An Aussie Abroad

Day 106: Iran Post-Script

It was with a touch of disappointment that I flew out of Iran yesterday.  I really had a delightful three weeks in the country, yet it was also one of my most profound travel experiences.  It wasn't just that it was a great travel destination - a really "different" part of the world with so much to see and do, surprisingly easy to get around, super-cheap, and hardly any tourists - but because every day showed me something surprising, interesting and new about the Iranian people.

They have a proud history and rich culture stretching back millenia and they're immensely proud of their nation.  With a bit of prodding they'll admit to some of its deficiencies and problems (which for the most part aren't that dissimilar to most of the rest of the world), and I heard my fair share of criticism for the politics of Ahmadinejad (the current Iranian "firebrand" president).  In fact, take away the headscarves, and it really looked and felt like any number of countries around the world.  And at the centre of their culture is hospitality and genuine friendliness - as a guest in Iran you find yourself treated with respect and honour, with all manner of people bending over backwards to help you.

I've also never felt more like an ambassador for Australia and Western culture as a whole.  At every turn people wanted to find out where I was from, and once that was established with a sign of great approval, they always wanted to know more about me and about Australia.  Everything from the weather and the music I listen to, to the quality of life to how they as Muslims would be welcomed in my country.  Whenever I travel I always carry around a small picture book of Oz, and it really got a work-out in Iran.  I even had a taxi driver take me to a photocopy shop so that he could make copies of a few of the pages!

One parallel I draw to traveling around Iran is my experience in Colombia a few years back.  This is another country that gets a very biased - and unfair - wrap in the media, all doom-and-gloom and wars and drugs and politics and and and...  The news we watch doesn't tell us much or anything about the people there and what their lives are like, and the enjoyment I've had in both place once I learn the truth definitely helps to put both countries in my list of faves.

I've also seen the damage that the politics of George Bush & Co. have done to the region.  Labeling Iran as one of the "Axis of Evil" is plainly ignorant and stupid, but I've also seen the damage that the present trade embargo (like the one the US has against Cuba) leaves behind.  The Iranian first of all have no problem with Americans - their gripe is with the US's foreign policies and meddling, and hey they're not alone there in the world!  They're desperate for change, and progress, they lap up anything from the West (culture, music, fashion...) and truly want to be a part of the world order.  The trade embargo (which is anyway lop-sided - the US still gets its nice, cheap oil from Iran but nothing goes the other way) doesn't just affect Iran's economy, but Iranian quality of life - and trust me they're doing it pretty tough!  There is some resentment there, but its towards the US and not their own government.  If the US wants to affect change in Iran, then trading with them and giving the Iranian people access to US and Western culture is definitely the way to accelerate the process and force change upon the religious hardliners presently in power.

Anyway, that's my two cents!

Whenever I leave a country I always like to ask myself, a la Peter Cash on his travel show, whether I'd come back again.  For me it's a resounding "Yes! In sh'allah..." for Iran.  I'm such a fan that I'd recommend to anyone that if they have a few weeks vacation coming up they should definitely submit their visa applications, pack their bags, and take off to Iran.  It's not the easiest place to travel, but it's certainly not the hardest, but it's definitely be different and infinitely rewarding.

Day 105: Walking Amongst the Pilgrims

Sorry this'll have to be a quick entry but I'm just about to duck into a taxi and make my way back to the airport.  I'm in Mashhad, in the far north-eastern corner of Iran, near the Afghan and Turkmen borders, and will be catching the once-a-week flight to Biskek, Kyrgyzstan, on a dodgy Tupolev aircraft this afternoon.

I left Shiraz yesterday evening and flew to Tehran on the last flight of the night.  I got into the airport at around 1am, rolled out my thermarest mattress, and tried to get a few hours sleep.  I then had a 6am flight here, and I've been in Mashhad for the last few hours.  I'm pretty knackered but oh well, what can you do!

The city of Mashhad really doesn't have anything going for it apart from the most important Shiite pilgrimage site in Iran - the Holy Shrine of Imam Reza, a direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed, and the eighth Imam (I hope I got that right - anyone testing?).  It's a long story but he was apparently poisoned by the Sunnis all the way back when, and has been revered as a martyr ever since.  Some 20 million pilgrims come from over the world to visit his tomb, and the massive complex consumes 75 hectares in the centre of the city!  It's HUGE.

After a bombing in 1994 that killed 24 people, no bags or cameras are allowed inside, so I have precious little to show for my visit.  Unfortunately, as a non-Muslim, I also wasn't permitted to visit the inner sanctum (where the tomb is), but the outskirts of the buildings, mosques and squares were impressive enough.  The international visitors centre gave me a guide and were extremely helpful - I was even allowed to take a few books from their library, and was told that if I gave them my address they'd keep sending me books and pamphlets in the mail (subtle conversion techniques...).  For books, I went for "Imam Khomenei on Exportation of Revolution" (should be a good read...) and the curiously titled "Spurious Arguments About the Shia".  Another titled "Personal Jihad" (about self-embetterment, not killing Christians and Zionists) by Khomenei is now on my Christmas wish-list.

