Why should IRAN be on your TRAVEL BUCKET LIST OF 2018?

Why You Should Travel to Iran? 8 Reasons to Visit Iran

If you love travelling to new places, Iran is a top destination. Iran, as the seventeenth largest country in the world and the second largest country in the Middle East enjoys a variety of cultural and natural attractions, delicious Persian foods, fascinating art works, breathtaking adventurous activities, famous poems and poets like Hafez, amazing events and festivals, different religious monuments, and so many other entertaining programs to appeal to tourists with many different interests.

Why should IRAN be on your TRAVEL BUCKET LIST OF 2018?

Iran enjoys a variety of cultural and natural attractions

Here are some of the reasons why Iran should be on your travel bucket list.

Iran is safe and affordable

Though the media has not portrayed a positive picture of Iran, the truth is that it is one of the safest and friendliest countries in the world. It is safe enough to welcome all nations even those solo travelers and women who love to travel by themselves. Moreover, Iran is one of the world’s most affordable destinations. The government has also eased the visa issuing progress. Therefore, travelers have more opportunities to visit this amazing country.

Iran has intact nature and ancient culture

Long history, outstanding architecture, elegant gardens, astonishing landscapes, and remarkable wildlife all represent Iran as a great destination to explore. With 22 cultural heritage and one natural sites inscribed on UNESCO World Heritage List, Iran is proud of its thousands year old historical and cultural attractions. It is the country of wind catchers, Persian gardens, museums, caravanserais, bridges, mausoleums, mosques, churches, and bazaars.

Susa, Shushtar Hydraulic System, and chogha zanbil in Khuzestan as the birthplace of the Elamites, and Burnt City dating back to 3200 BC in Sistan and Baluchestan are among Iran cultural and heritage sites.

Why should IRAN be on your TRAVEL BUCKET LIST OF 2018?

Shushtar Historical Hydraulic System as a UNESCO World Heritage site

Iran also embraces mountains, deserts, forests, caves, canyons, rivers, and national parks. Ali Sadr Cave in Hamadan, Badab-e-Soort travertine terraces in Mazandaran, Kaluts of Shahdad in Lut Desert, and mangrove trees and Star Valley in Qeshm Island are only some of the natural attractions of Iran.

Iran is wonderful for adventure seekers

Surrounded by high peaks, roaring rivers, intense forests, vast deserts, large waterfalls, and deep canyons, Iran has the most inspiring places for adventure seekers from around the world. Rafting, hiking, biking, trekking, spelunking, caving, mountain biking, scuba diving, Safari expeditions, sand boarding, bird watching, and canyoneering are all the adventurous activities one can enjoy in Iran.

Why should IRAN be on your TRAVEL BUCKET LIST OF 2018?

Iran is wonderful for adventure seekers

Iran has fantastic festivals

As a historical country, Iran has a variety of festivals and ancient traditions. Nowruz, Mehregan, Yalda Night, and Chaharshanbe Suri are among the most famous ones held annually in Iran.

Nowruz known as the Persian New Year is celebrated worldwide by Iranians. Setting “Sofreh Haft Seen” is an interesting custom of Nowruz. It includes Seven (Haft) symbolic edible herbs and fruits all starting with the letter “Seen” in Persian Alphabet (pronounced as letter S in English), an ornamented mirror, Holy book, and a Divan of Hafez. Each of the fruits or herbs stands for a meaningful concept.

The autumn starts with the month of Mehr in Iran and its 16th day called “Mehregan” is the celebration of light, friendship, kindness, and love in Avestan calendar.

Shab-e-Yalda (Yalda Night) is one of the most ancient Persian festivals annually celebrated on December 21 by Iranians all around the world. It is the last night of autumn and the longest night of the year. On Shab-e-Yalda, people gather in groups of friends or relatives to pass the longest night of the year happily by eating nuts and fruits, reading Hafiz poems, making good wishes, and talking and laughing all together.

Why should IRAN be on your TRAVEL BUCKET LIST OF 2018?

