Saturday, March 30, 2013

I've been Shushed

I've now arrived in Shiraz, fabled city of poetry and wine, although only the former has any kind of a foothold anymore. This after a couple really lovely days in Khuzestan, the southwestern province of Iran. Khuzestan is at the heart of Iran's oil production, and it was largely in an attempt to seize the Khuzestan oil fields that Saddam Hussein launched the disastrous Iran-Iraq war in 1980. That war has left a deep scar on Iran--about half a million Iranian soldiers plus another 100,000 civilians killed--in a war that bears close resemblance to the First World War not only in its utter pointlessness and devastation, but also in its methods, including trench warfare and poison gas. The Iraqis were much better armed than the Iranians (this was back when Saddam was thought to be an ally to the United States), but the Iranians took advantage of their superiority in numbers, using teenagers intoxicated with religion and nationalism to clear minefields by simply walking into them. All over Iran, one sees placards and streetside posters showing the faces of the shahid, or martyrs, of this war. But Khuzestan was hardest hit, and the region still hasn't fully recovered from the devastation.

My last blog entry ended with the worry that I was heading to Ahvaz on a night bus and was going to arrive in an unfamiliar and apparently unappealing city in the middle of the night. As it happens, Iranian hospitality rose to new levels of insanity when a complete stranger came out to meet my bus at four in the morning. I can imagine my parents might do something like that if it was absolutely necessary, but I'm not sure I could stretch such a request beyond close ties of consanguinity. But to explain how this act of generosity came to pass, let's rewind to my last morning in Qazvin (imagine spelling that on a triple word score in Scrabble).

Ali, my host in Qazvin, is not only a black belt in hapkido, he's also a student of the setar, an Iranian instrument not to be mistaken with the Indian sitar: the sitar apparently evolved from the setar, but has far more strings (se = "three" and tar = "string," although a fourth string was added a couple centuries ago, while the Indian sitar can have as many as twenty strings). That morning, as part of the general No Ruz visiting and paying respects, we went to visit his setar teacher, who also happens to be a highly respected setar maker, shipping his creations to such far-flung places as Canada and Australia. I got to visit his basement workshop, where setars in various stages of creation reminded me of Michelangelo's figures emerging from the blocks of marble: here just a bit of rough-hewn wood, there a gourd-like resonating chamber waiting for a neck, and so on. And I also got to hear him play, which was a real treat. I love watching gifted musicians play. Not just for the music itself, but for watching them, and the way they get lost in the music. A look of deep concentration crossed the setar teacher's face (let's call him Hossein) with a little furrow between his eyebrows and a slight sneer on the right side of his face that arched with his eyebrows at moments of emphasis. And his breathing followed the phrasing of the music, taking in a sharp breath at the beginning of each phrase, as if he needed that extra air in order to say what he was about to say. What I admire about musicians in particular--maybe dancers get this too--is the way that performing seems to transport them to a place that's too meditative for words. It reminds me of a passage in Zhuangzi where he says that the net is for catching the fish--once you've caught the fish you no longer need the net--and the snare is for catching the rabbit--once you've caught the rabbit you no longer need the snare--and similarly words are for catching the Dao. "Where is the man who has got beyond words?" he asks. "I'd like to have a word with him."

Anyway, Ali's family and Hossein were all concerned at the thought of my arriving in Ahvaz in the middle of the night. Apparently, any kind of hardship that comes as a consequence of lacking hospitality is an unthinkable evil in Iran, so Hossein got on the phone to a student in Ahvaz, asking if he'd mind picking me up from the bus terminal in Ahvaz and letting me get some sleep at his place before the day gets underway. And so I emerged from a bus in the middle of the night to be greeted by Ahmad (again, not his real name), who carted me off to his house and lay me down on a mattress in his study.

