Tabriz - Welcome to Iran, or: so many friendly encounters
Tabriz, a 1.5 million inhabitant city in the North-West of Iran, is famous for its old and very big bazaar, the oldest parts of which are over 1000 years old (but most of it dates from the 15th century) and covers an area of 7 square km. It is built entirely in brick and has kilometres of vaulted alleys, with shops selling virtually everything (the most unusual being a shop exclusively selling sugar in all shapes and forms and the owner being busy producing small cubes from a huge block of sugar with hammer and a knife...). It also has more than 20 caravanserais (sheltering the caravans bringing all the goods to the bazaar) and more than 20 beautiful domed halls. It is pointless to try to follow a specific path as orientation is virtually impossible, so I just let myself be guided by the next interesting thing to see and there were plenty, especially the activities going on in there and the people... Unfortunately, I could not take too many pictures there as it was quite dark (the vaulted ceilings only have very few small openings which let in only little light). But I got many smiles and "welcome" from the people working there or walking through. Iranians generally seem to be very happy to see foreigners and try to do their best to help. The nicest encounters in the bazaar was an Iranian family living in the Netherlands and visiting their family, who had a spice shop in the bazaar, and two older men, Ali and Habib. While my Dutch is extremely limited, I managed to carry a decent conversation with the family, but the daughter spoke excellent English as well. Ali and Habib asked where I come from (as many people do when you walk by as a tourist and they all seem to like it when you say "from Germany"), many mentioning football and German football players (different ones depending on the generation, but it is interesting that each generation seems to have liked the German players of their time...). My name as well as the city close to which I grew up (Stuttgart) were also always known due to football references: VfB STUTTGART, JÜRGEN Klinsmann and Thomas MÜLLER...
After about 3 hours, Ali and Habib chatted me up in one of the many alleys with the typical "welcome, where do you come from?" They both spoke German (Ali quite good, actually..) The intention of the chat was to convince me to buy a carpet, but when I clearly told them that I would not buy any, they nevertheless insisted to go to drink a tea together... And so I accepted. We went to one of the many tea houses in the bazaar, situated in the basement. A pity I did not dare to ask to take a photo: it was super small, packed with older men, all smoking the water pipe (called qalyan here and banned until 2011 in public places, but due to lack of enforcement the ban was lifted again .. The power of the people of Iran...(!!!)) and drinking tea. The others just sat there, smoked and drank and barely talked to each other, while Ali and Habib did not stop asking me questions. And I was impressed how well hey were informed about what is going on in the world. They asked about my family (Ali specifically wondering why I was still not married and did not have kids at my age (!!) but it later turned out that Habib was also single (which is a much more unusual thing in Iran than in Europe..), my job, my studies, about Germany and Belgium, about prices of various things (cars, houses, salaries), my opinions about Chancellor Merkel and President Obama, about Iran and Iranian people etc.. After about an hour, or 3 teas each and a water pipe later, I ended the conversation and invited them, which they accepted after some initial haggling and were finally very happy about.
Out of the bazaar, I went to a very nice courtyard / garden restaurant which I discovered by coincidence in a little side street and had "Dizi" or also called "abgusht", a typical Iranian dish consisting of mutton meat, potatoes, chick peas, tomatoes and spices and is eaten in a very particular way (which fortunately is explained in my lonely planet guidebook: you tear in parts the huge Iranian bread (my colleagues know it as I served it during my "see you soon drink" before leaving, you put it in so that the liquid soaks in, you eat the soaked bread and then take a spatula and mash all the other ingredients together and eat it.. It was really tasty!!