Shab-e-Yalda is one of the most ancient Persian festivals

Chaharshanbeh Suri known as the Persian Festival of Fire is also celebrated on the eve of the last Wednesday before Nowruz. In the evening of Chaharshanbeh Suri, people make bonfires and jump over the fire while symbolically ask the fire to take sickness away and bring about health.

Iran is great for religious Tourism

Iran enjoys diversity in religions. Many Islamic holy places such as Mashhad and Qom attract even non-Muslims because of their magnificent architectural features. As Iran has been the land of other religions before Islam such as Zoroastrianism and Christianity, there are many holy places related to those religions in different parts of Iran. Armenian Monastic Ensembles in West Azarbaijan province, Vank Cathedral in Isfahan, the Zoroastrian Pir-e-Sabz or Chak Chak pilgrimage place in Yazd, the Tomb of Daniel in Susa, and the Holy Shrine in Mashad all satisfy the spiritual needs of the followers of different religions.

Iran enjoys diversity in religions

Iran has opportunities for Halal Tourism

Halal tourism means providing travel in accordance with Muslim beliefs and practices such as serving no alcohol or pork products. Travelling around Iran provides peace of mind for Muslims, because foods are all halal. Kebabs and different kinds of stew, soup, and Persian rice dishes are the famous delicious Iranian foods. Iran could be a perfect destination for travelers who wish to spend their holidays with respect to their cultural and religious beliefs.

Why should IRAN be on your TRAVEL BUCKET LIST OF 2018?

Kebabs are among the most delicious Iranian foods

Iran is a proper option for Health Tourism

Iran’s highly equipped hospitals and rehabilitation centers offer a wide range of state-of-the-art facilities and treatment with experienced expert medical teams at reasonable costs. Treatment costs are much lower comparing to the developed countries, southeastern Asian countries, and Iran’s regional competitors such as the Persian Gulf States.

Iran has great potentials for MICE Tourism

Iran has also potentials for MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, and Exhibition) tourism. Since business travelers use travel services such as hotel facilities and other amenities like restaurants, souvenir shops and local tourist spots, all these sectors could be considered as an area for development and investment.

Are you planning to travel to Iran? Check out our Iran tours.

Saadi Shirazi tomb

Saadi, the Great Persian Poet of All Time

Saadi Shirazi- Abu-Mohammad Muslih al-Din Shirazi- the great Persian poet of all time, was born in Shiraz in the 13th century. He is one of the most influential Persian poets of the medieval period, admired for his artistry in expressing the deepest moral and social thoughts in the simplest words for all ages. He is well-known as the “Master of speech” among Persian scholars and one of the best poets of classical Persian literature. His two outstanding literary masterpieces are Golestan and Bostan.
The exact date of his birth is not known. According to his qasida poems, he left home to explore the world in 1225, contemporary to the invasion of Mongols to Fars. In Golestan, composed in 1258, he addresses himself as a person who has lived 50 years, but he is still naïve and does not know much about life.

Saadi Shirazi

The tomb of Saadi in Shiraz

Saadi Shirazi Lifestory

After leaving Shiraz, he went to the Nezamiyeh University in Baghdad and studied Islamic sciences, theology, law, history, and Arabic literature. During his thirty-year journey, he had the opportunity to travel across Anatolia, Syria, Egypt, and Iraq. He also visited Jerusalem, Mecca, and Medina. He wrote about his travels and adventurous life in both Bustan and Golestan. Master of Speech fought alongside Sufis against Crusaders in Halab, but they captured him at Acre and held him captive there for seven years. But like many of his other stories, such as traveling to India and Central Asia, it cannot be confirmed and is considered highly suspect. Without a doubt, he lived much of his life as a wandering dervish.

Who is Saadi?

