Blogs from East, Iran, Middle East - page 5

Reza is working, so he leaves me with his friend Mehrdad. Mehrdad and his taxi driver brother Mehdi come to collect me and after a sneaky lunchtime tea (behind closed doors so as not to offend the masses) we head to the Holy Shrine of Imam Reza. Apparently he was a pretty popular bloke because the sheer size of the Haram is unbelievable. After much confusion (since alot of the site is off-limits to non-muslims) we are allowed in and are ushered to the Islamic Relations Office and Foreign Pilgrims Affairs, where I am bombarded with Islamic propaganda by friendly staff. The museums are interesting, my favourite exhibit being the ode to nuclear power - a sculpture of two hands holding a radioactive cannister, with jars of each element displayed underneath...... contra-versial. So, its Tuesday morning ... read more

We arrived in Yazd from Isfahan on the 6th June. The bus journey was good, a nice air conditioned very punctual bus. We're staying at Kohan Kashana traditional hotel, which means courtyards, fountains and general lovely atmosphere, all for 300,000 rials a night (twin room, inc. breakfast, en suite). I've managed to get ill, by eating a camel burger on the 6th. Severe stomach cramps and all the usual food poisoning joy followed, until finally last night I decided I'd better go to a doctor (the LP says to seek medical attention immediately if suffering abdominal pain as well as, erm, bad stomach-ness). We duly headed off, saw a doctor who spoke just about enough English, and then went to find a pharmacy. He had prescribed a syrup to treat the actual bug, some fairly strong ... read more

Hopefully these will buy me some more time to procrastinate on my Iranian blog... but seriously, how do you summarize Iran in a few hundred words or less? So.. How was Iran? Riiight. All photos are courtesy (and property) of "Big Dan X".... read more

Finally, this is our next blog entry... it took a while and is short wrap up of our last 10 days in beautiful Iran. Esfahan This city is the beauty queen of Iran. We stayed 4 nights but could have stayed a lot more. The biggest attraction is the Imam Khomeini Square. The second biggest square in the world (the biggest is Tiananmen Square in China) is not only huge, but it is surrounded by nice buildings. Among others two of the most wonderful mosques in the whole Islam. We visited both, the Imam Khomeini Mosque and the Sheik Lotfollah Mosque and were deeply impressed. The square is also home to close to hundreds of souvenir shops as part of the bazar and as a tourist you are begged 10 times per day to buy a ... read more

Vista dall'alto, Yazd appare come una uniforme distesa marrone di basse case di fango punteggiata dalle cupole azzurre e dagli slanciati minareti, finemente decorati, delle sue moschee. Cio' che risalta maggiormente e' la quantita' impressionante di badghirs, le antiche torri di ventilazione che servivano a rinfrescare le case durante le estati insopportabilmente calde e che ora costituiscono il tipico orizzonte urbano. Sorgendo ai margini del deserto, in previsione di giornate roventi, trovo un rassicurante ricovero nel confortevole hotel in centro citta', dove passero' gran parte delle due settimane trascorse a Yazd collaudando i divani, bevendo the' e dando una mano in cucina. Subito il secondo giorno mi gioco la gita culturale nel deserto: partiamo di buon mattino a bordo di una scassata pegeout senza aria condizionata e ci inoltriamo nel nulla fino ad arrivare ad Asr ... read more