It was quite incredible - and an honour - to witness the outpouring of emotion and strength of people's faith.  Many people were weeping and various religious chants would erupt spontaneously from the crowd.  It really is a different world...

Day 104: Persepolis - A True Ancient Wonder!

Persepolis was absolutely INCREDIBLE!!!!!!!!!!!!  Easily one of the most impressive ancient sights I've ever seen - right up there with Tikal in Guatemala or Mt. Nemrut in Turkey.

The site of the ancient royal city of Persepolis is about 50km north of Shiraz.  It's the remains of one of the three Achaemenid capitals and stood vacant apart from the time the royals were in town.  Work was begun at the site under the reign of Darius I (the Great) around 518 BC.  It was added to by successive royals over about 150 years until Alexander the Great swept through and razed it to the ground.

Persepolisis built onto the sloping escarpment of Mt. Rahmat at the edge of a large plain.  The foundation is constructed of large interlocking stones (done without a hint of mortar, which reminded me of the Inca walls I've seen), so the whole site is raised a good 10-20 metres above the valley floor and looks truly monumental as you enter from below.

We entered the city up the Grand Stairway, and passed under the massive Gate of All Nations which was flanked by some incredible stone carvings of bull-like figures that we were told had strong Assyrian character.  One thing I liked about the site is that the Achaemenids had integrated styles and designs from not just their 18-nation empire but from many different ancient worlds and religions (Egyptians, Zoroastrians etc.).

    

The Gate of All Nations.

    
Looking across towards the Palace of 100 Columns.

The Palace of 100 Columns was incredibly impressive, in particular the gates you enter through, which had some bas relief carvings in superb condition - especially considering they've been out in the elements for two millennia!  It was difficult to imagine what the palace must have been like with the columns still standing (they were timber and burnt down when Alexander the Great razed the city) and with additional huge timbers supporting the roofs of all the different palaces and halls.  The Apadana Palace (Central Hall) had 23m high columns with carved capitals on top - incredible!

The Apadana Staircase, which lead from the Palace of 100 Columns to the Central Hall, was another highlight.  Now under cover, the carvings on these staircases were just immaculate and showed a procession of people walking up the stairs bringing offerings to their king.

    

    

Here are a few photos from Darius's Royal Palace, still in incredibly good condition and adorned with many of the same carvings as the staircase:

    

    

    
(L) Apadana Palace's 23m high columns - when this building stood it must have been breathtaking.  (R) Looking across the Palace of 100 Columns (note the stone mounts for the wooden columns) towards one of the royal tombs cut into the hill.

Above the site were a couple of royal tombs cut into the cliffs, but we drove a quick 10 minutes from Persepolis to Naqsh-e Rostam, an ancient necropolis with more impressive rock tombs - cut high up into the cliff face - of four Achaemenid kings.  There were also some more fantastic Achaemenid and Sassanian rock carvings.  The site really reminded me of photos I've seen of Petra in Jordan, and I did definitely feel sort of like Indiana Jones exploring the area.  Or am I more of a Shot Round?  "Indyyyyyyyyyyy!!!"

    

    

Day 103: Shiraz (The Place, not the Wine)

Yesterday was my last day in Yazd and I had one more, and slighty eerie, sight left to see - the Zoroastrian "Towers of Silence".  Here's a little more info about Zoroastrianism: they're followers of Zoroaster, who was born about 550 BC in what is now Mazar-e-Sharif, Afghanistan, who postulated a single, omnipotent God (Ahura Mazda, who is represented by an eternal flame in their temples).  Zoroaster's teachings are written in their "bible", the Avesta, and the core lesson is dualism, the battle between good and evil.  There are only about 150,000 Zoroastrians in the world today - it used to be the dominant religion in ancient Persia, but the Arab Conquest did a good job of converting people to Islam!

Since Zoroastrians believe in purity of the elements, the don't bury their dead (because it pollutes the earth), nor do they cremate them (because it pollutes the air).  Instead, up until the 1960's, bodies were placed in the stone Towers of Silence on hills outside of town to be picked clean by vultures.  In one of those jobs you really don't want, a priest would sit with the bodies (which were placed in the seated position) to observe which eye the birds picked out first: the right and the soul faced a good future, the left and the future didn't look so rosy.  Yucko.

    

With that somewhat grisly site behind me, I left Yazd and took a seven hour bus ride south to Shiraz.  I'd heard that Shiraz didn't have much to offer - especially in comparison to gorgeous Yazd, which I loved - so I wasn't expecting much out of the city.  I was essentially coming here in able to make a day trip out to the ruins of the ancient royal city of Persepolis (which I'm doing tomorrow - can't wait!).  After a good night's sleep last night I took in a few of the sights of the city today: the dome-roofed bazaar was a good one to wander through with a great local atmosphere, and I chilled out this afternoon in an old hamam which had been beautifully converted into a teahouse.  A few of the mosques were worth a look as well.

