Travels

I’m here until May 1 to report for PRI’s The World. I’m staying at the Stadion Hostel, where there’s free WiFi. So far, I met a friendly Greek student who’s studying abroad here on the bus back from the airport, and an Iranian engineer who works for Nokia and lives in Mashad, but is here to visit Nokia HQ. Small world. Off to find dinner and explore a little bit!

Part III ; Part II ; Part I Music: Blue Scholars – Second Chapter 9:16 Pacific Time March 26 2008 Without even realizing it, I clench my teeth and suck in air quickly and audibly, almost every time I ride in a Tehran taxi — my instinctual physical reaction to the frightening proximity of myself to the driver of the adjacent speeding car. I’m not afraid, per say, of my own personal impending doom, but rather that one of these…

Parts I and II can be found here, and here, respectively. Music: Beethoven – Symphony No. 6 12:17 pm Pacific Time March 24 2008 For the last couple of days, we begin our morning with Iranian noon, a sweet, almost buttery cheese, homemade quince jam, Persian tea and Peet’s Coffee. That’s right, Peet’s Coffee in Tehran. My father packed two pounds of French roast as a little comfort element for my mother whilst in unfamiliar territory. Yesterday morning, after our…

Music: The New Pornographers – Sing Me Spanish Techno (Soho Sessions) 1:03 pm Pacific Time March 22 2008 Khanoom and her husband — who passed years before — are buried sideways, so that they can face the Shrine of Massoumeh in Qom for all of eternity. This is the holiest of Iranian cities, the base of Iranian Shi’ite clergy and theology. Men walk the streets in dark robes and white turbans and glare out from behind their bearded and sunglassed…

So, as you probably know by now, I was traveling in Iran for two weeks in late March. I didn’t blog about it or publicize it much, given that as a dual-citizen (I can be drafted into the Iranian military, although I have a short-term exemption) and a journalist (I didn’t do any reporting while I was there), there was a very small possibility that I’d somehow get into trouble. You never know. Fortunately, I made it back without incident.…

Here’s my first batch. I’ve got nearly 1,000 in all. Here’s a few of my favs from the first round:

We had a six-hour flight from Tehran, braved Paris rush-hour traffic and made it to my aunt Firouzeh’s house in Issy-Les-Moulineaux. I’ll be spending two nights here (my parents four) before heading home to California for one night before I mosey on over to Austin for a week for the Science Literacy Project conference. So all of you who’ve been asking me when I’ll be back in Oakland, I wouldn’t count on seeing me until April 13.

They have free WiFi, and serve “Caffè Americano” at Tehran airport. No joke. More on the flip side.

NYT’s Jet Lagged: Jerusalem these days is barely a day away from Santa Barbara. In 36 hours or so I moved from a society that seems to have annulled history — and even parts of reality — to a place a millennium away where the very fury of human hopes and grievances, the constant debate of this world and some other, give reality and history a moment-by-moment urgency that reminds us why the Sabbath and holidays were first called into…