Trip to Iran

It was October, 24 2008. It has been five years since I had been to Iran. I am going to Iran with my parents and my brother. After checking in our luggage we headed to the gates. We were informed that we were "Randomly" selected for secondary screening. Random? Random my behind. We were headed for Iran and my mother wore a scarf over her head. I was put in one of those X-ray machines that blew something at me and revealed my inside.
After the flight took off, I asked for two little bottles of JD on the rocks and sat back hoping to be able to sleep. It was hard to sleep. We had a 7 hours layover in Amsterdam. I tried to sleep a little on the lounge chairs with no success. my brother and father went to the little casino. My father quickly won nearly $500.00 after putting a coin in a slot machine. My brother won about 150 euros after several trips to the Black Jack table.
After playing cards and taking a couple of naps it was about time to go to the gate to fly to Iran.
Of course the plane they chose for this leg was an old Boeing jet that hardly anything worked on it anymore. The TV did not work. They only had one bathroom for a large section of the airplane and the seats were almost impossible to come out of because the handles would only go half way up. This was still KLM so it gives you an idea of the different treatments for Iranians. Remember this part because on the way back, it becomes even more obvious.
There was a handsome Iranian guy who was bringing his American wife to Iran for the first time. I chatted with them a little. She was not nervous at all. When we got close, she put on her scarf over her blond hair. For some reasons, the roo sari ( Scarf) makes pretty girls look even prettier. It is weird. I think it may have something to do with leaving some things to the imagination. I compare it to a girl that wears a nice long skirt which is tight fitting and a nice shirt with the top two buttons undone. I lie that much more than a girl that reveals evereything.
A couple of hours before landing a guy got sick. I think he was dehydrated. They asked for a medical Doctor. Hte guy seated in the row behind me got up to help. He worked on the guy until we arrived in Tehran.
We landed in Imam Khomeini airport. It is a newer airport. For years Tehran, this vast city with millions of people and lots of activity had relied on the Mehrabad airport which was very outdated and they had to bus people to the gates and so forth. Mehrabad is in middle of Tehran and this one is outside the city, about 45 minutes to an hour drive with metro service. It is a more updated airport with ramps that go to the plane like the ones others take for granted. Even though they were not using the ramps when we got back. The employees were kind of frustrated about that. I am jumping ahead.
We collected our luggage and went to passport check and customs. When I handed the guy my passport he took longer than everyone else looking at it and entered an unusul amount of data in the computer. It made me nervous a little. We finally got through and met my brother Shervin and Giti outside. Shervin drove my parents and my brother in his Puegoet Persia. It is a car that is Montaged in Iran. It is nicely made and a comfotable drive. You can buy a new one for about 15 - 20 million Toman which equates to about 15,000 dollars. There are other models you can buy for less money. There is one that burns either Gasoline or CNG and it is rear wheel drive. You can buy that new for about 9,000 dollars. It is interesting that Iran with it's wealth of oil and Natural gas is using alterntive fuels more than th USA that is dependent on other countried for Oil. In Iran all public transportation vehicles like taxies, which there are a lot of, must use CNG or compressed natural gas. Giti and I took another Taxi with the rest of the luggage. We got home around 3:30 am and went to sleep around 4:15 or 4:30. More to come...