Camel breath

I think this will be my last post from Iran. I decided to leave Yazd yesterday and jumped on bus to Bam in the Southeast of Iran. My visa's up tomorrow and I have to leave Iran, so I'm going to go to the Pakistani border at Zahedan tomorrow morning (about a five hour drive).

I've noticed that the Iranian buses don't like to stop and they go quite a while without stopping for a toilet break (and they don't have toilets on board). Yesterday I got on the bus at 4pm and it still hadn't stop by 9.00pm that night. I was about to burst my gut and eventually it stopped at a police checkpoint and all the men rushed to the front of the bus. I was thinking to myself "Thank fuck I'm not the only one who needs to piss" and I jumped up and followed them all. There was a sand dune that would have fit my needs perfectly, but they all ran out into the desert. Presuming that they knew something I didn't (maybe it was a sacred sand dune or something) I followed them thinking they would eventually all stop to relieve themselves... So I was with this group of Iranian men and suddenly they all dropped to their knees in prostration and started praying... and there was I standing in their midst with my zip half down... It was ...ehh... slightly embarrassing... I had two choices: drop to my knees and start praying or obviously turn around like an eejit and retreat. I chose the latter since I couldn't have feigned praying had my life depended on it... I decided to make use of the sand dune on the way back from my embarrassment and with quite some relief, I contributed my bladder contents to the battle against desertification.

Arrived in Bam late last night and spent today walking around the ruins of the Arg-e-Bam. Some of you may remember that shortly after Christmas 2007, Bam was hit by a very serious earthquake during which 35000 people died... the town is a bit of a disaster zone (click here for news coverage). The castle and citadel here (Arg-e-Bam) used to be the jewels in crown of the Iranian historical sites, but they've been reduced to rubble. They're trying to rebuild it like it used to be, but it's going to take them decades and millions of euros...

Also, see below for some pictures of Yazd... I went camel riding, saw some Zoroastrian stuff, some old citadels etc. It was very nice and relaxing with a good mix of seeing shit and then chilling out in the hotel, getting my ass kicked in chess, playing cards etc.

Zoroastrianism was the principle religion of ancient Persia and survived until the Islamic armies marched in. There are still 1m Zoroastrians in Iran (also in India and Pakistan). It's a pretty cool religion. Their god is Ahura Mazda and they have a prophet called Zoroaster (who looks a bit like Jesus in pictures). They believe in good and evil, truth and falsehood etc. They also place strong importance on the four elements: Wind, Water, Earth and Fire. They don't want to impurify earth or fire by burying or burning their dead, so they used to leave the cadavers to rot and the bones to be picked clean by vultures after death. They did this by leaving them in so called towers of silence. This has been discontinued since the sixties and now they bury their dead in tombs lined with cement so that contamination of the earth doesn't occur.

In other news, before I left Yadz, I collected books from the post office that my mum sent me (yay mum!)... so I've got books again and am very happy. currently reading 'Among the believers' by VS Naipul... which seems to be very interesting.

I also discovered that I really, really dislike camels and camel riding. Camels are ugly, smelly, fly infested, Starwars-esque beasts and to ride on them is paramount to letting someone with high heels do a jig on your genitals... I could not recommend it any less. I don't know how these Silk Road traders did it.

Here are some pictures of Yadz, more to come when I get a decent Internet connection (I've heard it ain't so good in Pakistan though... )

Signing off for the last time in Iran... C.

camel steaks... two for a foiver!

Well hullo there folkaroonies... for your information, the following is a prioritised list of things I would like to eat/drink:

• A Beer... a cold one... maybe an Erdinger or something...
• A sausage (as in a pork sausage - you durty bastards! Superquinn would do nicely)
• A bag of king cheese and onion crisps... hmmmmmmmmmmm.... tasty!
  
• A rasher (well, lots of rashers)
  
• A whiskey and ginger ale with a lime (again, several of these would be good, just enough to get me tipsy)
  
• A glass of white wine
• Sunday Roast
• And I'd also luv a burger king whopper meal (yes, I don't care what you think, all you French people out there... I can hear you now: "Zat is rreally onbelievabal zat you wud wont one of zose gressy omburgurs de merde")

So now that we've got that out of the way, a short update on where I am and what I'm at... I jumped on a bus from Shiraz yesterday and arrived in the desert city of Yadz, where I'm going to spend pretty much the rest of my visa time (7-10 days). There seems to be a lot to do here with lots of Zoroastrian sites (more to come on that in later posts), nomads and deserty stuff, so i'm going to use this as my base and generally flute around for the next while.

