Exploring Tehran

Golestan Palace

We woke to another beautiful day in Tehran with clear blue skies. The hotel breakfast was a good introduction to the Persian breakfast. Nan bread (not like the Indian tandoor one but thinner and somewhat cardboardy), egg, white cheese spread, butter and jam. [Edit: while I enjoyed it, little did I know that better versions include cucumber, tomatoes and olives.]

Our first sight for the day was the Golestan Palace, which we reached on foot. The complex was built by the Qajar Dynasty and was once inside a mud-thatched citadel. It dates back to the 1500s but the current form is largely from 1865.

We visited a couple of palaces within the complex. Mirrored mosaics were definitely the style at the time and this was seen in a few of the halls. The Marble Throne consists of 65 pieces of marble from a mine in Yazd.

After visiting the interior, we continued to the exterior courtyard and rose gardens. Exiting to the bazaar, we were accosted by a few carpet salesmen but they were pretty tame compared to countries where tourism was more rampant.

We had a chance crossing with a religious procession bazaar, supposedly for Imam Hassan, with men dressed in black beating their chests in mourning. It was a very solemn and somewhat moving scene. I wasn’t sure if I was glad or disappointed that it wasn’t Imam Hussein’s commemoration as the mourners would be whipping their back with chains till raw and bleeding.

We continued across a park looking for a restaurant for lunch. We settled on a kebab on Ferdowsi Street. We opted for a mixed plate of beef and chicken with two sticks of bread, salad and mayo. We made our own sandwiches from that. It was delicious until we saw the congealed fat left behind as the platter cooled down.

Text continues after this gallery.

Treasury of National Jewels

It was a short walk to the Bank Melli vault, opposite the German and Turkish embassies, which holds for safe-keeping the treasures and jewels of the former Shah. Officially it is called the Treasury of National Jewels.

Oh, the riches that the Shah’s family had was obscene. There were large chunks of stones in crowns, and necklaces. Then platefuls of diamonds, emeralds, rubies but no sapphires. The most stunning was probably the Darya Noor, the world’s largest pink diamond and one of the largest diamonds in the world as well.

But the most extravagant display, for me, where the whole row of curtain tassles that weren’t. They were in fact very small pearls threaded into tassles just to decorate a bloody curtain. That is sick. Dear Reza and Farah had too much money they didn’t know what do it with it.

We taxied back to the hotel for a rest. Later in the afternoon, we took a taxi to the corner of Ferdowsi and Jomhouri Islami to find an internet café We found a big one with many PS and it was cheap too.

After an hour online, we wandered and found Manouchehri St with beautiful antique shops. I loved the antique oil/kerosene lamps for only USD20. There were plenty of very classy antique chandeliers. For more contemporary shopping, some beautiful leather satchels for work were around NZD100.

For a snack, we bought some bread called taftun. It was flat oval-shaped with some stripey channels. Warm and fresh out of the oven, it was delicious on its own with enough of a salty flavour. We also found some real Pepsi rather than Zam-Zam Cola or Iranda! It was from a shop selling lots of imported goods such as cereals, detergent etc.

Back at the hotel, I was starting to get a headache. Perhaps I wasn’t drinking enough even though it wasn’t that hot. With the heavy lunch and the bread as snack, we skipped dinner.

Delicious bread on the streeets.