it, it, it was a very, very difficult time.
Speaker:And I try to portray that in the book as you read the book, is that
Speaker:there was a reviewer that made a comment that sometimes survival and
Speaker:love are two different things and
Speaker:Oh
Speaker:things for survival.
Speaker:To get through things, and I think the whole stepfather coming into the
Speaker:picture and all of that, it was based more of a survival thing for her than
Speaker:it was a love thing that she wanted to live with this person and all of that.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That, no, that, and that's an interesting kind of observation,
Speaker:especially by a, by a book reviewer.
Speaker:Well, a hundred percent.
Speaker:And that was my experience in the Middle East too.
Speaker:So I, I remember I couldn't really shop in the Suks.
Speaker:I had to have a male with me, because no one's really gonna.
Speaker:Like you said, even make eye contact with me or so to negotiate.
Speaker:You really need a mail with you.
Speaker:And I don't think people really understand that unless they've lived
Speaker:it or seen it or what that's especially from an American Westernized culture,
Speaker:you just don't understand that concept.
Speaker:Now your mother remarried.
Speaker:Is she still in Iran today or did she come to America?
Speaker:still there.
Speaker:wow.
Speaker:And do you
Speaker:still there.
Speaker:and do you go back and visit her?
Speaker:No, I can't go back.
Speaker:Yeah, I, I, I think I saw one of your more recent interviews that said you were,
Speaker:you're a little bit of a, a rabble-rouser, and that's part of the reason why
Speaker:you you escaped the country and was
Speaker:my execution note was out, so I had to escape around
Speaker:Oh, oh my goodness.
Speaker:So explain that to me.
Speaker:I saw execution order.
Speaker:You're 19 years old.
Speaker:What does that look like?
Speaker:What, what does that, when that comes out, is it you and
Speaker:a bunch of people or just you?
Speaker:What,
Speaker:what does that it was your face on a wanted poster or something like that, or.
Speaker:kind of like that.
Speaker:But in, in Iran, during that period of time in one year, they killed over
Speaker:15,000 people of opposition people.
Speaker:They hold executions in the, in the middle of the street.
Speaker:They bring a tractor trailer with a noose on it, and they hang the people there.
Speaker:If they shoot you in order your family to get your body, you have to pay
Speaker:for the bullets, which is a exuberant amount of money to get the body of
Speaker:body of the person they just executed.
Speaker:Wow,
Speaker:It's, at that time, there's no law.
Speaker:Basically, they would just break down the doors, come into your house
Speaker:whenever they please take you away.
Speaker:And sometimes nobody would hear from you.
Speaker:Currently in Iran, there's mass graves that that I mean is miles
Speaker:and miles on mass graves, that the bodies are buried there with no
Speaker:headstones with nothing like that.
Speaker:And people have been trying to talk about it, but it's, they can't.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:I see.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So the execution order comes out with your name on it.
Speaker:And basically it's either you gotta get outta the country or someone's
Speaker:gonna turn you in, or someone's gonna show up at your door and you don't
Speaker:know when and you don't know who.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Now, how do you get outta the country then?
Speaker:So the way I got outta the country was through the Turkish border
Speaker:between Iran and, and that area is where the Kurdish people live in
Speaker:Turkey, Iran, and Northern Iraq.
Speaker:That's where all of the.
Speaker:Kurdish Bedouins have, and they have sheep and have thousands of sheep.
Speaker:And so getting in the middle of the sheep and crossing the border, basically,
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Now, now for the, I think the next part of the book was obviously the ran Iraq
Speaker:conflict that, that took place from 80 to 88 because you weren't there,
Speaker:obviously your perspective was as someone who had, who had just left the
Speaker:no.
Speaker:I was there during the run Iraq war.
Speaker:Oh, you were?
Speaker:Yeah, he was in the army.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So you actually, when you came in the army, like you
Speaker:got sent, you got sent over.
Speaker:Yeah, actually when when I joined, which Iran and, and Iraq War, if you're talking
Speaker:about Iran and Iraq or US and Iraq.
Speaker:Ah, Iran and Iraq.
Speaker:The
Speaker:Iran and Iraq, yeah.
Speaker:The Iran and Iraq War.
Speaker:I was in Iran when it started,
Speaker:Oh, I didn't realize that.
Speaker:I was actually picked up in the middle of the street and
Speaker:thrown into the Iranian army.
Speaker:For about six months fighting with the Iraqis.
Speaker:And I have some scholars from it too because I, and it was basically, it
Speaker:took me six months to prove that because if you are a student, you were exempt.
Speaker:So it took me six months to prove first I'm not Iranian.
Speaker:Second I'm a student.
Speaker:And it took about six months to do that.
Speaker:I had lost a couple of my really good friends, one to chemical
Speaker:attack in Halal in Iraq.
Speaker:I had to carry his body back from the front lines, the, to get to bury him.
