Where 33 - Tehran, Iran --OR-- Why Danger in Iran Really is Hillman Hunter Shaped

HI Everyone from the Headquarters of the Axis of Evil ... where death really does lurk around every corner.

Before ... I was in Quetta, Pakistan over 600km from the Iranian border and just about to on get a train ...

The twice monthly train left at midday - except of course that it didn't. There was a 3-hour wait which ended when some important looking plain clothes policeman came on board to check my passport - apparently having it checked by ordinary policeman was insufficient. I wasn't aware that the train was waiting because of me (ıt left as soon as I had my passport checked), but no-one seemed very bothered - there were only 3 other passengers (all locals) so we all had loads of room to lay around. Disasterously they had only brought one prayer mat between them which they had to share in rotation so prayer-time 5-times a day lasted about an hour each time. They had to face mecca each time but luckily they didnt have to keep moving it cos the track was dead straight all the way! Most Pakistanis are religious, do pray and wished they lived in a 'proper' Islamic state like Iran.

We crossed flat desert and more flat desert. Surprisingly the track had been washed away by heavy rains and had only just been repaired so progress was very slow especially across the bit where one guy was ankle deep in water next to the track holding a green flag presumably ready to change it to red if the track started to slip. I didnt really expect the train to be on time. It was due to arrive at the border at about midday the next day; it didnt make it there at midday or that afternoon or that evening. I am told it got there at 5am the next morning (3rd day) but I was asleep. I could not be bothered to wait for the whole train and goods wagons to clear the border and carry on so I got off and went across on foot, into Iran...


Now we all know that Iran is a dangerous place full of hard line Islamic Iranians who will happily lynch a foreigner especially if they are from USA or UK. However,this may not be entirely true - in fact nothing could be further from the truth. However, there are a few things you should know about Iran...

The Law!
In public it is illegal for:
- men (or women) to wear shorts (unless at a segregated swimming area or involved in sport - football seems to be the only sport which anyone actually plays)
- men to wear sleeveless tops
- women to wear short sleeves
- for females over 9 years old to take off their hejab or headscarf.
- women not to have a coat covering their bums
- males and females to hold hands unless they are married - occasional touching of shoulders appears to be tolerated though (men happily hold hands with other men and women with women)
- dance with opposite sex
- sing
- play music ...

In private it is still illegal (though that doesn't mean they dont happen) to:
- Drink alcohol
- gamble
- watch films with sex in
- have satellite TV

The penalty for a foreigner having sex with an Iranian women is death!


In reality:
- Iran is very westernised.
- Most Iranians hate the rules and are not actively religious (I didnt see a single prayer mat in Iran!)
- Many Iranians think the Islamic revolution in 1979 was a mistake.
- The mullahs (religious leaders who run the country) are effectively running a military dictatorship and are very corrupt.
- Bush and Blair are often well respected and many hope Bush does invade and kick out the present regime.
- The Iran Lonely Planet guidebook entry under 'Discos and Nightclubs' is very short and simply reads 'Dream on.' - Those things that are illegal in public are pretty much stuck to as there are loads of police around to enforce them.
- Whatever you can get away with in private is OK!

- Men and women are segregated on buses and are not allowed to sit next to each other unless related - although in a shared taxi or on a train no-one seems to care about that.
- Women allways have their heads covered in public (unless in a very deserted spot), 80% of women wear all black (less in Tehran) often black capes which they have to hold closed with their hands, or if they are carrying things, with their teeth!
- Many Iranians really believe that the current dictatorship was put in place by, and is under the control of, Great Britain!

So, it is a great irony that Iran is a very strict Islamic state, cos most Iranians are not even that religious.

I should mention at this point that there are 2 types of Iranians: Those driving cars and those not driving cars.
- Iranians driving cars
These are very dangerous people who will try not to stop at any time. Unfortunately Iran, and Tehran in particular, is full of cars and hence Iran and Tehran are very dangerous places to be. Every time I crossed the street in Tehran I knew I was taking my life in my hands - basically you have to use the 'Saigon method' (dont look just walk and presume/hope/pray that everythýng will miss you). This works in Saigon (Vietnam) with motorcycles which can easily swerve around you at the last moment and almost always do. However in Tehran they have cars which are wide and do not swerve round you at any moment. So the only solution is to walk straight into the road (there is no point in stoppýng at the kerb cos there will never be a gap) and walk straight across, giving the impression that you are not going to stop for anything and havent even looked to see whats coming, whilst being confident in the knowledge that the cars heading for you MIGHT stop, and of course keeping an eye out for the car that comes hammering round the corner and is not going to stop/couldnt stop in time anyway, so you can jump out of the way at the last moment. I have seen more accidents in Iran in a month than in the rest of my life. Everyone drives like this. Iran is a dangerous place!

- Iranians not driving cars
These people are incredibly friendly and will immediately sympathise with you about how bad the driving is. Then they will ask you where you are from and wonder what the hell you want to visit Iran for. Then they will show you tremendous hospitality which would be unheard of in the west including feeding you,paying for you and even let you stay in a spare apartment (with sauna and swimming pool etc ... more later).

