The graphic memoir opens in Austria, where there is no requirement to wear a veil. Marjane feels that she has gained liberation from the enforcement of the dress code of modesty required in Iran. In the memoir, the veil thus symbolizes female repression under fundamentalist Islamic control.

When her mother visits Marjane in Austria, she comments openly about how lovely it is to have her hair free. She means so much more than this as she smokes openly in public and walks freely in western garb along the streets of Vienna. When Marjane decides to go back to Iran after her breakup with Markus, the first thing she does is don the veil. She makes the decision to trade her rights as a woman of equal status (though the women in the novel still experience sexism in Austria) in order to go home.

Importantly, when Marjane and her counterculture peers are at parties or behind closed doors, no veil is present. They feel free to express themselves and be themselves when the regime isn’t watching. When wearing the mandatory veil under the regime, Marjane feels that she is repressed because the veil is not a matter of free choice but rather a gendered obligation.