Blogs from Iran, Middle East - page 54

Long distance buses Iran’s long distance buses are of two types. The older and the newer buses: The older buses are by Mercedes Benz and the newer once are from Volvo, Scania and MAN buses. The Benz is about half the price as the other 3 but much slower. Comfort wise as well the other 3 looks better than the Benz. You go to the terminal and tell them where you want to go and by the ticket. In Esfahan the price seemed constant however in Tehran you can negotiate. First I was told the Volvo bus from Tehran to Istanbul was IRA350,000/= then the Scania people told me it was IRA250,000/= and finally the MAN people told me they can give me a ticket for IRA200,000. I have been in a Volvo and MAN and ... 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

Woke up around 7:30am, went across the street bought some Barbari (one of the four types of bread in Iran) came back to my dorm and ate it with cheese and Nutella. Afterwards checked my email at the hostel and called Beyruse. He said he will come at about 11am. I checked out of the hotel and put my luggage in Beyruse’s car and went roaming around the city centre. Afterwards Beyruse took me to the Soffeh bus terminal and I took the 1pm bus to Tehran. Once in the bus I continued to read Pet Semetary and then I suddenly realised that I had left my passport at Amir Kabir guest house. Generally no guest house keeps the passport but these guys decided to keep it and I forgot to take it from them. Quickly ... read more

I woke up around 7:30am and the rest of the people were fast asleep. I tried to go into one of the rooms to get my stuff and to shave and have a shower but the room was locked and I didn’t know where the keys were. I spent the next two hours with my mobile deleting text messages and updating my contacts list as I couldn’t do anything else till these guys woke up. They finally woke up at 9:30am and we had breakfast. I love this Iranian breakfast of cheese, walnuts, butter, honey and Lavash (one of the 4 types of bread in Iran). Oh yeah they also have yogurt as well but I ate yogurt with sugar while they ate with lavash. These Iranians drink so much tea it’s not funny; three cups ... read more

I got into Esfahan (Iranians sometimes spell it as Isfahan too), Kaveh Bus Terminal at 8:30am. I am at this massive bus station, no guide book, no mobile phone (it doesn’t work in Iran), no one speaks English and don’t know where to go. Last but not least only USD4/= i.e. Iranian Riyals (IRA) 36,000 in my purse. Wow what a feeling. The situation gets even better as I learnt later that Iran didn’t accept travellers cheques, no ATM’s, visa card not accepted due to US sanctions and I had changed my last USD10/= bill in Quetta, Pakistan. This is situation is worse but quite similar to Myanmar where they didn’t accept TC’s, no ATM and no mobile phones. I am now right royally screwed !!!! I had a few friends in Esfahan through Hospitality club ... read more