Saadi was a man of learning and traveling. He met all kinds of people, from intellectuals, merchants, preachers, farmers, ordinary people, and survivors of the Mongol invasions to Sufi dervishes and even thieves living in remote areas far from the invaded regions. Saadi was able to study society and advise and preach to people to follow wisdom and morality. He finally came back to Shiraz before 1257 CE in his late forties, and it was the time that he finished the composition of his masterpiece called Bustan. His birthplace Shiraz was where he spent the remainder of his life and was greatly respected by the residents and ruler of the city. He passed away between 1291 and 1294 in Shiraz. He has been titled a Sheikh because of his depth of knowledge.

 

Saadi Poet

The tomb of the Persian poet Saadi displays traditional Persian architecture.

Saadi Shirazi Bustan

His best-known work Bustan (or Bostan), was completed in 1257. Bustan is entirely in verse. It includes 183 stories in ten chapters about the virtues such as justice, kindness, love, modesty, liberality, generosity, satisfaction, and happiness, and the ecstatic practices of dervishes addressing all people to have a better and happier life. Bustan was called Saadi Nameh in older versions. It contains about 4000 verses.

Golestan

His masterpiece Golestan was completed in 1258, a year after composing Bustan. It is mainly composed in prose. It includes 8 chapters, mainly about the kings’ morality, the dervishes’ behavior, the benefits of contentment, silence and talking in proper time, love and youthfulness, weakness in old age, and education. Interspersed among the stories are short poems. It is one of the most influential books in prose in Persian literature. Saadi attempts to advise people to live freely and improve their quality of life in Golestan. It contains different anecdotes, pieces of advice, and quotations. It can show the cultural and social conditions of the society at the time of Saadi very well. Some characters and stories are real, and some are fictional. It is one of the first Persian books made by a print machine in 1824 in Tabriz.

Saadi Persian Poet

Golestan can show the cultural and social conditions of the society at the time of Saadi very well.

Persian Language and Literature

Other works of Saadi include Ghazals (love poems or Lyrics; sonnets), Qasidas (longer mono-rhyme poems or Odes), Quatrains, and short pieces in prose in both Persian and Arabic. He is known as one of the greatest ghazal-writers of Persian poetry besides Hafez. Many scholars believe the best ghazals are from Saadi and Hafiz. Saadi has about 700 ghazals, mostly with the essence of love and some with mysticism sermons. He uses irony in his works to represent and criticize the deficiencies and corruptions in the society of his time.

The Greatest Ghazal Poet

The ghazals of Saadi are collected in four groups: Old Sonnets (written in his youth); Tayebat and Badaye (written in his middle age); and Khavateem (written in his old days). Most experts believe Saadi’s Old Sonnets are about earthy love, while his Khavateem is more about mystical love, as well as ethics and piety. According to this dichotomy, they guess Saadi practically passed the earthy love to the mystical love during the different stages of his life.

Saadi’s Artistic Style of Writing

Saadi elaborately distinguishes between spiritual and mundane aspects of life in his works. He tries to visualize the deepest meanings of life in the most tangible contexts and close to conversational language as far as possible in a way that even common people can get the most out of his writings. Saadi’s writing style is called Saj’ in Persian and Arabic, and it is a kind of prose characterized by rhythm as well as rhyme. This artistic style of writing reaches its peak in Saadi’s Golestan. His prose style is described as simple but impossible to imitate.

Saadi Iranian Poet

Visuals of the tomb of Saadi Shirazi at night

Saadi Shirazi Poems

The writing style of Saadi undoubtedly had a huge influence on Persian literature and many great poets who followed him. There is a surprising similarity between his language and modern Persian. After about eight centuries, his works are still easy to understand and admirable in different languages. Many of the Persian proverbs have been taken from his works. Translations include “the proof of the pudding is in the eating”, “what can you expect from a hog but a grunt?” and “Haste makes waste.” Among the well-known western poets who translated Saadi’s works are Goethe and Andre du Ryer- the first European who presented Saadi to the west for the first time in 1634. Golestan was translated into Latin in 1651. Sir Richard Francis Burton translated Golestan into English for the first time.

