The great Imam mosque at Imam square.
While writing this I'm waiting for the night train to Tehran at the main train station conveniently located a good 20 min bus ride outside the city center. Stupid. Behind me in Esfahan I left three awesome and interesting encounters which I ended up sharing room with at the Amir Kabir Hostel: Keeron, a 27 year old guy from Tinidad and Tobago who's been more or less traveling for 7 years. Hes moving from country to country and stays as long as his Visa is valid. At the same time hes studying computer science and works temporarily when possible. Quite a unique way of life i must say. David from UK who studies politics and philosophy has been traveling in the Middle East and around for almost 8 months now. A cool Harry Potter look-a-like who knows pretty much everything there is to know about the history and current situation in the countries around here. Last but not least Travis, a funny guy from NZ who's been trotting the globe for 15 months now and still has another 5 to go. Hopefully Ill see more of him in Tehran since we both are going in that direction. Good guys who increased the overall score of my Esfahan visit from great to awesome.
Anyways, these four nights and days I spent in the city has mostly consisted of good old sightseeing, because there are a lot of sites to see in this city. Before coming here I don't think Ive ever heard of Esfahan, which in retrospect just proves how little one knows about Iran and the Middle East. The city is full of history and its architecture is astonishing. There's amazing mosques, palaces, bridges and parks everywhere and ti also inhabits the second biggest square in the world - however in comparison to Tianmen square this square is actually beautiful and people hang out here.
Hence we've basically been walking around the city from site to site during the days. And since the city is pretty big its been a lot of walking, so much that I reckon that hard fought 1.5kg gained this spring are hopelessly gone - I guess we're moving in opposite directions Hans..
Other from that there's been a lot of radom meetings. For example one night when trying to find somewhere to refill my Iranian sim card this guy helped me find the place and afterwards he invited me for tea at his school where he also lived. When we arrived I realized his school was one of the sites (renowned in the LP) that we tried to visit earlier that day. It was the Madraseh-ye Maze-dar-e Shah (translated: the theological school of the Shah's mother), one of the oldest and most famous theological schools in Iran. You enter into a big tree-filled couryard surrounded by two story porches where the students lived. Together with some of his frends we sat donw in his very simple room (one rug for sleeping, eating, hanging out and a porch which had a small refrigerator and a two plate stowe). It turned out that he had been studying to be a clergyman (Mullah) for 12 (TWELVE) years and was just about to finish. It was really interesting to listen to his view of life and to get a perspecitve of his values and priorities. At hte same time he was very eager to get my opinion and to know what people in Europe thought about this and that. Even though we didnt share the same values about some things, our views were similar in most things, allthough I kept the conversation away from their religious leaders and I didnt mention that I didnt really believe in a god - two things I've learned that you should avoid, especially when talking to clergys. For most muslims, not believing in a god is so irrational that a discussion about it most often leads nowhere. It is btw also one of three ways of not getting in to heaven according to Islam, the second being paganism and the third being "evil" (this is a very short way of putting it, it should probably be expounded better).
Anyways he was a genuinly good and bright guy and at the end of the night he wanted to carry on the concersation with some of his senior clergy students the next day and offered me to stay in his room all through my visit in Esfahan. A tempting offer which I nevertheless declined.
Thinking about it, his enthusiasm and eagerness to talk to me, and me to him, is probably one small micro example of a much bigger, global problem: the fact that we know very little about eachother.
This is about how much I managed to write at the train station before a youth football team discoverd that there was some sort of alien human being amongst them at the station. And as soon as the bravest of them dared walking up to it and say "hello mister", his fellow team members soon followed after and before I knew it they were climbing all over me, wanting to shake my hand and write autographs. First and last time that happened. After 10 minutes I had to signal their coach so that I could escape, and eventually get on my train.
While actually posting this I'm sitting in a shabby Cafenet in Tehran. So far Tehran as a city sucks but the surrounding mountains - which I just hiked - and my couchsurfing friend Hossein, who's place I'm staying at, are.. yes, awesome. (Did that sentence add up?)