I've lashed in some photos from Shiraz and Persepolis, the Archemeden city of Xerxes which it's most known for. Persepolis is quite impressive. It was built around 500BC and then burned down by Alexander the muppet in 330BC (although its rumoured that his troops just got drunk and accidently started a fire... how we've progressed since then). I spent a good half day there with a canadian dude just wandering around musing about civilisations past.

So here in Yadz, I'm staying in this nice little hostel called the Silk Road. Its the most backpackery hostel in Iran and it's good to mingle with some foreigners again.

One thing that I keep on noticing though, is that even amongst backpackers and travellers, there's a kind of snobbery as to what they've 'done' and 'not done'... Inevitably when you meet people, they reel off the list of shit they've 'done': "Yeah, so I DID Turkey and then I DID Greece and Slovenia... after that I DID Georgia and once I've DONE Iran, then I'll DO Pakistan... yah, yah... sooper!". People are almost judged by the amount of shit they've DONE... with wilder off-piste stuff gaining particular kudos: "Oh, yah... loike I've totally DONE iraq... yah, yah... brill... best country ever! The jihadists ore loike sooooo friendly!"

Still though, I am adamant that my Irishness is my most significant asset when travelling. People are automatically postively predisposed to you... even if you're a complete tosser! There's two asian guys in the hostel... one is from London and the other from Amsterdam, but when the Iranians ask them "what country mista?" and they reply England or Holland, the iranians burst their shits and start with "Japan, Korea, China...", so these two guys have just resigned themselves to it and now reply to their heritage questions with an Asian country, just to save themselves going crazy! Ti-hi-hi... the concepts of multiculturalism havn't spread this far yet...

So when I arrived at the hostel last night, they didn't have any rooms in the dorms and I was fooked if I was gonna fork out for a single room so they let me sleep on the roof. But it was deadly, there was a brilliant view on the mosques and save the 4.30am call to prayers, the cool breeze let me sleep like a little babby. Although I did have to get up early this morning cos the sun was burning me...

I'd like to see some comments from McNamara's people... are you all dead or what! (note that redundancy is no excuse for not commenting)

Speaking about work, I'm reading that armageddon has hit the banking system with the collapse of the Lehman brothers etc.... I used to know this guy... a right dickhead (no names mentioned) who worked there... so I'm happy about that. I hear that they're not gonna pay salaries at the end of the month and that these swish bankers are reduced to clearing their canteen cards by stocking up on chocolate bars... What a funny thought! Only two weeks ago, they were jetting around on super-dooper expense accounts sucking the economy dry... Aah no, only joking, poor them! (-ish)... But seriously, economic decline brings it's own opportunities so I'm not worried (yet)... My dad keeps tellin' me that I've never lived through an 80's-esque recession and that I shouldn't be such a smart-ass, but in fairness, if you bought property in Ireland in the past year or two, I have no sympathy for you! (Did you think prices would rise into perpetuity).

One final piece of useless drivel is that I can't figure out how to go overland from India into SouthEast Asia. Burma seems to be a black hole that you can't get into from the north. So my options are a flight (boo-hiss...) or else going from Kathmandu in Nepal to Lhasa in Tibet up into China and then back down around into Vietnam... this would add considerable expense and time and bureacratic visa effort, but it could be interesting to stick China into the itinerary...

Apparantly there's an 'all-you-can-eat-for-60000-rials' on camel steaks at a hotel around the corner tonite so I'm off to stretch my stomach muscles and get into form...

Ur man in Iran... C to the P ;-)

Cold Sore suck @$$

eugghghhghghg, what... what do you want... why are you bugging me...? Oooooowwww, you wanna know what's going on, you want a new post do you? Why do you torment me for updates, your prying eyes raping my soul to feed your sordid desires for information...

Eh... ahem...!

