Do shanbeh The post-election lull. I wind down by further loosening my already quite loose collar and inviting a couple of young Basiji militiamen to my home for an evening of board games. We start with Scrabble. The first Basiji scores 11 and the second scores 32. Then I score 11,073.

“Seriously?” says one Basiji. Then the other one hits him with an iron bar. Hurriedly, the first Basiji insists that he’s not accusing me of cheating. “It’s just an unexpectedly large number of points,” he explains. “If you’d said 50, I’d probably have let it go. But 11,073? It’s just not plausible.” The other one hits him with the iron bar again.

“Brother,” I say, gently. “Why this dissent? Am I not an honourable man? Was it not a triple-word score? And is it not clear that 95 per cent of the people in this room consider me to be the clear winner?”

The first Basiji spits out a tooth. “But . . . there . . . are only three of us here,” he mumbles. “And even if you’d had the Q and and the X . . .” His friend hits him a third time and he slumps on to the table. “Now,” I say, clapping my hands. “Monopoly?”

Se shanbeh A splendid game, in the end, during which the first Basiji had no houses, his friend achieved four or five hotels, and I managed to have everywhere from Piccadilly to Mayfair covered in little plastic models of the Empire State Building and the Forbidden Palace.

And then, to the airport. Today I am at a very important regional conference in Russia. President Medvedev is wearing a very expensive suit.

“Nice of you to wear a tie,” he says, archly, and offers to lend me a razor.

“I am a humble man,” I tell him.

Medvedev sighs. They’re all on my side, he says. Obviously. Him, Chávez, the Chinese. All the famously sensible world leaders. But when I appear with them, looking like the American detective Colombo after a night on a park bench, it just lowers the tone. Don’t I know that Tehran is burning?

“I blame the Zionists,” I tell him. “They stole your washbag?” he asks.

Chaar shanbeh Actually, it’s kind of awkward. Between you and me, I don’t even know how to tie a tie. I do have a clip-on one, for emergencies, but it’s bright green. Probably best not.

Still in Russia. Protests continue. A crisis phone call from the Supreme Ruler of all Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei. “Kh-aye-main-ah-ee,” he corrects me, and then sighs.

We have a problem, he says. It’s not just that I faked the election results. It’s that I faked them so incredibly badly. It’s made the whole Islamic revolution look really slapdash. “And who has to hold it all together?” he says. “Muggins here, that’s who. I’ll have to make a speech to the nation on Friday.” If anybody can do it, I tell him, he can. After all, he’s the Ayatolla Khamenei. “Kh-ahman-ay-eye,” he says.

“I’m sure that’s not what you said last time,” I say.

The Supreme Leader gives a guilty chuckle. He admits he keeps changing it to confuse the BBC.

Panj shanbeh Back in Iran. Medvedev keeps calling. Really annoying. Before I left yesterday, we all went out for lunch. When the bill came, I just chucked some coins on the table.

“That should pay my share,” I said, loudly, “which I calculate to be 2 per cent!” President Medvedev frowned. “There are only five of us here,” he said. “And we all ate the same.” If I’d said 10 per cent, added Hugo Chávez, they’d have let it go. But 2 per cent?

That’s just rude. It’s like I think they’re all morons. That was when I legged it to the airport. Didn’t have an iron bar.

Jome “Well,” says the Supreme Leader, after addressing the nation at Friday prayers. “That should have fixed it. Or my name’s not Ayatollah Kh-ah-mee-nay-aye!” “And is it?” I ask. The Ayatollah shrugs. “Lost track,” he says. “Now. What was the other cock-up?”

“Restaurant bill,” I say, meekly.

“Ah yes,” he sighs, and I hand him the phone.

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