In one of the most well-known immortal poetries of Saadi, he considers all humans as different parts of a whole body, regardless of social barriers and race:
Human beings are members of a whole,
In the creation of one essence and soul.
If one member is afflicted with pain,
Other members uneasy will remain.
If you have no sympathy for human pain,
The name of a human you cannot retain.
This poem conveys such a deep humane universal concept that is printed on the ten-thousand-Rial bill to remind everyone of the love and peace in everyday life.

Persian Poet Saadi

Saadi’s poem printed on the ten-thousand-Rial bill

Tomb of Saadi

It is one of the major tourist attractions in Shiraz to visit his mausoleum, also known as Saadieh. It is located in a beautiful garden beside Delgosha Garden (dating back to the Sassanid era). The tomb was built in the 13th century. Unfortunately, it was destroyed in the 17th century. The present-day building was built between the years 1950 and 1952. It was inspired by Chehel Sotoun and built by the architect Mohsen Foroughi. Many Persian elements have been used in its architecture. It is also a National Heritage Site. It is visited annually by thousands of visitors who respect him and adore the eloquence in his works. Most of the tours to Iran include Saadieh in their itineraries while visiting Shiraz during their travel to Iran. To commemorate Saadi, 21 March is celebrated as the National Day of Saadi in Iran every year.

Are you planning to travel to Iran? Please read Things to do in Shiraz and Check out our Iran tours.

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque (Pink Mosque), Shiraz: Photos, video

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque also known as the Pink Mosque is an elegant piece of art and architecture that belongs to the end of the 19th century.  Located in Shiraz, it is a colorful mosque built during the Qajar dynasty. Nasir al-Mulk Mosque takes its name from one of the Qajar rulers – Mirza Hasan Ali Nasir al-Mulk – who ordered the construction of the mosque. Mohammad Hasan-e-Memar and Mohammad Reza Kashi-Saz were the professional designers of such an exquisite mosque. The construction of the mosque lasted from 1876 to 1888. Nasir al-Mulk Mosque in Shiraz-the combination of art and architecture – is one of the attractions for many tourists who travel to Iran.

Since the pink color and stained glass windows are applied elaborately in the structure and design of the Mosque, it is known by different names. Pink Mosque, Rainbow Mosque, Mosque of colors, and Kaleidoscope Mosque all describe different interpretations of visitors from this fantastic site.

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque

The glory of colors shining through the stained glass windows of Nasir al-Mulk Mosque

At dawn, the sun shines through the stained glass windows of the Mosque and it glides from the right-hand side to the left-hand side to fill the inside with the glory of various colors combined. The vivid colors spread over the ground, the Persian rugs, the ceiling, the walls, the tiles, and the arches give soul to the solid structure of the mosque. They caress the amazed visitors’ and worshipers’ faces and inspire photographers with great ideas to take amazing pictures. Maybe the designers had aimed to construct such an astonishing space to hold everybody in awe and to create a sacred space for prayer.

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque has two eastern and western shabestans. The eastern Shabestan has a gorgeous tiled altar and twelve columns along with stained glass windows. The arts of tiling and painting in Shabestans, and the beautiful decorations of Mihrab have extraordinary beauty. The harmony among columns, fantastic geometric patterns, the play of light and colors, and the splendid Muqarnas all dazzle the eyes of visitors and photographers. The mosque has great elements of traditional architecture such as a central fountain, an iwan, Panj kāseh-i (five concaves), faience, and plaster works.

Nasir al-Mulk Mosque has been inscribed as one of the national heritage sites of Iran and it annually attracts many travelers to Iran. The best time to visit the mosque is early in the morning and about 8 to 9 am. This is the best time to see the light passing through the stained glass windows and making a kaleidoscopic space that amuses travelers, photographers, and worshipers. The interesting point is that Nasir al-Mulk Mosque is still used for worship. Today this glorious mosque is under protection by Nasir al-Mulk’s Endowment Foundation.

Are you planning to travel to Iran? Please read Things to do in Shiraz and Check out our Iran tours.