Speaker:There were rockets coming down on us pretty much every
Speaker:night watching the fireworks.
Speaker:We would come out into the streets and watch the airplanes bomb, and we
Speaker:would count the bombs because we knew how many bombs each plane could carry.
Speaker:And then we would know when it's when the number of bombs hit a certain amount.
Speaker:Then we would say, okay, it's time to come back out.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And you wrote your, your character again, your experience is all through that.
Speaker:I'll alter that.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So then your execution order doesn't come until the eighties
Speaker:then if you're still in Iran
Speaker:It's onto 8 19 87.
Speaker:1987. Okay.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So when you come to America, how old are you?
Speaker:I'm 19.
Speaker:You are 19 and you come alone.
Speaker:No, mom, are you?
Speaker:mom, no family, didn't know anybody, had $50 in my pocket and landed in Detroit and
Speaker:sat on the bench at the airport figuring out, okay, now what, what am I gonna do
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:And can you speak any English at that time or very little?
Speaker:very little, very broken English.
Speaker:And it was a culture shock.
Speaker:And, and this is the funny part, because my image of America, before that we
Speaker:came to America one time before the revolution in Iran and stuff to look
Speaker:for my dad and we couldn't find him.
Speaker:By the way.
Speaker:I found out my dad works for the CIA the whole time
Speaker:I, I, I saw that in some of your
Speaker:35 years later in Las Vegas,
Speaker:crazy.
Speaker:which is another story around own.
Speaker:But my image of America was from movies and the things that we saw in, in Iran.
Speaker:So at the time, break dancing was really big, and Michael Jackson was
Speaker:the, the, the big thing and all of that.
Speaker:So my image of America was, I'm gonna go to Detroit, I'm gonna join a gang,
Speaker:and I'm gonna break dancing the streets.
Speaker:I love
Speaker:that.
Speaker:That's amazing.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:. So 87, you're sitting on a bench in Detroit and you're
Speaker:like, what am I gonna do now?
Speaker:So what did you do?
Speaker:What?
Speaker:What does your character do?
Speaker:What do you do next?
Speaker:So there was a taxi driver.
Speaker:He was sitting on the bench over there because it was summer day, it was
Speaker:in August, and it was a summer day.
Speaker:It was hot.
Speaker:He was sitting there on the bench with as well.
Speaker:I had my one little suitcase.
Speaker:I'm just sitting there just looking around thinking, okay, now what am I gonna do?
Speaker:And had a conversation with the guy with my broken English, and
Speaker:he said, where are you going?
Speaker:I have no idea.
Speaker:He said, you want to go to a hotel?
Speaker:I'm like, I pulled out my money.
Speaker:I said, this is what I got.
Speaker:He said, that's not going to get you far.
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:So he took me to a YMCA downtown Detroit which he could rent a
Speaker:bed basically for $10 a night.
Speaker:And I rented a bed over there, put my suitcase, locked it up, and went
Speaker:walking the streets to find a job because I thought that's what you do.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I walked into Wendy's and there was this beautiful lady,
Speaker:the that ran was the manager.
Speaker:And, and she asked, I asked her for an app for a job and she gave me
Speaker:an application and she said, and I'm looking at this application.
Speaker:I have no idea what to write in this application.
Speaker:So with my broken English re communicated and she said, so do
Speaker:you have a social security card?
Speaker:I'm like, what is that?
Speaker:Oh my God.
Speaker:Yeah, of
Speaker:I had no idea you needed a social security card.
Speaker:She helped me through this whole process of getting the job and all of that stuff.
Speaker:And my idea at the time was, so I was ripping burgers in the back
Speaker:because my English wasn't very good.
Speaker:So I'm like, okay, this is my career.
Speaker:My dream was to make it to the cash register to be the guy that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's very much like coming to America.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Next week I'll be on fries and then the big buck start rolling in McDonald's.
Speaker:Not McDonald's.
Speaker:Yeah, McDonald's.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So that was my idea of career progression.
Speaker:But there was this strip mall across the street and the Army
Speaker:Police Station in that strip mall.
Speaker:They would come and eat lunch at the Wendy's once in a while.
Speaker:And this gentleman, he would, and every, we started talking and having
Speaker:conversations and stuff and he said, Hey I know you're here and all of this stuff.
Speaker:You want three meals a day as good paycheck, medical benefits.
Speaker:You want a think about signing up for the Army?
Speaker:I'm like, sign me up.
Speaker:This is great.
Speaker:Let's do it.
Speaker:When I took the ASVAB test,
Speaker:That's
Speaker:which I completely bombed it by the way the math and the physics and things like
Speaker:that was good English, not very good.
Speaker:So the only thing I qualified for was infantry
Speaker:that's wild.
Speaker:That's, I mean, that is, that is quite the, quite the story.
Speaker:Now, I think you said too, or at least some of your interviews and
Speaker:I collected some stuff together.
Speaker:You said the Army really?