I'd already connected with a couchsurfing host in Shushtar, an hour north of Ahvaz, so my plan had been simply to get a few hours of sleep, thank Ahmad profusely, and then head for the bus terminal. Ahvaz and his wife (call her Neda) had other plans, however. After a tasty breakfast, they proposed a day's excursion, where they and their eight-year-old Ahura (I'll use his real name because I think it's delightful that they named their son after Ahura Mazda, the ancient god of Zoroastrianism, which was the dominant religion in Iran for the thousand-plus years the preceded the arrival of Islam) would accompany me to the major sights of Choqa Zanbil, Shush, and Shushtar. They hadn't been themselves in four years, so it was an outing for them as much as for me. It was also tremendously efficient from my perspective.

Choqa Zanbil is southwestern Iran's piece de resistance, a 3300-year-old Elamite ziggurat, which was lost beneath desert sands for over 2500 years after the Elamites' defeat by the Assyrians in 640 BC, rediscovered by accident only in the 1930's during a British aerial survey looking for oil. One consequence of its only recent excavation is that it's marvellously well preserved, where the individual bricks stand out clearly as if they'd been lain down only a century ago. And yet the whole thing dates back literally to the time before Iran was Iran: the country gets its name from the Aryan tribes that swept down from the north late in the second millennium BC. Toby and Niklas, my German hiking companions in the Alamut Valley, remarked that they'd had a couple awkward conversations in which Iranians enthusiastically explained that they and the Germans both belonged to the Aryan races. It's strange to think that, 3000-odd years ago, the area was lush and forested, as it now stands in a sun-baked arid plain. Even during the Elamites' tenure, the region started to dry up, evidence for which is provided by ingenious water channels that brought water to the site from rivers as far as 45km away.

One downside to a site so ancient is that it's really hard to get inside the mindset. In the mosques of Isfahan, it's not at all difficult to fathom the love of God that might motivate a people to build such monuments. But Choqa Zanbil's sacrificial altars and mountain-mimicking structure represent an understanding of the universe that's too alien from my own to really get into the spirit of things. But it could also be that I just didn't spend enough time there. There's something to be said for travelling independently: when I'm in the company of others, I think I go at a somewhat faster pace. Like my first visit to Nashq-e Jahan Square in Isfahan, I left Choqa Zanbil feeling unsaturated, as if I hadn't fully absorbed what I'd seen.

Next stop was Shush, known as Susa in English, and a major city in ancient Persia, known both from the Bible (Esther and Daniel were both residents here, and the Tomb of Daniel still stands in the city, although of much more recent vintage) and from Greek histories. It went into decline after being sacked by Alexander the Great, and indeed, there's not a whole lot to stimulate the imagination here (but I should see Persepolis sometime in the next few days!), besides the bases of what must have been enormous columns, and a semi-preserved double-horse capital. By far the most impressive-looking structure in Shush is the Chateau de Morgan, a massive desert fortress built a bit over a century ago by the French Archaeological Service to keep themselves and their excavated booty safe from unruly local tribesfolk.

And the last visit of the day was to Shushtar, deservedly famous for its incredible watermills. The town sits on a river, and a series of dams and tunnels were dug in the rock, sending water shooting through channels at high speeds, which then spun mills for grinding flour and the like, before cascading out in impressive fashion into the river below and continuing on its gentle course. It's hard to describe, but a google image search should do the trick, although it won't come with the sound of roaring water. I've never seen anything like it: it would be mind-boggling if built a couple centuries ago, and it's even more so for dating back to the time of Darius the Great, although the main waterworks were built during the Sassanid dynasty in the third century AD. If ancient engineering genius like this makes you think of the Romans, you wouldn't be far off the mark. The Sassanids defeated a Roman army at Edessa in 259, giving Valerian the dubious distinction of being the only Roman emperor to be captured alive (accounts differ, but it seems his fate included being force-fed a soup of molten gold to punish him for his greed and ambition), and captured Roman legionnaries were pressed into service in helping build the watermills.