A bit dark is it? A lil' bit crrraaazzzzyyyy!?! I'm only joking... AHAHAHAHA... ROFL... HEE HEE... but you know sometimes it's not so frickin' easy to write this thing... (not like it's a literary masterpiece) but even to know what to drivel on about... During the day, I keep on seeing things and think to myself "Oh by jove, that would make suuuuuch an interessssting anecdote on my little bloggy-woggy!" and then I skip off and instantly forget about it. I try to keep my diary and a pen with me so that I can write down in bullet point form (consultancy training) the little episodes that so illustrate the kaleidoscope of my life, so that I can remember them later. But inevitably I forget to do that, and instead I find my diary filling up with the Farsi phonetic translation for "Top or Bottom?" or "Son of a donkey" (very helpful as an exclamation when haggling). And by the time I get to an internet cafe, my posts end up like some kind of horse manure: And then I went to the loo and after that I saw a sign and then I farted and after that a car beeped and then... and after that... and then... and after that...! You get the idea!

Sooooooooooo, today I went to Persepolis, the foremost attraction in Iran. It was nice! I've also got a cold sore which PISSES ME OFF IMMENSELY!

Last day in Esfahan

shit, shit, shit... my booze plan fell through... I thought I had it all lined up perfectly, feic sake! Anyway, I'm off to Shiraz tonite where I have to try to get some of that famous wine!

Went out for dinner and a qualyun with some folks from the hostel last night. We all got different things so as to taste everything. Really nice aubergine dishes and meat wrapped in vine leaves and kebabs and stuff like that... Then we went to a deadly little tavern for smoking waterpipes. We had two girls with us so we had to sit down the back (girls aren't usually allowed in, but they make an exception for western birds).

On that point, I forgot to tell you that when I arrived in tehran, I got a bus to my hostel with all my various bags and shit hanging out of me. I got up onto the bus at the middle entrance and put my bags down and sat down (sweat running off me). I was surrounded by all these girls who were giggling at me and all the men started shouting at me beckoning for me to come to them... I didnt know what they were ranting about and then this man came up and started pointing to the women shouting "WOO MAN, WOO MAN... no, no..." and pointing to the front of the bus. And finally the penny dropped that the buses were segregated with women sitting at the back, men at the front and that I had sat in the WOOMAN section. So I had to get all my bags on again, trapse off the bus and back on via the the front door where I sat down and was surrounded by men laughing and pointing to the back of the bus saying "WOOMAN".

Anyway, so beyond that, all is going rather well. I'm managing to keep to my budget (partially cos the Iranians won't let me pay for anything) and am eating relatively healthily. My bowels are in good working order (a rarity) and any cuts or scratches that I've got have been kept free of infection... I still have a bit of a cold and am snuffling away to myself as I type but I'm gonna go to the hammam today to sweat it out of me!

There was 6.1 earthquake in Bandar Abbas yesterday but that's miles away from me so all is hunky dorey here. I am preparing myself for a shudder though as they hit Iran very frequently. (Remember Bam in '04).

Nightbus to Shiraz tonite and then some more sightseeing malarky, particularly Persepolis.

Peace out!

Tourist adoption

Got back to the hostel last night at about one o' clock in the morning and I bumped into two other backpackers who were also just returning. "How was your day?" we asked each other, only to find that we had each suffered a similar fate: Our adoption by non-English speaking Iranians... it's a hardcore situation!

What happens is that you're strolling along and inevitably someone will stop you to ask you where you're from, what you think of Iran etc... (the ability to speak english is not a prequisite here... Hey mista, country wha?). Eventually, they invite you for a tea, which turns into a lunch, which turns into an afternoon, which turns into dinner, which turns into invitations to stay in their house that night... etc. etc. etc. So it's all very friendly.

On Monday, I went to see these shaking minarets and bumped into four lads from the north of iran on their holidays... not a word of english between them but somehow we managed to spend two days together and actually had great craic ripping the piss out of each other with charades and face gestures (hey mista conor, you mista bean!). They brought me for lunch and dinner and gilyan (sheesha type water pipes) and didn't let me put my hand in my pocket. At one stage, I snuck off and bought us all some ice creams and they got very angry and tried to force the money for the ice creams on me... (you guest, you guest...).

We kept on getting lost in translation though... We were talking about countries and I wanted to make the off-hand remark that Iceland is really small and that they're all interbred (my apologies to anyone from Iceland) but somehow they ended up tut-tutting at length and believing that in Iceland everyone must sleep with their family members (Again, my apologies to anyone from Iceland).

