Interview | Growing Up Irooni- Moj Mahdara on the Iranian Diaspora Collective
Learn Persian with Chai and Conversation
Chai & Conversation
4.9 • 548 Ratings
🗓️ 25 January 2023
⏱️ 55 minutes
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Summary
This interview with Moj is the first I've done for the Growing Up Irooni series since the death of Mahsa Amini on September 16th. So much has changed since then for Iran and especially for the Iranian Diaspora. As one of the cofounders of Iranian Diaspora Collective, I couldn't think of a better person to talk through these changes than Moj Mahdara. They are a venture capitalist and very well known in that world, but before the events that took place in September, they admittedly weren't too involved in or interested in the Iranian diaspora community. But the events stirred a worldwide movement and feeling of connection within the diaspora community, and we talked through that together!
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| 0:00.0 | Learn Persian with Chai and |
| 0:31.0 | conversation and host of the Growing Up Etony interview series. |
| 0:35.0 | So as many of you know, I recently gave birth to a daughter, little Effie. |
| 0:39.3 | She was born on October 1st of this year, just a couple weeks after Massa Amini was killed in Iran, |
| 0:44.7 | and the Zanzan Degi Ozadi movement began. So before that, I'd done a few interviews, and they |
| 0:50.1 | were ready to be published after my due date. but then after Master Ani, none of them seemed |
| 0:55.5 | really relevant or even appropriate to publish anymore. So all of this is to say that this interview |
| 1:01.2 | with Morge, one of the co-founders of the Iranian Diaspora Collective, is the first one I've done |
| 1:06.9 | since the birth of my daughter and the birth of this movement, really. |
| 1:17.1 | Moj is an incredibly strong figure of the movement. They are an entrepreneur and CEO and currently a venture capitalist as two funds. We talked about their upbringing, connection |
| 1:21.8 | to Iranian culture and the Persian language, and what led them to co-found this incredible |
| 1:26.2 | organization, Iranian diaspora collective, a non-partisan co-found this incredible organization, Iranian Diaspora |
| 1:28.0 | Collective, a non-partisan multi-faith group that is inclusive of multiple backgrounds, |
| 1:33.2 | genders, and LGBTQ plus identity, and includes leaders in business, tech, media, entertainment, |
| 1:39.5 | fashion, beauty, and more. And that has been so active and effective at spreading the message of this |
| 1:45.9 | movement and getting members of the diaspora involved. So with no further ado, here's my interview |
| 1:51.5 | with Moj Mahdara. Yeah, Moj Mahdara, thank you so much for talking with me today. You are |
| 1:58.2 | more than welcome. I just wanted to start with the very beginning of |
| 2:03.2 | where did you grow up and where were you born? I was born in Lexington, Kentucky. My parents had come here |
| 2:10.1 | late 60s, early 70s separately to get an education. My mom is super educated. Her parents were in favor of her coming to the United |
| 2:19.4 | States to join her older brother and her sister to get an education. My dad was in his whole family |
| 2:26.5 | is a lineage of chemical engineers working with an oil. And they both got a scholarship recruiting into a feeder school into the |
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