4 days to Tehran – aka 'welcome to Tehran'

In the early 70's, a catalog came out called The Whole Earth Catalog. In a strange way it was kinda dangerous. Not really. But it definitely changed some people's lives and directions. Perhaps that's totally undangerous. I don't know.

For example, a good friend found a wonderful design for a large catamaran. He decided he would build it as he could borrow a piece of land on Lake Ontario. And then sail it down the coastal passage so he could live in the Caribbean and sail tourists around. So for many summers, he would work on his boat and drive cab in winters to finance it. I'm told it was a beauty. He went to launch it and with a huge noise the boat got a large split in it. End of ability to float – an essential ingredient of a boat...After this I lost contact. Who knows what happened.

For me, it was a casual glance at the pages that revealed a short description of how to go 'Overland to Kathmandu'. At this point, the only time I had heard of Kathmandu was a type of black hash. I had no idea that it was a place, the capital of the Kingdom of Nepal. And yup, I decided to go.

I'll skip the beginnings and detours – Montreal to London, France, Holland, France, Spain, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Italy, Greece and finally Istanbul. Turkey is a large country in terms of length so crossing the country is an arduous journey. The catalog and it seems others knew the cheapest way was the 4 day train ride to Tehran - $4 one way with fake student card. And no food, no water, and especially no bar car.

I managed to find 5 other travelers like me. I have no recollection of how but this was important as then the 6 people could fill a train compartment car, then lock it to keep out wandering bandits and such.

Yet, this seemed minor compared to the lack of food and water and the fact that the train never stopped for 4 days. So everyone had gone to market stalls in Istanbul to buy food – the only problem being that unplucked chickens were not great for traveling. But dried apricots there was a plenty. However as we had not gone together to shop – yup – everyone had lots of dried apricots and not much else. Now I find it odd but I don't remember any water or even toilets on the train. I guess there must have been. I have this distorted vision of women in pairs going to the bathroom which would have required having the train car door locked after them – remember the wandering thieves – and some kind of secret knock to get back in. And we must have had water to wash down a diet of apricots.

But I'll back up to before we even got on the train. I was traveling with a woman whom I had met – wish I could remember her name as we made it all the way to Delhi together. We arrived hours before the train was to leave. We didn't want to miss it as it only ran once a week. And as well we hated Istanbul and wanted out. It was the combination of realistic fears, severe very severe air pollution (everything was permanently covered in soot), and the huge billboards that read 'One Puff, 10 Years' (pre Midnight Express). So having time to kill near the train station, we began to wander the nearby streets. It seemed very safe as it wasn't downtown and it was daylight (no one ever went outside in the dark – no one – not even people from Istanbul). Did I mention how much we hated it...

Now, as far as we knew Istanbul was dry as in no alcohol due to the Muslim population. Well, for unknown reasons, around the train station must have been exempt. We were startled by a Tuborg beer sign in a bar window. No problem. 4 days of possible sheer hell ahead of us sounded like a good enough reason for a beer. So we went in, sat at a table and pointed to the sign. That got us a beer each. It was probably the best beer I've ever had. And every time we were low in the bottles, 2 more would appear. After about 6 each, we realized that the train was indeed leaving soon though at that point a nearby hotel and beer every day for a week waiting for the next train began to sound better and better. And we had no idea how much these beers had cost and no idea if we had enough Turkish money (lira) to pay. So as we got up to leave or attempted to stand up, we began fumbling with money. The waiter shook his head and pointed to a man at the bar. Yes, he had bought all our beers...Did I mention how much we loved Istanbul?

So we wander into our train car completely bombed and face the why didn't you come get us comments. Our response of course was that then they wouldn't have been free – didn't help.

So try being in a very cramped space with 5 other basically strangers and see what happens. Believe it or not, it took us about 2 or 3 days before murderous thoughts entered the scene. Especially when even the apricots were running low and we were forced to count them out or hide ours. There were a couple of events that helped calm things. Sort of...

