With all my worldly possessions-and a precious visa to visit in tow, husband Gee Kin and I have just arrived in Tehran, the capital of Iran. We left behind the globalized world of Starbucks, KFC and Macdonalds, to one with brewed tea, fast food chicken legs roasting on an open fire, and lamb kebabs with bread made with pebbles for dimples. We passed tantalizing corner stores filled with pistachios and dry fruits that you buy to take to a friend’s house. Hospitality means alot here, and we can already feel it in the air.

Having just completed a marathon flight in 19 hours (San Francisco-Washington DC-Vienna-Tehran, I was glad to hit the end of the day with a hearty meal of lamb stew mascerated at the table and mixed into a tomato based soup, chicken and lab kebobs, saffron rice, yoghurt dressing, a vinegar-based eggplant sauce on the side, and bread.

Everything is not so different at first blush. Getting through immigration was a breeze and easier than stateside! Tehran has about 9 million people living here, with the active daily working population at around 14 million. Iran is a country of 80 million, about the population of Germany. The mountains just outside of Tehran are over 5,000 m, so skiing is a big attraction for tourists, who normally come from Germany, France, and Italy, but more recently even from China.

Stay tuned for more to come in art and architecture in Tehran and Shiraz, our next stop.

(This post is now formatted as intended and was created on April 15, 2018)