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"On July 31, 2009, while hiking in a beautiful mountainous area in Iraqi Kurdistan near the border of Iran, Americans Shane Bauer, 28, his fianc&amp;amp;eacute;e, Sarah Shourd, 32, and their friend Josh Fattal, 28, were arrested by Iranian forces and accused of spying. Since then, Sarah has been in solitary confinement; Shane and Josh share a tiny cell. (Sarah recently found a lump in her breast but is being denied medical care, she told her mother in a rare phone call after this interview.) The three are in Iran&amp;amp;#8217;s notorious Evin prison, where the regime often holds its political prisoners. The latest word from Iran is that the hikers may eventually be put on trial, but back in the United States their families are fighting to free them now. I can&amp;amp;#8217;t imagine how frustrated and powerless they must feel. Recently I sat down with Shane&amp;amp;#8217;s two sisters&amp;amp;#8212;Shannon Bauer, 24, of Boulder, Colorado, and Nicole Lindstrom, 26, of Duluth, Minnesota&amp;amp;#8212;to find out how they&amp;amp;#8217;re handling this ordeal. KATIE COURIC: Take us back to the day in 2009 when you found out that Shane, Sarah and Josh had been detained by Iranian authorities. It must have been surreal. SHANNON BAUER: I was at work at the YMCA [in Boulder], and we had just gotten about 40 kids out of the pool. We were joking around, and then my boss told me that my mom was calling and trying to get a hold of me. I knew right away that something was wrong. KATIE COURIC: That must&amp;amp;#8217;ve been frightening. SHANNON BAUER: I called her, and she said that Shane was taken. I broke down right away. Part of me thought, It&amp;amp;#8217;s all a misunderstanding and it&amp;amp;#8217;ll be figured out by tomorrow. I never would&amp;amp;#8217;ve guessed that it would still be going on now. KATIE COURIC: What about you, Nicole? It&amp;amp;#8217;s so traumatic to get scary news. Did you feel you were walking around in a fog after you found out Shane had been detained? NICOLE LINDSTROM: My initial thought when my mom told me was of the things you see in the news when journalists are taken hostage and then there are videos released with guns to their heads. KATIE COURIC: A lot of people might wonder what Shane, Sarah and Josh were doing hiking in Iraq. What drew them to that area? It&amp;amp;#8217;s an unusual vacation spot for Americans, right? NICOLE LINDSTROM: Shane and Sarah were living in Damascus, Syria. Sarah was teaching English, and Shane was doing freelance journalism and photography. And Josh came to visit them. Sarah had a week off from teaching, so they all were going to take a vacation. This place was close, and it was a tourist destination for that area. SHANNON BAUER: They were going to a waterfall in Ahmed Awa. They&amp;amp;#8217;d heard so much about this spot, but no one said it was dangerous. Shane and Sarah and Josh are all really avid outdoor people. And Damascus is a really big city. So I know they were getting antsy being there all the time. Shane is so responsible about his traveling. He&amp;amp;#8217;s lived in the Middle East on and off for seven years, and he speaks Arabic, so it&amp;amp;#8217;s not like he&amp;amp;#8217;s just living in Damascus and doesn&amp;amp;#8217;t know anything about the culture or the language or anything. KATIE COURIC: It must be very difficult not knowing what is going on&amp;amp;#8212;that must be one of the hardest parts of all this. NICOLE LINDSTROM: Yeah, it seems like there&amp;amp;#8217;s nothing we can do to change the situation, and we almost just have to sit and wait. I mean, obviously we&amp;amp;#8217;re going to do anything and everything we can, but it feels like we&amp;amp;#8217;re almost in the same spot as we were a year ago. KATIE COURIC: Your mom and Sarah&amp;amp;#8217;s and Josh&amp;amp;#8217;s moms were allowed to see all three of them in Iran in May. How did you feel after that trip? SHANNON BAUER: When they came back without Shane, Sarah and Josh, it was discouraging. The whole trip was crazy for all of us. We didn&amp;amp;#8217;t know we were going see them on TV. KATIE COURIC: How did they look to you? NICOLE LINDSTROM: Shane was pale. SHANNON BAUER: And he had really dark circles under his eyes. KATIE COURIC: Did they all look much thinner? SHANNON BAUER: They were all thin. They all work out, like, two hours a day. NICOLE LINDSTROM: At least. SHANNON BAUER: They have really strict schedules to get through the day and break things up. KATIE COURIC: What do they do? How do they spend their days? NICOLE LINDSTROM: For an hour or so Shane and Josh run back and forth in their cell, which is small, like 6 by 9 or 9 by 9. They just run back and forth. And then they do weight lifting with their bed and bags of water. SHANNON BAUER: They get to see Sarah twice a day. KATIE COURIC: She&amp;amp;#8217;s in solitary confinement. How long are those visits for? SHANNON BAUER: They see her half an hour each time. When they get together, they said they sometimes discuss certain books or memorize a poem together. NICOLE LINDSTROM: They sing together. KATIE COURIC: I&amp;amp;#8217;m sure they have to figure out ways to keep themselves from losing their minds. NICOLE LINDSTROM: Yeah. They read one encyclopedia several times. And Shane said that they were reading a dictionary for a while, too, before they got actual books, just to read anything. KATIE COURIC: Is there any indication of how they&amp;amp;#8217;re being treated by their captors? Are they being abused in any way? SHANNON BAUER: They weren&amp;amp;#8217;t able to speak a lot about what&amp;amp;#8217;s going on there but said that they haven&amp;amp;#8217;t been physically hurt. But this whole situation is so psychologically and emotionally draining. KATIE COURIC: In statements, the Iranian government has accused Shane and Sarah and Josh of spying, though they have not been formally charged. What&amp;amp;#8217;s your reaction to that accusation? NICOLE LINDSTROM: The fact that they would accuse them of spying is just ridiculous to all of us. They&amp;amp;#8217;re the last people who would be spies. SHANNON BAUER: I just don&amp;amp;#8217;t think he has it in him to be sneaky enough to do it. It&amp;amp;#8217;s just not how they are. They&amp;amp;#8217;re all just really good people, and they love other cultures. KATIE COURIC: Recently an article in The Nation, which Shane had written for, suggested that he, Sarah and Josh didn&amp;amp;#8217;t cross the border into Iran and that they were seized in Iraq by Iranian forces. Has there been any impact of that article? SHANNON BAUER: I think it&amp;amp;#8217;s had an impact as far as people here understanding more of what went on. But there hasn&amp;amp;#8217;t been anything from Iran. KATIE COURIC: Have you been frustrated with the U.S. government&amp;amp;#8217;s response? Or do you feel as if the administration officials are doing all they can? I mean, I would be going crazy in the middle of the State Department. I would want someone somewhere to take charge of this for me on my behalf and on my brother&amp;amp;#8217;s behalf. NICOLE LINDSTROM: It&amp;amp;#8217;s definitely frustrating that the two countries don&amp;amp;#8217;t communicate. I just want to shake someone and be like, &amp;amp;#8220;Just call. Talk to each other and get this resolved.&amp;amp;#8221; But that&amp;amp;#8217;s not how it is. KATIE COURIC: How is it? NICOLE LINDSTROM: They communicate through the Swiss. SHANNON BAUER: Until Shane and Sarah and Josh are home, no one will be doing enough in our eyes. It&amp;amp;#8217;s hard knowing they&amp;amp;#8217;re potentially paying the price for disagreements between countries they have no control over. KATIE COURIC: And you all are trying to keep this in the public eye, but do you wonder if publicity actually could hurt the cause? It&amp;amp;#8217;s a delicate balance, isn&amp;amp;#8217;t it? NICOLE LINDSTROM: Yeah. We weigh things every time we decide to do an interview. SHANNON BAUER: At this point, we do something one way, nothing happens, we try it another way. So we&amp;amp;#8217;re changing it all the time. But the frustrating