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| A Londoner in Iran, off the beaten track | A Londoner in Iran, off the beaten track |
| (3 months later) | |
| As I arrived by ferry into Bandar Abbas – or what the locals call just plain Bandar – I was struck first by the thickness of the hot air, heavily laced with Persian Gulf salt. It was low tide and two boys played at the ocean’s edge, throwing silt and dodging rainbow coloured blotches of oil bleeding from a sputtering motorboat. On the other side of a four-lane boulevard, facing out towards the sea, a mosque loomed; its two spindly minarets, much taller than the base that supported them, threw long sideways shadows across neighbouring buildings, themselves a nondescript mixture of concrete and glass, or rotting wood facades. | |
| “Bandar Abbas, but why?” a man in Isfahan had asked a week earlier, drawing his face into a look of slightly pained bemusement when I told him my planned route. The guidebook I carried agreed: “short on both historical features and charisma” it intoned authoritatively. Nevertheless, despite not quite knowing why I was drawn to Bandar Abbas in particular, I did know I wanted to see a different side of Iran, somewhere without the refined splendour of Isfahan, the cosmopolitan buzz of Tehran, or the serene beauty of the Kurdish northwest. | |
| I reached the roadside, flagged down a taxi and tried to agree on a reasonable price with the driver who – seeing my backpack, noting the searing heat and perhaps sensing that I had only a fairly vague notion of where the hotel was – opened the bidding high. After a minute of back-and-forth negotiation, a far cry from the evasive, tarof-laden conversations I had so often experienced further north in the country, we settled on 6000 Toman (about $2), still above the odds but no longer enough to embarrass me about my haggling skills. The car moved down the boulevard and turned into a narrower street. A small groups of teenage boys in blue shirts wandered off in different directions, laughing and jostling each other as they passed between cars – a sign that a nearby school had just finished the day’s classes. | |
| I arrived at my hotel, dropped off my bag and, narrowly resisting the lure of an air-conditioned room, headed back outside with the intention of wandering gradually down towards the bazaar, taking photos on the way. The city seemed half-asleep, with many roadside stalls closed during the afternoon heat, their owners dozing in patches of shade. The lanky minarets were a useful reference point as they marked the centre of the city’s shoreline. I walked slowly towards them, via an indirect route with palm tree lined residential streets. | |
| I reached the bazaar when the listless afternoon met the preparation for evening trading, the busiest time of the day, once the heat begins to fade and families emerge to buy supplies. Fruit and vegetable vendors unpacked crates of ripe tomatoes and laid out forests of coriander, radishes, and spring onions; children chased each other through the narrow alleyways and wealthy women perused golden broaches and bangles in jewellery stores adjacent to the market. Women donned hijabs in wild combinations of red, yellow, pink, green, blue, purple and orange, often embossed with floral patterns, rather than the plain black chadors, so ubiquitous elsewhere in Iran. Some also wore a Batman-style black leather mask covering their cheekbones and nose, an incongruous contrast to their colourful clothing. Many of the city’s inhabitants were darker skinned than their northern compatriots and I learned that Hormozgan Province, of which Bandar Abbas is the capital, is also home to a significant proportion of the country’s Afro-Iranian population. I ate a quick meal of rice and chicken, washed down with two glasses of cold doogh, a savoury yoghurt drink seasoned with mint. | |
| Tired and slightly overpowered by the ferocious heat, I returned to my room. As I walked, a motorbike carrying two policemen rode past and despite my attempted nonchalance – I had heard and read enough about Iranian policemen to want to avoid unnecessary interactions – I inadvertently made eye contact with the driver. At first I thought the two would continue up the road, but just as this hope formed in my head, the bike made a sharp U-turn and returned, stopping alongside me. I noticed that the policeman riding pillion, still probably a teenager, had a rifle slung over his shoulder. The more senior of the two, tall and wearing a pristine khaki uniform, black stubble and black designer shades that hid his eyes, approached me, baring unnaturally white teeth in a wide grin. | |
| “Welcome to Iran, what are you doing here?” he said in lightly accented but otherwise perfect English. He glanced down at the camera attached to my wrist. “I’m a tourist, on holiday, just taking pictures,” I replied, unnecessarily miming the process of taking a photo. His face was still fixed in a grin of ironic amusement. “You are sweating – why is that?” he asked, pointing at my brow, which was indeed pretty damp. | |
| “Because it’s very hot – it must still be 35 degrees!” I protested, looking up at the sun. | |
| “Yes, where are you from?” he continued, ostentatiously not sweating himself. | |
| “London”, I replied. | |
| “Show me your passport then” | |
| “It’s at my hotel,” I answered, realising that by rights I should have at least a photocopy with me. Could he arrest me for this lapse I wondered? | |
| “I see,” he answered, his grin widening, “so tell me your name”. | |
| “Adam” | “Adam” |
| “Adam. And your family name…”“Chidell” I said. He asked me to spell it out and he repeated each letter slowly as though testing out the sounds for the first time. | |
| “What do you think of Iran?” he continued | |
| “It’s a beautiful country, full of very kind and welcoming people,” I said, hoping he would take the hint. | |
| “Yes, and what do you think of our government? And what about the police?” he laughed. | |
| I replied as diplomatically and enthusiastically as possible, but the questions kept coming, and the grin never faded. The sulky teenager with the rifle didn’t utter a thing, but stood motionless. I guessed he could not understand a word we were saying. The policeman revealed he was originally from Shiraz and asked me what I thought of “the most beautiful city in Iran”. I had not been and decided to come clean rather than try to bluff my way through. For a moment I thought his grin flickered, but soon it was fixed again and after a reproachful comment he began telling me about his home city in minute detail. I nodded and alternated between asking questions and politely lamenting my own stupidity at having missed out on this paradise. I noticed the eyes of nearby shopkeepers on us. Eventually the policeman seemed satisfied, shook my hand, pressing a little tighter than necessary and motioned to the teenager with the gun that they were leaving. He sat down on the bike, kicked the engine on and just as I was about to turn to leave he looked around and said “Goodbye… Adam Chidell,” emphasising my surname and giving a final menacing grin as he raced away. | |
| Adam Chidell is a teacher, photographer and writer based in London. | Adam Chidell is a teacher, photographer and writer based in London. |