Speaker:Taught you the life skills and gave you that structure, gave you that
Speaker:foundation to, to, to make your, your, your life here in America.
Speaker:Was that the, the same for your character through the book?
Speaker:It is the same thing for the characters through the book.
Speaker:I mean, army taught me what America is about and it gave me a family
Speaker:that I didn't have and it was, I. Unreal for me, going through basic
Speaker:training and all of that stuff because I went through basic training
Speaker:for three weeks when I was in Iran.
Speaker:Oh yeah,
Speaker:I first, I was really afraid when the sergeants would yell at you and
Speaker:scream at after the first few days, I figured, man, they can't beat you up.
Speaker:I'm.
Speaker:My guys.
Speaker:Oh, they can't, they can't hit me.
Speaker:So the difference between American basic and Iranian basic is the
Speaker:physi, the physicality of what the instructor can do to you.
Speaker:So in Iran, they really could hit you and beat
Speaker:They hit you, they slap you, they throw you around.
Speaker:Oh wow.
Speaker:But in American Army, I figured out all they can do is make me do pushups.
Speaker:I'm like, why not
Speaker:yeah, yeah.
Speaker:do that all little?
Speaker:Well, your perspective was so like, Hey, I got, I got this.
Speaker:And
Speaker:I, and, and I, I think too, all of us who've gone through if anybody's
Speaker:listening or watching, anybody who's gone through bootcamp has that moment.
Speaker:When they realize okay, I can, I can do this right?
Speaker:I can play this game, I can play this game.
Speaker:It was the same for me.
Speaker:And I had, I had nowhere near the experience, you know, doing my
Speaker:Navy version of, of bootcamp when I went through through college.
Speaker:But after a fir, the first few days, after you get used to
Speaker:getting yelled at, I. Same thing.
Speaker:All it can make me do is just do more pushups, and so it's, it's
Speaker:that you have that realization.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Especially for you.
Speaker:You had already been through a much, a much different experience.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I think that's amazing.
Speaker:So how long before you joined the Army were you in America?
Speaker:With about a year.
Speaker:About six months.
Speaker:months.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So I love that you found the Army and IFI love that you found and happy
Speaker:250th birthday to the Army, by the way.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Happy birthday to the Army.
Speaker:I love that you found that because that is what the military does.
Speaker:I really do believe that.
Speaker:It gives you that family, it gives you that sense of community.
Speaker:It builds up you as a person.
Speaker:It teaches you how to those life.
Speaker:Skills.
Speaker:And then it also offers you ways to develop yourself
Speaker:with education and training.
Speaker:And I love that's what you found and you were able to do that.
Speaker:I feel like it's almost like a blessing that happened to you.
Speaker:It was a, it was a great blessing.
Speaker:I owe everything to the army.
Speaker:I mean, my whole life after.
Speaker:Coming to the, to the us I owe it to the Army.
Speaker:And I was so disappointed when I had to leave the Army.
Speaker:And the reason was 'cause I got injured in Bosnia and I couldn't be on the
Speaker:teams anymore and I couldn't do the jump outta airplanes and all of that stuff.
Speaker:So I, it, it was a real disappointment for me that I
Speaker:couldn't finish the whole 20 years.
Speaker:Well, I love that the Army also recognized.
Speaker:Your potential as half Iranian that they could use you in
Speaker:this, in the Middle East, right?
Speaker:And so I'm glad that they able were to recognize that as well.
Speaker:And you were able to do that.
Speaker:What was it like going back in that capacity?
Speaker:What did that feel like?
Speaker:The interesting part was, and, and I never forget that day when the steam
Speaker:port one landed that we spent 17 hours on the Blackbird Steel 1 41 from Pul
Speaker:first base into the Haran airport, when the first Gulf War happened.
Speaker:And I got off that plane because they told us we were going to Turkey.
Speaker:And they opened the door, and this was August 1st.
Speaker:Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2nd,
Speaker:Oh wow.
Speaker:and we opened the door and this rush of hot air hit me.
Speaker:And as soon as he hit me, a friend of mine that was sitting with
Speaker:me, he's oh, we're in Turkey.
Speaker:I'm like, no, we're not.
Speaker:You knew.
Speaker:You knew.
Speaker:I could not forget that.
Speaker:Desert
Speaker:heat.
Speaker:And so when we get off the plane and and get ready, they finally tell us
Speaker:we're in Saudi Arabia and where ex they were expecting Iraq to invade Kuwait.
Speaker:And they pulled us to the right, the edge of Saudi Iraq, Kuwait corner of the area.
Speaker:And I never forget, we were standing there with a bunch of stinger missiles and.
Speaker:Bunch of our weapons and stuff and general luck at the time was
Speaker:the, at Airborne Corps commander.
Speaker:He was in charge and he came up to me and he said, son, see that highway?
Speaker:I'm like, yes, sir. He said, if the Iraqis decide to come into Saudi Arabia,
Speaker:they're gonna come through here and there's two battalion tank battalions
Speaker:sitting at the other end of this highway.
