Iran | Crossfit, Instagram and nose jobs

One month into our travels, we have reached those much-feared gates of laziness. A moment where anything seems more attractive than even a semblance of intellectual effort put into planning or, in that matter, writing. Checking out 101 pictures of animals in the running for the funniest picture of the year - sure. Scouring the local village for a barber only to communicate to him in broken Farsi how you want your hair cut - anytime. Deliberating whether to download Love Actually just so we could watch it one more time - of course.

Having exhausted all these undeniably appealing time fillers, we found ourselves with no viable alternative but to share our impressions from the second week of Iranian travels. With laziness still lurking behind the surface, we resorted to the safe practice of a numbered list - something that looks structured and well thought through but is, in fact, anything but.

So, 3 random Iranian impressions from each of us.

Oskar:

1. Iranian nose jobs - This will be a case study in biases-at-work. Few days into our stay, we have started noticing a surprising number of women with multiple band-aids covering their noses. My first thought, which I soon came to be ashamed of, was that this must be the effect of domestic violence. Little did we know that Iran is in enviable 4th place globally when it comes to the prevalence of cosmetic surgery, trailing only Colombia, Venezuela and the USA - the superstars in that field. According to our Iranian friends, women here opt not only for nose jobs and botox injections but also for modifications of body parts that cannot be shown to the public under the current regime. No pictures here we are afraid - you need to believe us that once seen, the identical post-surgery noses cannot be unseen.

2. THE original Crossfit - Zurkhaneh means “House of Strength” and what a fitting name this is. Recognised as the world’s longest running form of training, it defies imagination in how it mixes pre-Islamic culture, Zoroastrianism, Sufism and spirituality of Shia Islam together with calisthenics and wrestling. All of that in a sunken octagonal ring, where older moustached Iranian men perform exercises in unison to the drumbeat of morshed (“the master”) who recites Gnostic poems and tales from Persian mythology. You surely can’t be surprised that, once we found a local Zurkhaneh in Isfahan, we stayed for the full 2-hour workout, sipping on yet another tea. Even Marta soon forgot that she is the only tourist and the only woman in attendance (or, rather, the “honorary man” according to the local rules of the gym).

3. You can’t afford this carpet - If you are Polish, you can’t be blamed for not getting excited by the Persian carpets. You probably remember their similar-looking, cheaper Turkish version covering the floors of communist-era flats, together with their siblings of plywood chests of drawers and paintings of deer adorning the walls. Yuck. So it was with some surprise that I came to appreciate and even like the local carpets. In our two weeks of travels, we met Nomadic women who take over a year to weave an intricately patterned carpet from memory, with no templates and no room for mistake. We found out that each city or tribe has their own designs which often mirror the surroundings and lives of their people. We appreciated 50-year old carpets that lost none of their colour and, in fact, ended up buying one for ourselves in Yazd. And then, we encountered the carpet seller. What started with an innocent “Where are you from?” in an Isfahan bazaar, ended up with an hour of world-class carpet selling. All the ways of selling were there. Choose the seemingly more susceptible party (sorry Marta). Create an illusion of scarcity (“They don’t produce carpets like this anymore”). Insult the ego of the buyer (“You can’t afford these carpets so let me just show you what you are missing on”). Appeal to authority (“Here is my picture with the former foreign minister of Poland who bought this carpet”). To history (“My family had this store for generations. Just look at the picture of my grandfather”). To vanity (“I will not sell you these carpet”). Use the name of the buyer in every sentence (“You know Marta, what can I say Marta, you are like my sister Marta, I like you Marta”). And never, under no circumstances, stop talking or rolling our yet another carpet. It says so much about Iran and its people that despite, or maybe because, of all of this, we enjoyed that hour immensely and said goodbye to our seller Hamid with the largest of smiles. And no, we did not buy anything.

Marta:

1. Instagram is king - “Do you have Instagram?” must be one of the most frequently asked questions of our travels, narrowly losing only to “Where are you from?”. Let’s leave aside for a second the question on why Facebook is not accessible in Iran but Facebook-owned Instagram is. The fact is that the number of Iranian followers of my Instagram might soon outnumber the non-Iranian kind. And even that it would be way below an average Iranian account where a 16-year old aspiring rapper we met in an Isfahani park had over 50 thousand followers. All in all, Instagram - together with Third Wave coffee, cosmetic surgery, hipster hangouts, sanction-defying North Tehran fashion boutiques - shows how little we knew about this fascinating country.

2. Picnics galore - As if to give you another reason to understand that Iranians don’t wake up thinking about nuclear weapons and obliteration of the modern world, Iranians love picnics. In fact, they picnic everywhere. Not just in parks under the shade of a cypress but on pavements, by the side of the motorway, in petrol stations, even in the middle of a roundabout, surrounded by lanes upon lanes of world’s worst pollution. And they come prepared. With gas tanks for tea making, pyramids of sweets and pomegranates, Persian carpets, shisha pipes, bowls of rice and the indispensable invitation to join them. What not to love?

3. Glam, fashion and ice cream - I started thinking about what to wear in Iran two weeks into our Namibia trip. Covering my hair with a scarf seemed easy enough. But how should I go about covering my bum until mid-thigh while wearing pants? I haven't worn anything like this since the early 2000s when tunics over leggings were popular in Poland. The more I looked through Google Search results, the less confident I became that my carefully planned 'backpacker’s wardrobe’ would make me look at least slightly ‘Iranian’. My fashion sense was challenged but since there were not many shopping options in Namibia other than tight T-shirts and tiny shorts, I decided to take care of my hair first and think about my bum later. When we boarded the plane to Tehran I kept standing until all passengers found their seat to see how Iranian girls solve the dress code dilemma. I sat down disappointed as everyone looked so, well, normal. The commotion did start in the end the moment the plane hit the ground - scarfs shot up in the air and long manteau (light coat finishing mid-thigh) left the bags. I followed, put my scarf on and buttoned up Oskar's shirt as high as I could. I got off the plane feeling a bit insecure and angry at all men (read: Oskar) - why do I need to wear the scarf and they don’t? Next day brought even more fashion insecurity - yet again, I couldn’t stop staring at the girls. They looked comfortable and fashionable in what for me seemed like an impossible configuration of clothes. Full makeup with red lipstick and smokey eye were common. Scarfs on their heads showed as much hair as possible. ‘All I want is glam, fashion and ice cream’ is what I saw written on one T-shirt. It perfectly emphasised for me the fact that most women around the world, regardless of religion or prevailing political regime, love the same things - pretty dresses, makeup, a little pampering from time to time and, yes, ice cream.