iran – przypadkowy wywiad

Któregoś dnia postanowiłem podzielić się moimi zdjęciami na grupie See_you_in_Iran na Facebook’u. Pomyślałem, że kilka osób może zainteresować się nimi i udać się do miejsc, w których zostały wykonane. Reakcja na zdjęcia bardzo mnie ucieszyła. Po kilku godzinach napisała do mnie Farnaz, która studiuje dziennikarstwo w Dubaju. Zapytała mnie, czy mógłbym udzielić dla niej wywiadu dotyczącego moich wrażej z wyjazdu do Iranu, gdyż zbiera materiały do swojej pracy – magazynu poświęconego Iranowi. Nigdy nie odmawiam w takich sytuacjach. Muszę przyznać, że naiwnie wierzę w taki świat – ludzie, którzy się nie znają, ale wyświadczają sobie przysługi, rozmawiają, wymieniają się poglądami. Nie chciałbym zatracić tej cechy.

Być może kogoś zainteresują moje odpowiedzi. [ENG]

When did you travel to Iran? Was it your first time?
I have always wanted to go to Iran but I could not find accompany to do so. In the beginning of this year I said to myself that I need to go there now and I booked a flight. It was fine by me to go to Iran alone. I mailed to my older sister to share this exciting news. She booked a flight two days after so we went there together in March.

Which city did you visit? Which city did you like more?
I think I have done this “typical” route, from north to south: Tehran, Kashan, Isfahan, Yazd, Shiraz and smaller places all around them. I like Kashan for the hospitality that I could experience, Tehran for a Tower of Freedom and Shiraz for mosques. But I just love Yazd. For its coziness, Zoroastrian sites and zurkhaneh.

Which place in Iran did you like more and impressed you?
Towers of Silence in Yazd. Maybe it is nothing special for a regular tourist but I can say that I am fascinated by this religion and its influence on Iranian nowadays customs. It was something moving in climbing a hill and be on the place where numbers of people ended their journey on earth.

I think you are not a Muslim. But why did you visit Shah Chehcheragh in Shiraz?
It will be very simple answer – architecture and boldness of internal design.

You are from Poland where a rich history and many historical take place. What made your decision to travel to Iran?
Fascination of Middle East, architecture, Islam and all differences to the Polish culture. It is not easy to explain. I think that we choose our destinations because some countries are different and all of this differences attract us to come. Then we meet a lot of similarities that make us to visit again. I also wanted to see how the country was developing after a war and under western economic and diplomatic sanctions. From my research and studies I knew that the image of Iran in media might be a “bit” false so I wanted to check it by my own.

How did you communicate with Iranian people? Did you have any problem with talking English with them?
Sometimes that was a challenge. I live in very touristic city so in every restaurant or on the street you can speak at least English and German. Anyway, I was using my body language and Google translator if needed. It was not that bad. I could find out that many people are hungry of having a conversation with foreigners so we were trying to do our best. I learned some words in Farsi too. It was easy to guess when they were asking of the country of origin so I could response – Lahestan. And when they heard that conversation about volleyball were coming out 🙂

In your opinion what does Polish and Iranian people have similarities in?
That would be love to volleyball 🙂 It would be the first thing, very visible and that you can see without any deeper analysis of our characters. But when you talk more to Iranians, especially about difficult topics like politics and history, you can discover that the past is still very important for us. It was not easy, we had to fight for our survivor, very often invaded by neighbors. I think that is why we are so proud of who we are and our culture.
And also one more visible similarity – painting eggs in spring.

Can you please explain one of your best memory you had in Iran?
That will be my last night in Iran. I stayed in hostel in Tehran before my early flight. Young people that run this hostel celebrated charshanbe suri by making bonfire in a yard, jumping over flames and playing some music. That was like a perfect end of my stay in Iran but also reminded me of slightly forgotten ritual in Poland when people made bonfires to celebrate the victory of spring over the winter.

How much far was it from what you hear in media about Iran and what you see?
I will say this much – far, very far.

Which problem in Iran makes you to question Iran?
I would not dare. I might do not like some aspects of life and rules in Iran but maybe I simply do not understand them. I just hope that only Iranians will be able to change them if they find them as problems.

Between all the cities that you’d been to, how would you rate Iran out of all of them?
Iran was amazing, I did not expect that I will be able to experience and see so much. I was positively surprised. It is also difficult to compare city with other cities or country with other countries because everywhere you can find something interesting and different. But If I had to give some “stars” I would give five out of five.

Is there anything left that you want to add?
I want to come back and visit Tabriz and Keshm Island, to buy more sugar on sticks and visit people that I promised to visit. Iran has really big tourist potential and I hope Iranians will use it.