I believe it was during WW1 that ‘shell shock’ was first documented. I’d like to introduce you to the ‘Delhi shock’.

I arrived from the pittorque city of Tehran (15 mio inhabitants) at 04.00 in the morning. The taxi drive through the tree filled streets was one I won’t easily forget. Only after 10 minutes I noticed that cars should drive on the left. The mist (visibility: 50 meters) added a mystic touch to the scenic trip.

Hotels are really affordable in Delhi and interior design is fantastic. Unfortunately, the execution of the master’s design is off a slightly lower standard, which means that basically everything is broken.

There’s a festival on these days, thus you can (and do) light firecrackers at any moment of the day. Fortunately everybody is in an extra festive mood.

The cokroaches and dead dogs in the street come with the territory, but please don’t make me get used to the homeless people.

I’m in the bus towards Tehran, and I will be leaving Iran soon. After my short stay overhere, I would like to share some things I’ve seen and read about Iran:
– Iranians like jews, they even *guarantee* seats in the parlement specifically for jews. Admittedly, jews don’t have the same rights as Muslims. Iranians don’t agree with the current situation in Israel.

– Iranians like Americans. The Americans I’ve met in Iran were extremy positive about their reception (even at the border). American products are cherished by Iranians. Both are a miracle as the USA overthrew the legally elected government in Iran in 1954 (headed by the Times man-of-the-year Mossadegh), categorised Iran in the ‘axis of evil’ when it had its most pro-western and peace loving government in decades, the Iran-contra affair, shot down of the civilian IranAir flight 655 (290 people on board) by the US navy most advanced warship. Surprisingly, you’ll find amazing similarities between the ideas of American Christians evangelicals (and tea party movement) and the current situation in Iran. – Iran is not agressive: it hasn’t attacked anoyher country for centuries and its miliyary budget is only 2,7% of GDP. As an indication, the USA spends every two weeks in Iraq alone what Iran spends in a year. This despite that Iran has been occuppied by Russians, British and was under attack of Iraq and had operations on its soil by the USA. Despite what many western people might think, Iran despises thd Taliban about as much as the USA.

– Iran doesn’t have nuclear weapons (yet). This is an exception in the region as the main countries that operate in there (India, Pakistan, Israel, Russia and USA) all have these weapons. Moreover, Iran is an importer of fossil fuels (they lack refinery capacity for their oil), therefore nuclear energy really is important to them.

– Iran isn’t anti-west, it just doesn’t want to turn into a country where mindless pursuit of money, status and sex are its citizens main occupations.

Isn’t there anything negative in Iran? Of course there is. – The oppression of women and non-muslims is non-worthy for such a great nation (the fact that the situation in neighbouring countries is far worse isn’t an excuse).

– Economic policy is dramatic, leading to poverty in what could be one of the richest countries in the world. Again, income disparity isn’t something that is confined to Iran, but the situation is needlessly bad.

– Support for movements outide its country need to stop (it wouldn’t want other countries do the same to Iran).

– The influence of the clergy should be limited to theological affairs. Freedom of speech and elections are sacred too.

– Despite what many people from the west think, the green movement didn’t want to make the country secular, nor did it want to stop Iran’s nuclear efforts. Also, the support from the west for the green movement did far more harm than good (it was inmediately branded as a foreign supported coup, with which the Iranians have very bad experiences).

-And many more…

The world seems to misunderstand Iran and Iran’s ruling class doesn’t understand its people. After reading a couple of books and spending a couple of weeks in Iran, I can’t pretend to understand it either. What I do know is that Iranians are in general genuinely nice people. They’re very hurt by their negative image abroad (it’s typically the 2nd question they ask you). In my opinion it’s a country that will slowly change for the better and then emerge as the leading country in its region and maybe this will work as a ‘religious democracy’. ‘Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there’ as they call it over here. And I’ll miss Iran.

it’s been now a bit more than two weeks since I left NL. It’s probably thanks to the intense experiences, but my time here seems so much longer. Typically ‘time flies when you’re having fun’, but once you’ve got a lot of time it only seems to increase. I’ve slept every day at least 10 hours a day (and I still could sleep more), which reduces the time to do things (and should therefore make time go faster), but fortunately the clock keeps ticking in slowmotion.

