Everyone told us Shiraz is such an awesome place because some very famous Iranian poet was born here... ??? I never get that. I mean why does it make a city most interesting that a dead poet was born there. Eh, whatever.
Shiraz is an interesting city, a bit dirty though, 1.5 million people and as everywhere in Iran, very few tourists. But lots of heat, a nice main square where people hang out in the evenings (we even saw some festival-like thing), friendly people (as everywhere in Iran) and tasty shakes:
The old town is very interesting, lots of small alleys, although for me it's a but annoying that when I just start walking in some direction in an Iranian old town towards some square or something I want to reach, it sometimes proves impossible to do because at the end of a long-long system of alleys going to the right way without any forks, there is suddenly just a dead-end. Of course this can be considered as a beauty of these old towns but it still annoys me. It reminded me of Cologne (Köln), Germany, for it's the complete opposite. About 10 years ago, at the first time I wandered around in Germany by myself I spent a week or two in Köln, and when walking around in the city, the term "user-friendly" kept coming to my mind constantly when considering the city plan. Because let it be the smallest alley starting from someplace heading towards a river or something, you can bet that in the end it will be designed in such a way that it's not a dead-end but you have some stairs leading to a bridge or a passage to some logical direction. Because it was designed and built so. Our country, Hungary is somewhere between these two but still much closer to Germany in this aspect. Well, Shiraz is different. But it turn they have a nice fort:
The big attraction of Shiraz is the nearby (~50 km) Persepolis, which is basically some old ruins. Well, we took a bus and taxi one morning to get out there, and I would say it was exciting, but honestly, for me, an ignorant bastard, these were just some big stones. I couldn't even make good pictures, nothing. Just the heat and the stones. I hope Judit will write an article about it [UPDATE: She didn't.], because she is much more educated than myself so she enjoyed it a lot. Look at her, she even put on her favorite sweater at noon:
I decided we are not trolling enough on the blog so I'll put my picture which we also made in Persepolis:
Other thing we loved in Shiraz was our hotel. It was so awesome it could even be photographed. Or at least we couldn't make a single worthy picture of it. Neither do I remember its name at the moment but anyone going to Iran drop me an email (veszelovszki@gmail.com) so I'll find it for you some way for sure, because this place is a must. Clean, nicely designed rooms, optimal temperature all day, good company, what else do you need?
Once again about the Iranian copyright law, or actually the lack absence of it. You can buy one of this beds for your kid in Iran, look:
