The train station was fairly crowded and offered the usual inefficiencies, such as waiting 20 minutes in a line for an agent to tell you to wait in another line. The tickets were absurdly cheap, reminding us that Iran might have the most affordable public transportation in the world. I don’t remember that day’s prices but a week earlier we had traveled 60km via a metro line linked to a train line (kind of like the taking San Francisco MUNI N-Judah from UCSF to the BART to somewhere well north of Berkeley) for 17 cents per passenger!
In our compartment were four men - two college kids, a married businessman, and an old man with a cane. While Madhavi read Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s autobiography and took her usual 3 hour moving vehicle nap, I chatted with the guys. In Iran, if you haven’t already noticed by our previous stories, conversations with strangers (especially if you’re a foreigner) often end up on the final common pathway of politics. I need not bother telling you how they felt about things domestically. The old man, though, surprised me. On average older Iranians, who lived through the worst of the Shah and American puppeteering and are inherently more socially conservative, may (at least in the cities) dislike the regime but they tend to have a more nuanced perspective. This 80-something, though, was a downright radical. He railed against the mullahs, expressed sadness for the youth and their lost opportunities, and vigorously defended G.W. Bush while blaming the Iraq disaster on the Arabs. Once again I found myself in the odd position of having to present essentially the Islamic Republic’s side of things: regarding both Bush and the deposed Shah (the latter almost revered by all four of them who collectively blew off my stale criticisms). When the college guys started describing the epidemic of youth drug abuse, I once again sunk into depression. It’s hard not to get depressed in this country, especially if you are connected to its culture and people and you know its potential. Of course, Iranians get sad talking about it themselves. Sometimes in these situations I tried to be the American cheerleader, breaking the dreary silence with “history is long” and “a government not supported by the people will never last”, etc. I emphasized that overwhelming popular sentiment is not easily crushed, which is why the Shah was powerless against the hundreds of thousands of peaceful protesters of 1978. But someone inevitably replies with an ace of hopelessness (this time it was the married man): “The Shah didn’t kill all those people, but these mullahs will.”
We arrived in Zanjan. The married man invited us to stay at his house, and when we politely declined he came with us in the cab to make sure we got to our hotel. After a nice lunch in the city square, we headed back to the hotel for a nap but were woken by a wicked hail storm out of nowhere – sun to golf ball hail back to sun again. We walked around the main bazaar eating delicious dried mulberries and listening to the singing street vendors who turned “fresh strawberries, grapes, oranges” into love songs. After discovering an old underground teahouse, we called one of the college guys named Ardeshir to invite him out for dinner. We planned to eat in a famous caravanserai but it was closed for renovation. The kind manager did let us in to have a look at this magnificent old restaurant, with hidden sections accessible by small corridors where you had to duck to get through. He ended up recommending another place, which turned out to be a little jewel itself – one of those old exercise theaters (like we saw in Yazd) turned into a restaurant. The four of us ate dizi and kabab and smoked a coconut milk galyoon (rather than the standard water). The conversation, as usual, was fast and non-stop. Ardeshir and I talked on and on about classic rock music, which now includes Guns-N'-Roses and Nirvana - God I’m old! He loves rock and plays on his electric guitar. He's quite a good player (I heard a recording of his on his cell phone), which makes even sadder that he can only play in private as pop music is forbidden by Islamic law. The next morning Mr. Ayatollah (just a name, not a title in his case) picked us up for a day trip into the countryside. Within 30 minutes we were driving through really spectacular mountains covered in different shades of green with little stone and straw villages set in valleys and hillsides. We passed mines of copper and iron with their distinct blue-green and silver hues. We stopped for pictures, and on occasion Mr. Ayatollah would pick some wild herbs for us, one of which was so minty good that we kept it to add in sandwiches later in the day. A couple hours into our drive we decided to stop at a particularly enchanting village for a short break and a hike.
Madhavi and I walked up the muddy hill by goats and sheep and colorfully dressed curious onlookers, mostly women and children. After trying to make some conversation, I realized that the villagers don’t speak Farsi but rather Azeri, which is closer to Turkish and is the primary language of the majority of people in northwest Iran. So we just planned on walking through the village and hiking up a hill when a kind woman with plump pink cheeks and a welcoming smile greeted us and it was clear she knew Farsi. I think her name was Parvaneh. She introduced us to her very cute 5 year old daughter Roya as well as her sister-in-law and mother-in-law, we started chatting, and soon she invited us in. We walked half-bent into the mud-brick home and sat in a room on dusty red carpets around a table that stood over a fire pit. Dad had described this special kind of table, where during winter you sit on the ground with your legs tucked underneath it to be warmed by the fire. The room also had a wood oven-fireplace and a few pictures on the wall. Parvaneh served us tea and homemade nun panir (bread and cheese), showed us old pictures, and told her story. She grew up in the then small town of Zanjan but moved to the village after marrying. Though she enjoys the serenity of the village she says life here is too difficult. Every day she and her husband wake at 4AM: he goes to the mines while she farms, tends to the animals, makes carpets (she sold one that took her almost two years to make for over $4,000), and raises her son and daughter. They finish work at 10PM. Her daughter Roya was so adorable, quietly just sitting and watching us before finally opening her coloring book to scribble away. Parvaneh said Roya and her son would probably continue school as long as possible and eventually move out of the village like many other children do. There are only 40 families left now, she said. She recalled being a child and the commotion at home when everyone was glued to the TV. “Mom, what’s happening?” “Imam Khomeini is coming; the Shah is leaving.” She and many rural dwellers saw real improvements in their lives, like electricity, good roads, and new schools, thanks to Khomeini and his populist policies. So even if she complains about the current government not doing enough for the villagers, she remembers Khomeini fondly.
We gave Parvaneh mulberries and pastries and left for Takht-e-Soleiman. After waiting for the rain to let up, we entered this very ancient Zoroastrian fire temple, a sprawling maze of mud buildings set around a crater lake. The lake was important as it allowed the Zoroastrians to have the four elements of the universe – air, water, fire, and earth in one place. We wandered around, soaking up the phenomenal natural setting for a while. One of the workers graciously gave us an extemporaneous tour, pointing out key features like the sleeping quarters, the naan-making rooms, the layers of unearthed columns revealing additions and changing styles through the centuries, and of course the place of eternal fire. We met a couple of nice Kurdish families, easily distinguishable by the traditional baggy pants that the men wear. They came from close to the Iraq border in the west, where most of them live. I nosily inquired about issues of Kurdish separatism, testing the general wisdom and our experience in Orumiyeh/Tabriz that minorities in Iran feel a strong bond with the country and that separatist movements are thus very weak. Their answers (“I’m both”, “Whatever God wants”) were neutral, which seemed appropriate given my excessive forwardness. 
We headed down the road to Zendan-e-Soleiman, the original site of the temple before it collapsed. We climbed and sloshed up the hill in pouring rain before reaching the top where we saw a massively deep crater lined by gray volcanic rock. We gingerly walked around side of the hill to see the incredible surrounding green valleys and distant snow mountains from all perspectives. We were totally soaked, and it was time to head back to Zanjan. There we had a quick dinner in a hole-in-the-wall and I met Ardeshir. He came to our hotel to give me his original guitar pick of 14 years ago. I graciously refused, and he refused my refusal. I felt badly taking something that means so much to him, but in the end I took it and was touched. These couple days were exhilarating, and we were so happy that we had taken some detours off the beaten paths to see a quiet and beautiful side of the country and to once again meet wonderful people. We were excited that more was to come.
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