February 19, 2015
It’s raining in Shiraz. Cats and dogs. I hope it will quiet down, otherwise we won’t be able to see anything of this town. It rained all night. In the guesthouse, there’s a sheet covering the courtyard where we have breakfast, and from time to time a drop falls into your head while you’re eating.
13h20 Seray-e Mehr Teahouse & Restaurant
Luckily the rain slowed down a bit and we made it to the bazaar and we are now having lunch at this beautiful teahouse hidden in the maze of the bazaar.
My eggplant dish was less tasty than usual; Luca’s chicken with rice and pomegranate was delicious.
We met some lovely people here in Shiraz. We were walking in the street and I stopped to photograph a door at the end of the alley, when the owner of the house I was photographing walked by; he had gone to buy some bread and invited us for a chai. It was a bit embarrassing, because neither him nor his son could speak English. But we did manage to communicate, somehow. Bread and cheese, oranges, fruits similar to jujube. The room where we were sitting on the floor, displayed a fridge, some mattresses piled along a wall, a wardrobe and a carpet that covered the concrete floor. At one point they showed us the rest of the house. There was a room where they were weaving a carpet (finally we understood what earlier they tried to explain to us) and a beautiful mirrors room. Everything was falling apart, but it was stunning in its decadence. I hope they’ll find the money to refurbish, so they can make some money with tourism.
21h14 We are at the hotel. Luca is exchanging glances with two girls behind his shoulders, both having dinner with their partner, but it looks like this is not a problem. After the afternoon nap we went back to the street. We visited the castle, the Hammam, another mosque, a bazaar, the bus station to buy the bus ticket to Isfahan for tomorrow night. A Taiwan girl we met at the hotel found a taxi driver that can take us to Persepolis and Pesargade for 8 euro each. Great! We leave tomorrow 8.30 am. At the hotel they asked for 55 USD each for a similar tour. Yeek!