One thing was pretty funny. We were sitting around eating our Ice Cream when four girls passed us, two iranians and two obvious backpackers (who had been 'adopted'). We started talking to them and one of the girls was from County Clare, so we started having a bit of banter and talking about the iranians etc. She said she had her high heels in her handbag and that they were on their way to a rave, at which I broke my shits laughing. We were generally chatting and laughing and when eventually we bid them farewell (for single lads talking to single ladies would quickly earn the ire of the fun police), the Iranian guys asked me whether the girl was my sister. They coulnd't believe that I had just met her and would speak so openly and loudly with an unknown woman. They were convinced that we must be related... twas mad!

In other news, I was walking down the street yesterday engrossed in my copy of 'Iran Daily' (Ahmadinejad mouthpiece) and went to cross what I thought was a piece of grass, only to find myself up to my hips in the most putrid pool of sickening foul water, with a scum on top that grass had started to grow on... I was not impressed and went to the fountain in Imam Square to clean myself... Fucking revolting stuff and I spent the whole day squelching around in my shoes.

Also, my various attempts to procure a bottle of whiskey have not been fruitful. I have a last ditch attempt tonight when this Iranian I met is supposed to meet me at the hostel with 'da moichendice'.

Ramazan is still as annoying as ever (I think this is having a negative effect on my whiskey adventures)... especially since I'm now convinced that there's no-one in Iran who actually follows it and fasts. I see everyone smoking and taking sly drinks of water and I'm sure that they're all eating in their homes.

So I've done some research on Pakistan and am really looking forward to it now. I'm going to make a beeline straight for the north (Lahore) and spend my time in the northern mountains there doing some trekking etc. Unfortunately the Kyber Pass into Afghanistan seems to be closed to foreigners so I won't be visiting that (I'm only joking mum, relax, I'm not going near Afghanistan).

I'm also looking forward to going to Shiraz (which I'm gonna do tomorrow) and then Yadz before making my way east. I've put myself in contact with the Irish embassies in both Tehran and Islamabad letting them know that I'm arsing around and they've asked me to keep them up-to-date.... very nice guys!

That's it for today... be good and would someone please leave me a frickin' comment or two?

C.

Alco-holy Armenians

I've been trying to find some booze here in Esfahan... A friend gave me a name of a street in the Armenian quarter. (The Armenians have always been a large immigrant community in Iran, they have their own parts of each city and are Christian. It is 'informally tolerated' that they use wine in their religious ceremonies and as such, they have become the source of illegal booze).


So, off I went to the Armenian quarter, to the road which my friend had told me to walk down. Apparently it was certain that someone would come up to me and offer "whiskey, vodka" under their breath. So I walked up and down this very long road for about an hour, trying my best to look like an alcoholic foreigner, but alas... no-one came up to me... I tried my best to give 'the eye' to any dodgy lookin' characters, but I'd say they all just thought I was a fruitcake. So... long story short... I got no booze! And then, last night when I came back to the hostel, I was speaking to a French guy who said that he'd been offered whiskey twice that day... Is there something about me that suggests tee-totaller? (Of course, the french eejit didn't accept it!).


Not much else going on apart from that, but I was speaking to someone who has just come from Pakistan and they said that they loved it. For some reason, I was planning on barging through Pakistan very quickly, but I think I need to research more about it. Apparently the north is very nice.


I'm still enjoying Esfahan. I spend a lot of time just walking around looking at mosques or shit like that. The people here are really friendly. Even the carpet sellers are nice... they want you to buy a carpet but they're not militant about it. They invite you in for a tea and say "don't worry about carpets, I won't try to sell you one!". In general people don't try to flog you stuff here, they seem to be more interested in speaking to you and finding out what you think of Iran. I think they're used to the western foreigners being 'backpacker' types with no spare funds to indulge in knick-knacks... they have the Arab tourist for that!


Despite what you all think (as per the poll to the right), I shaved my beard today... but don't worry, it'll grow back quickly. I can't believe you people, telling me that I look better with a beard is paramount to saying that my face is so hideous, it needs to be covered! You should be ashamed of yourselves.


Also Ramazan is really wrecking my nutz. There's all these little 'secret' places to eat during the day, but no-one ever tells me about them. And then, as soon as the sun goes down (and the Imam does his little song and dance), people can start eating again. But the restaurants don't let people in (or else they'd get overflown) and instead just set up a stand on the road from which they sell the standard post-fast grub (lentil stews and the like).


