Escort Iran (English)
Door: Mike
Blijf op de hoogte en volg Mike&Lisanne
08 April 2009 | Iran, Bām
Frst, pls forgve the "i" without dot.. ..Turkish keyboard place a "|" on the "i". We have no idea was effect ths has on the quality reading of the blog but now you know where that stuff comes from.
Waking up in Zahedan we found our bikes in a rusty condton. The climate in Zahedan is a rough one. Hard winds, blended with salty rains make an assured mix for orange-coloured nuts and bolts. Thankfully we've polished large parts of the bikes in Karachi with the help of the boys of the Children's village; these parts were still shiny thankfully!
The inner works of the bikes is liable to extra wear-and-tear too. Although the benzin of the Iranian petrol station is relatively cheap (about 40 cts per liter), the octane level and the quality of the film is below that of benzene-containing Chinese dairy milk; i.e.: dramatically insignfcant. But still: our bikes run on it without much complaint.
When we started our journey in the morning we were happy to learn that we had been assigned a police escort again to resume our trip to Kerman: our goal for the day. When the police escort arrived on their motorbikes, we swiftly toured around the town of Zahedan. Lisanne and I were starting to get suspcious when the tour through Zahedan lasted and lasted - soon we were treated on visiting all the main-streets and small corners of Zahedan. It was as-if the police was showcasing the newly arrved tourists to all of the Zahedan muncipality. This was being topped by the stop-overs at the most busy crossings imaginable of the town Zahedan. Again, Zahedan is probably the most dangerous town of Iran for foreign travellers. Revered about the amount of drugtraffikers and foreign abductions, this is your place-to-be to hit the spotlights in internatonal media under the headlines of "Kidnapping" and the like.
That's also the exact reason why the Iranian authorities assign these escorts to us: to avoid painful international headlines about kidnapped tourists by Balochistanian separatists in Iran. The Balochi separatists in return ponder to negotiate the pardon of their fellow warriors in Iranian jails in return for some tourists. Well, as much as Lisanne and I don't want to function as exchange-money for separatist groups we certainly don't have the right temper/patience for Iranian police escorts..
..after spending nearly two-and-a-half-ours (!) driving around in and around Zahedan. Stopping, rushing-for-no-obvious-reason, and nearly bumping into the policecar (due to their ever unpredictable break-stop-and-go-behaviour). We had enough. As by now we (in 2:30 hrs) only had covered not even 100 kilometers!! After a quick intercom chat Lisanne and I choose our next move: to get rid off the 'Henkies' of the police escort.
(We call them 'Henkies' as we had called the Chinese travel agent companions like this. If we wanted to travel on our motorbikes across China this was one of the necessities summoned upon us by the Chinese authorities. This would mean a limited sense of freedom when driving through China and an extra burden in deciding where to go, or not to go. For the record: the term 'Henkie' has nothng to do with the Henk's that are helping us along the way!)
We spurted our bikes out of Zahedan. Finally, the sense of freedom! This feeling lasted until we encountered our first police post along the way, just about 20 kilometers outside Zahedan..
..as we drove towards the policepost we saw a bunch of policemen hastingly running around the roads, waving with their hands and jumping to their stations; they were clearly aroused by our entry: "here come the two stray rebellious tourist motorcyclists are coming!!", we imagined that's what went on in their minds.
Soon we found ourselves again in the inevitable slow estafette train of police escorts. Our ambition to reach Kerman?? We had to let this drop. We could be glad with the prospect of reaching Bam. Bam, a medium-sized town, once famous due to its largest adobe earthwork city structure in the world, centuries old. Now - one earthquake later - Bam is disposed of its main tourist attraction. The whole ancient city is leveled-down to nothing but a mudpile. Nearly every house is still wrapped in scaffolding. The whole town of Bam is renewed, as the old one is vanished by a 6.8 Richter scale earthquake in 2003 - six years ago. The distaster just took two seconds in total..
After a tiring day of ill/none-English police escorts with little apathy to non-army foreign civilians we found ourselves at the guesthouse of mister Akbar.
Mister Akbar is an Iranian pensioner who dreamed of havng his guesthouse for all of his life. In-town people nicknamed him 'English', as he probably is the best English speaking inhabtant of Bam. Until the age of 61 he tought English at school. Now he is running the most popular overlander guesthouse in Bam. His guesthouse is still under construction; ironcally in fashion with all buildngs in Bam.
We can just grasp his emotions after the earthquake, as he mutes in silence when the subject is raised. Normally, Akbar is an inquistive and talkative man. Imagine when your life-dream is just scattered in 2 seconds after a full productive life and you have to begin all-over again.
Despite this setback, Mister Akbar is a joyfull and optimstic man; this is a great quality we think all people should have: always be prepared to start all-over, with focus, endeavor and character. Even in Bam, YOU CAN.