Speaker:What do you think we're gonna do?
Speaker:I said, well, sir, we're just gonna fight with them.
Speaker:He said, we don't have enough ammo or people here to fight the tank batal.
Speaker:I said, well, then we just throw rocks at 'em, sir. He said, yes.
Speaker:The spirit that's.
Speaker:That's, that's what general's looking for.
Speaker:She's just some fight.
Speaker:I just need some fight with my soldiers.
Speaker:We'll figure it out.
Speaker:So that's, that's amazing.
Speaker:How did you feel?
Speaker:Going back to fight
Speaker:how did you, how did that make you feel?
Speaker:And I know that this is a, this is personal.
Speaker:This is not who your character is, but when, when you write a character
Speaker:who's having this duality, and I think that is the biggest thing here.
Speaker:It's survival, it's duality, it's, it's you, you're straddling two worlds here.
Speaker:You're American and Iranian.
Speaker:And what's hard about that is you don't really get accepted by either,
Speaker:but your heart belongs to both.
Speaker:Yeah, and the feeling was okay.
Speaker:I spent all of this time running out of Iran, going through Europe,
Speaker:getting to America, joining the Army.
Speaker:Now here I'm back in the same desert, fighting the same guys from a different
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:But even if Iran would've gotten involved into that war there is a
Speaker:big difference with fighting your people and fighting a government.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:And throughout this whole last few days where all of the attacks on Iran from
Speaker:Israel and all of this happened, everybody keep asking me, so what do you think?
Speaker:I'm like, Israel is not fighting the Iranian people.
Speaker:They're fighting the Islamic government.
Speaker:And I was fighting against that Islamic government before I left Iran.
Speaker:That's why my execution note was out.
Speaker:There's a big separation of difference between the government
Speaker:and the military in Iran as well.
Speaker:So when you hear about the IRGC in Iran, which is the kind of like the
Speaker:Iraqi Republican guards and all of that, they're the defenders of the
Speaker:government, not the defenders of Iran.
Speaker:All of the heads that Israel took out, they're all IRGC commanders.
Speaker:These are the same people that in 2019 and 2022.
Speaker:Suppressed all of the uprising of women life freedom in Iran.
Speaker:They're the same ones that executed a lot of my friends, so I don't
Speaker:see them as representative of Iran.
Speaker:I see them as the Islamic government.
Speaker:Yeah, I, I really appreciate that perspective.
Speaker:'cause that, that very easily gets lost when you're just watching the news and
Speaker:you just, you see the highlights of, hey, bombed, nuclear, facility sites and you
Speaker:just, it's just the country in general.
Speaker:But I, I appreciate that perspective, and that's something that I want our
Speaker:listeners and our, and our viewers to to really listen and, and to think about.
Speaker:It's, to your point, it's, it's the, the, the, the government of the, that
Speaker:aren't really protecting the people.
Speaker:And I think in, in some other spots, you said it's anywhere from 80 to 90%
Speaker:of the people are actually pro western.
Speaker:right.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And they've just been suppressed and I like, I love that because
Speaker:it's real world experience from you this clash of east versus west.
Speaker:Why do you think people don't wanna hear the truth?
Speaker:Like why do you think people think Iran?
Speaker:Iran is.
Speaker:Is all of this, and it's not these people who are being oppressed.
Speaker:And when you think about women's rights in Iran, like I'm telling what rights, right?
Speaker:Like I'm always like talking about the way women are treated there.
Speaker:I I was over there 20 years ago, right?
Speaker:And I made a point to always wear my hair down so that you
Speaker:could see that I was a woman and.
Speaker:What I learned through my military experience is I actually gave hope
Speaker:to those Iranian women that there is a, the westernized culture does
Speaker:support women's rights and do actually see women as being something, being
Speaker:more than just being suppressed.
Speaker:And I wanted to do that to give them hope and I don't know why here
Speaker:in America that's hard for people to see that or understand that.
Speaker:What do you
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So this is a, this is a symptom of the Western culture because the governments
Speaker:are representatives of the people.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:When your government is a representative of people, your military is a
Speaker:representative of your people, so the government and the people,
Speaker:even though you might be on the left, you might be on the right.
Speaker:You might not disagree on a lot of the topics and the decisions and all of
Speaker:that, but the government is the people, and the people is the government.
Speaker:So when you grow up in that type of a society, you don't understand when
Speaker:a dictator runs things on their own.
Speaker:You think the people are supporting 'em.
Speaker:That's why they're in power.
Speaker:a lot of people ask me, so why doesn't people in Iran
Speaker:just overthrow the government?
Speaker:They think it's just like Rich, but it's
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Not that simple.
Speaker:It's, it's a very different way of looking at things and the way
Speaker:different, so in, in America, in Europe, in most of these countries,
Speaker:they feel that the government is theirs.
