12 - 14 January 2013, Farahzad, Dasht-e Kavir Desert, Iran
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The floor where my body
is laying is cold. Below is the soil of the desert. Here in the
refuge the water from the tap has a strange salty-like taste. The
refuge is built on a fertile land amid sand dunes in the Dasht-e
Kavir - one of the Iranian deserts. In a place - up until recently - that lacked electricity.
This desert looks like a
barren landscape with kilometers without any green plant at sight:
only scattered rocks, dirty roads, and dried vegetation. And I find
my self at the edge of this kind of desert. Near is the
out-and-out desert: the one made of sandy dunes like the Sahara.
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Often I had wondered how
the desert in winter could be. Here I found it out. The desert in
Iran can become so cold that all the palms die – as it happened few
years ago.
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| Difficulties in spelling my name! |
The small village of the
refuge lies somewhere eastward from Isfahan and Yazd. Farahzad is a
tiny settlement where all its residents belong to one extended family
and make a living from agriculture and a budding tourism – mainly
Iranian.
How did I wound up here?
After spending the first Iranian days in Urumye the second destination was Tabriz – the fifth biggest Iranian city - and then Teheran where I was hosted through Couchsurfing by a young couple who is on the brink of moving to Australia as they were lucky enough to win a visa to work and to establish in residence there.
For the second weekend of January Mohammad
- a young Iranian Couchsurfer from
Isfahan – invited me to go with
him and a group of about thirty crazy young Iranians in the town of
Khur, in the desert near Yazd and Nain. One of the nights there I
slept outside in my tent with a freezing temperature of -5. The rest
of the weekend I spent doing a full-immersion Iranian experience with
them, visiting the nearby desert villages and trying to improve my
basic knowledge of the Persian language.
After the weekend they returned to Isfahan and I decided to stick around in the desert some days longer. I passed these days with an interesting Iranian couple living there. They are of about my age and did not finish university but learned astronomy and the English language by themselves and make a living by manufacturing and selling small objects such as wallets, earrings and bracelets.
After spending the first Iranian days in Urumye the second destination was Tabriz – the fifth biggest Iranian city - and then Teheran where I was hosted through Couchsurfing by a young couple who is on the brink of moving to Australia as they were lucky enough to win a visa to work and to establish in residence there.
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| Local lunch |
After the weekend they returned to Isfahan and I decided to stick around in the desert some days longer. I passed these days with an interesting Iranian couple living there. They are of about my age and did not finish university but learned astronomy and the English language by themselves and make a living by manufacturing and selling small objects such as wallets, earrings and bracelets.
Here I could stargazing, walking in the desert and relaxing after the frenetic
weekend and before heading to the ancient capital of Isfahan (see pictures below).
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| Sitting whilst looking at the Desert |
like the bus ticket seller, I didn't know the letter "c" in Italy spells "ch" and because of that if I want to write your name, I write it like this "Franchesco" :) and I thought they write the foreign names on the bus ticket in Persian: فرانچسکو The picture of your ticket is interesting to me!
ReplyDeleteI really like your picture that you named it "local lunch" and I guess you were eating some kind of food like "dizi"
Dear Francesco, I think you have forgotten to write about one of the most beautiful views of desert! "The sky of desert" That is amazing! full of stars! If the sky wasn't cloudy!