    

I was also able to witness thousands of Shiites visiting the Shah-e Cheragh Mausoleum, and important pilgrimage site.  The remains of Sayyed Mir Ahmad (a brother of Imam Reza, the eighth Imam I think he was - apologies to any Shiites reading this!) are entombed here in the most bizarre mirrored mausoleum, with absolutely every surface covered in tiny mirrored tiles.  The effect was dazzling - shame no cameras were allowed.  I couldn't work out exactly what was going on but it was amazing to see many people overcome with emotion, reciting prayers, and strangely kissing every single surface in sight (not just the tomb itself but all the walls, doors, door handles etc. - ewwww).

To all those wine buffs out there, I'm afraid to announce that the Islamic Revolution even did away with the last of Shiraz's famous red wine!  What a shame...  Still, all the better for Australia's wine industry I guess!  Mmmmm I could really do with a glass of wine, although the last few weeks have been a great detox.

Without much else to report from Shiraz, and seeing I haven't done it in a couple of posts, I thought I might add a few more fun facts and interesting observations:

• Most of the locals I've spoken to have never left Iran, not even to a neighbouring country like Pakistan or Turkey.  Now I found out why, apart from the obvious economic constraints: it turns out that you have to serve in the military to be eligible for a passport!
• The currency is called the rial but confusingly you're usually told everything in toman (10 rials = toman).  Ayatollah Khomenei is on every bill (as well as every billboard and vacant wall!) and I think it's kinda cute that they call the 10,000 rial bill a "Khomenei".
• The national language is Farsi, which is written in Arabic script but completely different.  Interestingly, while words are written right-to-left across the page, numbers are written left-to-right.  I can't make any sense whatsoever out of written Farsi script, but I'm getting along OK with the numbers as you can actually see teeny weeny bit of similarity between some of the numbers we use and the Persian ones.
• I've noticed that you hardly see any dogs - and by hardly I mean never - and I asked a group of schoolkids about it the other day.  Turns out, probably rightly so, that dogs are considered unclean and disease-ridden, and are therefore disliked.
• I had a TV in my room last night and was curious to see what I could find on the box.  There are just five channels, all apparently government-run, so you can just imagine what they're like.  My favourite is their "CNN", called the "Iranian News Network", which has the only English I could find on TV in those little news bars that run across the bottom of the screen.  It was funny to read their (the government's) take on the world outside Iran: a mix of displeasure about the Pope's apparent "blasphemous" remarks about Islam, anger over something the "Zionist regime" was up to in Palestine, and of course something about US "imperialism" and "interventionism".
• While we're on media, I picked up a copy of the Tehran Times today, the only English language daily in circulation throughout the country.  It's choc-a-bloc full of the "party line", but it makes for an entertaining read nonetheless!  Here's something though: I found out that there's a bookstore near Tehran University in which you can find all the Western magazines you could want, everything from Vogue to Time!  I never thought that would be possible here...  If only I'd known that earlier - I'm having Economist withdrawl!!
• Internet censorship isn't as bad as I thought it would be.  Even sites like CNN are unblocked.  For some reason though, The Age newspaper from back home in Melbourne is blocked, while the Sydney Morning Herald (its sister paper with almost identical content) isn't.  Weird...
• Women have three choices to cover themselves up and abide by sharia (religious) law.  From conservative to progressive the choices are:  (1) chador, a black cloak (think: black bedsheet) that a woman wraps around herself to cover everything apart from the face, hands and feet.  Here's the freakiest thing about it...  It isn't fastened closed by a button or a pin, and has to be held closed either by a hand or with TEETH!  (2) hejab, sort of like a nun's habit, it fits snugly around the woman's face and ends below the shoulder.  (3) headscarf, pretty self-explanatory, in combination with a "manteau" jacket down to the knee.
• My favourite Iranian dish is dizi or abgusht (I'm all kebab-ed out), which funny enough is considered a bit of a poor-man's food.  It's a lamb and vegetable stew that comes in an earthenware pot.  First you decant the yummy soup/broth our of the pot and into a bowl, and you then chuck in a whole bunch of flat bread to soak up the soup.  Turning back to the pot, you take a metal plunger to mash up the contents of the stew into a paste.  Then consume - yum!
• The buses are always fun because it's always a bit of "musical chairs" to get everyone ordered correctly.  As women can't generally sit next to men, especially unmarried women, it's always a bit of a shuffle to get everyone seated according to their social norms.

Day 101: The Dasht-e Lut Desert

I was really keen to get out of the cities and explore the countryside and deserts of Iran, and a day-trip from Yazd gave me just that opportunity.

We started off in the town of Meybod nearby and had a look at the Narein castle ruins, a Safavid-era ice house, and a quirky pigeon tower which used to be used to collect guano for fertiliser (quirky because they've now filled it with about 100 stuffed birds to "recreate" the effect).

    

    
Ancient mud brick fortress.                     Interior of an ice store.

