Pasargad

Pasargad

Sixty kilometres down the road from Persepolis lies the tomb of Cyrus the Great at Pasargard. If having already visited Persepolis, expectations for Pasargard should be lowered. While Pasargad has a different feel to it, there is simply not enough left for it to be inadvertently compared to Persepolis. As a historical site that has stood the test of time for 2500 years the tomb of Cyrus the Great, is worth a visit to witness. The land is flat and open, there is a tower that stands on the way to the castle but essentially there are just ruins at Pasargad and if it were not for the tomb of Cyrus, it would not be mentioned.

  A Passage Through Time

During my time in Iran, I decided to couch surf all the way through, it turned out to be carpet surfing but it meant that I could live the Iranian way for a few weeks. That meant going to Iranian parties, eating authentic Iranian food, listening to stories of their lives and getting a deeper understanding of Iran as a whole.

I started in Tehran went to Kashan, Esfahan, Shiraz and Yazd before flying out of Tehran. The time I spent there was enlightening for me. The people were some of the most hospitable that I had met in the world, i.e even without the element of Tarof(The most interesting and intriguing custom that catches almost all travellers off guard at the beginning).

What I did feel strongly was that the western world has for their own agenda destroyed the dreams of so many so easily. Iran surely does not stand alone in this regard but the light in which it has been portrayed, the hardship involved for their citizens, to travel anywhere west of Turkey and the effect on the common person who wants to strive for another life, is grim.

I have had my own share of problems with visas and documents but what I always had was a chance, a hope and until that last glimmer of hope stayed, I believed because I had a reason to believe. In Iran, that glimmer of hope is that each person should have, is darkened and shadowed into eternal obscurity.

Over the last half decade or so one thing that I have learnt above all else is not to generalize. It is easy to fail at it but I try to be conscious of my failings. However, in this world the greatest of powers generalize day in and day out, they cast their curse over countries, ethnicities, races and sexes. In Iran I witnessed people who longed for more, they were intelligent, philanthropists, caring, touching, as hospitable as they come and their hopes had been burnt to ash by the west, it saddened me. I was in no position to help but I truly wanted to.

It is so easy to hate all people of a nationality, all the more so when one has the power, it is a selfish, sick act that tears humanity further apart. None of the people I met deserved it and they and they are still subjugated into fighting so much harder and climbing a mountain so much higher.

As I looked out of my hosts apart over the city of Shiraz at night, I imagined how powerless one would be in the face of western hostilities, I felt for the people of so many cities who must have sat and prayed as they would see air strikes on the horizon and hope it would not be them. On the journey from Pasargard to Yazd in the expanse of Iran’s nature around me, I wondered what did it all lead to, desert land, or barren land, rocky hills and not a soul lived there. It was pristine and beautiful yet the heart of man is set on conquering, a disgrace. On one of my last nights in Yazd I sat on the mounds of the towers of silence in Yazd and looked over the city, hopes washed away and an existence without the means to rise and fight for a greater good, all due to the choices of aliens, never to really know these people. It is the worst to feel powerless, to be played in a game where one’s own movements are seldom controlled. Iran doesn’t deserve this and Persia doesn’t either. I left a part of me in these lands so beautiful, where the hearts of the people are filled with values to aspire for.