I think I've cracked the currency though. I can now ask how much something is, understand the response, choose the correct notes and pay in a timely manner :-) Progress!

So I believe that it's Monday morning and you're all in work... tihihi...

Anyone who works in McNamara's reading this post should click on comments below and leave me a little message...

Take it easy... ur man in iran... C.

Esfahan Pics

Some first impressions from Esfahan:



And here's prayer time in Jamme Mosque

Goin' South

It rained on Thursday in Tehran a bit... a nice kind of cooling rain with a bit of an electrical storm. Apart from that the weather has been hot, but not unbearable. It's probably in and around the 35 C mark at the peak of the day, but generally quite dry. You wouldn't want to be walking around outside too much around midday but it gets nice and cool in the evening and at night. Unfortunately these frickin' Iranians feel the need to air condition everything and I've got a huge big head-cold with a snuffly nose, sore throat and general shittiness from sleeping in uber-airconditioned rooms (where you can't control the AC yourself).

I'm almost finished my book and as soon as I do, I'm up the swannee with a toothpick for a paddle as I have no more (unread) books left. I'm reading 'The Idiot' by Fyodor Dostoevsky at the moment and it's taking its time on getting to the point. My favourite book so far has been Captain Corelli's Mandolin, which kind of reminded me of the Magus, one of my favourite books of all time.

I had a good few days in Tehran. I spent 8 of my 30 visa days here, which is probably a little more than I should have, but I reckon that it was well worth it. The capital cities are always important as they reveal a lot about a people and I've really enjoyed myself here. I was put in contact with one of the locals here, a really nice guy, who took me under his wing and made sure that I got to see some of the "other" sides of the Islamic Republic. The other night, he brought me along to a bit of a party... and well... I got hammered on this stuff called arac, which is a locally brewed concoction known for its effect of making you blind. The guys at the party assured me that the particular batch had been tested by them on many an occasion without any resulting blindness and so, I conceded and drank myself to oblivion. I woke up the next morning (well, more afternoon than morning really) with a pounding headache. I don't know if this is all in the spirit of Ramazan, but whatyagonna do... when in Rome...!!!

So I hopped on a Super-VIP-ComfyComfy-Super-Super bus from Tehran for a quick six hour blitz to Esfahan in Central Iran yesterday. Arrived here last night after having the ear yapped off me by this friendly Iranian guy with no English... but apparently this city is the THE thing to do in Iran so lets see what the craic is. I'm going to stay here for a couple of days and then move south towards Shiraz. Then I'll spend a few days in the desert in Yadz before putting the head down and doing a legger to Zahedan and then directly across the Pakistani border to Quetta and Karachi.

I had the maddest dream last night... (In fact it was kinda a whole night of mad dreams but I just remember one): I was skateboarding (as I do) down this mad mountain and fell off the cliff and kept on falling for ages before I was able to grab onto a random ledge. And then I was worried about my skateboard had been lent to me by my brother, while hanging there from the ledge. I spent half the fucking night hanging from that ledge worrying about the skateboard until I was interrupted by some Saudi/Qatari/generic Arab who burst into our dormitory at 7.00am this morning ranting and raving about people not sitting on this bed (the dream was over by this stage).

I had other stuff to tell you but I can't remember it now...


View Larger Map

Crazy Traffic

The traffic is mental here... Apparently some tourists have a really difficult time crossing the road. There's no lights for pedestrians so you just have to barge through the traffic... You look up a road which is choc-a-bloc with speeding cars, vans, buses, motorbikes and can't even imagine yourself crossing it. But if you need to cross, then there's no other option. You basically just have to walk and the majority of cars swerve to avoid you and you try to stop and start to make the best of the gaps, keeping your tummy and arse tucked in tightly while two buses sandwich you to a hair's breadth... Exiting stuff.
Here a short video generically found on the web.

Friendly Iran

Before I left Ireland, when I told people I was coming to Iran, the standard response was 'Why?'. Given the generally unfavorable coverage that Iran gets in the media, I suppose this is understandable. In fact, I was a little apprehensive coming here myself. I remember how as soon as I entered into the grounds of the Iranian embassy in Dublin, my heart skipped a beat or two and I was kind of 'on edge'. However, in the past few days, a lot of the prejudices that I had about Iran have been demystified.

