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30.08. – 06.09.2012 Iranian Border – TabrizSonja:
Border:
"Have you ever been in Iran?" - "No." - "What do you think about Iran?" - "We don't know yet, because we are here for the first time!?!" That's about how our conversation went with an Iranian officer at the border. To be friendly Olli wanted to shake hands with her when we said goodbye, which she rejected appalled. The reason is that in Iran it's very unusual to shake hands with the opposite sex, which Olli had completely forgotten because of the whole excitement. What a good start :) After a Turkish guy tried to cheat on us as a parting gift when we wanted to change money, which could be avoided by the help of the Turkish border police and two helpful Iranians, we finally could say: Full steam ahead for Iran. We got even permission by the Iranian military to take our traditional border photo, although shooting photos is actually forbidden at the border :) Welcome to Iran! We had heard a lot about the Islamic Republic of fellow travelers and also from the press, but we didn't really know what to expect and if you can believe all the information. Accordingly, we were of course pretty excited.
Dress Code:
For me this new part of our journey now unfortunately meant cycling in the heat wearing long clothes and a headscarf. To show his solidarity Olli also wore long trousers, although for men doing sports wearing shorts is tolerated. Little by little, I then found out that it's OK for cycling female tourists outside of major cities to wear a small buff as headscarf and that sleeves to the elbows are actually long enough. That's a small relief.
Hospitality:
What we also already knew from many other cyclists is the great and warm hospitality and friendliness of the Iranians. With great enthusiasm they welcome you with the few words of English they remember from school when you pass them on the street: "Hello! Hello! How are you? Where are you from? What's your name? " This or likewise you can experience it in every village you pass. Sometimes they even stop you and give you fruits or offer tea. When you then strike up a conversation over tea, quickly another important issue comes up which every Iranian is dying to ask: "How do you like Iran? What do you think about Iran? " That sounds familiar already... We were explained that due to the global press, which is usually rather negative, everyone is worried here, what foreigners might think of them.
Language & Money:
The first few days in the northwest of the country we were able to communicate very well with our Turkish and especially the younger ones can sometimes speak a little English, but unfortunately not as many as we would have thought. That is why we immediately took the opportunity to learn a little Persian at our first invitation to tea in a field of sunflowers. The farmer excitedly taught us the Persian numbers and some key words. The language has a very pleasant sound and some words are similar in Turkish, but we will probably never get used to the font. Just imagine you stand in front of the toilets and you can't, by any stretch of the imagination, recognize or read, which is for men and which for women. Even the search for very basic shops such as a bakery becomes a challenge when you can't read the sign and what's more, often a bakery can't be recognized as such from outside. You sometimes feel a bit like an illiterate. When handling the Iranian money sometimes our heads start spinning quite a bit because of all the zeros. 1 € is about 30 000 Rials (depending on the current inflation), which corresponds to 3000 Tuman, because people calculate in Tuman, although it says Rials on the banknotes. As you can imagine, in the beginning our brains got totally twisted when we tried to convert, for the amusement of the dealers who always had to smile at the sight of our bewildered faces.
Olli:
Water supply:
Unfortunately, water supply in Iran is no longer as convenient as in Turkey, where there were always plenty of fountains everywhere. There is no such luxury here and unfortunately the tap water often tastes strongly of chlorine. We both already had to suffer from mild diarrhea, so that we decided to buy water from now on, which is very cheap here for us Europeans.
Public Transportation:
Also very cheap are buses (about 10 € per person for 600 km) and taxis (a few Euros to go all across the city). Especially going by night bus to travel in between cities using luxury buses (comfortable seats, air conditioning, free water) on the well paved roads is very popular with the Iranians and the route network is highly developed. You can also bring your bicycle for a small fee of a few Euros. All these advantages and the fact that we only have a 30-day visa for Iran, which we don't want to extend, because we want to get as far as possible before winter starts and also we have to wait in Tehran for our visas for Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan for 14 days let us finally take the decision to largely switch to the bus in Iran. So we traveled the routes Tabriz - Tehran, Tehran - Isfahan and back to Tehran all by bus. Soon we'll go to Mashad by bus as well.
But don't think we got lazy! There was a lot of bureaucratic stuff to take care of (German, Turkmen, Uzbek Embassy for visa applications), we were extensively busy with sightseeing (Tabriz -> here's pictures of a cute photographer from Tabriz, Tehran, Isfahan) and we were climbing in the mountains outside of Tehran in over 2000 m altitude, which provided us with a multi-day soreness. But you'll learn more about our activities in and around Tehran in the next report.
Food & Drinking:
The Persian food, or rather what we could find vegetarian in the Persian cuisine, which is very heavy on meat, tasted very delicious, with just a few exceptions such as pickled sour cherries. In turn we dished up our German specialties, such as apple strudel, potato salad, pumpkin soup and vegetarian pizza, at every opportunity to promote international understanding. However, as thoroughbred Bavarians we couldn't make friends with the local beer. In Iran alcohol is forbidden. Thus there is only non-alcoholic beer. Out of solidarity to our home we tried a beer with the beautiful name "Bavaria", which however, was from Holland and exactly tasted like that (Please do not be offended dear Dutchman) ;) Another attempt we made with a beer with pineapple flavor ... I won't say anything to that. Tastes just as you'd imagine. Welcome to Iran :)
Addendum:
Money supply (frequently asked question):
In Iran as a tourist to get cash is impossible. As a foreigner, you can not withdraw money from ATM machines , not directly from banks and also not via Western Union. With a credit card or traveler's checks it's not possible either. The only option is to bring cash, preferably in the form of U.S. dollars or euros, which you then exchange in exchange offices (not in banks) in small amounts. When changing you also need to know that there are two courses: the worse government's course, about 60% less, and the better course of the exchange offices.
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