Sunday, September 17: we set out on a long and adventurous (later it turned out to be) journey to the mountains. Thanks to Soroush we visit his family in the Padena region and meet the Qashqai nomad tribe. Moreover, we manage to attend a wedding…
Please click on the first picture (and the following ones) for the story:
We start our journey from Shahreza shortly after breakfast. Our host, Soroush Bakhtiar and the French ladies travel by taxi, we use our rented car. Our destination: Semirom and then the Bakhtiar’s family house int he mountains, in Padena, more precisely. Soroush and his parents generously offered us accommodation in their mountain home, int he village of Padena. Our first stop: Semirom. Of course we stop and observe how the make the famous Persian carpets…
At a certain point Souroush calls us and says: there’s a Qashqai celebration, we must absolutely see it. Right after the call there’s no more GSM signal, our off-line navigation fails utterly. We ask the locals: since English is not widely known, we use drawings…
Thanks, “Farsi guy”…
We’re out in the desert somewhere. At least that’s what we think. We ask another person: where can Hosein Abad, a remote village, where the members of the Qashqai nomad tribe live. Just over there – he signals…
Finally we find the Qashqai village. It turnes out, there’s going to be a… wedding…
The Qashqai gained international attention thanks to the automotive industry. They are mostly of Turkish origin, almost all of them speak the Turki dialect, but, of course, they speak Persian. The majority of Qashqai people were originally nomadic pastoralists and some remain so today. The traditional nomadic Qashqai travelled with their flocks twice yearly to and from the summer highland pastures north of Shiraz roughly 480 km or 300 miles south to the winter pastures on lower (and warmer) lands near the Persian Gulf, to the southwest of Shiraz. The majority, however, have now become partially or wholly sedentary. They live in these kind of houses…
They were very kind and dressed the European ladies into their traditional celebration cloths
Emma and Bianka, the new Qashqai women
Everybody was very nice to us. We usually managed to find somebody who spoke English. If not, our gracious host, Soroush translated for us. The lady in the middle was speaking Shakespeare’s language, so we managed to have a chat
The Qashqai are renowned for their pile carpets and other woven wool products. They are sometimes referred to as “Shiraz” because Shiraz was the major marketplace for them in the past. The wool produced in the mountains and valleys near Shiraz is exceptionally soft and beautiful and takes a deeper color than wool from other parts of Iran
We attended the whole wedding. We still don’t understand why the bride and the groom were so… sad
Qashqai wedding in the willage of Hosein Abad in Eastern Iran
These DJ’s were making some serious music
Maybe they’ll reember us…
Attending the Qashqai wedding
We were given food, soft drinks, everything. We chipped in with 2 euros each. We wanted to give more, but were told that’s enough…
After the Qashqai wedding we were invited to attend the apple festival…
The Iranan girl
We also went to a nice waterfall…
Militarism is present in Iran: from the tank-shaped benches in Iran and rockets next to a mosqe, we found these missiles… in a playground…
In the evening we arrived in the village of Padena, where Shoroush’s parents live. What a nice welcoming, what a great hospitality, what a nice family!
We were treated like family. They served us dinner, soft drinks, fruits, everything. We sat by the fire and enjoyed the Bakhtiar family’s incredible hospitality. These people are genuinly nice, hospitable, they enjoy visitors
Excellent way of sleeping
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