First the army general. Somehow, I don't know how but we allowed him into the compartment. Maybe just cause he looked important and maybe we still had the Istanbul scary blues. He had lots of stripes and things so we guessed he was a general. He also had this large bag of Turkish cigarettes that apparently were free to army members. I had not smoked in over 3 years but hey I was really bored... and smoked cigarettes and bedhis for the next 12 years...But hey nice guy who got off soon after, leaving a huge number of smokes. Yes, the train did stop but getting off meant not getting back on. Besides, eastern Turkey is a mix of snowy mountains and pure desert. So no sneaking off for a Turkish coffee (which I never saw anywhere – kinda like the 60's in Italy when they had never heard of a thing called pizza).

The second event was totally my doing – by overcoming my fear of anywhere outside the compartment – I wandered into yes it's true – another train car. Maybe I was thinking there must be a hidden bar car. As I was venturing into the next car, I met a Japanese man whom I had met months before in Morocco. At the time, there were no Japanese traveling, especially young ones. None. Zero. He invited me to his compartment. Turns out he was now traveling with 5 Japaneses women. Even he knew he had it good. He proceeded to pull out some Moroccan hash. Yes, all those borders. But then again who was going to search a Japanese. Come to think of it, I was never searched though I was clean and the Algerian border was freaky. Don't get me going. Algiers is worse than Istanbul. It was totally lawless, run essentially by thugs. So back to those Japanese women. He lite a pipe and passed it around. Everyone smoked. The women just looked totally stoned. Now who would have thought they had turned it into a ritual. Pipe was empty and they all simultaneously pulled out an orange to eat.

I made it back to my compartment somehow. They all looked at me and immediately wanted to know where and how I had got stoned. After all, we were still in Turkey and I don't think the Japanese women would have been with me for 10 years in prison. So I told them how. I honestly think I had forgotten to ask for a small piece to share. They never forgave me.

The rest of the trip seems like a blur. Not because of the hash. We were basically out of food. Everyone had told their life story in detail. If we had been a therapy group we would even have said less. A followup therapy group would have been interesting. I think we were all thinking that 'oh my god, I've never told anyone that...I wonder what they think of me now'. As a matter of fact, nothing. We were too tired, too hungry, too hot as we entered the desert. We all basically hated each other. We would have hated any 5 people there, no matter who they were. Oh, sorry, I didn't mean my drinking buddy. I still traveled with her and loved her – as if love was possible in our situation.

I once described Tehran as the shocking intro to the third world. Then I went to Pakistan and learned all over again. I used words like cacophony and claustrophobic. Like a smelly, dirty cloud suddenly descended and never left me til I left. That was the train station in Tehran. Not only was there the incredibly awful air, there was also the total crush of taxi cab drivers rushing head long at anybody who was moving, standing or crushed. Yelling “Amir Kabir, Amir Kabir, Amir Kabir ...” . We didn't know that he had been an ancient ruler. We did know that we were told that most young travelers stayed there. We stuck close together and did our very best to ignore all the drivers though we indeed wanted a ride there. We managed to make our way outside (where the air was only more dusty) and wandered aimlessly away from the station. Sure enough, a taxi pulled up and we took it – yes 'Amir Kabir'. How 7 people were in there – I do not know. The driver seemed to immediately take us here and there, pointing out sight seeing spots and such. Iran was still controlled by the Shah and had the odd feeling of being in the U.S. Midwest. We all became convinced that this cab was taking us for what I call the NYC spin. Where your cab just misses the turn for the right bridge and has to take that construction detour... We were helpless and trying to actually appreciate the sights, considering we had no intention of staying in Iran one more day than possible.

Eventually, we arrived at a sign that said 'Amir Kabir'. They could have added 'hippies welcomed'. So here were 6 of us trying to figure our how we were going to pay when none of us had any Iranian money as the train never stopped so how do you get money changed. We were standing there, on the sidewalk, packs all way bigger than we needed, blistering heat, dust and growing hate for Tehran and all trains, when the taxi driver leaned out and with a huge smile said 'welcome to Tehran' and drove away. No charge. I still thank you Sir...