From Meybod we drove north into the endless expanses of the Dasht-e Lut desert.  It was beautiful out there - all browns and greys with a blue sky and glaring sun beating down, wide plains of loose stones and a dry grass, and huuuuge mountains looming in the distance.  Completely desolate and empty.  Distances were really deceiving as well because the air was surprisingly clear - you'd swear the mountains are just a few km's away, but they're really 10 or 20km away and soar over 3000+ metres.  We pulled the car over for a photo shoot and I can honestly say that there are only a few places I've felt as much in the middle of nowhere - maybe driving across the back blocks of Nevada or on the Nullabor in Australia?

    

Middle of Nowhere, Iran.

Our next stop was the most important Zoroastrian pilgrimage site in Iran, a little hillside temple at a place called Chak Chak.  Who are the Zoroastrians you might ask?  Well I was scratching my head as well, but I found out that it is the oldest - yep, that's right - monotheistic (ie. only one God/Allah) religion in the world.  All the other big monotheistic religions like Islam, Christianity and Judaism take some of their rituals and beliefs from Zoroaster.  Zoroastrianism is a little bit sorta pagan as they worship the four elements of the earth - water and fire are always represented together in the temples.

The temple at Chak Chak itself was a bit of a non-event.  There was some symbolic story about the Zoroastrian leader finding water coming out of the mountain in the desert blah blah blah, but there were just a few dribbles of water coming down off the cliff face.  Hence the Farsi name for the place - Chak Chak means "Drip Drip".

     

Driving from Chak Chak to Kharanaq we came across a goat herd and its shepherd (or is it goat herder?) crossing the countryside.  What both the goats and the herder live on I have no idea...

    

Our last stop was the abandoned village of Kharanaq.  It's old mud brick village is slowly crumbling down, so the locals have moved out and rebuilt their town nearby.  The old town is quite eerie and ghostly and was fun to explore. I was able to scramble up the minaret in the photo below which was quite a challenge - let's just say it was a tight squeeze!

    

There was also a caravanserai nearby that had recently been immaculately restored to its former glory.  I think they have plans to open it as a hotel - nice!

    

We arrived back in Yazd just in time to enjoy sunset from the hotel rooftop after a delicious dinner with a selection of non-alcoholic beverages on offer.  Aaaaaaah, it doesn't get much better than this...!!!

Dinner is served: camel stew, rice and a date milkshake - delicious!

Day 100: Yay for Yazd!

I caught a five hour bus east from Esfahan across one edge of the Dasht-e Kavir desert to the picturesque city of Yazd.  I'd been told by a few different travelers that Yazd was their highlight of Iran, so I was really keen to settle down for a few days and explore the city and the region.

I checked in to the aptly-named Silk Road Hotel (I'm trying to retrace its route after all!) and settled down for the evening.  For the first time since I arrived in Iran I met several other backpackers and travelers, and I have to admit it was great to be able to speak something more than pigeon English again!  The hotel is awesome - a converted merchant's house, with a delighful central courtyard (they're very common here and remind me of another hot place - southern Spain around Sevilla) and rooftop area perfect for enjoying tea and a qalyan (water pipe) in the evenings.  Check out the pics - not bad for $5 a night, eh?!

    

 

After my first good night's sleep in a while, I rolled out of bed, threw my boots on and went to explore the old city.  First stop was the Jameh (Friday) Mosque right next door to the hotel which has a huge entrance portal topped with two beautifully tiled minarets from the 15th century.

    

Another highlight of the region around Yazd are its "qanats".  These are underground water channels that have been dug and maintained for centuries.  They carry water from the base of the mountains and fresh springs into the towns (for drinking etc.) and fields (for agriculture).  If there's any one thing that makes living in this dry desert environment possible, it's the qanats.  All through the city you see stairways down to the qanats where people used to go and collect water in jugs, and I was able to explore a couple.  I also had a look in the interesting Water Museum and was astounded by some of the figures - the tunnels are sometimes over 60km long, dug completely by hand, and have been used in Iran for over 2000 years.  Amazing!  Unfortunately, since electric pumps came along, the water table has dropped so far that most of them aren't in use any more.

Like most of the towns around here the majority of the buildings are constructed out of mud and straw (perfect for all the earthquakes that Iran gets - remember Bam?), but the great thing about this place is that there's a really good concentration of them in the old city centre.  It was great fun to wander around the alleys and get thoroughly lost.  It was interesting to see the many "badgirs" - these are ingenious old ventilation "air cooling" systems sometimes over 30m tall that catch any breeze over the city and draw it into the house, cooling it with water on the way down.  There are many still in use.

I wandered through the town and had a look at some of the sights along the way - a water reservoir with its own badgirs, the Tomb of the 12 Imams etc.  I made my way to the derelict Hosseinieh and was allowed to climb onto the roof for sunset.  I finally had my first unobstructed views over the town to the flat desert expanses and dramatic mountains beyond - fantastic!  A real highlight of my trip to Iran.

    

    

Day 98: I've Now Seen "Half of the World!"

