The Yalda that was not
10 Feb 2020
Tehran, 21/12/2019
To describe Persia it is not an easy thing nor a granted one: is easy to enter its borders, easy to interact with its inhabitants, easy to be moved and stounded by its martian geography, easy to be engulfed by the weight of a civilization that centuries before being seduced, forced and covered by Islam was – and to some extend still is – the bellybutton of the world and the obsession of every cultural and military power of its own time - nihil novum sub solem.
What is that fascinates to such high degree?
What lies behind all the insidious propaganda and delusions we have to cope with in our current era of intense [mis]information?
Is reality still stronger than any ideas or we have failed to create a proper division between the objective reality and the virtual ones: are we ought to dig into the details to find the underlined coherence and contradictions?
My iranian adventure was a deep trip into a country that appears more like a piece of acid jazz: non estatic, convulsed, to be redifine, changing skin, chaotic, noisy, unpleasant (at moments), mesmerazing, inspiring, fermenting, enthusiastic, melancholic, and in conflict within itself and within the power that dominates its demons.
A trip into the stomach of the ancient and current world to see and admire the patina that men from other centuries and millenea ago fell for.
I arrived to Tehran on Yalda night, the winter solstice: a celebration of pagan origins that is discretly celebrated.
At the airport two uknown men were waiting for me: once in the car with them I had an intense de ja vu straight from Caracas: the night, the endless city highway, the careless driving, a kind but empty conversation, political propaganda, poverty kept out from the comfort of the car I was riding in.
It was almost midnight, not even the time to put my baggage in the hostel: we were dining in a trashy skii themed restaurant on the hills with marvellous look over Tehran: cocacola, pizza, pasta, hamburgers, french fries, and other local dishes; pomegranates and watermelons hanging from the ceiling to remind us about Yalda.
At the exit I was gifted a watermelon by the restaurant staff.
On the streets an old man in an elegant but consumed opera suit, was singing with his wireless mic on hand, and was stopping the traffic, and was asking for change, on the other side a motorcycle: two young lovers: she let the wind rip off her hijab.
To be continued.