I've been speaking to people about what's going on in Iran and there are a lot of varying opinions. First of all, a (very) brief recent history lesson (full lesson here). The Persians have a history going back thousands and thousands of years. It is suggested that the first civilisations began here and much thinking went on here while Europe was still hanging around in the Dark Ages. Persia was ruled by various caliphates (or muslim kings) and then by the somewhat more secular Shah's until 1979. Things were pretty liberal back then, although it could be argued that the shah was a bit of a plonker and tended to spend the country's cash a tad freely. Due primarily to this financial imprudence in '79, religious traditionalists, communists and nationalists all came together to overthrow the shah during the iranian revolution. In the power vacuum that followed, an exiled religious leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, returned to Iran and claimed the country as an islamic republic, imprisoning and killing many of the non-islamic revolutionaries who had helped bring about the Iranian revolution (now retrospectively known as the Islamic revolution by the Iranian government) and founding a nation state where Shia Islam is not only the national religion but infiltrates every aspect of government activities, including the institualisation of sharia law in the judiciary. Directly after the revolution, our mate Saddam Hussein decided to take advantage of the inexperienced new state and make a land grab from Iraq, prompting the very bloody eight-year Iran-Iraq war. Although this war left many dead and wounded, Iran stood its ground and the war solidified the place of the Islamic Republic and the governing council of guardians.

So, back to life in Iran today. So far, all I've seen is Tehran and one must remember that this city of 20 million is the most liberal and progressive part of iranian society. However, life here is quite similar to big European metropoli. Although sharia law is nominally quite strict in certain instances (i.e. stoning for extramarital affairs, death by hanging for sodomy etc.), it should be noted that the sharia punishments are almost never handed down. They are only handed in down if the crime has been committed in conjunction with other serious crimes, i.e. murder or rape. Also, sharia punishments can only be handed down in accordance with sharia methods of proof, some of which are quite amusing. (I.e. sodomy must mean actual penetration as witnessed by four men and the couple involved must remain in their positions while a string is passed between the two bodies... Only if it gets stuck, has sodomy occurred...WTF???).

Also, booze is available over here through delivery men... you just call your local buddy and he passes by your house and drops off a bottle of vodka, to which you add some perfectly legal red bulls and bob's your uncle... Club92!

One of the contacts I had here brought me out for dinner the other night to a restaurant a little outside of Tehran and we had a quality feed and smoked some shisha... but he works for an Iranian private bank and is involved in Islamic banking. Listen to this, under Islamic law, it's illegal to charge interest (it's the same in Christianity actually, but that's one of the little rules that we've forgotten about), so there's this concept of Islamic banking, which buys the house that you're looking to buy with a loan and sells it back to you for more money... i.e. no interest involved whatsoever... click here for more on Islamic banking.

Anyway, what I was trying to say was that everything feels very much normal here... although there are obvious restrictions (my facebook account being one of them), it really ain't all that different.

One major difference is actually a postive one, the Iranians I've met so far have been unbelieveably hospitable. They seem to see unfailing hospitality as a 'duty' or 'responsibility'. I've been taken out for countless dinners and lunches, had teas bought for me, been driven around, been brought to visit different things and generally been treated like a prince by the Iranians I've met so far. They won't let me put my hand in my pocket (even though I am quite insistant) and they always go beyond the call of duty.

The other night I had brought out too little money and was stranded in north Tehran with only enough for a taxi halfway home, and the nicest motorcyclist on the face of the planet gave me a free spin home... twas great...

That's all for now... excuse the slight disjointedness of posting.

C.

Ramadan vs. Atkins...

Just a quick one for yez to let you know that I'm still alive and that I haven't been gunned down by the mujadeen... (I don't even know what the mujadeen are, but they sound ominous!).


So yesterday, I was an exemplary little tourist and did lots of cultural stuff. I got up at cockcrow and went to the Grand Bazaar which was interesting (pretty similar to the one in Istanbul... grand bazaar is grand bazaar). After that you won't believe what I did... you won't feckin' believe it... wait for it... wait for it... yes, I went to a museum! Actually it was more a palace than a museum (the Golestan Palace in fact, click here for Wikipedia link), but it had lots of old shit behind glass cases and lots of drawings so it qualifies as a museum... there was even an etymological museum part of it, with freaky life size mannequins wearing traditional Iranian clothes... freaky shit!

