It's been widely and erroneously reported that I moved to Iran in 2008 because of a love affair with my ancestral homeland.

It's the sort of detail that seeps into an ongoing news story often enough that it becomes fact.

In this case, though, I have the opportunity and responsibility to set the record straight.

Jason Rezion did some traveling to and from Iran in his mid-20s and early 30s.

He was born and raised in California's Bay Area where his Iranian dad sold Persian rugs.

In 2008, he took up the family business and opened his own rug shop in San Francisco.

That venture crashed because of 2008 along with the rest of the U.S. economy.

Jason was 32, he was single and he didn't have a job.

But on these various trips he'd take to Iran, he'd write stories here and there about Iranian culture and society.

So after he lost his business, he decided that's what he was going to do full time.

In 2009, on what he calls his Jesus year, Jason packed up his things.

Yes, it was out of attraction that I finally, after years of brushing up against it and later

longer drawn out encounters, moved in with Iran. But this wasn't an unconditional thing.

It was definitely not meant to be. I had to put in a lot of effort to make it work.

Iran was the slightly less polished, funnier sister with real depth who never dated much in school.

Iran wasn't flashy and sexy on the surface. Iran's not France or Japan, but it's not like it's hard

to love either. It's just Iran. And for a time, Jason was thriving there. He landed a gig as the

Washington Post, Tehran Buro chief. He married a successful Iranian journalist named Yagane, he calls

her Yagi. And Yagi and Jason had a beautiful apartment and a cool part of Tehran, lots of friends.

He even played tour guide for Anthony Bourdain. The spell it cast on me was slow to come on, but

ultimately very powerful. It can be a hard place. Look at the dry and rocky landscape or Tehran's pollution.

That's capable of incredible tenderness. Some of the softest people you'd ever want to meet.

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