I’m now lying on a carpet on the roof of a family hotel situated right at the border of an oasis. It’s19.00 hrs, this means that it’s pitch dark in Iran and I can enjoy the stars and the total silence except for the sounds produced by a warm autum breeze coming from the mountain a couple of hundred meters away.

I climbed that mountain this morning, accompagnied all the way by a dog who I befriended on my way through the oasis. This afternoon, I took a taxi to see the desert sunset from the top of a giant sanddune. It looked even better than in the movies.

I’ve been reading quite a lot recently, devouring all books I could find on Iran. More about them and my personal opinion on Iran in a couple of days.

After the entertainment, it was time for a more serious note. The iran-iraq war cementary in Esfahan is impressive. Not so much for its size (it’s small) as for the pain you feel when walking around. Even on a weekday, the cementary is full with people. School classes on one hand and mourning families on the other. The impact on a random visitor is immense: each grave has a picture of the deceased and is decorated with an Iranian flag. The flags are regularly attached to eachother in case of multiple deaths in one family. Shocking are the children’s faces on the tombstones.

Striking are the parents, seemingly unable to get one with their lives because of a war, even when it ended 22 years ago

There are times in life where you have to admit that you were wrong. And unfortunately this is one of them. After careful consideration and balancing of the pro’s and cons, I have decided that it’s time to go home. For two pairs of socks, two T-shirts and one of the two locks for my backpack. All the best to them.*

(GB added later: Some confusion has rissen on this first paragraph. In order to be very clear: it’s part of my *clothes* that is going home, not me!)

Iran does not stop to amaze me: from vodka in cars, ‘couch surfer’ meetings in hotels, to the endless beauty of the city of Esfahan.

I’m not going to rave about the beauty of the Sheik Lotfollah Mosque, you will just have to come and see it for yourself, as I can’t do it justice. Neither can I fully describe the joy when I discovered a secret passage onto the roofs of the bazar, so i could enjoy quietly the insane beauty of Imam square (2nd largest square in the world). The discovery became even more valuable at night, when I could share the spot with a group of Swiss architecture students.

And (of course) I’ve been treated fantastic by the Iranians: invitation at home, followed by an evening picnic in the park next to the river, walks around the city and good conversations about life (Iranian guy with a broken heart because his girlfriend left him for somebody who is two years younger, and a girl who was left by her boyfriend even though he has a fatal illness). In general, relations in Iran have captured my interest: how do you meet when you can’t just start talking to somebody of the opposite sex? Can you be in a relationship without being married? How do you deal with the short window of opportunity between to young to marry and to old? And many more.

I have to revise one more thing: I thought that Iran was expensive. However, all these great experiences in Iran have cost me 500 euro until now (+234 euro for the flight AMS-Tehran). I realize that this is a lot of money for my new friends, but it fits within my budget. Even better, I wouldn’t want to miss these two weeks in Iran for the world.

* I will give them to somebody here of course

As beautiful as the Iranian cities are, sometimes you need a good taste of wilderness. I asked around a bit and the Shirkooh mountain appeared as a beautiful opportunity. Not to far, not to high (4.100 meters), just perfect.

After attempting to ride a bus there (failed) I took a taxi. Immediately I noticed the perfect mood of the driver, if he could have, he would have danced in his little car. He did manage to sing with both hands off the wheel in full (Iranian!) traffic. We rode with open windows, but when they were closed (when trucks passed) I noticed a strong gas smell. This was confirmed when we went to a fuel station and I was asked to leave the car, while he tanked gas, due to the increased expolosion risk. Afterwards, we had to keep all windows open. Fortunately, he was so sure of his car, that he kept chainsmoking. Anyway, we arrived safely at the track after almost crashing 20 times during a 30 minute ride.

When I arrived at the start of the track it was already 12.00, which left me little time as the (always optimistic) estimates by the locals was 4 hrs to the hut where I would spend the night (at 17.00 it gets dark). The trip took longer than expected, mainly due to the very nice Iranians that kept offering me food for my overnight stay. The last people were about to depart when I arrived at the hut. They looked very surprised upon my total lack of gear. I told them that my "North Face" sleeping bag (cheap Chinese imitation bought in Nepal) was certified until -15 degrees Celsius. They wished me a lot of luck and left for the valley.

