Wow so I finalllly get a chance to write again. It has been rather hectic ever since I got back and I have been slacking a bit. Hope I haven't lost all of you. Since I am no longer on the trip I will not give a brief synopsis of my circumstances during which I am blogging. Because well, it's probably rather boring. I wont be stuck in a train station for 15 hours or just made it onto a plane as the last person after going to the wrong airport or on a train ride from one side of a foreign country to the other. I will most likely be at home, at a park, or at a coffee shop.
So without further ado, I present you July 7th 2010:
The internet has not been working at our house the past couple of days so finally today we called a friend to come and fix it. Everything so basic to us in the US (internet, telephone, electricity, water, air conditioning, and gasoline) can be part of a larger hassle in Iran. I have mentioned this several times but this day we got to experience it yet again. Although it was the middle of the week, the friend of my aunt's came over around mid-day to fix the internet. It was a raaaather easy fix actually. All he did was find the piece of paper with the internet password written on it. The password we were trying was the WiFi password and not the internet password. Anywho, moral of the story is the job took two minutes and he was out and on his way.
Because we are gone on so many different trips (to northern Iran, to Esfehan, and to Shiraz) and do not have internet access during these times, when we get back to Tehran to my aunt's house it becomes rather "important" to have e-mail/g-voice/skype/twitter and all that to keep your sanity.]. There is this idea of culture-shock that is experienced by people when they visit another part of the world. It is an idea where the impact of this new life-style, with its unfamiliar customs and people, is too much to take and causes a lot of anxiety for the traveler. In my opinion, one of the main reasons I did not experience a culture shock to a great extent (behind the main reason which I believe was that I knew the language), was the existence of the internet. Whether it is to say a few words to your significant other or to update on twitter that you are alive and what you plan to do next, the internet serves as a familiar place to visit familiar sites that has familiar people, and that has an IMMENSE calming feeling. Like I watched videos of the Edwin Jackson's no hitter. It's the little things, but it matters.
ANYYYWHO, so the internet was fixed and we had it for a few hours before we flew to Rasht (which is in north-eastern Iran). During this time I booked my hostel for Frankfurt. It was reallly weird realizing that this next chapter of my trip is actually approaching. I have been saving for over three years for my trip and it was THE THING that I wanted to do after graduation and booking my hostel in Frankfurt was weird because it made it a reality. [and it is even weirder to think that as of the writing of this that chapter has ended and now I am at a point with no "next" planned].
Unlike the trips to Esfehan and Shiraz, my aunt's husband came along with us. The flight to Rasht though was not as easy as you would imagine. As I have mentioned on here several times, the sanctions against Iran have tremendous effect on the people of Iran. In this case, it is jet-fuel that is rationed and to conserve the quota a company gets the air conditioning system of the flight is turned off WHEN IT IS 100+ DEGREES OUTSIDE AND 100+ PEOPLE ARE CRAMPED IN A PLANE. I mean they don't claim it is because of these sanctions and the lack there of jet-fuel that the air is not "working," but come on, really? All planes in Iran have broken air conditioning units? I don't think so.
So after bunch of sweating and misery, we got to Rasht and got the house of the family we are staying with. It was such a nice house filled with even nicer people. To be honest, I was at first a bit skeptical of going to this random place that I did not know, Rasht, and staying with random people. In fact we had even discussed canceling the trip because of the fatigue we had from going to northern Iran, then straight to Esfehan, then to Shiraz. However, we just decided to do it, and in about two hours after getting there I was realizing what a great decision we had made.
The family had a son and daughter about my age and at night me and my sister went out with the daughter and one of her friends. It was REALLLY neat as we just walked around, talked, got fruit juice, and had a raaather innocent night. Night-life here is muuuuch differnt but then again we hear about a TON of alcohol and hard-drug use and I wonder if we were just spared the scenery. Either way, one thing is certain, PUBLIC night-life here is different because of the ban on selling alcohol.
Anywho, we continued to walk around and had our fruit-juice and looked at shops and talked about, well, normal things people our age talk about. It was my first time hangin out with people my own age on this trip as eveeeeryone else we had seen was either significantly older or if they had kids our age we never separated from the parents and go off on our own.
Although simple and innocent, it was reallly a great night.
That is all I have for now,
-NZ
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