Speaker:But in Iran, the government is a separate entity.
Speaker:Yeah, that's, that's a great point.
Speaker:And that's something again, I think that we try to talk
Speaker:about through history, right?
Speaker:When we talk about our history topics, we try to try to be cognizant of the lens
Speaker:that we are looking at something through.
Speaker:Whether it's our modern day morals and values and, and what we know of,
Speaker:whether it's like a slavery topic or the American Revolution or whatever it is,
Speaker:we try to be cognizant of our modern day lens that we're looking at it through.
Speaker:But to your point, this is the American Western lens that we're
Speaker:looking at other countries through.
Speaker:So that's, I think that's a really good point.
Speaker:And for, for folks who are history fans and, and, and listeners and, and, and
Speaker:audience of ours, I would, I would.
Speaker:I would hope that they they make that connection because I think
Speaker:that's a really good point.
Speaker:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:And, and the thing is, and and I'm go, I'm gonna break this topic up because
Speaker:I feel very passionate about it.
Speaker:Is, is that when people talk about the Israeli and Gaza war, and there's a lot
Speaker:of people that say, oh my God, those poor people are dying over there, and Israel
Speaker:is bombing them and doing this and doing that, my argument to that is, did you
Speaker:feel the same way when we bombed Berlin?
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:destroy the Nazis.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:There were a lot of innocent people there.
Speaker:There were a lot of women and children that
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:and those were the people that, maybe not all of them, but
Speaker:majority of them elected Hitler.
Speaker:So the thing is, in every war, unfortunately, there is casualties and
Speaker:there is civilian casualties, and there is innocent people that are gonna die.
Speaker:That doesn't change the fact that we have to fight the Just war.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:I know, and people love to use World War II and Nazism as
Speaker:their example for everything.
Speaker:But they never forget the other side of it.
Speaker:Like I always remind people we didn't come into the war.
Speaker:For a long time, right?
Speaker:And we just kinda watched things happen for a long time, America, right?
Speaker:We like to tote ourselves as the heroes, but like for a long
Speaker:time we just let that happen.
Speaker:So imagine if we had the opportunity to bomb areas before they
Speaker:opened the concentration camps.
Speaker:Before they did that.
Speaker:What?
Speaker:Imagine we had that opportunity, what would that have looked like for America?
Speaker:And people don't like to think about that with the modernization of
Speaker:everything, but I really loved your analogy where you talked about your,
Speaker:your character and your book with the mirror and the window, right?
Speaker:So looking at themselves, themselves, their life, who they are and
Speaker:the window, the opportunity.
Speaker:Can you explain that analogy for me?
Speaker:'cause for the, our listeners, because I thought that was just insightful about
Speaker:your character and what they're going through in their personal background
Speaker:and what they're doing in the world with this conflict that's going on.
Speaker:Yeah the way I the message of the book it's, it's really about hope.
Speaker:It's, it's about it's about no matter what you are going through,
Speaker:it's not a basis of comparison.
Speaker:Oh my God, this guy saw a lot of dead bodies.
Speaker:I've never been in that situation and so my life is not as bad.
Speaker:That's not the point.
Speaker:The point is that no matter what life through you, you can't
Speaker:control the external things that into you, but you can make the
Speaker:decision to be a victim or survive.
Speaker:And it's a personal decision, and what changes your life is
Speaker:those series of decisions that you make throughout your life.
Speaker:So what I'm, what I was trying to do with that mirror is look at yourself.
Speaker:Look at the decisions that you have made, and use that window to see
Speaker:what decisions other people have made and what changed their lives
Speaker:and what you can change in your own life in order to be a better person.
Speaker:Yeah, I love that because history, I'm a big fan of history doesn't repeat itself.
Speaker:But it echoes.
Speaker:And if you can learn from history, if you can look through that window
Speaker:of history and see what people did in the past and how they acted, it
Speaker:can give you a good reflection in the mirror of how maybe you can use that
Speaker:knowledge and act and move forward.
Speaker:And I really loved that.
Speaker:Yeah, during my time when I was when I was in Iran and I'm working
Speaker:against the government, the French parties, and were my heroes.
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:I did a lot of reading around World War II and really understanding their tactics,
Speaker:what they did and how they did it, and all of that so that they were my heroes.
Speaker:And so looking at that window was, is how they adapted to live on their Nazis
Speaker:and how that reflected in my life, living under the Islamic government.
Speaker:Now that, that's cool that you.
Speaker:And, and that's what I like about asking and seeing how people research
Speaker:their books and stuff like that.
Speaker:'cause Jenn's working on her on her own historical fiction.
Speaker:And I, I love hearing about how people research because
Speaker:different eras of history, I.
Speaker:Have different resources, right?
Speaker:If you're writing a book about a president, sometimes a president was,
Speaker:kept all sorts of journals and you can get primary source or for you, right?
Speaker:You live through large parts of it, but you're also studying World War ii.