What followed was one of my coldest nights ever. I didn't sleep for more than 30 mins straight. Main causes for waking up were either the piercing cold or a feeling that resembled concussion in the ribs (caused by sleeping on my side on an ice cold floor). I promised myself not to look at the clock of my phone (for not getting desperate), but I could follow the passing of time through the light of the moon falling through the windows. When I had just fallen asleep, I was awoken by somebody trying to open the door which I had closed from the inside. I went to have a look, and it was an older man that apparently just arrived at the hut. I looked at the clock and it was 05.00. I saw that in about an hour the sun would come out, so I packed my stuff and left for the summit. That was also much tougher than expected. I had difficulties breathing due to the altitude combined with the lack of sleep and exhaustion (had I mentioned that I only had eaten biscuits for dinner and breakfast?).

Anyway, I arrived exhausted at the summit and enjoyed a beautiful (but chilly) 360 degrees view from the highest mountain in the region. This reminded me why had undertaken this (now) mad trip. When I arrived back at the hut, the unexpected guests (they appeared to be 2) of the morning had woken up as well. They invited me for a (very welcome) tea and to do the rest of the descent together. I barely made it down to the value with hurting knees, ankles and nails.

They kindly invited me to their house where I was presented a (delicious!) sheep stomach soup, a local specialty and met the rest of the family. For the foreseeable future, I will ensure that I'm better prepared. Tomorrow I will go on a tour around Yazd and take a bus to the very famous Esfahan. In the mean time I will catch some well deserved sleep.

I went on my first ‘organised’ tour. It was to a nomad family which had everybody complain about a gruesome 7 hr ride. We arrived after dark. Fortunately, we could join herding the goats up the mountain, which made us long for the simple life these people were leading.

After a rough night (our hosts were up most of it as wolves had eaten a lamb 2 days before, testified by their dog which was bitten too) I had enormous fun while playing with the lambs that I was tasked to herd. Only then I realized the true daily routine of living in the middle of nowhere, without rain, but with incredible numbers of flies that appeared out of nowhere at 09.00 in the morning. Temperature hit 30+ degrees celcius at 09.30. This was also the start of the daily ‘attack’ by gigantic wasps. Our hosts had a half open tent to live in and seemed to be completely used to both the flies and the wasps.

Through an interpreter I had the opportunity to ask the man of the family some questions. We spoke of everything from his ancestors to how he made money on his goats (milk, not meat). His family had been nomads for generations, but he had no man to succeed him on his land. The Irani government has been pushing the nomads to settle (easier to control), however most nomads refused. Expectantly, I asked if he was one of the persons who had refused (out of love for the nomad life). He had refused alright, but only because the government’s offer for living in the city would lead to worse conditions than he was now.

We left in our van at 10.00 when the heat became unbearable.
[ ]

Persepolis is a world class monument, however the experience pales by what happend yesterday.

I was sitting quietly at the tomb of Hafez, Iran’s greatest poet, when I was approached by an Iranian family. They are well educated people and pArts of their family live(d) abroad. They invited me to their beautiful house where I was presented a delicious Iranian lunch including Shiraz wine (!). Especially striking was the difference in their appearance outside an inside. We had a lively discussion on the current political and touristic situation in Iran and their support for ‘the famous Dutch politician (Geert Wilders).

Afterward they invited me to visit a beautiful park together where we observed together how unmarried Iranians interact. Finally, they invited me for dinner in a beautiful coffeeshop.

My grattitude was enormous: inviting a stranger in your house, feed him, talk with him like a long lost friend and show him around your town. They wouldn’t accept any contribution for the dinner, as I was their guest. Beautiful people who I wish all the best.

Experiences like these are the reason to travel around the world, easily beating any monument.

I’m from Holland, which is The Netherlands.
In Holland we say: ‘Ik spreek Nederlands’. I speak Dutch.
‘Ich spreche Deutsch’ is what they say in Deutschland, which is germany.