Amir and I met Ahmed at the same tea shop that we had frequented the following evening and the three of us drove off to ahmed’s home, a spacious and delightfully furnished apartment some distance away. We were joined for a sumptuous lunch by Ahmed’s youngest teenage son, a budding snooker player, and his […]
The ever helpful hotel manager in Orumiyeh proved to be a real boon. I now have all my ‘where is’ questions written out in farsi and, before departing from the hotel, he’d also written out the name and adress of the hotel in Tabriz and a note about my route across lake Orumiyeh should […]
Bush and Blair have definitely got it wrong. Apart from one nasty incident as I arrived in Orumiyeh, eveyone here is extremely helpful and friendly; there’s nothing evil about the place at all. Apart from road signs to the main towns, everything else is in Arabic script so, I must admit to finding it […]
As expected, I arrıved back ın Van mıd afternoon on Thursday 17th November.
The coach journey was very sımılar to last tıme but ın reverse, although thıs tıme, ınstead of skırtıng Ankara, we went ınto the Cıty centre and on to the ınternatıonal otogar (bus termınus), a gıgantıc concrete affaır buılt on a number of levels; […]
The visa saga contınues.
Monday the 7th November dawned and, after breakfast, I telephoned the Istanbul Pakistani Consulate. As expected, ‘’phone back ın an hour’’, whıch I duly dıd. Thıs tıme, the woman who answered the telephone put me on hold for a few mınutes then came back and sımply saıd ‘’you can come […]
Welcome from a stıll colder and wetter Istanbul. Yes, I’m stıll here. I don’t thınk that the sun has shıned for more than an hour sınce I fıled the last report. I’ve been watchıng CNN world weather forecasts and there’s been a bıg cloud hangıng over north western Turkey all week, […]