I'm in Esfahan and LOVING it - THIS is the Iran I came to see!  The city is Iran's masterpiece, the jewel of ancient Persia and allegedly one of the finest cities in the Islamic world.  And it hasn't disappointed!!!

   
Imam Square.

No I'm not boasting about seeing half of the world - not yet, anyway!  The French poet Renier described Esfahan as "half of the world" in the 16th century, and it was the wonders surrounding the massive Naqsh-e Jahan (Pattern of the World) square that he was describing.  The city flourished after 1602 when Shah Abbas the Great relocated his capital to Esfahan and set about building a truly royal city, with most of the grandest sights situated around the square (second largest in the world behind Tiananmen Square).  The square has since been renamed Meydan-e Imam (Imam Square) and it's an incredible place to soak up and explore.

Here are a few of the sights around the square:

Imam Mosque: Built in 1611 over four years, the mosque is one of the finest in the world with beautiful blue-tiled mosaic designs and a wonderful symmetry to its structure.  You enter the mosque through a 30m high portal flanked by two minarets, and from there you enter the main courtyard with a pool in the middle of it.  Unfortunately there was a lot of renovation going on and the courtyard was covered with overhead tarpaulins, so I didn't get the "full effect".  It was still impressive though.  On each side of the courtyard was a tall iwan leading to a vaulted sanctuary.  The main sanctuary to the south it topped with a 51m high tiled dome, and its construction is so perfect that if you clap your hands you hear over ten echoes come back.

    

The entrance portal illuminated at twilight.

Sheikh Lotfollah Mosque: This smaller mosque on the eastern side of the square was my personal fave.  Unlike the Imam Mosque, this one has a delighful cream-coloured tiled dome that changes colour dramatically at sunset.  The entrance and the interior are exquisite and decorated with some fantastic mosaic tiles and Arabic script.

    

    

Ali Qapu Palace: The tall palace sits on the western side of the square, and also serves as a gateway to the royal buildings behind it.  It has a large terrace a few floors up that has some of the best views of the square - but (of course) unfortunately most of the palace was covered in scaffolding!

Bazar-e Bozorg: This covered bazaar is one of the largest in Iran, and can be entered from the north side of the square through the Qeysarieh Portal.  It's a real labyrinth of passages with caravanserais spreading off to the sides, and good fun to get lost in for a couple of hours.  There's everything in there from the ubiquitous carpet shop and souvenir knick-knacks to spices and everyday items that the Esfahanis come looking for.

I almost came close to buying a carpet while I was in Esfahan.  I fell in love with a style called a "bijar" and started looking around the various shops to compare prices.  Unfortunately, I quickly found that while reasonably priced, I just didn't have the cash to pay for them - if you'll remember, I had to enter the country with all the cash I'd need, as credit cards and travelers cheques don't fly here.

    

    

    
(L) Enjoying a tea in the most eccentric of tea houses.  (R) Chilling in the square with my new-found friends.

Jameh Mosque: At the other end of the bazaar, a few kilometres away from Imam Square, is 800-year-old Jameh Mosque.  It's been added to for centuries and therefore provides you with a glimpse of the different architectural styles through the ages - Seljuk, Mongol, Safavid, Timurid etc.  It has an open plan with four iwans facing the central courtyard.  Much of it was covered in scaffolding for renovations and repairs, but it was still spectacular.

     

And some other sights around the city:

Zayandeh River Bridges: The river running through the city is almost unique in that it rises up out of the ground upstream of the city, and disappears back underground downstream of the city.  In Esfahan, the river is crossed by several old bridges built in the early 17th century.  My two picks were the 298m-long Si-o-Seh bridge and the 132m Khaju Bridge.  I spent an afternoon walking along thr river bank through parks from one bridge to another, stopping off at teahouses along the way to chat to the locals.

    

Chehel Sotun Palace: Just off Imam Square, this palace is the one that the Shah built for himself in the early 1600s (although the present-day structure was built in 1706 after a fire).  It's entered via a talar terrace with slender wooden pillars that makes a lovely transition from the pool in front of the building to the interior of the building.  The Great Hall inside was decorated with some lovely frescoes, some unfortunately in not such good shape after Afghans (18th century) and revolutionaries (1979) had their wicked way with them.

    

Day 94: Finding (Relative) Peace and Quiet in Kashan

I got up early this morning and raced back up to the Chinese Embassy at 9am opening time.  I wanted to get the visa cranked out that day and knew I was against the clock (consular diplomats are lazy the world over and only work a couple of hours for a couple of days of the week).  When my taxi rounded the corner, I was astounded to see hundreds of people waiting outside.  Shit!!!  Turned out that the Canton Fair is coming up soon and all the businessmen were after their visas for it.  It also turned out that people had been camping out since the previous evening to make sure the got served.  F#ck.  What hope would I have?