So all in all, an excellent day of sightseeing with a lovely family. Things took a turn for the odd, however, on the visit to Shushtar. You'll recall that I'd already contacted a couchsurfing host in Shushtar. When it was clear that Ahmad and his family genuinely wanted to go on a day trip with me, I contacted the host--call him Hamid--and told him that I didn't need a host in Shushtar after all, but thanks for the offer. He texted back to say it would still be nice to meet me and so arranged to meet up with us at the watermills in Shushtar. Hamid's in his early twenties, and like every second educated Iranian I've met, studies engineering. He and his family recently moved to Karaj, near Tehran, but he's from Shushtar originally and is back for the holidays. So Hamid, Ahmad, and I (Neda and Ahura went shopping instead) wandered about the watermills for half an hour, and then Hamid asked me what my plan was for the evening. I was a bit perplexed by this question as I thought it was pretty clear I was going back to Ahvaz with Ahmad and his family, and said as much. But he said I should stick around and spend the night in Shushtar. Generally I think "always say 'yes'" is a good policy in travel, and in life in general--and I suppose it turned out not to be a bad call on this occasion--but I said "yes" more out of not knowing what else to say. There were enough cultural and linguistic barriers for me not to be sure if this was okay with Ahmad, but he insisted it would be fine, so I left him to drive Neda and Ahura back to Ahvaz while I stayed on with Hamid, carrying only my Lonely Planet guide and what I had in my pockets.

What was strange is that it wasn't entirely clear to me why Hamid wanted me to stay. Because he was visiting Shushtar himself, he couldn't put me up, and when I told him that two things I really needed to do were check e-mail (a friend in Oxford had been deliberating about joining me and I needed to know what her plans were--turns out securing a visa was too complicated on short notice during No Ruz, so I'll be on my own for the whole trip) and have a shower, and both of these requests were met with a worried look. As was the fact that I was a vegetarian, even though falafel and veggie pizza are pretty readily available street foods in a pinch. As was the fact that I didn't want a late night. The evening's activities involved visiting the local mosque--which is actually very old but a bit run-down and unexciting from an architectural perspective, although it was interesting to sit in the back with Hamid during the evening prayers--and then going down to the river and smoking a hookah with a friend of his. At around 11pm, he told me there were two options: he could drop me at the house of a friend who lives with his parents where they could set me up with a mattress, or I could hang out with him and his friends at a friend's place and sleep on the floor, which would be a lot more fun. I told him that I was really tired (remember, I'd taken a night bus the previous night), besides which I still really needed to check my e-mail, and a worried look crossed his face. "Are you sure you don't just want to go to my friend's apartment?" "It's very important that I check e-mail." It seems this first option wasn't actually an option at all, and we ended up at his friend's place, although he was decent enough to run home and grab his laptop and a wireless internet device so that I could check e-mail, although I had to insist pretty strenuously in order for this to happen.

The friend's place looked more like a squat--and indeed, it probably was--where, besides the obligatory Persian carpet on the floor, it was just a bare set of walls on a semi-constructed apartment building. The party consisted of Hamid and four of five of his friends, all young guys who were friendly enough albeit a little rough around the edges. The whole place had the feel of some sort of den of sin, and if we'd been anywhere but Iran, I'm sure the place would have been thick with marijuana smoke and drug paraphernalia. As it was, the only illegal substance on the premises was vodka (I was glad that I wasn't going to be riding on the back of Hamid's motorbike again until morning), and Lent or no, I didn't feel the least bit tempted to partake. But I did manage to check my e-mail and then escape to a windowless room off the main room and curl up and try to get a bit of sleep.

The others, it seems, stayed up till about 5am and were a bit worse for wear the next morning, but nevertheless managed to deliver a spectacular end to a rather strange visit to Shushtar. What I couldn't see in the dead of night was that this apartment building overlooked a deep canyon dropping into the river, and we climbed up onto the roof for breakfast, surveying a scene of lazy tropical bliss, with the river gently flowing past palm trees, and a turtle greeting the morning sun down by the riverbank.

