Besides checking out the most luxurious hotel in Tehran in order to enjoy a great view and having a sitting toilet I was exploring mainly more common things in Tehran with Arian and Amir.
Changing money
Changing money was indeed an interesting task for myself. I went out for a walk with Arian and we wanted to open up a bank account in order to get around easier and pay by card. After checking a few banks we understood it might not be possible, because I didn’t have a long term visa. Going back to basics.
For Arian it was important to get Euros or Dollars, in order to save money due to inflation. The economics in Iran are bad due to the sanctions against them. It is also the reason, why as a traveler you are not able to use your credit cards, you need to bring cash!
We had to go to his bank and get 100 Euros, in Iranian money, from his bank account, in order to change it to the 100 Euros I had in cash. In Iran there is a little limit on how much you can get out of the ATM, in order to be safe for robbers.
I received such a big pile of money! 6.500.000 in exchange for 100 Euros, never had this much paper money on myself, it felt very unsafe and crazy at the same time. With my little back it was hard to see for others though.
Exploring the region
With the pile of money on myself it was time to explore a little bit of the region again. We crossed roads like crazy, but since Pakistan I am used to the high amount of traffic which you need to cross by foot.
We went to the most known monument, the freedom monument, near the domestic airport of Tehran. It is interesting to have a monument with freedom in its name as one of the most popular sights in the city, when there is not much freedom in the country, but that’s another topic.
The monument is looking cool, but you don’t need more than five minutes there I assume and nothing really is around.
Tabiat Bridge
Arian and I went to the park near the Tabiat Bridge, a bridge designed by a woman and connecting two parks which also light up at night. The park around there was just stunning, nobody was around due to work. It was completely empty which made it perfect to walk around.
I actually took many pictures, because I enjoyed it a lot over there, so much nature and everything in good shape.
There was also a beautiful little bazaar which we checked out. I liked some handcrafted things there a lot, but decided to buy something similar somewhere else, a big mistake. We received many things there to try out and there were many tasty things and I ended up buying some syrup which tasted amazing and we all liked it.
My highlight wasn’t the park
I was checking the map to see what is all around in that region, to maybe find something great to do. Directly in my vision was the military museum at the other side of the hill.
Arian went there already once and the way he explained it, it was just something I had to see!
So we went off and hiked over the mountains in order to make it there. We took many short cuts, so we saved a lot of energy. Kind of funny, walking through the mountains was a bit like how I could myself imagine some scenes in war.
Military Museum
We arrived at the museum and we didn’t have to pay entrance, because most of the exhibition was outside. You could just go for a long walk and see all the missiles, jets, tanks, flame thrower and many more things. It was very fascinating, so some things were also stories on information boards included.
Many were made somewhere else but occupied by Iran, kind of funny to make a game out of it and guess the origin.
I enjoyed my time there a lot and especially having Arian with me was making it much better as well. We also found a hidden place which usually was guarded, but not at that time.
We were checking out tanks which were not looking that good yet, they needed some makeover. It was possible to see the inside of the tank and also be close to the missles. It is insane how big those rockets are which are getting launched for long distances. They look huge on TV, but in reality they were a bit more massive then I would have imagined. It is important to keep in mind that the ones I saw were old, the new ones must be even crazier!
Successfully finding another European Toilet
We continued to walk in the park and checked out the things there. A huge street food market, which wasn’t open sadly, and a massive library. That was my chance, I believed that the library had to have a European toilet and they actually did. I made it a challenge since Arian told me that it would be impossible to find non squad toilets in Iran, but he was luckily wrong. Squatting toilets is my biggest fear while traveling when being completely honest.
The sun was slowly setting and the fountains in the park started to function. It was very nice and we walked slowly back to the car. Walking the whole mountains up again was a bit exhausting, but quite nice to be in nature.
The Tabiat Bridge was now in rainbow colors, which was quite surprising, and more people were around. Earlier that day it was almost completely empty there, but now life came back to the place.
Paying for food in Iran
Arian really wanted to show me fast food in Iran and gave me options. I wanted to try out the pizza, so we went to a mall and checked out the food court. I wanted to invite him for the food and then it was my turn to pay. Usually the locals are using a card, but that wasn’t possible for me. So it was time to get the huge stack of money out of my pocket and count in order to pay for it. Literally funny how stupid that was, it would make more sense to have bigger amounts of bills.
The pizza arrived and on my last trip to India the pizzas were just extremely bad, but I gave it a try and I must say that the pizza was very tasty!
Checking out the biggest mall in the world
The next day Arian took me to the Iran Mall, the biggest mall in the world, said by the locals and also wikipedia. There are other sites saying it is different, but when comparing the square meters with each other the Iran Mall stands out.
It was crazy what all was in there. From the outside it didn’t look as huge when being honest, but it was! You could find a library, ice skating, tennis court, bowling, hundreds of shops and an endless amount of restaurants as well. Even a few natural places and a running track are there. It just felt surreal, like a little town inside of it.
It is a government owned one, so even during covid it stayed open, while other malls had to close. The mall is something for real worth to check out when visiting Tehran.
After the mall we checked out a little street bazaar quite nearby where we were able to try out many things, some tasty and some horrible disgusting and spicy. Overall an okay mixture.
In general the region was not much going on. The city wants to expand in that region of the mall and even a huge man made lake is nearby which we checked out as well. The lake was massive and also beaches were found nearby. Many new buildings and also a small amusement park, something I wasn’t expecting at the lake and in general it was very clean over there. In general Tehran felt very clean during my visit.
What’s up next?
Next week you are going to read about how the trip continued and also some fire surprise
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