Day 112 (Iran): back in Tehran (the end of the journey to the consulate? nope is the answer)

Note: No pictures today - didn’t really feel like it and there wasn’t anything interesting to take pictures of. But as always, there are plenty of pictures on the flickr site.

And: Happy holiday to the French - this is a bit late as I am posting this, I know. But it’s the thought that counts (or something like that).

The night train should be that … you get to sleep. The guy in the bunk across from me didn’t think so. He wasn’t too happy that I almost fell asleep at 11:30pm last night (meaning the other passengers put their bunks down, too) and now woke up at 4 am to chat with one of them. That would have been fine, had it not been 2 ft from my ears. I tried to plead with him and said please at first. He just looked at me, said that I was crazy and continued on in his deep voice. Sure, I am crazy - I won’t object to this. After all the biking trip is a case in point. But when he talked for five more minutes I thought “OK … that was it”. We are still 4 hours away from Tehran and I want to sleep. We have a slight dispute and I try to convey to him that he should take a hike. He does eventually after two more people complain. Needless to say though I was the only one whose hands he didn’t shake when we all got off. I sort of feel bad about this, I don’t want to do any of this - but I really wanted to sleep. After all this not-so-fun-stuff going on with the consulate, I don’t need any of this. I am tired of fighting on these fronts.

I made my way back to the consulate. Had to change Euros into $ on the way, not sure whether was given fake bills or not. No matter or so I hope. When I arrive at the consulate I am nervous yet again, uncertain of what to expect. I slowly climb the stairs and the nice secretary raises her hands and says: “The consul is not here today, you have to come back tomorrow!” Ouch … he said Monday, now he’s not here and I continue to be in the limbo until tomorrow. No matter really … sure matter. It sucks. I just want to know. And again, I can do exactly nothing.

The saving grace are Isabelle and Andreas. They are super kind, invite me over and so I can hunker down for a few days until I have my visa situation sorted out. After a nap in the afternoon and some great food I am happy to slumber off somewhat more peacefully. There’ll be another day tomorrow.