Speaker:And some of the experiences there.
Speaker:'cause I, I think you quoted a couple times, Winston Churchill, or
Speaker:at least attributed him when you're going through, hell keep going.
Speaker:And it seems like kind of like a core tenet of, of you and your character,
Speaker:of going through these, these highs and lows of, of life and through
Speaker:these, through these conflicts.
Speaker:And so it's always interesting to me seeing, and again for our audience,
Speaker:realizing that when you're researching.
Speaker:A, a topic or you're researching for a book.
Speaker:It doesn't have to be just on that area, but you can see, war is
Speaker:different, but it's also the same, throughout, throughout the years.
Speaker:And so the experiences and, and what different societies and cultures
Speaker:and areas of the world go through.
Speaker:While there are very different in every conflict, people are still people.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:So I had a question for you that I, you talk a lot about indoctrination
Speaker:and lies, and you have the people you know are swayed by politics
Speaker:and you say sometimes uneducated.
Speaker:In today's day and age, we even see educated people who are swayed
Speaker:by indoctrination and lies and.
Speaker:It happens in every country.
Speaker:So what, what have you found is the best way to kind of like, is it just
Speaker:getting the stories out there, getting people to just listen instead of talk?
Speaker:Is it getting people to just do their own research?
Speaker:What do you think is the best way to overcome that?
Speaker:Indoctrination and lies.
Speaker:The thing is, is that when we, when I talk about uneducated, I'm not
Speaker:talking about school education,
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:there's a big difference.
Speaker:You could have a PhD and still be in it.
Speaker:Yeah, that's that's very true.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So it, it's not about school education, it's about life
Speaker:education, it's about looking at the past, looking at the history.
Speaker:I'm a big, huge history above.
Speaker:So it's really understanding what happened, what are the
Speaker:things that happened in the past.
Speaker:Everything from when we look at World War I and the causes of
Speaker:the World War I, why it started.
Speaker:Everybody likes to talk about World War ii, but World War I was
Speaker:actually the starter of World War ii.
Speaker:So when you look World War I and what happened there and how Hitler came into
Speaker:power and influenced big populations based on what happened in World War I and how
Speaker:used that to basically, create the Jews as the enemy of Germany and, and all of that.
Speaker:So there's a lot of lessons in there from the propaganda perspective, from
Speaker:understanding how he was able to change minds of people to do all of those things.
Speaker:And then when it comes to religion, it's becomes a
Speaker:completely different picture and.
Speaker:As Nietzche once said, good people will always do good and bad.
Speaker:People will always do bad, but for a good person to do bad, it takes religion.
Speaker:Interesting.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:that is really interest to understand the, your own belief system and what you
Speaker:own Compass in your life is and how you.
Speaker:Look at things and Yeah, especially today with social media and all of these
Speaker:things, there's a lot of influences on you, but do your own research.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I think that's one of the most, one of the most important things we
Speaker:always try to just mention, right?
Speaker:We've done, I don't know how many podcasts now, 150 plus 160,
Speaker:and when we're talking about.
Speaker:Fellow authors or the topics we're always trying to talk about, Hey, this
Speaker:is, these are great places to start.
Speaker:If it's primary source, that's ideal, but if you're reading
Speaker:another author, you gotta make sure you do your own homework, right?
Speaker:We talked about Steven Ambrose not too long ago, and he did some, some
Speaker:amazing things for history and for World War II in the World War II Museum.
Speaker:But he had his own weaknesses as well.
Speaker:And and we always say that doesn't mean that.
Speaker:It's not good information.
Speaker:It just means that you need to make sure that you have the critical
Speaker:thinking skills enough, right?
Speaker:The life experience enough to know Hey, if I have a question about this
Speaker:thing, I shouldn't just always take it in in blind faith as the truth.
Speaker:I should, I should do my own homework, I should do my own research.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So I grew up in my uncle's bookstore.
Speaker:My and it's in the book.
Speaker:My uncle had this really small bookstore that he repaired all antique
Speaker:books and, and things like that.
Speaker:So he was kind like my father.
Speaker:For most of my time in Iran that I, I grew up with.
Speaker:And he, he was a real critical thinker in, in this process and I
Speaker:learned so much from him and inside of that bookstore and and all of that.
Speaker:And he always told me, he said, when you read in the book, keep in mind that
Speaker:that's the perspective of the writer.
Speaker:And remember that the history is always written by the victors.
Speaker:And so there's always another side to
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So
Speaker:a great lesson to learn when you're
Speaker:you're reading these things.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:That's, that's a phenomenal lesson to have built into you at a young age
Speaker:because it's too easy now, especially with the internet and stuff like that.
Speaker:You just, you Google something and you assume that the top couple hits are true.
Speaker:That's not the case.
Speaker:Not not
Speaker:case.
Speaker:Go
Speaker:Now your character in the book, you, you're gonna, you,
Speaker:you wanna write more, right?
