The whole family gathers again for breakfast. Breakfast is as it always is in Iran: folded A3 sandwich bread, tomatoes, cucumber, fried egg or omelette (always mixed with tomatoes here), some cream cheese and a few nuts. As the family cook spent some time in Belgium, he knows that we also have a sweet breakfast here. So we have a kind of Nutella (delicious because it's not so sweet), homemade jam and honey on the "table". Gerd doesn't normally eat breakfast, he struggles with a bit of egg, while I'm good at munching. This makes breakfast a really cosy round.
The men say goodbye early, they're off to the gym. (And yes, you can clearly see the results, wow!) Gerd goes to our Felix, the home office is calling. And I'm sitting with the women over a cup of tea for the first time. My office is closed today, I've decided to spend the day with the women. I'm not going to miss this opportunity. Because I rarely meet women when we turn up as a couple.
And so we knit and embroider, swap recipes, talk about our children and discuss what we could do all day. The only difference is that doing nothing is an accepted item on the agenda here. Sitting, drinking tea and chatting is an absolutely serious daily activity. (Chatting here means: google-translate, sentence by sentence)
The family gets together again around midday, they have looked up our website and learnt that we are interested in history. So we plan a trip to an old - yes, what should I call it - house. A small museum that keeps the old days alive. We wait outside the door, which is unlocked especially for us.
We look round all the rooms, are allowed to climb the wall and have a fantastic view of the mountains and date palm oases. And the best thing is that everyone is somehow totally interested, things are constantly being taken off the wall (in a museum! Try that in Switzerland!) and explained to me. This is for this, that is for that. Mega, I feel like I'm in a hands-on museum.
When we get back home, it's also time for a nap. So we all get some rest, because the evening is going to be long. Here in Iran, we assume it's because of the weather, there is a long siesta between 2 and 5 o'clock. Around 5 o'clock it gets lively again, the youngest, maybe 8 or 9 years old, comes up on his scooter (and I really mean scooter, a small motorbike!), beams at me and I ask him if he likes football. He does.
So he gets to enjoy one of our footballs and beams. What we don't know at this point: He plays for a football club and is actually really good at it. So it's a hit, he's happy. When his dad sees the ball (and realises that it's a brand-new original Champions League ball, albeit from the season before last), he is also overjoyed. Because football really is a big topic in Iran.
We cook in the evening. I cook a huge pot of chilli, but I have no idea whether it will go down so well here. Gerd then says: "No problem, we can eat it later on our own, chilli tastes better the next day anyway". But the leftovers don't work out, the family, which is getting bigger and bigger, easily manages our huge pot of chilli. And of course the many other delicacies that fill the "carpet table". (I should also mention that while I'm cooking, they keep coming back to our Felix and marvelling at how we can cook here too. A car with a cooker, what a thing).
It's going to be a fun evening, we dig out our wedding album. And see for ourselves how young we were back then. Fatemeh is a make-up artist, I ask her if she can conjure up something beautiful on my face. She immediately drives off, picks up bags of make-up and off we go: I am transformed. I, who applies something like mascara about once a year, now get a full coat on my face. I'm amazed at how much you can apply to a single face. The family agrees: the result is impressive. One look at Gerd's face, however, tells me that he has a slightly different opinion. Anyway, I enjoyed it and Fatemeh obviously did too.
And then Fatemeh looks at our wedding album: the women aren't wearing make-up! Er, yes, they are. Just different. More natural. Emphasised, not changed. She can't believe that we don't "dress up" so much when we get married or come to the wedding as guests.
Well, other countries, other customs. But the family all agree that we had a great wedding. Especially the green meadow, the many (real) flowers, the celebration in the garden with a view of the snow-covered Swiss Alps and the beaming people - "What, only 40 guests? Do you have such a small family?" - testify to a good celebration and everyone agrees that this is how we will have a good marriage.
The evening is long, very long. When we fall into bed sometime between midnight and 1 a.m., the living room is far from empty. But we can't take any more, so many impressions, so many conversations, so much food and so much hospitality need to be processed.
And tomorrow? Yes, tomorrow is another day!
Merci for "travelling with us
We are thinking about taking another break from travelling in the summer and visiting our families in Germany and Switzerland. One of the ideas is to organise a Lecture about our long journey to the Persian Gulf to prepare. If you would like to, what would interest you the most? We will also tell stories here that don't find a place here on the blog. We're thinking of the Bern and Berlin area - simply because we have family there. But other places are also conceivable. Feel free to write to us.
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