Blogs from Tehran, North, Iran, Middle East - page 9

Teheran: la mastodontica capital irani donde el caotico y monstruoso trafico hace que cruzar la calle sea un deporte de riesgo. Teheran nunca nos ha robado el corazon, nunca la recordamos con carinyo, tan solo la presencia de la Familia de Saeed ( novio de la hermana de Marc) que siempre nos reciben con una sonrisa en los labios nos hace la estancia mas acogedora. Pero esta vez hemos recorrido una Teheran desconocida para la mayoria de turistas, la Teheran judia. Contactamos con el Comite judio de Teheran , ya que queremos incluir fotos de esta comunidad en el libro fotografico que estamos preparando. La comunidad de judios en Iran no es muy amplia, y cada vez mas gente emigra a America o Canada, como el resto de iranis buscando una vida mejor ( mas libertad, ... read more

Tehran! Immensa e sterminata capitale dell'Iran. Qui vivono oltre 13 milioni di persone (registrate); la cosa si puo' facilmente intuire dall' onnipresente traffico che opprime ogni singola via, dalla piu' piccola alla piu' grande, della sterminata citta'. Anche soltanto camminare lungo le strade puo' rappresentare un rischio visto che macchine, autobus e motorini possono arrivare da qualunque direzione!!! Ogni sortita al di fuori dell'hotel, di un museo o di uno dei numerosi parchi e' un po' un terno al lotto. In molti ci avevano addirittura suggerito di evitare Tehran dicendoci che se ne poteva anche fare a meno. Ciononostante abbiamo voluto passare un paio di giorni nella capitale per "tastare il polso"" di come sia effettivamente la vita qui. E siamo contenti di averlo fatto anche se un paio di giorni sono piu' che sufficienti. Prima ... read more

We decided to take a bus to Tehran to see our friend Majid, who we had met in Hamedan, and to try to climb Damavand, Iran’s highest mountain. Buying a bus ticket in Yazd was a bit of an effort as everyone assumed we wanted the luxury coach. No, I want to go on the retro-chic Mercedes bus and when we came to board it I was not disappointed. On the side of the 1960’s style coach emblazoned in big letters it said “Beautiful Bus”, I could not agree more. The big ugly and air-conditioned modern coaches pulled away from the terminal and we clambered aboard the beautiful bus and happily opened the windows for a night of wind swept motoring. The Mercedes bus was about 1/3 less expensive than an air conditioned coach and since ... read more

It was as I expected it would be, the hotel tried to charge me for two days instead of one and then I spent 8 hours on two old Mercedes busses that must predate WW2. The scenery did improve as I got closer to Kermanshah, the bus went through Lorestan which is nomad territory and reminded me a little of Mongolia. I talked to a University student on the bus that was a doppleganger of my mate Nigel, the hair, the nose, the physique were all spot on, freaked me out a bit. He got me in a cab and showed me the way to the hotel I was looking for and paid for the taxi, a typical act of kindness here. I then went and pigged out in a Kebabi I will really miss the ... read more

Woke up around 7:30am, had Lavash, Nutella, Honey and Butter for breakfast. Mehdi and I went to the National History Museum. Mehdi showed his pass as he is doing Tourism planning for his degree and only told them that I was a student and they gave a 50% discount. Even though I am not much of a museum fan, there were a few impressive things. I liked the Iranian Salt Man, some of the old characters and statues. Some palatial ruins like artefacts which reminded me of Anuradhapura. Where you have the wooden columns in this instance like the stone columns Sri Lanka had. The National History Museum and the Islamic History Museum are side by side. The door entrances in the Islamic museum were quite nice. After the museum we went had a kebab and ... read more