[desertblues]

As always; excuse the typo's *and so on.*

Tuesday 10 of May: day 18

Going further into the desert now; temperatures will be way over 30 C.On the left side the desert and on the right the Karkas mountains, with eternal snow on its summits. Reddish soil, sand, salt and rock.......

We are going to Yazd, a city out of the 1000-and one tales, between the two northern deserts: Dasht-e Kavir and the Dasht-e Lut. A beautiful city with a labyrinth of historic streets and lanes.
Typical are the windtowers or badgirs on the roofs of the houses; a system of natural airconditioning. Currents in a house are organised by it, through a system of airshelves and flaps. The warm air is (often) led over a pool of water, cooling the air that goes around in the house, and the warm air goes upwards through the windtower/windcatcher. It is good to feel the cool wind, generated by it.

Yazd houses the largest population of Zoroastrians in Iran(5500).In Iran 98 % of the people is Islam, 1% other as Bahai/ Jewish/ Christian and 1% is Zoroastrian.
Zoroastranism is the oldest monotheism and was the most important religion in Iran, until the Arab conquest and Islam, somewhere in the 7th century A.D.
Zoroaster(Zarathrustra)was born between 1500-1000 B.C,possibly near the salt lake Urimiyeh.(which I've seen!).
The supreme being is Ahura Mazda, served by its ancient priests, the magi. The three magi=wise men from the Bible, that came to adore the infant Jezus, were Zoroastrian priests, so it is said.
They believe in the purity of the elements, worship in the direction of the light( fire, sun).The essence of Zoroastranism is the dualism, the battle between good an evil, day and night, life and dead.
The Zoroastrian-women don't wear the chador, but embroidered dresses and headscarves in white, cream or red.*

On our way through the desert, we occasionally see the ruins of a caravanserai.
A caravanserai was an inn for camel-trains along the great trade routes from east to west, that can be seen in the whole of the Oriental world.Usually it consisted of rooms, with a fortified wall, around a courtyard. Oftener than not, is was manned by soldiers. Merchants and their goods travelled from one caravanserai to the other. It gave them protection against robbers and, equally important, an opportunity to trade their goods along the way.

We passed Na'in,a city on the road to Yazd. It has the Jameh Mosque, which dates from the beginning of the Islam, the 7th century and is the oldest in Iran. This mosque has beautiful carved pillars, use of stucco and decorated ceilings with geometrical patterned ceilings. And there is an enclosed garden. The basement of that mosque has, through it's marble walls, a difference in temperature of 20 C. It will be 45C+ in summer and 25 C in the basement.In summer, people come with their rugs, drink tea and rest a bit from the heat.*We ate a huge watermelon in the garden and had some chai. Lunch was a handful of nuts, dates and figs.

And on the road again;desert on both sides,through the Hamaneh-mountains.Magnificent, huge rocks with sand and salt. It is getting hotter,no camels as yet.
In this desert there are white and black scorpions; the white ones are deadly.

We visited a qanat,near Chekchekou, high up the mountains. Water trickles out of a wall and is being led to a pool and underground canals to irrigate. This one is also a holy place. The man who guards it, a Zoroastrian, lit a fire in the cave to honour the elements .

Qanats are underground waterchanels; to irrigate crops and produce drinkwater. Obviously, the well has to be on a higher level than the destination. Iran is said to have more than 50.000 of this qanats, some of them 2000 years old.*Constructing and maintenance are governed by law, as it is extremely important for the water supply of many towns and villages. Modern irrigation is being used as well these days.

To be in this desert is a mysterious experience.
The famous Persian poet Rumi, said:
"A great silence overcomes me, and I wonder why I ever thought to use language."

The next day we were,after the Oriental breakfast of feta/ egg/ cucumber/tomatoes and Ahmadtea,ready for a new day of exploring: Yazd.

It is said that Yazd is earth's oldest city. It has had inhabitants of and on for 7000 years. Marco Polo visited it in the 13th century.This desert-city has a temperarure of 35 C and 6 % humidity today.

We saw the sights:
An ancient burial site, where the Zoroastrians used to lay their deaths on. The 'Tower of Silence', where the vultures devoured their death.(till 1960).That tower, high up a rock, has a pit of 20 meters deep for the bones. Out of respect for the purity of the earth, they didn't want to contaminate it by burying their death in it.
Around it are the remains of the round/square mudhouses, one for each region around Yazd; for the family of the death, to stay in.These days they bury their death in a concrete cube, above the ground.

Then Ateskadeh, which is a Zoroastrian Fire Temple, we visited next. A sacred flame has been burning here since 470 AD. Fire is a special element, as it provides light also, to which the Zoroastrian direct themselves to pray 5 times a day( or to the sun).

After the lunch we saw the beautiful Jameh mosque, build in the 15 th century.I never saw so many beautiful tiles.*
Calligraphy on the tiles for the mosque: what looks like a beautiful blue and white flower in a cirkel on a tile, is in fact an exquisite Persian caligraphy of six times the name of Allah. So these tiles tell a story or hide many a message for people that don't read Farsi.

After a long walk through the old town, we witnessed and pre-islamitic tradition: Zurkhane or the House of Power. It is connected with the Shiite Islam, which was surpressed by the Arabs in the 9th century; they went underground then.
12-18 atlethes excercise in a small gymnasium for an hour; ritual, symbolic excercises accompagnied by heavy drums, singing of Qoranverses or verses about heroes, in a very loud voice.
They use ancient wapons like very heavy bows and shields for this concentrated powertraining. **

It has been a long day; from 8-20 with one hour
"free". Time to call it a day. Hot, hot and lots of sand in the air(from Iraq, as they say here).