Waking up in Zahedan we found our bikes in a rusty condton. The climate in Zahedan is a rough one. Hard winds, blended with salty rains make an assured mix for orange-coloured nuts and bolts. Thankfully we've polished large parts of the bikes in Karachi with the help of the boys of the Children's village; these parts were still shiny thankfully!
The inner works of the bikes is liable to extra wear-and-tear too. Although the benzin of the Iranian petrol station is relatively cheap (about 40 cts per liter), the octane level and the quality of the film is below that of benzene-containing Chinese dairy milk; i.e.: dramatically insignfcant. But still: our bikes run on it without much complaint.
When we started our journey in the morning we were happy to learn that we had been assigned a police escort again to resume our trip to Kerman: our goal for the day. When the police escort arrived on their motorbikes, we swiftly toured around the town of Zahedan. Lisanne and I were starting to get suspcious when the tour through Zahedan lasted and lasted - soon we were treated on visiting all the main-streets and small corners of Zahedan. It was as-if the police was showcasing the newly arrved tourists to all of the Zahedan muncipality. This was being topped by the stop-overs at the most busy crossings imaginable of the town Zahedan. Again, Zahedan is probably the most dangerous town of Iran for foreign travellers. Revered about the amount of drugtraffikers and foreign abductions, this is your place-to-be to hit the spotlights in internatonal media under the headlines of "Kidnapping" and the like.
That's also the exact reason why the Iranian authorities assign these escorts to us: to avoid painful international headlines about kidnapped tourists by Balochistanian separatists in Iran. The Balochi separatists in return ponder to negotiate the pardon of their fellow warriors in Iranian jails in return for some tourists. Well, as much as Lisanne and I don't want to function as exchange-money for separatist groups we certainly don't have the right temper/patience for Iranian police escorts..
..after spending nearly two-and-a-half-ours (!) driving around in and around Zahedan. Stopping, rushing-for-no-obvious-reason, and nearly bumping into the policecar (due to their ever unpredictable break-stop-and-go-behaviour). We had enough. As by now we (in 2:30 hrs) only had covered not even 100 kilometers!! After a quick intercom chat Lisanne and I choose our next move: to get rid off the 'Henkies' of the police escort.
(We call them 'Henkies' as we had called the Chinese travel agent companions like this. If we wanted to travel on our motorbikes across China this was one of the necessities summoned upon us by the Chinese authorities. This would mean a limited sense of freedom when driving through China and an extra burden in deciding where to go, or not to go. For the record: the term 'Henkie' has nothng to do with the Henk's that are helping us along the way!)
We spurted our bikes out of Zahedan. Finally, the sense of freedom! This feeling lasted until we encountered our first police post along the way, just about 20 kilometers outside Zahedan..
..as we drove towards the policepost we saw a bunch of policemen hastingly running around the roads, waving with their hands and jumping to their stations; they were clearly aroused by our entry: "here come the two stray rebellious tourist motorcyclists are coming!!", we imagined that's what went on in their minds.
Soon we found ourselves again in the inevitable slow estafette train of police escorts. Our ambition to reach Kerman?? We had to let this drop. We could be glad with the prospect of reaching Bam. Bam, a medium-sized town, once famous due to its largest adobe earthwork city structure in the world, centuries old. Now - one earthquake later - Bam is disposed of its main tourist attraction. The whole ancient city is leveled-down to nothing but a mudpile. Nearly every house is still wrapped in scaffolding. The whole town of Bam is renewed, as the old one is vanished by a 6.8 Richter scale earthquake in 2003 - six years ago. The distaster just took two seconds in total..
After a tiring day of ill/none-English police escorts with little apathy to non-army foreign civilians we found ourselves at the guesthouse of mister Akbar.
Mister Akbar is an Iranian pensioner who dreamed of havng his guesthouse for all of his life. In-town people nicknamed him 'English', as he probably is the best English speaking inhabtant of Bam. Until the age of 61 he tought English at school. Now he is running the most popular overlander guesthouse in Bam. His guesthouse is still under construction; ironcally in fashion with all buildngs in Bam.
We can just grasp his emotions after the earthquake, as he mutes in silence when the subject is raised. Normally, Akbar is an inquistive and talkative man. Imagine when your life-dream is just scattered in 2 seconds after a full productive life and you have to begin all-over again.
Despite this setback, Mister Akbar is a joyfull and optimstic man; this is a great quality we think all people should have: always be prepared to start all-over, with focus, endeavor and character. Even in Bam, YOU CAN.
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Je kunt nu ook Smileys gebruiken. Via de toolbar, toetsenbord of door eerst : te typen en dan een woord bijvoorbeeld :smiley