Weeeeeell, I turned on the foreign tourist card and it worked like a charm.  I was bumped up the order and dealt with in a cool 15 minutes.  I then had to go to the bank to pay the visa fee, but once that was out of the way I had time to kill until the 2pm pick-up.  Luck played its part and I bumped into a local guy I'd met briefly the previous day at the embassy (he had his own visa woes).  His name was Mohammed, an entrepreneur in the ceramic tile business.  When he heard my plan was to sit on my pack and read a book until I could get my passport back, he had none of it and was instead keen for me to come with him to his house in North Tehran to meet his wife.  Kelly turned out to be a Texan who'd met Moh in Kyrgyzstan a little while back, and they'd got married just 1 1/2 months ago.  Kelly was, like me, going crazy in Tehran and she was really glad to have some "Western" company for the day.

Actually, hanging out with them in their gorgeous North Tehran apartment was a real eye-opener into modern Iran, and it was a great chance to talk to Moh and his cousin Reza about their business, politics (domestic and international) and life in Iran.  At one stage I joked with Kelly that after a month and a half in Iran she must be dying for a beer - next thing you know I had a cold Tuborg in my hand!  Turns out that drinking alcohol in the Armenian Christian community is tolerated by the regime, and a healthy black market in booze has sprouted up around it.  It was also particularly entertaining watching Kelly grumble and moan as she changed out of her shorts and t-shirt into loose and baggy "outdoor" clothes (gotta watch out for those fasion police!), and I especially liked her half-arsed attempt at a head scarf.

    
Typical urban scene in North Tehran.       Saying goodbye to Moh and Kelly.

It was hard to drag myself away from such comfy surroundings, but I knew I had to get going to get out of Tehran that night.  Reza gave me a ride down to the Metro and I caught it to the gigantic Southern Bus Terminal to find a bus headed my way.  Of course I hadn't factored in that it was the equivalent of a Friday evening AND the one big long weekend of the year, so the place was rammed!  People and chaos everywhere, buses full and turning away people.  I was desperate to get out of the city at that point but thought I was screwed and prepared to sleep in the station, but in a last-ditch effort I was able to wangle a ticket later that night - phew!  I kicked around the terminal for hours as I waited, sitting on my backpack and watching the world go by, still feeling pretty worse for wear.

It wasn't a long bus ride to Kashan but it was well past midnight by the time we arrived.  Once again a local man took me under his wing and made sure I got to my hotel and found a bed for the night.  AND FINALLY I'M OUT OF TEHRAN!!!  YAY!!!  It's such a relief to be out of there, the city didn't exactly enthrall me.  And boy did I sleep like a baby on the lumpy, hard mattress...

The next morning I got up with a spring in my step, feeling well-rested, healthier, and keen to get out there and see what Kashan has to offer.  I knew the bazaar would likely be closed because of the public holiday but I walked through it anyway.  I eventually found my way to Khan-e Tabatabei, and old mid-19th century traditional house once owned by a wealth merchant.  It was great to wander around and enjoy the architecture of the place (which reminded me in parts of some of the stuff I saw around Agra Fort in India), and I had the place all to myself.

    

    
Domed ceiling.                                       Mirrored walls.

    
                                                             Old school water cooler!

After lunch I caught a taxi out to Bagh-e Tarikhi-ye Fin, a peaceful set of gardens and fountains built around a series of natural springs.  Peaceful was what I wanted but screaming kids was what I got!  It was the start of celebrations for the Birthday of Imam Mahdi, the "12th Imam", and every family in Iran had clearly head to the hills to camp out on any patch of dirt/grass they could find and picnic.  The garden itself was a bit of a let-down (the fact I haven't even got a good photo of it to put here is a bit of a giveaway) but it was interesting to see where former prime minister Amir Kabir was imprisoned in the 1840's and in 1951 given the choice of how he wanted to die by the Shah (in case you're wondering, he went for slitting his own wrists).

That evening, following a long sermon from the Supreme Leader blasted out all around town, the streets filled as everyone came out to celebrate the 12th Imam's birthday, one of the holiest days of the year for the Persians.  I was shown around town by a group of young boys with furry moustaches, whose English unfortunately wasn't good enough to answer my questions about what was going on.  It was all a little confusing, but a spectacle I'm glad I got to see.

I've had many examples of Persian hospitality since I've been here, but this one was a stand-out.  I was wandering through the gardens when a middle-aged man approached me.  He was a bit podgy and had terrible teeth, and at first I thought he was coming over to practice his English with me (I get that a lot).  I quickly realized that wasn't the case as his vocab consisted of just a handful of words.  He enquired as to why I was Iran - it's the generic question I get asked - and, seemingly happy with my reply, walked off.  Later on he approached me again and said, "Sir I am at your service, my house is yours."  Incredible...!  I of course thanked him profusely.

Early the next morning, before I headed to the bus station to catch my bus for Esfahan, I took one last slow lap of the bazaar.  I struck gold at one tea house and was let up onto the mud-and-straw roof of the bazaar to get a birds-eye view of the town.

    
Fascinating shapes in the domed roof of the bazaar.

    
On the roof of the bazaar.

