TEHRAN - DAY 2

 Today was a sorta interesting day. We started off with a visit to the former US Embassy...the site of the famous hostage taking event that riveted international attention. However, as world attention has moved on it remains an important piece of the contemporary Iranian narrative. The Embassy has now been converted into a museum. Everything as it was then has been kept intact and in some ways fetishized..."this is the Ambassador's desk...these are the encryption machines...etc." It's like a time capsule of 1970's technology. An earnest young man gave us a tour, referring to various hostages by name and the books they wrote and was surprised that we weren't familiar with them. Throughout the tour he stressed how humanely the hostages were treated...it was important to him as it seems to be to all Iranians we've encountered that we take away the understanding that they are all good people.




Wherever we go people are always asking what we think of their country...do you like us? They're not so much curious as they are friendly and seem genuinely interested hoping that we will all go back home and tell our friends and colleagues that Iran is a safe normal place.

I'm running behind on blogging as our schedule has been rather hectic...I wanted to post something but I'll have to finish and post some photos later.

I'm back...one of he things I wanted to do is to acquire some Iranian Beluga caviar. On the way to our next stop, one of the Shah's palaces we stopped at an incredible nut and fruit store and I spotted the caviar.

Here's a pic



It cost $65 for 50 grams (2 oz)...in Paris Beluga sells for $4000 lb so while expensive it was still a deal. I'd like to be able to report that it was fabulous but unfortunately when I ate it later in the day at the hotel it was disappointing. The little egg bubbles didn't burst brightly and the overall texture was a little gummy. Oh well...I guess I won't be pigging out on caviar the rest of the trip.
The palace thing was a bit of a snooze...they're all over the place animist were built by the first Shah. Basically they're monuments to what happens when you have a lot of money and very little taste.There was a field trip from a local girls school and they were very cute and animated.

We fly out to Shiraz this evening.

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