First he took us to his apartment for lunch. He had called his wife 20 minutes earlier and somehow when we arrived she had khoresh gheimeh and rice ready for us. Mehdi showed us his son's West Asian gymnastics championship medal - given his own physique his son's success was not surprising. This random stop was one of those beautiful things we experienced in Iran on many occasions - people open their homes and offer you so much without any expectation of payback.We left and headed up an unremarkable mountain pass. As we rolled over the crest, we saw Alamut. Seemingly all of it, at once. We got out of the car, walked to the cliff edge, and just stood there for a while. The view was one of those that is so expansive - deep, wide, and complex - that if you were a child you'd swear this was half the world. Exactly unlike Mt. Damavand, it looks so much bigger than it is. Green and red rolling mountains as far left and right as the eye could see were sprinkled with clusters of villages, smaller hills, and a modest brown river below. Alamut is the name given to this area of long adjacent mountain ranges (the northern one being the Alborz) and the valleys and canyons that separate them. It is famous in Iran for its natural beauty and the Castles of the Assassins.
Mehdi started collecting wildflowers and herbs for us, including these interesting purple "tea leaves". The aromas were so nice. We continued the descent down the mountain and very soon we were in the valley. Too soon. It felt wrong to traverse such an apparently vast landscape so quickly, so easily, just sitting there in the passenger seat daydreaming as it all whizzed by. As it was, we were suddenly on other side, in the Alborz mountains. We stopped at a narrow deep canyon with swirling tie-dye-like gray rock walls before arriving at the base of one of the castles of the Assassins. The castles, forts, and amazing cliff-hanging villages surrounding them were built on mountain peaks in Alamut in the 12th century by a fierce warrior cult that rose to dominate this strategic pass connecting the Persian Gulf to the Caspian for 150 years. According to Marco Polo the leader would recruit young men by inviting them to the gates of his "magnificent" castle garden. There he would have them drink a potion with hashish. When they were stoned asleep he would bring them in and upon awakening they would see this amazing garden with beautiful dancing women. He told them it was paradise. He preached agnosticism, telling them to forget about the prophets, to fear nothing. These "hashishins", following orders, would then seek and kill high-ranking officials of opposing regimes. Hence the English word "assassin".
We walked up a dirt road towards a path where a young guy stood to collect the entrance fee. This 20-something must have been a government employee but it was hard to tell in his T-shirt and jacket with an F.B.I. logo on it. I teased him, saying he could get into trouble if he wasn't careful. "I don't care. They can do whatever they want. I like America. For that matter, I like Israel too," he said with a knowing laugh. We headed up a steep path, where Mehdi stopped us often to point out various features of this castle/village ruin. The rock face was so steep that the ancients had to use hundred foot ropes and pulleys to get materials and goods to the top. In the castle ruin itself the security guy let us through to the off-limits excavation area where you could see (just like in Takht-e-Soleiman) layers of history dug up from meters deep in ground. On the way down, we took a detour along a hill where Mehdi demonstrated an echo effect with a loud yell. We were impressed, and perhaps reminding himself that he has a great voice, he started singing opera style for the next half-hour. It was awesome, and you know that if he lived in the West there would be a good chance he could make a career out of that voice. Fortunately, he didn't care to be anywhere but where he was at that moment. He's not just trying to make ends meet or looking for a way out like so many others. He loves nature and his family, ignores politics, and believes that international borders are artificial and wrong: "Do these birds care whether they're in Iran or not?" At the end of the trail we also heard women singing - in public. This doesn't sound noteworthy, except that in Iran it is illegal. But being so far in the middle of nowhere, the women were just a bit more free. Madhavi took advantage of this to remove her annoying headscarf and overcoat during our hike the next day - she was so happy!
As the sun set, we headed to one of the villages where we'd be staying for the night. At the door of the typically modest home, a middle-aged couple let us in. They had just set out dinner, so we immediately sat down and ate with them and their cute 12 year-old daughter, the youngest of seven. The food was simple - bread, cheese, grape jam, rice with peas, yogurt, and doogh (the yogurt drink). It all tasted so fresh because it was. They grew and harvested or otherwise made all their own food: grains, dairy, fruits, vegetables. They hadn't been to a market in months. We saw the spot outside where they had been aging cheese underground for a year. In their simple living room with a small decorative cabinet and outdated calendars, they had a picture of Aishwariya Rai in one corner. Deep in rural Iran this should have come as a surprise but it didn't. Travelling through Asia revealed to us that perhaps the most consistent element of popular culture across the continent (and now that we're in Africa you can throw this continent into the equation) is fondness for Indian cinema. The father, echoing people in other countries, said he loved the family-oriented drama and the singing. Later we talked to the girl, who reinforced our experience in the Zanjan village by saying she wanted to move to a city. I asked what would become of the village. Mehdi then stood up and did a hilarious imitation of old people bent in half with canes and quivering voices (he was a friend of the family, so they took it well). 
The next morning we thanked this kind family and left for more exploring. Mehdi showed us everything from a spring-fed lake to unusual flowers to huge eagles to fruits like cherries, wild pomegranate, wild rubarb, and mulberries. He was such a fantastic guide: knowledgeable, funny, and phenomenally enthusiastic. He stopped so many times to allow us to take pictures that even I had to ask him to chill out. One of the best things about him was the way he illuminated things we never would have noticed. Like the time he stopped and said "Look at those birds." These little hummingbird-size guys were speeding in a circle over a small hill of daisies. But we didn't notice anything particularly interesting until he said "Pay attention. They never stop flying. They never sit, never rest." He was right. We watched for at least 10 minutes and not a single one of the 20 or so birds stopped for even a second. A few days later my all-knowing Ame Monir would explain that they do fly constantly and catch flies in the process. 
We ended the day with a climb up a hill to another of the castles. This time it was the trek up that was most interesting. We passed through beautiful fields of daisies, dandelions, red and orange poppies, and purple and blue flowers, all of which were wild. I picked a bouquet or two for Madhavi. We had lunch at another villager's home, that of a couple who had a memorable garden that included pink roses (the ones from which Iranians make rosewater). She made a great egg/tomato omelete that was so simple but so good; it reminded us of the one we had at Mama's way back at in December in southwestern China. The 16 year-old daughter of the family was fun to talk to. Somehow the conversation turned to religion and I mentioned that I don't pray. "Good, just like me," she exclaimed with a chuckle. But when I went a bit further she became distinctly alarmed, turning to Mehdi for help, "But he has a God right?" "Of course he does," he reassured her, "he just doesn't pray." We started the drive back towards Tehran. On the way we stopped where a group of college girls who were out on a research/field trip. We chatted with them for a bit. I explained to one of the hipsters that the "Bulls 23" on her jeans represented a famous retired basketball player named Michael Jordan. She didn't seem to care. As they drove away in a bus the girls stood up and started singing and dancing. It was a great scene.
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