As son as I had left the restaurant, I ran into another Ali, an 18-year old high-school student, who insisted on showing me around, which I accepted after some discussions (iran does not seem to be like many other countries I have visited before, where such situations inevitably lead to paying (too much) money for (mostly poor) tour guide services...). He just wanted to practice his English (as many other young Iranians I have met during these few days here). He even tried to get me into a closed government compound where there was one interesting historic building (a museum that was closed as it was Holy Friday), as he knew one of the soldiers working there. He first convinced the guard to let us on the compound (I just had to leave my camera at the reception) and then one of the soldiers took us to the room where the other soldiers were sleeping to find Ali's friend and we did. He put on his very impressive representative uniform and showed us around. Unfortunately, he did not manage to open the interesting building for us, but still.... Ali finally insisted on inviting me for a tea and then gave me Iranian Rials so that I send him one of the new 5 Euro bills (he is a collector and the many money changers here do not have such low denominations....). He even accepted that he would only receive the bill in September when I am back to Europe, but I might perhaps find among my readers a volunteer who would like to send the bill to Ali??? (Please tell me... ;-) )
Other interesting things to report in brief:
- I took the bus on the way back, which was quite a challenge, despite Ali giving me some explanations beforehand (for example indicating where the bus leaves, explaining the Farsi / Persian numbers (here it was easy as number 101 in Farsi looks pretty much the same). He also told me about the price, which I found very impressively low (5 euro cents), especially I comparison with other prices and whereas a taxi for the same distance costs 2 Euros). If in Brussels a taxi also 40 times the price of public transport, nobody would take it.... ;-) another thing I had read before leaving but in the meanwhile had forgotten about was that local buses are split in two parts: in front for men and behind for women. After a while there were however too many women and they started getting into the male section, which the conductor allowed, but some older / more conservative men did not seem to be too happy about, but could not do much about... ;-) it seems to be rather unusual for foreigners to ride a bus here and very quickly the whole bus knew that I was from Germany and many started "talking" to me, mentioning all the German football clubs and cities they know...
- much to my surprise and deep shock, Hitler is not only very often mentioned in the conversation when you say you are from Germany, but often positively or at least with some fascination!! As one actually very nice and friendly shopkeeper in Ardabil told me (who was so happy to have a Foreign customer buying something in his shop that he offered me some saffron as a gift! - antönet example of wonderful Iranian hospitality to which I will come back in a later post...), it it is because all the other bigger nations (including the Brits and the Russians) just came to Iran to plunder, but Hitler did not and met them with respect. It might perhaps also be because of the fact that Persians are part of the Aryan race and because of the relations between Iran and Israel (even if most of the normal Iranian people do not seem to consider Israelis as enemies...).
- in Tabriz, El Goli park a bit outside town is a place to relax and have fun. Not only on Fridays, when everyone is off, but also on normal weekdays, people come here in crowds, not least to visit the local amusement park, with everything a "fair" has to offer in Europe... This did not at all correspond to the image of the strict and "no fun" society most people in Europe (including myself until that experience) have about Iran and many young people were sitting there and playing music with heir guitars and singing songs and families were enjoying heir picknicks, playing volleyball etc... Just as in any park anywhere in Europe...
Photos
Tabriz, a 1.5 million inhabitant city in the North-West of Iran, is famous for its old and very big bazaar, the oldest parts of which are over 1000 years old (but most of it dates from the 15th century) and covers an area of 7 square km. It is built entirely in brick and has kilometres of vaulted alleys, with shops selling virtually everything (the most unusual being a shop exclusively selling sugar in all shapes and forms and the owner being busy producing small cubes from a huge block of sugar with hammer and a knife...). It also has more than 20 caravanserais (sheltering the caravans bringing all the goods to the bazaar) and more than 20 beautiful domed halls. It is pointless to try to follow a specific path as orientation is virtually impossible, so I just let myself be guided by the next interesting thing to see and there were plenty, especially the activities going on in there and the people... Unfortunately, I could not take too many pictures there as it was quite dark (the vaulted ceilings only have very few small openings which let in only little light). But I got many smiles and "welcome" from the people working there or walking through. Iranians generally seem to be very happy to see foreigners and try to do their best to help. The nicest encounters in the bazaar was an Iranian family living in the Netherlands and visiting their family, who had a spice shop in the bazaar, and two older men, Ali and Habib. While my Dutch is extremely limited, I managed to carry a decent conversation with the family, but the daughter spoke excellent English as well. Ali and Habib asked where I come from (as many people do when you walk by as a tourist and they all seem to like it when you say "from Germany"), many mentioning football and German football players (different ones depending on the generation, but it is interesting that each generation seems to have liked the German players of their time...). My name as well as the city close to which I grew up (Stuttgart) were also always known due to football references: VfB STUTTGART, JÜRGEN Klinsmann and Thomas MÜLLER...
