One of the unique things about Mashhad is that it’s surrounded by fascinating landscape, only minutes outside the city. The stark landscape north of Mashhad is dotted with endless hills, lonely villages and gorgeous rocky outcrops. The area is known for its wild cherries. Winters are relatively mild in the plains. The snow stays on..
IMAM REZA SHRINE, MASHHAD, Iran – Beneath giant chandeliers and surrounded by bewilderingly intricate mirror artwork and calligraphy sits this nation’s equivalent of the Wailing Wall. Dar-al Hojjeh is an immense underground hall adjacent to the burial chamber of Imam Reza (Persian: امام رضا), whose 1000-year-old shrine is Iran’s spiritual nucleus and the world’s largest..
IMAM REZA SHRINE, MASHHAD, Iran – It’s called the Window of Steel, through which millions of Shia pilgrims try to find hope and healing. For the tourist, it can provide a fascinating – and at times heart-wrenching – peak into mankind’s universal urge to touch something greater than himself. The Window of Steel (a.k.a Fulad..
MASHHAD, Iran, March 3, 2015 – I am standing in pouring winter rain in land for sale that looks like a war-zone. The swimming pool is infested with algae; there’s a rusting metal pergola about to crash into the cracked cement below, and despite the denials of the owner, part of the land appears to..
MASHHAD, Iran, Jan 29, 2015 – To an outsider, visiting an IT seminar in Iran might seem like a bizarre mix of tradition, blatant advertising and emotional calls to stop government stifling of the Internet. Like any official Iranian event, the one-day seminar at Mashhad’s Islamic Azad University, began with the obligatory Koran recitation and..