    
A pretty "typical" tea house that I found in the Kashan bazaar.  Note the eccentricities and influence of the Zoroastrian religion with the combination of fire and water in the fountain.

Day 92: Get Me Outta Tehran!!!

This city is REALLY doing my head in!  It's either the noise or the pollution from the traffic but I get a cracking headache every time I go outside.  On top of that I haven't had a decent meal in a couple of days as I've been really crook the last couple of days, holed up in my crummy hotel room popping questionable local pills, guzzling litres of water and making quick dashes for the bathroom.  Urgh.

The only thing stopping me getting out of here is my Chinese visa.  It's pretty critical to the rest of my trip here.  I've now booked my flight from Iran (Mashhad) to Kygyzstan (Bishkek) and I leave here on the 19th September - a bit earlier than I planned but there's only one flight a week.  Oh well.  After 10 days or so trekking in the mountains of Kyrgyzstan I want to delve into Western China for the last couple of weeks (I fly out of Honkers on 18th October).  Anyhoo so I went up to the Chinese Embassy waaaay up the hill in North Tehran.  The north of the city is MUCH more likeable: less traffic congestion, more leafy and green, and closer to the Alborz Mountains.  Turned out my trip up there was for nought though: all I got was a curt "come back tomorrow" from an intercom.  Ah well...

On the way back down to my hotel, I got off the brand spanking new Metro system (side note: it's mixed but there are separate women only carriages) at Taleqani station and went upstairs to the "US Den of Espionage".  It's a massive walled complex of buildings, looking pretty run-down these days.  Since the US left it's been the home of the Sepah militia, who vow to "defend the revolution".  They're a bit touchy at people taking photos of the walls apparently, as I'd only just started snapping off a couple when I was harassed and sternly warned by a group of six boy soldiers to not take any more.  Still I did get a couple of good photos of some of the murals.  There was one with had the Statue of Liberty with a skull for a face, and I especially liked this quote: "The Day United States of America Praises Us We Should Mourn".

    
Bombs and flowers.                                 What remains of the US seal.

My personal favourite.  :-)

    
Some ubiquitous trash talk...                  More rhetoric (and that's all it is).

This evening I was desperate to eat something substantial and definitely NOT a kebab (this region of the world is not a gourmand's delight), so I tracked down a - or the - Chinese restaurant in town.  To get there I decided to take a motorcycle "taxi" there - i.e. a guy with a bike that wants to make a few extra rials.  Well it turned out to be the most amount of urban fun out there!!!  Hanging on for dear life, we wove our way through six lanes of traffic, around buses, between cars (my knees grazed a few), used both sides of the road and even the pavement!  $2 well spent!!  The Chinese food was half decent as well.

So here are a few more fun facts and observations about Iran:

• On almost every street corner you find these hexagonal, blue mail boxes.  On closer inspection they turned out to be donation boxes for giving alms, which is one of the four pillars of Islam.  You see people drop their spare change into them all the time.
• I've seen several guys wearing black "Cal" baseball caps of all things!  What a laugh!!  I assume they fell off the back of a truck from China...
• There are heaps and heaps of teenagers and young adults around, and I was able to find out that it's a by-product of the Islamic Revolution.  After the revolution the government made the smart move of banning contraception and telling everyone to make lots of babies.  And make lots they did!  The average number of children per mother was a disbelievable SIX!!  The government then realized the economic consequences of their decision and repealed it.  Still, today a staggering 70% of the population is under 30!  Of course this has outpaced the economy and unemployment is a real problem.
• Next time you eat a pistachio, spare a thought for Iran.  The country produces a whopping 57% of the world's supply of the nut!  And the ones I've had here are delicious.
• No posters of Osama here!  Thought I might spy a couple (I saw a few Anti-Zionist posters in Eastern Turkey) but I guess that Sunni-Shiite rift is pretty cavernous.  I've seen a few of Nasrallah though.
• To really confuse you, Iran uses not two but THREE calendars!  Our Gregorian one (anything international), the Persian solar calendar (official), and the Muslim lunar calendar (religious).  It can get tricky booking tickets...  Oh and Thursday and Friday of their week is the weekend, which has meant I've had to re-adjust some of travel plans.

     
(L) One of the many Iran-Iraq war murals adorning the sides of buildings.
(R) A proud shopkeeper and my lifeline to surviving the kebab-laden meals.

Fingers crossed I can sort out my visa bright and early tomorrow morning because I really want to get out of here and down to the town of Kashan, a couple of hours south of here.

Day 91: The Long Road to Tehran

After a day and a half of traveling from Van, I made it!!!  I can hardly believe I'm here in Tehran, the capital of the Islamic Republic of Iran!  Woohoo!  It was quite a journey here though...  I left Van early yesterday morning on a bus that would take me over the mountains of south-east Turkey and through a "minor" border crossing at Sero (near the border with Iraq).  Distances are deceiving on the map because it's quite mountainous and the roads aren't that flash, and it was about six hours later we rolled into the border station.