So, I am in Iran and haven't been lynched (it isn't anythýng like what we are lead to believe in the media). There was some stuff to see:

- Bam - the first stop in Iran. This was hope to a beautiful mud city but in December 2003 it was flattened by a huge earthquake. A huge amount of aid flowed into the town from inside and outside of Iran but most of it seems to have 'disappeared' and the sad reality is that it looks as if the earhquake happened just one month ago. Most buildings were destoyed and the remaining ones look very wobbly but they have not been pulled down yet. Only a few small houses have been rebuilt and most people are still living in Red Crescent tents. The bazaar is a line of metal heavy goods containers - the doors are opened at one end and you have a shop.

- The Desert - Nearly every day in Iran I woke up to find that I was (once again) in a desert and surrounded by mountains, very hot durýng the day and cold at night. Parts of the desert are tediously featureless but other parts are incredibly interesting with oases, sand dunes carved by the wind, colourful rocks and date palms. And, when the wind stops blowing, peace.

- Persepolis - A city built 2,500 years ago although there is not so much there now. But it has a few buildings, columns, statues, stairways with carvings etc.

- Indoor Bazaars - Everytown has one and most claim to be hundreds of years old. They are nice not because of what they contain (they are just shops really) but because they are about the only place where there are no cars! However motorbikes get ridden through the often narrow passageways at high speed instead.

- Mosques - These were not in short supply and I could go on at some length about how incredible they all are. Many are 500 years or more old and are covered in mosaics tiles of brilliant colours, as bright as they were the day they were made, the arches describing beautiful shapes and reveal crisp stalactite mouldings ... I could go on but suffice to say that if you like blue tiles then you'll love them.

- Teahouses - Nearly always full of men smoking water pipes and occasionally drinking tea. Many of them are very old in superbly atmospheric underground caverns and one was even between the piers of a bridge not much above water level; unfortunately it was windy and so we did get a bit wet from time to time from the spray.

- No Ruz (New Year) - Unfortunately I ended up in Iran at the one time in the year when everyone (the locals) travels. The Persian calander is different to ours in terms of years, months, and days, but luckily they do have 7 days in a week. New Year is on 21 March except that this year it was actually on 20 March just after 4pm in the afternoon (it depends on the position of the sun). I was staying in a tiny village in the desert at the time - we all gathered round looking at the 7 things beginning with S (in Persian) to bring good luck for the next year and then suddenly it was new year! No alcohol, no party poppers, no Big Ben, no music, dancing or celebration. It just was New Year!

So Iran is a fascinating country full of interesting things and culture and really friendly people ...
...There are some annoying things though (apart from the laws and the driving):
- About 50% of cars are Paykans - replicas of Hillman Hunters, and nearly all are white, produce incredible pollution and are very inefficient (but petrol is only about 10 US cents (5p) a litre).
- The Iranian currency in the rial, which all banknotes are denominated in. However, Iranians nearly always quote prices in tuman (a tuman in 10 rials). This get more than a bit confusing cos I had to keep losing and adding a zero every time I spent any money - and off course unless you are careful you end up being charged 10 times more than you thought.

... And I did have some bad experiences:
The Bug - On the way back from a day in the dunes in the desert I was happily sitting in the back of a 4wd when I was suddenly bitten/stung, by something unknown, on my finger. It really hurt so we stopped the car and had a look to see what it was but could find nothing. We drove for another hour and by then it was still really painful, even though my finger had gone numb and my arm wasnt feeling great either. So we stopped at a very rural hospital and, cos they couldnt decide what it was either, ended up having 2 injection in my arms. And the Iranian Health Service? Basic - but I recovered.

The Razor - One of the biggest pains when travellýng is buses that arrive very early in the morning. In this case getting to Shiraz (where the wine grape originates - but of course it is illegal to make wine out of it here) all the bus companies left at 8pm so they could all get to Shiraz at 3.30am!!! Even the locals didnt know why. So having no choice I caught the bus and once in Shiraz decided to sleep at the bus station until it was light, locking my daysac to my backpack via a cable which secured the whole lot to a bench. I woke up to find a man leaning over my bags in a suspicious way so I yelled at him and he dissapeared. It was only when it got light that I found a razor blade which had been dropped on my bag and the handle of my daysac had been sliced through leaving me very close to having lost a lot of stuff. I didnt sleep in any bus stations after that!

The Lift - On the way back from the desert to reality I got a lift to a village where I was told the bus went at 3pm. It actually went at 1.30pm so I was left to try and hitch a lift or wait for a bus passing through. Hours passed and no buses came and no one willing to give me a lift - most of the cars were packed full of families on their way home from Mashad (holiest place in Iran). After 5 hours (8pm) it was dark and I was still looking at a 7 or 8 hour journey to get to my destination, I was slumped by the side of the road and had given up trying to get a lift when a taxi stopped in front of me. He asked me where I was going, I asked how much, but he said no charge. Unfortunately the small car (a Paykan of course) was already packed with his family and all their things (returning from Mashad). Car full, boot full. No problem, they took enough stuff from the boot to fit my backpack in, crammed themselves and their stuff into the back seat and I got in the front. I couldn,t believe how lucky I was after waiting that long. Then less than 100 metres down the road, it ran out of petrol! We eventually got going and after that lift, waiting at a roundabout to catch a bus at about midnight, and a taxi ride I eventually found a bed at 3am.

Eventually I went to Tehran to some great hospıtalıty ... more about that next time ...

Love
Ankur / Pete