part is, there&amp;amp;#8217;s no way of knowing what&amp;amp;#8217;s helping or not. KATIE COURIC: How are your parents doing through all this? NICOLE LINDSTROM: You can&amp;amp;#8217;t really explain what we all go through. You wake up, and this is what you&amp;amp;#8217;re thinking about. It&amp;amp;#8217;s always there, hanging heavily on you. KATIE COURIC: I know that Shane and Sarah got engaged. They probably didn&amp;amp;#8217;t have much of an engagement party. SHANNON BAUER: We did! We went for ice cream for them because Shane really likes sweet things. KATIE COURIC: Thank goodness they have each other. I can&amp;amp;#8217;t imagine being all by yourself in a situation like that. SHANNON BAUER: Yeah, and I know that when they&amp;amp;#8217;re together, Shane is doing absolutely anything he can for Sarah. I feel like his day is probably in some ways consumed with thinking about her and worrying about how she&amp;amp;#8217;s doing. KATIE COURIC: When people ask you about your brother, how do you describe him? NICOLE LINDSTROM: He&amp;amp;#8217;s very smart and bright and responsible, but he&amp;amp;#8217;s also a big goofball. We love just to get together and goof around and laugh and be silly. SHANNON BAUER: When we&amp;amp;#8217;re together, just as our family, it&amp;amp;#8217;s a totally different side of Shane. We&amp;amp;#8217;ll laugh so hard. Right before he and Sarah flew to Damascus, they stayed with me in Boulder. And we&amp;amp;#8217;re driving down the road&amp;amp;#8212;when we were kids, we used to dry our mouths out and fold our lips in so you could only see our teeth and our gums. [Laughs.] So Shane and I were sticking our heads out of the window so we could do it again. He&amp;amp;#8217;s so goofy. And he will support Nicole and me with anything we decide in life. I think that&amp;amp;#8217;s one of the things I miss the most. I still feel it from him. Not being able to just call and talk to him&amp;amp;#8212;I miss Shane a lot. After my mom got back, she brought messages for us. KATIE COURIC: What were his messages to you? NICOLE LINDSTROM: He thinks about Shannon and me all the time, and he thinks he&amp;amp;#8217;s relived every childhood memory we ever had. SHANNON BAUER: He said that he thinks about Nicole and me more than anyone else and that he&amp;amp;#8217;s really worried about us, which doesn&amp;amp;#8217;t surprise me, because that&amp;amp;#8217;s Shane. KATIE COURIC: Typical big brother? SHANNON BAUER: Yeah. And I wrote him that when I see ravens, I think about him and I just feel like he&amp;amp;#8217;s there. And he said that he sees ravens hanging outside his prison cell a lot, and they make him think about me. NICOLE LINDSTROM: He also said that I need to go back to school. I was supposed to go last fall, and then I didn&amp;amp;#8217;t, because of this. And he also told both of us that he wants us to go out for hikes and drink coffee and just write to him about these things. SHANNON BAUER: Like, simple things. NICOLE LINDSTROM: It helps him to escape a little bit. KATIE COURIC: To live vicariously through what you&amp;amp;#8217;re doing? SHANNON BAUER: Yeah. I had taken time off from school, and he talked about how that meant a lot to him and he&amp;amp;#8217;s really happy I was going back. KATIE COURIC: It sounds like he feels guilty for disrupting your lives in a way. SHANNON BAUER: Yeah, I think he does. And, like, it&amp;amp;#8217;s obviously not something that&amp;amp;#8212;it&amp;amp;#8217;s our choice. But that&amp;amp;#8217;s Shane. KATIE COURIC: You both, as you&amp;amp;#8217;ve said, have taken time off from school and work. What have you been doing to fight for Shane and Sarah and Josh&amp;amp;#8217;s release? SHANNON BAUER: Well, we check an infinite amount of e-mail every day. All three families are kind of one big family at this point. KATIE COURIC: That&amp;amp;#8217;s pretty remarkable, because there are few situations as tense and fraught with anxiety as this one is. SHANNON BAUER: Yeah, and we don&amp;amp;#8217;t agree on everything, by any means. But we always talk through to a consensus. We know that any decision we make won&amp;amp;#8217;t affect [just] one of them. NICOLE LINDSTROM: It&amp;amp;#8217;ll affect all three of them. SHANNON BAUER: Yeah. And there are calls with the State Department, family calls, calls with our lawyer, and then just working on different letters to leaders, and media, vigils. KATIE COURIC: We have two questions from people who read Glamour. Leslie Bullock wants to know, &amp;amp;#8220;How do you think negotiations to have the hikers released, or the lack of negotiations, will affect U.S.