Speaker:So where does the story end for your character?
Speaker:What time is the story ending and what, what would be the next follow on to it?
Speaker:So the next book is gonna be finishing Ricardo's story basically, and that would
Speaker:be probably somewhere around 20 18, 20 19.
Speaker:That's where I'm gonna finish his story.
Speaker:The third book is gonna be about my dad
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:okay.
Speaker:because he passed away two years ago.
Speaker:And I spent three weeks before he passed away with and recorded all of his
Speaker:stories to write it as the third book.
Speaker:And he was a Naval intelligent officer.
Speaker:He was a Navy.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Fell fellow Army, Navy.
Speaker:Army, Navy, family.
Speaker:Now, in our research, I saw that you've, you've talked about him, right?
Speaker:He had worked for, was it CIA or was it Navy intelligence?
Speaker:Yeah, he worked for the CIA quite an, sounds like his story
Speaker:would be quite interesting.
Speaker:So can you touch a little bit on, on him and maybe what you'll write in that book?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:His story, he was, he was in Vietnam during the Vietnam War and his ship
Speaker:docked in Iran at the time in the sixties, and that's where he met my mom and.
Speaker:He was actually was supposed to be in Iran, and he was leaving
Speaker:the Navy and coming to Iran.
Speaker:And after I found him 35 years later in Las Vegas, I asked him, I said so, because
Speaker:then I found out that I have a whole bunch of half-sisters and brothers in Egypt, in
Speaker:Lebanon, in couple other places as well.
Speaker:And I asked him, I said, so why do you have so many women
Speaker:and families and all of that?
Speaker:And his answer was having a family is the best cover.
Speaker:Oh my gosh.
Speaker:You know when I read that about you and I was talking to
Speaker:Scott, CIA, I'm like his dad.
Speaker:Sounds like the typical James Bond from the, from the work we have
Speaker:done with people like your dad.
Speaker:I. That is the best cover, and I wasn't surprised to hear that you had, he had
Speaker:other families, because that was even my experience working with those people
Speaker:Yeah, but one thing I say about my dad, he wasn't an emotional person.
Speaker:He wasn't in my life for a very long time, and but he did work with the
Speaker:US Army and directed a lot of the things that I did in the US Army.
Speaker:He knew exactly where I was, what I was doing, and he had complete insight into
Speaker:everything from the time I left Iran.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And I didn't know he was there.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:That's, that's gotta be, I mean, h how, what did that feel like when
Speaker:you found out that he had he, he had that insight oversight on your life.
Speaker:Was that kind of a relief?
Speaker:Was that like, I, I imagine you must have had some mixed feelings about that.
Speaker:I working with special operations in the Army.
Speaker:I understood him.
Speaker:Ah, okay.
Speaker:Of course, yeah, you could, you, you had a little bit of insight
Speaker:already so you could categorize
Speaker:my sister is completely the opposite of me.
Speaker:She's oh my God, he's an idiot.
Speaker:He's this, he's that.
Speaker:He didn't take care of us, he, all of that.
Speaker:But I completely understood him.
Speaker:I only completely understood his mentality.
Speaker:For him, it was country and his job, that's all he cared about in his life.
Speaker:Everything else was a vehicle to get the job done.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:It's, it sounds like quintessential James bond, right?
Speaker:That, that unforgiving love of country, right?
Speaker:Like it make it, you just, whatever it takes for that love of country and.
Speaker:I, I'll be honest with you, between, between our listeners
Speaker:and you, we need people like that.
Speaker:And so I'm thankful for people like your father.
Speaker:Yes, we do.
Speaker:We, we need people like that.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Right on.
Speaker:That's good.
Speaker:So if, if people want to find your book, if they wanna find more about
Speaker:you and keep track of you and, and look for your future books, because I
Speaker:think that, I mean, I, I'm, I'm gonna probably order your book because I
Speaker:just think it sounds so fascinating.
Speaker:I'm enjoying this, this conversation and I think the future books
Speaker:will be just as interesting.
Speaker:Where, where's the best place for, for folks to, to find you and
Speaker:So my website pn berg.com.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:That's, and by the way, I go by Nick because it was easier.
Speaker:My first name is Pedro.
Speaker:That's why I named the character Ricardo.
Speaker:And with the last name, which is Berg, which is sounds Jewish and in in Iran.
Speaker:And you saw on all those comments and everything else they're talking
Speaker:about that he might be Jewish.
Speaker:I'm not Jewish.
Speaker:My mom was Raan, actually she was a Muslim.
Speaker:I grew up as a Zora and, everybody called me the Spanish
Speaker:Jewish person with the Iranian background that never fit anywhere.
Speaker:So the, the, the book, they can find it on my website, pburg.com.
Speaker:The book's available everywhere.
Speaker:Book sold.
Speaker:Amazon, Barnes and Noble.
Speaker:Any of the local bookstores, they can, they can find it there.
