Today I am staying in a caravanserai made for the shrine of the brother of one of Islam's religious leaders. In the middle of the courtyard of the caravanserai there is a cemetery, not 100m from where I'm typing.

Ok yet again I have no idea where I left off, so I'm just going to hentam. We entered Iran (finally) on the 1st of September, and subsequently lost use of our mobile phone - apparently we have no roaming agreements with Iran. Maybe it’s the trade embargo? The customs at the border was painless, except that when we got there at 3pm the gate to the Iran side was closed because apparently the Turks were still having lunch. So we stood in a sea of Iranians fielding the usual questions about where we were from, where we were going, how come we were so gosh darned good looking and so on. After an hour of standing there looking good, the gate opened and we immediately felt the hospitality of Iranians - we were somehow swept to the front of the non-existent 'queue' and herded past the gate. The only thing that stopped us from going further was actually the Turkish border guard who, using my mother's expression, used his nose to look for the turkish exit stamps on my passport. The Iranian customs even filled in our forms for us (good thing cos we don't understand Farsi) and with a hearty "Welcome to Iran!" let us through to the beautiful 30km downhill to our first stop in Iran, the small town of Maku.

Maku is a town snuggled in the valley of a steep gorge, so all that existed of it was one straight road thru the town. Overlooking that road was the most beautiful cliff I've seen, at some parts 300m high and the whole gorge about 2km long. Apparently some people have already tried to climb it, all foreigners and all failed (at this stern-looking overhanging section) including one guy who spent 2 days on the wall before he had to be helicoptered out. Here we had our first true taste of Iranian hospitality as an Iranian appeared out of nowhere to translate for us when we were trying to change our money. In fact the rate was not good so he brought us to Bazargan (the actualy border town, 25km back) to change money with someone he knew. This was a person who was in University and had an exam the next day. He blatantly refused to let us pay for the cab ride, and we were at a total loss of how to repay him. Good thing though, cos after we came back to the hotel (where he was also staying. Apparently its cheaper to rent a hotel room than stay in the dorms) he disappeared without a trace.

The next day it was an exciting 20km more of downhill (I love just cruising at 35, no need to pedal, feeling the wind in my hair and the warmth of the sun on my face. Ahh) before we made a wrong turn (lousy map) and so began our lucky streak of coincidences. 5km down the road that led the wrong way, a guy pulled up next to us on his motorbike and asked us where we were going. We probably looked quite stupid being so utterly trusting to the map (I've never equated blind faith to a map before, but this trip opened my eyes a bit more) so the nice man brought us back to his place to explain the way we should take. His 'place' turned out to be a biscuit factory, so you can imagine the damage 2 starving cyclists did there. After all the digestives we cleaned off the plate, they STILL gave us 3 more packs each, plus enough tea to bloat Alex up (trust me that takes some doing)

So anyway, we cycled thru the amazingly boring desert for 2 days from Maku until the small town of Marand. Here was where Iranian hospitality REALLY showed itself. We cycled into town, got hopelessly lost in the haphazard traffic and the multitude of signs on the doors looking for a place to stay. So we stopped at the town square (each town and city has its collection of 'squares' rarely are they square, or even rectangular. Most of them turn out to be a roundabout (like this one) or a cross junction. Very few are actual parks or anything pleasant, unless you like bad fountains in the middle of a roundabout, miserably failing to be a sea of calm in an ocean of traffic) and before we could take out a map there were people all around us, but none of them spoke english. In a matter of moments though, word got around and a shopkeeper from the bazaar who DID speak english ran out and offered to help. He brought us to the hotel (which was marked in Farsi except for the word 'hotel' hidden away in one corner) and invited us to his shop after we had settled in.

Ali Ashgar turned out to be tending the shop during the Uni holidays, and was a Archi student in Tabriz. We talked for a long time (over tea and carrot juice) and got invited to go his village the next day for a wedding. So much for only staying the day in Marand - and so began the lack of cycling for the first few days in Iran. So we hung out the next day and he drove us to his village, about 60km north. There we were well fed (very much like a malay wedding back home, people eating something like nasi briyani in groups) and then went out to watch the wedding ceremony. The night was the first night of the wedding, when the whole village would gather and the men would dance in the courtyard and the onlookers would press money into the dancers' hands. They went out of their way to make us feel welcome, even making the MC acknowledge that we were there. Although that night was simple, it had its overwhelming charm and Alex and I were enthused to dance - it was really fun. We gave the money we collected to the groom's family, of course.

The gathering itself was a sight to behold. The ladies and the men were generally segregated, of course, but what impressed me most was the sturdiness of the village huts. The walls were still made out of a mixture of mud and straw, with some concrete and even asphalt for the ceiling, and wood trusses. But there were no less than 300 people (probably more, actually) sitting on the roof watching the festivities. And the dancing lasted a LONG time. It went from about 7plus till 3am (we didn't stay till the very end) or whenever the groom decides to come out and dance. The last dance was elaborate, with most of the people joining in (instead of dancing pair by pair) and pretty much the whole village of 2000 was there. It was an awesome introduction to this amazing country.

Instead of going back to our hotel, we were persuaded to stay the night at the village, where the next day the locals brought us around their village (we watched the phone lines being put up for a bit. The village until now only had one phone) and we saw the local bakery with its gas furnace oven and a carpet weaver at work. After watching the guy weave and trying it for myself (Alex sed I devalued the carpet) I can say with respect that Persian carpets are worth every cent you pay for them. The carpet that he was weaving had easily more than 300 knots/sq inch, and he told us that sitting 8hrs in front of the loom everyday would take him 6 months to finish the 2x3m carpet.

The locals then brought us out to their fields where they grew sunflowers and watermelons, and we sat in the middle of the plains enjoying the view and eating freshly plucked watermelons. Now we know how to tell if a watermelon is ripe :)

As many questions we had about Iran, the locals had the same for our country. But the funniest one by far was when they asked how much money a shepherd made. It took quite a while to make them understand that agriculture in Singapore was pretty much reduced to small gardens (they would be called gardens in Iran) in Lim Chu Kang. Actually if took a paradigm shift for them to understand just how small our country was - and I'm pretty sure they still have not fathomed it.

That night we watched the second part of the wedding ceremony, where the groom picked up the bride at her house and brought her back to their new place, where he would stand on the roof and throw things (coins, sweets, and finally a handkerchief) at her that members of her family would hit away using big pans. One of the locals took us back to our hotel in town that night, and in the car he even sincerely asked if we had enough money for our trip and even offered us some (and he was not the last Iranian to be so generous). These routine, neverending acts of generosity are what touched me the most about Iranians. I feel well and truly humbled in their presence.

And that, in a nutshell, was our first 4 days in the Islamic Republic of Iran :) will write about the next four days another day, when nothing exciting's happening (yeah right)

Cheerio,

jo