Today is Monday July 5, 2010. It is our last day in Shiraz and i just had lunch with my aunt, mom, and sister. They went to a gun museum but I did not go with them because I'm a bit too full with museums right now so I took the day off. I'm trying to pace myself. After-all this is the easy part of my trip. I have 6 weeks alone in europe coming up in a few days. I'm a bit nervous but I deal. I'm writing this entry as a mosque nearby is blasting the mid-day prayer. It is interesting to see how religious this country is sometimes. Anywho, not tooting my own horn but this entry is pretty interesting and entertaining also, specially if you found the last one to be such.
We woke up on the morning of the 26th and had breakfast at the hotel together. Once we set off on our way, the first sign said we were only about 55 miles from our destination. If you learn anything from this entry let it be the understanding that trips in Iran by car are not as much about gettig to the destination as trips in the US are. This 55 miles took us about 4.5 hours and was really a trip in it of itself.
We first stopped at a little town to buy a certain type of lentles only found in Iran. We were having trouble finding the bazar and the people we asked seemed to not know what we were talking about until my aunt talked to them in a slight northern iranian dialect and named the bazar by its village name. The attitude of the same person who a minute ago seemed to know nothing totally changed and he gave us directions on how to get there. My grandparents grew up in northern Iran and that is why my aunt knows their dialect a bit. I can understand my grandparents speaking it but I only know a few words to speak. It was interesting to me though that they were more willing to help us once they found out we could speak their language and were not strangers. I could go on analyzing these dialects as safety mehanisms and such but I will let it rest here.
So on our quick mission to buy this lentle we got kind of lost I guess and bought rice, sweets, and fruits on top of the lentles. We spent about an hour and half walking the bazar. Bazars are really where it's at btw. The color of the town, fresh local products, and the attitudes all come out. Just don't let them know you are foreign. No prices are marked and the owners have adopted a keen sense of sight for any foreigners and will pounce on the opportunity to rip you off. Even people from Tehran get a bit of a price-hike sometimes but lord if they find out you are from US. The 30 cents per pound cherries will suddenly cost you $1. I guess in reality that is not so bad but who likes to pay 3x the price.
After this bazar trip we were back on our way but not for long. We saw a small store with ice cream and stopped. I once again visited my childhood by buying the fancy ice-cream I had to save a week and half worth of my allowance for and a couple of gums I always chewed as a child that have tattoos on the inside. Grand total cost of this visit to childhood: 55cents. It even included awesome flashbacks to when I was 6-8 for free. Btw got the robot tattoo, scoooore!!!
After finishing our ice-creams we were again on our way, for a grand total of 10 minutes. We stopped again at another bazar and bought chicken, eggs, drinking water, and garlic. The difference between Iran an US is that this sounds like a perfectly easy trip to the grocey store in US but in Iran this is an hour trip to four stores in a bazaar. Every store sells a different combination of things. As I half jokingly told my sister, if wallmart were to ever put one store here it would destroy the entire bazaar system. But as I said earlier, bazaars are where it's at if you wanna get a flavor for the people and town.
We were again on our way but now let me paint you a picture of HOW. You see our trunk was full with stuff already from 5 people's worth of stuff and an a/c unit we were taking with us for the heat. But now we had bought a few pounds of rice, and 3-5 pounds of lentils, peaches, cherries, a 4lb bucket of blakberries, a gallon of water, two chickens, and 30 eggs, and a couple cloves of garlic for good measure. There is ZERO room for this stuff in the trunk so we stuff all these things under our feet, on our laps, and wherever we find space. Oh yeah we also bought a big watermelon and a cantelope but we did managed to squeez the watermelon in the trunk so only the cantelope joined us up-front for the journey.
Now any sane person would just continue on and finish these last few miles to the villa and relax. However you should understand our insanity by now and not expect such a rational mode of action.
We had one more stop at the local fish market a few miles outside of our town near babol. With much work we got ourselves out the car and started scavanging the fish market for our lunch that day. Since i have zero clue what these fish were called I will describe them to you. My mom bought 10 little fish about 6 inches long, and two heavy big fish about a foot and half long each. I went off and bought an entire salmon myself for $3. I only like and eat salmon as other fish have too many bones and I don't like the taste also.
We somehow managed to stuff these freshly caught and cleaned fish into the trunk, re-stock ourself with all the things that did not fit in the trunk, and set sail for the destination. After about 4.5 hours and four stops we finished the 55 mile journey.
Now when I say villa, for good reason you have an image of a beautifule expensive place with nice amenedies. But I need to remind you that if this is what you are thinking you need to think 3rd world country style. It was interesting to me how much this place had changed by staying the same. What I mean is I remembered this place as being perfect. All my fond childhood memories are from playing in the garden or sleeping in its living room or having breakfast on it's patio. There was nothing as a child I would have ver changed about this villa. Yet going back after all these years of living in America I noticed all its flaws that I had never noticed. For starters, we had to manually attach the water pump that was hidden inside the house because people had stolen it in the past (more on the water later). Then I realized how old and used the house was. Yet although not much of the house was comfortable and easy I honestly still would not change anything about it. The vacation at this house consists of working together to make things work and bringing together every meal and moments so everyone can relax. Nothing is given at this house.
Having started the water pump and turned on the gas amd the fridge, my mom fried all the fish, made a stew with the heads of the three big fish, and made some rice. The fish-head stew is honestly better than it sounds. We sat and ate together at the front porch and then slept for 2 hours under the ceiling fan inside. It was as perfect as I remembered it but missing one thig, the family friends of my mom and their kids, they were on their way and would get there at night. They always came to our villa with us and without them this would not be right at all.
Mohsen's family got to the villa at around 9pm and there car looked just like us, filled to the brim. They had done the same thing as us and bought four big fish and also discretely brought the boos and the rest of our food for the couple days.
We started drinking, eating, talking, and laughing well into the night. It was the sort of night that makes the price of your flight worth it. After 12 years we were back at the same place. Only difference was us kids were the ones drinking now. I played and won 5 of 7 games of backgammon and also won the one game of bingo I played. Although I kind of felt bad and gave away all my winnings to different people. (I had won $9)....hah
Btw, I am a backgammon champ. I would be put into my place in a few nights as those of you who follow my twitter know. But I would take a challenge from anyone out there.
Anywho, I am at the airport of Shiraz now and waiting for my fligh back to Tehran. I wish everyone has had a great 4th. I'm starting to get a bit homesick actually but I think once I start my journey in Europe I will be re-juvinated. Note for all you out there, three weeks is pretty much the time it takes to get a general sense if the culture and history of the country you are visiting. For those of you that are angry with that statement I saaaaaid geeeneeeeraaaallll.
-NZ
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