Not wanting to overload myself with culture, I took the afternoon off and lay in a park reading my book... I also found this deadly little Iranian tea house and I tried 'dizi' for lunch, which is a famous Iranian dish. It's like a stew of mutton, spuds, tomatoes etc. and they serve it to you in a tall and narrow oven fired clay receptacle with a bowl and a pestle... Luckily enough I had read up in my lonely planet about it, so I wasn't baffled by this array of accoutrement.

First of all, you rip up bread and put it into the bowl and then you decant all the broth out of the stew into the bread and you eat that like a soup. That's essentially your starter. The idea is then to get your pestle and to grind the remaining stuff into a paste which you then eat with bread or a spoon and yogurt. So, pestle in hand, Conor starts trying to grind this stuff up... but I fear that I was a little too timid with it and was only really slopping it around the place (like a little girl). An Iranian dude beside me stood up and came over, ripped the pestle out of my hand and proceeded to beat the living bejayzus out of my lunch. He layed into it like a bat out of hell for about five minutes and then presented me with the resulting (very fine) paste for my entree... Mad altogether, but his bird spoke English so we chatted for a bit and I impressed on her my utmost gratification for her bloke having pureed my lunch for me... and we all laughed... hihihihihi!!! Ahhhh, it was very nice altogether...

And then when I went to pay, I think I gave the money to a beggar instead of a waiter and created a big hullabulloo whereby everyone was shouting at the beggar and trying to get the money back off him while I stood by with a slightly bewildered look on my face... Well done Conor you big eejit!

Tomorrow is a big day... it's the first day of Ramadan (Ramazan), the Muslim month of fasting... that's right, you heard me... Conor decided to go to the most frickin' Islamic place on the face of the planet at the most frickin' Islamic time of the year. And so, from tomorrow, no-one eats, drinks (even water) or smokes during daylight hours.. for a month ... and apparently I'm not allowed to either! Well isn't that just brilliant... just frickin' brilliant!!! I don't know what I'm going to do... apparently all the shops, restaurants and anything that might be source of nosh remains closed. Foreigners are supposed to survive by staying in their hotels and eating there, but that is going on the assumption that your hotel is not a hellhole of a cockroach infested piece of cowdung! Anyway... I'm sure I'll survive it somehow... worst case scenario I lose a pound or two (and we all know that wouldn't exactly be Armageddon!).

I bet ya nobodies even reading this... everyone's off in Electric Picnic having a ball while Conor's stuck in tehran awaiting starvation... Anyway, I don't care anymore, I'm off to search for a loo... l8r compadres...

The Tehran Summer

Jayzus, had a mad day today... walked about a trillion miles all over the city... I'm in the more affluent north of the city (my hostel being in the south) and earlier on this afternoon, I went for a stroll in the Park and bumped into something called the Tehran Summer Festival... Twas mad altogether... I lazed in the sun reading my book and talking to randomers. The Park was jammers with people all with picnics and playing badminton like mad bastards. There was all kinds of cultural shite on display and then when it got dark there was this crazy coloured water dance show where the fountains in the lake got down and jiggy to some choons... Brilliant altogether!

The money is still seriously wrecking my head though. They have rials here which are denominated in quadrillions, but when they talk about money, they talk in Toman, which means ten rials. So when you buy something, they tell you for instance: "1000 please sir"... and you dig through your ridiculous amount of notes and find one that says 1000 on it (in crazy symbols... see below) and hand it over... and they look at you like you're some kind of fruitcake and say "One THOUSAND please sir" and then you cop that they actually mean ten thousand so you have go rooting through your telephone book of notes again and dig out another couple of wads to keep the punter happy. I WILL UNDERSTAND THIS MONEY!!!

No real other news... I'm talking to people trying to come up with a plan of attack for Iran (I mean that in a friendly-traveller's-route kinda way, and not a You-can't-have-nuclear-energy-or-we'll-blow-you-up kinda way). There's a couple of places which are musts (Esfehan, Yadz etc.) but I want to come up with a decent itinerary so I'm talking to people about it and letting them deface my Lonely Planet (adding to the never-ending collection of email addresses I'm amassing).

