Yazd

In Yazd there are two towers. Once corpses were lying there to be eaten by vultures.
The corpses aren`t there anymore. The towers still are. And we were on them. On the towers of silence. It was the last resting place of the Zoroastrians.
Is it because you know the history of it, or just because you can feel it, that a place leaves such an intense impression?
On a mountain, and certainly on a deathtower on a mountain you can sit and listen to what would escape you otherwise. You hear the space you see, you hear that the motorway once wasn`t there, you don`t hear yourself for a moment.
You descend and you lose the experience, but you carry a little piece of that mountain with you. A little piece of silence in the background.
Also while traveling, you lose every place where you were, every person you met.
But from all that you take a little piece with you and you never lose that.

On the roof of our hostel, together with our new travelfriends, we watch the animationmovie Persepolis, from the book of the same name by Marjane Satrapi. The autobiography of an Iranian woman during and in the aftermath of the Islamic revolution in Iran.
The revolution, the protests, the Iran-Iraq war, the emigrations, the personal tragedies, the senseless killing. It all strikes you harder while being here.
Although safely smoking a waterpipe and freelytouristbeing, but still.
Watching the images of the revolution immediately made me think of the youtubeclips and pictures of the demonstrations in june.
The story of the war between Iraq and Iran that lasted 8 years suddenly got a face through the huge paintings on almost every streetcorner of Tehran. Paintings of martyrs who died for their country. Serving as an excuse for a totalitarian islamic `democratic` republic.
The soldiers of the revolutionary guard in the movie have the same eyes as the men who reproachfully/protectively look through you on the streets.
The people in the movie,the normal people, have the same warmth, the same unconditional openness as the people now, here, on the streets, wherever you are.
The people in the film that want to leave, still want to leave now. Whereto? Doesn`t matter, America or Europe. New-Zealand. India. London. Antwerp.
One out of four Iranians we meet wants to leave.
To be able to drink a beer in public, to wear what they want, hold hands when they want, dance wherever they want, say what they want.
The other three are staying and still do what`s not allowed, but underground.
Or as Marjane Satrapi puts it : We were so focused on having a good time that we forgot we didn`t have our freedom.

In the mean time we keep on traveling.
Since a few days we are in Yazd, city in the desert.
With an old part where you`re obliged to get lost and take thousands of pictures of old men (Maarten, Belgian cyclist we met, answers my question why so many photographers like to take pictures of old people: Because they sit still.), hijabs, soldiers (who afterwards keep staring at you for minutes), breadkneaders and little children in very coloured jackets (a relief compared to their hijabed mothers).
The city where we saw the practicing of Zorkhane, a combination of sports and praying. It comes down to a group of men standing in a circle, spinning around and chanting prayers to come closer to God. All this with live djembemusic. It made me want to dance. I`ll wait for that till we`re in India. Scarveless.

Tomorrow we`ll take the bus to Shiraz. And slowly we`re making up our plan what to do next. It hurts to say, but we will have to skip a little piece of land in our overlandjourney. We will avoid Pakistan. Even after hearing enough stories of travelers who have safely done it and are going to do it, we decided to go by plane, or maybe, and that would be the best middle way, by boat. From Dubai/Oman to Mumbay. We will put all our energy on this plan and try to make it work. We`ll see. But first Shiraz. Then all the rest.

Good luck to Maarten, Kim and Kurt, our company for the last days. Thank you for the nice time.