-Iranian relations, which are already strained?&amp;amp;#8221; NICOLE LINDSTROM: I see it more as the other way around. How does their negotiating affecting Shane, Sarah and Josh? SHANNON BAUER: I honestly think if the U.S. put forward goodwill gestures, and Iran did the same by releasing them, then that would only improve their relationship. It all depends on how both countries handle it. But right now the only things being kept apart are our families. KATIE COURIC: Jamie Mason wants to know, &amp;amp;#8220;What keeps your hope alive?&amp;amp;#8221; She adds, &amp;amp;#8220;A lot of people in today&amp;amp;#8217;s world could benefit from hearing your answer.&amp;amp;#8221; NICOLE LINDSTROM: Just thinking, This will end. But most of all, the support we&amp;amp;#8217;re getting from everyone else. There&amp;amp;#8217;s no way we could do this without support from other people. SHANNON BAUER: Our family was already really close&amp;amp;#8212;but just having the family that I have and then being able to reach out to Sarah&amp;amp;#8217;s and Josh&amp;amp;#8217;s families. There are so few people who can relate to this experience. So having them to talk to and then feeling Shane&amp;amp;#8217;s support and knowing he&amp;amp;#8217;s here with us. KATIE COURIC: You both have the same necklace. Tell me about that. SHANNON BAUER: It&amp;amp;#8217;s by Sarah Taylor, a jewelry designer in Canada. She made &amp;amp;#8220;Free the Hikers&amp;amp;#8221; necklace and is donating the money to the campaign to free Shane and Sarah and Josh (for more information, see http://www.sarahtaylordesigns.net/free_the_hikers_fundraiser). KATIE COURIC: Have you all become more religious from dealing with this? Were you religious before? Do you pray more now? NICOLE LINDSTROM: I wouldn&amp;amp;#8217;t say more religious, but I&amp;amp;#8217;ve learned to take time for myself through this because the pressure&amp;amp;#8217;s always on. I&amp;amp;#8217;ve learned to go out for a hike or go down to the lake and just to be out in nature. KATIE COURIC: Not to sound corny, but to seek an inner peace. SHANNON BAUER: Yeah. KATIE COURIC: I&amp;amp;#8217;m sure you have to find a way to do that or you would go crazy. And plus, I wonder if Shane&amp;amp;#8217;s telling your mom that you all, on his behalf, should enjoy your life and appreciate the things he can&amp;amp;#8217;t has probably given you a much stronger appreciation for things we all take for granted every day, like just having a hot cup of coffee. SHANNON BAUER: Yeah. I wouldn&amp;amp;#8217;t say I&amp;amp;#8217;m more religious, but I think I am getting a firmer understanding of my spirituality more. Just being outside. I go hiking every weekend. KATIE COURIC: You all are very outdoorsy. SHANNON BAUER: [Laughs.] Yeah, and I&amp;amp;#8217;ve started to run. And I think that just doing those things helps me to connect with myself more and then helps me to connect with Shane and stay as grounded as I can in this situation, which is a lot easier said than done most times. KATIE COURIC: I can&amp;amp;#8217;t imagine what a nightmare this has been. NICOLE LINDSTROM: It is for Shane, Sarah and Josh&amp;amp;#8212;they&amp;amp;#8217;re sitting in a cell. At least we can go for a walk. We&amp;amp;#8217;re all holding our breath for something good to happen. KATIE COURIC: Well, I sure hope they come home soon. SHANNON BAUER: Thank you. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/magazine/2010/09/a-katie-couric-interview-with-shannon-and-nicole-bauer-our-brother-is-not-a-spy>