Finally, I did the best thing that I ever did today... I got my card reader (which I use to transfer photos from my camera to computer) and I unceremoniously FUCKED it into the bin. It's been pissing me off since South America insofar as it only works every fourteenth time and generally breaks my balls. So I popped into one of the shops here and I bought a new one... It was super cheap and super plasticy but it works a dream... and so, my feathered friends, putting up photos has just become a lot easier and I leave you now with some of my first impressions of Iran.

Keep it real, homedogs! (And anyone going to Electric Picnic, I hope you have a ball of a time... I would love to be there!!!)

Crazy Money

hullo there readers and welcome to this, the first posting from Iran. I arrived in Tehran yesterday morning having survived a pretty shitty train journey from Van in Turkey. I arrived at the station in Van on Tuesday at four o'clock thinking to myself "Jesus, I'm great... I'm here well in time for my 18.47 train to Tehran... isn't it amazing how precise these train times are!!!"... When I got to the station, everyone was telling me to go away, that there was no train to Tehran until the following Friday. Fuck sake, I thought to myself, but I ain't goin' anywhere. I had heard that the trains were kind of haphazard and tended to pop in and out whenever they liked, so, being the stubborn bastard that I am, I stuck my heels in and decided to camp at the train station until a train came. My train finally arrived at 01.00 on Wednesday and didn't budge until 08.00 that morning. At least they let us on and we could sleep on the train though. Then we went on our merry way towards the city of Tabriz in Iran. After spending half of the first day at Turkish customs and the other half at Iranian customs we finally arrived in Tabriz at 10.00pm on Wednesday evening, and then in Tehran at 9.00am on Thursday morning. Bit of a nightmare, but I actually slept quite well on the train and also I got adopted by an Iranian guy and his son who were in my couchette and they helped me do all the stuff that I needed to do (eat, survive the passport grilling etc.). They insisted on paying for everything and wouldn't let me put my hand in my pocket.

Once I arrived in Tehran, I stood there on the steps of the train station and I imagine I must have looked like your atypical lost westerner. This oul fella came up to me and started chatting away in English. He offered to show me the cheap way to my hotel (i.e. bus as opposed to Taxi) and on the way, we popped into his gaf for some lunch... what a nice old man he was! He wouldn't let me pay for the buses or anything and insisted on paying for everything.

So basically, I've been here a day and I haven't been able to spend any money yet. Which is a pity, cos I have buckets of the stuff. Because of the sanctions and various other anomolies, you can't actually get money into or out of Iran (I.e. our cards don't work in their atms etc.) so you have to bring enough raw currency to do you for the whole stay. When I was in Turkey, I armed myself with 600 Euros, hoping that this would be enough for a month in Iran. I went to the money exchange place and asked could I change it into Iran Rials. Your man at the counter exploded in laughter at the idea of me changing that much into Rials, he pointed at my backpack and indicated that I'd need to empty it to carry the Rials if I wanted to exchange that much. So I decided to exchange 150 Euro to begin with (as you can also exchange Euro within Iran) and your man took my three clean 50 Euro bills and overloaded me with literally hundreds of hundreds of Iranian notes... He also gave me a plastic bag with which to carry them. (I thought that was nice). Basically, my backpack has doubled in size due to the fact that I have Iranian notes stuck in every concievable pocket and the fuckers won't even let me spend them.

There's nothing else to report really... I've been walking around tehran looking for internet cafes (which are thin on the ground). This one is the first one I've been able to find. Other than that, I'm a happy little camper. Gonna start my touristy shit tomorrow (I.e. the grand baazar, various mosques, a museum or two... etc. ) but I'm taking it easy today, just walking around trying to orientate myself... I've had about five people walk up to me starting a conversation in English and they've all given me their email addresses... it's mad as a hatter! Oh and my Farsi is coming along slowly. I used the train journey to learn some of the basics and can now count to ten as well as your usual hello goodbye thank you and all that malarky. It's a good deal more difficult than Turkey because the written alphabet is different... But I've learned all the numerical digits in Farsi script so I'm battling my way through it. I'm not even going to bother with the alpha digits, it's fucking madness: شیلشسلیسیباسیبلغتعهنمهخههعهخمعهخمغعمهغعه ... See what I mean!

L8r dudes, and anyone's who heading to EP, I hope you have a ball! I wish I was going.
Yur man in Iran,
Conor