    

    
A few photos en route from Van in south-eastern Turkey to the border with Iran.  This is the heart of Kurdistan and quite close to the northern edge of Iraq - doesn't look worth fighting over really...

I would have loved to have snapped a few photos at the border point but it's always a bit of a sensitive issue - "security" apparently - but it was a dry and dusty spot in the middle of nowehere with a big military presence on the Turkish side, a couple of buildings that had seen better days, and a queue of vehicles waiting at both sides of the gates.  I was the only westerner on the bus and completely stumped the Turkish authorities - I don't think they'd ever cleared an Aussie before!  The Iranian side was fortunately without incident (I held my breath as my name on the visa was spelled incorrectly) and it wasn't long before we were all watching the customs officials take the bus and our bags apart looking for contraband.

After another couple of hours we arrived in Orumiyeh, an unimpressive small city known nationally for its fruits and vegetables.  In that time on the bus I began to fully understand the breadth and depth of Iranian hospitality.  I'd been befriended by a local guy Hassan who was just returning from a vacation with his family in Turkey.  Although I really didn't want to burden him with the hassle, he insisted time and time again that I have all my issues taken care of - namely changing dollars into rials (at the local rate) and arranging transport to Tehran - and proceeded to drive me around town to work everything out.  Nice!

I originally planned to fly to Tehran (this place is dirt cheap - you can fly across the country for $30!) but I would have had to have waited until the next morning just to get on a waitlist, so I instead opted for the 12 hour night bus.  It wasn't the most comfortable night's sleep and I arrived this morning pretty groggy.  On top of that I've really struggled to find good quality food as I've moved further east, and I'm out-of-sorts with a bit of "Delhi belly".

So first impressions of Tehran and Iran in general:

• Tehran in a word: a dump!  It's a massive, sprawling, polluted city with 14 million inhabitants (1/5 of the country!).  Town planning seems to be non-existent and it's a real bitch to get around.  The streets are filled with Paykans (the lead petrol-powered national vehicle manufactured for the last 40 years without a design change) and little put-put-put motorcycles, and the combined effect is lots of noise and tons of air pollution.  I know that Iran has much better places to offer and I'll be getting out of here asap.
• Iran is the only Shiite state and is surrounded by Sunni neighbours, and I've already noticed some of the differences between the two faiths.  For example in Turkey the Sunni mosques have long slender minarets on their mosques, the ones here are short and stumpy, sorta "chunky".  One reason I'd prefer to be a Shiite (don't worry Mum...) is that they only have to prey three times a day as opposed to the Sunni five - that 4:45am wake-up-call call to prayer would really get to me!  I know the differences, which stem from a sort of Great Schism that occurred after the death of the Prophet Mohammed, go a lot deeper than that, and I'm looking forward to hopefully learning more about them.
• I saw a few women driving cars here today - I definitely didn't see that in macho male-dominated Turkey!  I also learnt that women fill most (80%!) of the places at university, which was another pleasant surprise.  You see many more women in the black head-to-toe chadors than in Turkey, but a lot of women seem to want to challenge the boundaries of Sharia law by instead wearing a head scarf that shows a lot of hair, a long jacket and jeans.  Oh and it was quite an eye-opener walking through a shopping arcade and just seeing guys clothes being sold!  I guess there's just no need for much wormen's fashion...
• I think I'm already coming to understand that Iran's greatest asset are its people.  All day I've been meeting complete strangers who are extremely friendly, keen to help or practice their English, and who want to learn more about me and why I'm in Iran.  They're a lot more educated and informed and open-minded than the Western media would have you believe, for example many of the middle class have been educated at universities throughout Europe and the US.  I think this is going to be a great trip (once I get out of Tehran)!

I went to see one of the highlights of the city this afternoon - the National Jewels Museum.  Its an incredible collection of the 17th to 20th century jewels from the Safavid monarchy that was given the arse when the Islamic Revolution came along in 1979 (think: Ayatollah Khomenei).  They say it rivals the Crown Jewels in the Tower of London but I have to say that it beats them hands down!  The sheer amount of exquisite jewellery and the number of loose gems (many in the 200+ carat category) was truly astounding.  The highlight for me was a 34kg globe of the world made out of gold and a staggering 51,366 precious jewels (diamonds used for Iran, rubies for the continents and emeralds for the oceans)!  Oh and Adri if you've ever wondered where all those Colombian emeralds went then look no further - they're all here!  Literally piles of them, along with diamonds from South Africa and rubies from Burma.  I've never described something as "priceless" before and mean it, but I think I can now...!

The other "must see" for me on the agenda for tomorrow is the former US embassy, now titled the "US Den of Espionage".  It was here that the CIA planned and executed their first ever coup back in 1953 (aaah the memories...).  It was also the location of the infamous hostage crisis 25 years later, when students (fearing more CIA dabbling in domestic politics) stormed the embassy and held 53 diplomats hostage for 444 days.  You're not allowed inside the building but the walls outside are covered with the "Down with the USA" and "Great Satan" murals you'd expect.  It should be entertaining...