After about 3 hours, Ali and Habib chatted me up in one of the many alleys with the typical "welcome, where do you come from?" They both spoke German (Ali quite good, actually..) The intention of the chat was to convince me to buy a carpet, but when I clearly told them that I would not buy any, they nevertheless insisted to go to drink a tea together... And so I accepted. We went to one of the many tea houses in the bazaar, situated in the basement. A pity I did not dare to ask to take a photo: it was super small, packed with older men, all smoking the water pipe (called qalyan here and banned until 2011 in public places, but due to lack of enforcement the ban was lifted again .. The power of the people of Iran...(!!!)) and drinking tea. The others just sat there, smoked and drank and barely talked to each other, while Ali and Habib did not stop asking me questions. And I was impressed how well hey were informed about what is going on in the world. They asked about my family (Ali specifically wondering why I was still not married and did not have kids at my age (!!) but it later turned out that Habib was also single (which is a much more unusual thing in Iran than in Europe..), my job, my studies, about Germany and Belgium, about prices of various things (cars, houses, salaries), my opinions about Chancellor Merkel and President Obama, about Iran and Iranian people etc.. After about an hour, or 3 teas each and a water pipe later, I ended the conversation and invited them, which they accepted after some initial haggling and were finally very happy about.
Out of the bazaar, I went to a very nice courtyard / garden restaurant which I discovered by coincidence in a little side street and had "Dizi" or also called "abgusht", a typical Iranian dish consisting of mutton meat, potatoes, chick peas, tomatoes and spices and is eaten in a very particular way (which fortunately is explained in my lonely planet guidebook: you tear in parts the huge Iranian bread (my colleagues know it as I served it during my "see you soon drink" before leaving, you put it in so that the liquid soaks in, you eat the soaked bread and then take a spatula and mash all the other ingredients together and eat it.. It was really tasty!!
As son as I had left the restaurant, I ran into another Ali, an 18-year old high-school student, who insisted on showing me around, which I accepted after some discussions (iran does not seem to be like many other countries I have visited before, where such situations inevitably lead to paying (too much) money for (mostly poor) tour guide services...). He just wanted to practice his English (as many other young Iranians I have met during these few days here). He even tried to get me into a closed government compound where there was one interesting historic building (a museum that was closed as it was Holy Friday), as he knew one of the soldiers working there. He first convinced the guard to let us on the compound (I just had to leave my camera at the reception) and then one of the soldiers took us to the room where the other soldiers were sleeping to find Ali's friend and we did. He put on his very impressive representative uniform and showed us around. Unfortunately, he did not manage to open the interesting building for us, but still.... Ali finally insisted on inviting me for a tea and then gave me Iranian Rials so that I send him one of the new 5 Euro bills (he is a collector and the many money changers here do not have such low denominations....). He even accepted that he would only receive the bill in September when I am back to Europe, but I might perhaps find among my readers a volunteer who would like to send the bill to Ali??? (Please tell me... ;-) )
Other interesting things to report in brief:
- I took the bus on the way back, which was quite a challenge, despite Ali giving me some explanations beforehand (for example indicating where the bus leaves, explaining the Farsi / Persian numbers (here it was easy as number 101 in Farsi looks pretty much the same). He also told me about the price, which I found very impressively low (5 euro cents), especially I comparison with other prices and whereas a taxi for the same distance costs 2 Euros). If in Brussels a taxi also 40 times the price of public transport, nobody would take it.... ;-) another thing I had read before leaving but in the meanwhile had forgotten about was that local buses are split in two parts: in front for men and behind for women. After a while there were however too many women and they started getting into the male section, which the conductor allowed, but some older / more conservative men did not seem to be too happy about, but could not do much about... ;-) it seems to be rather unusual for foreigners to ride a bus here and very quickly the whole bus knew that I was from Germany and many started "talking" to me, mentioning all the German football clubs and cities they know...
- much to my surprise and deep shock, Hitler is not only very often mentioned in the conversation when you say you are from Germany, but often positively or at least with some fascination!! As one actually very nice and friendly shopkeeper in Ardabil told me (who was so happy to have a Foreign customer buying something in his shop that he offered me some saffron as a gift! - antönet example of wonderful Iranian hospitality to which I will come back in a later post...), it it is because all the other bigger nations (including the Brits and the Russians) just came to Iran to plunder, but Hitler did not and met them with respect. It might perhaps also be because of the fact that Persians are part of the Aryan race and because of the relations between Iran and Israel (even if most of the normal Iranian people do not seem to consider Israelis as enemies...).
- in Tabriz, El Goli park a bit outside town is a place to relax and have fun. Not only on Fridays, when everyone is off, but also on normal weekdays, people come here in crowds, not least to visit the local amusement park, with everything a "fair" has to offer in Europe... This did not at all correspond to the image of the strict and "no fun" society most people in Europe (including myself until that experience) have about Iran and many young people were sitting there and playing music with heir guitars and singing songs and families were enjoying heir picknicks, playing volleyball etc... Just as in any park anywhere in Europe...
Photos
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