The other anxiety that had gnawed at me since I'd left Ahmad was whether I'd just committed a horrendous faux pas. Was it a grievous insult that I'd ditched Ahmad and his family at the end of a day that they'd showed me such generosity? Would I be welcome back in Ahvaz, and would it be very awkward when I got back? All these anxieties evaporated like morning dew with a text message after breakfast from Ahmad, urging me to get back to Ahvaz as soon as I could because they really wanted to spend more time with me. So I got Hamid to drop me at the shared taxi station and I was back in Ahvaz before noon.

Ahmad is a civil engineer by profession (see what I mean about educated Iranians and engineering?) but he's very cultured: besides the strong interest in the setar (I got to hear him play too, which was a treat), he has a well-stocked library of Western and Iranian classics. He was particularly thrilled to learn that I was a philosopher (I feel like a bit of a cheat, as a number of people have been delighted to meet an "Oxford professor" here, and even though I insist that it's just a one-year post and not a professorship, the subtle differences in rank that separate me from Timothy Williamson seem to be lost on most people), as he has quite an extensive library of philosophical works. I now have a photo of me holding a Farsi translation of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations! He's also a vegetarian, which made my own dietary preferences a point of common bonding rather than an inconvenience (even though the concept of vegetarianism seems alien in Iran, I've now met two vegetarians here from a fairly small sample). Ahmad speaks only halting English and his wife Neda speaks almost none, but there was so much good will and jollity on all sides that we had a wonderful time together--both on the day trip and upon my return to Ahvaz--that dredging through dictionaries was part of the fun. Neda is almost always smiling and has an infectuous laugh that reminds me of Rolie, my ex-landlady/friend in Toronto (it's one of the funny things about this world that there seems only to be a certain number of faces and characteristics, which get recycled in the strangest places). So we spent the afternoon chatting, eating, and with a short break for me to play soccer on the computer against Ahura. In what seemed to me a bit of an unfair match-up, I was forced to play Canada while he played Barcelona (in Ethiopia, the English Premiership was all the rage, but it seems like Messi and Barca are the favourites in Iran), but some stout defending from the Canadians kept it to a 1-0 decision.

We then had a picnic by the river before sending me off on another night bus to Shiraz. Partly because of a very early arrival and partly because I felt I wanted a bit of a break from the couchsurfing whirlwind, I've booked myself into a hotel here, and so far no regrets. Because of the recent depreciation of the Iranian Rial, prices are considerably lower than what my guide book led me to expect, and coupled with the huge generosity I've benefitted from so far, I've stayed way way under budget on this trip, to the point that I feel I've got money to burn. A single room in this hotel costs only $18 anyway, so I'm hardly bankrupting myself. It's in the old part of the city (the one downside to the place is that it's nested in such a maze of alleys that I may never find my way back!), and is in an old traditional building, where my room faces onto a courtyard with a fountain where they serve three meals a day. And the room has all sorts of amenities I've got used to not expecting, like a seat toilet, toilet paper, a towel, and soap! Yes, living the life of luxury. Now I ought to get out and see a bit of Shiraz.

I also went on nhl.com for the first time in a couple of weeks to see what's been happening in the world of hockey, and the answer seems to be "a lot": not only have the Pittsburgh Penguins not lost in a month, but they've also recently secured the services of Jarome Iginla, not to mention Brenden Morrow and Douglas Murray. How has this not been the talk of the Iranian teahouses? Pittsburgh versus anyone else is starting to look a lot like, well, a soccer game between Barcelona and Team Canada.

1 comment:

  1. you could be rich if u wrote a book :D

    your descriptions are too detailed and too long but not tiring, at least for me
    while im reading a sentence, I wonder what next words might be about
    I liked your literature; I mean the words you use, the way you express your feelings and the way you describe things

    ReplyDelete