Speaker:We, we really appreciate you joining us today and, and telling us, about your,
Speaker:your life and your, your book and, and all the stuff that's around that because
Speaker:it is chockfull of not only history, but.
Speaker:I mean, you're the primary source in this, for a lot of this stuff, which
Speaker:is, which is fun for, for us as, as as history nerds, well, history nerd and,
Speaker:and, and aspiring, married to a history nerd right here, as I joke all the time.
Speaker:But it, it's fun to be able to, I. Learn about the research you did, but also
Speaker:that you are part of the primary source, which is, which is pretty unique for us.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And the book is called, Yes.
Speaker:The book is called Shadows of Teran, and I want people to understand we're
Speaker:living in the shadows of teran right now.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So if you wanna read something, learn something that is based in real history of
Speaker:what is happening in the world today, this would be a great book for you to start.
Speaker:So we thank you for joining us today.
Speaker:It was a great conversation.
Speaker:We are praying for your mom and your family over there, we hope.
Speaker:fine right now.
Speaker:I talked to her yesterday.
Speaker:She's fine.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And uh.
Speaker:The, the, the biggest thing is, is coming to America and living here,
Speaker:I really appreciate everything that this country has done for me.
Speaker:And, there is no greater place to live.
Speaker:And so I was talking to somebody, I said, if America changes and goes away the way
Speaker:it is today, there's nowhere else to go.
Speaker:That's it.
Speaker:Yeah, that's so true.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Look at that.
Speaker:You got this one.
Speaker:I got this one.
Speaker:Emotional.
Speaker:Well, thanks again and again for our watchers and our listeners.
Speaker:I'll have all the information for Nick's book down in the show
Speaker:notes and the video description.
Speaker:I'll flash some stuff up on the screen as well.
Speaker:But thank you again, Nick, for joining us and and for our audience,
Speaker:we'll talk to you guys next time.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So what'd you guys think of our interview , with Nick?
Speaker:There was.
Speaker:More surprises to me, even after I'd done my research and looked at his other
Speaker:podcast and interviews he's been on,
Speaker:, we even found out he was a little starstruck talking to us because he's
Speaker:been following us for a couple years.
Speaker:But what'd you guys think of that, Jen?
Speaker:What'd you think of the interview?
Speaker:I felt like it was so validating about where America is today, about our
Speaker:love of country, our love of, serving.
Speaker:, in, , in the greatest military in the world.
Speaker:But he really put a lot of perspective as someone who grew up through it all and
Speaker:what's happening today, what he's seeing today, I loved his perspective, his
Speaker:point of view, historical fiction, writing about what's going on today from a real
Speaker:life perspective of someone who lived it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:, and it sounds like he's got a couple more books coming out
Speaker:that are even more interesting.
Speaker:Like the, the story about his father having worked for the, the Navy in
Speaker:the intelligence world, and then the CIA and then he found out he's got.
Speaker:A bunch of half brothers and sisters all spread throughout
Speaker:the, throughout the globe.
Speaker:, it was just a fascinating interview.
Speaker:Nick was such a, a positive person and I, I just so enjoyed talking
Speaker:to him as a fellow veteran.
Speaker:, someone who had served in the Army for 11 years and would've
Speaker:done more if he could have.
Speaker:, and now he's getting this story out there.
Speaker:It's fun to talk to someone who is a primary source.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:That is incredibly rare for us.
Speaker:, I don't know if we could ever really say that.
Speaker:, and the fact that he not only researched what happened there in the Middle
Speaker:East, but other wars to help fill out some of the experiences of the
Speaker:characters in his story, which I just thought was a really interesting way.
Speaker:I Interesting piece of how authors do what they do.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And as historians, you, we know you love this podcast in, in
Speaker:this show because of history.
Speaker:If you wanna learn more about what's happening in the world
Speaker:today, this would be a great book.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:This would be a great way to start.
Speaker:Just get, get your feet wet in someone who's lived through this
Speaker:Iranian revolution, then through the Iranian Iraq war, then
Speaker:coming to America and going back.
Speaker:It really is.
Speaker:A great foundation to where America is today and all of these different
Speaker:conflicts that are going on.
Speaker:, it gives you a great understanding of this from our generation.
Speaker:So yeah, I really think this was.
Speaker:A wonderful interview for us to do and , we don't really do a lot of like
Speaker:current events, but I feel like this is very important and the history of
Speaker:it is important for everyone to learn.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So if you want a book with good story that's well researched, that's accurate
Speaker:because he took his time making sure it was accurate and not just biased from
Speaker:his, from his view, from going through it.
Speaker:That will help explain what's going on in the world today and give you
Speaker:some knowledge and foundation in that.
Speaker:Check out shadows of Tehran.
Speaker:Links are in the video description or podcast show notes below.
Speaker:We hope you enjoyed this, this podcast, and our interview with Nick,
Speaker:and we'll talk to you next time.
Speaker:Thank you.
