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So what did we think of Iran.
We were both looking forward to visiting this country, which is generally closed to westerners.
We were surprised by the varied changes in the scenery, we were expecting desert and not much else, but what we got was snowy and wooded mountains, rolling hills, rivers, lakes and desert of course a wide range of agriculture dependant upon region.. Dates in the desert, rice in the wet lands and general agriculture elsewhere. The weather was generally mild until we moved closer to Pakistan and then it became very hot! Nothing stayed cool including us.
The people always greeted us with friendliness and at times wonderment that we were in their country, the women were a lot more liberated than anticipated, although some of this may be challenging their current regime, but ask our female members about the clothing and they would tell you it was restrictive. The younger members would speak to us and were interested in our country and backgrounds, they were sometimes shy in coming forward but when they did they would not stop speaking to us. There is a wide separation between the haves and the have nots, but is that any different from anywhere else, surprisingly they live the same lives as we do, they do love a picnic as well.
We had little interaction re the political situation here some people want to speak but are reluctant to do so, as they feel others are listening in, even our guide took his phone battery out when talking about the regime as he said there was techno that was used to scan words on phones, even when switched off. Others tried to draw you in we had already been briefed about that and did not engage with these people, these were the negative parts. I always had a little of guard up to interacting with people, more so than normally I would have.
We did have to record our movements at police check points as did our guide. The situation with the fuel allowance was ludicrous, they only allowed us a small amount of fuel per day, even though they knew our itinerary, this left us to buy fuel from others and open to different prices.
There were times when it looked like there was a lot of building going on but it was rarely finished, always just incomplete and in odd places, e.g. Shopping centres next to each other finished but not occupied or large universities in the middle of a desert and no obvious towns nearby.
Although classed as a very religious state, there were no obvious signs of it, in fact the mosques were more intrusive in Turkey.
There was a lot of reminders of the martyrs from the Iran/iraq war at each town of prominent place often with religious leaders saying things and of course the TV channels, but nobody seemed to take any notice of it.
The food, it took us some time to find traditional Iranian food, much on offer was kebabs, burgers and other fast food types, often with lots of rice and not much taste, but once we had found a good restaurant it was worth the wait and experience.
Some people struggled with the toilets used, but that is a western thing, its more the smell than the squatting!
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