Tehran
AS A CHILD in Tehran, my favourite season was winter, with its heavy snowfalls and clear, sunny days. The first day of snow was especially magical: waking up in the morning to find that the world had turned white overnight, I would rush to listen to the radio announcements to discover which schools were closed [...]
AS A CHILD in Tehran, my favourite season was winter, with its heavy snowfalls and clear, sunny days. The first day of snow was especially magical: waking up in the morning to find that the world had turned white overnight, I would rush to listen to the radio announcements to discover which schools were closed down thanks to the snow. If my school’s name was read out, my sister and I would ring our cousins and announce: “They have closed the world!” urging them to come out to play. A day of snowball fights and snowman
building would ensue, punctuated only by mealtimes in which we would be fed hot oaash, a broth made from herbs, vegetables, noodles and legumes, and sprinkled with hot fried mint and onion rings.
Tehran’s location, huddled into the lap of the Alborz
mountain range, means that the seasons stay distinct.
Residing at the lofty height of 1,191 metres, Tehran’s
winters are always bright and cold, and snow is still an
annual event. The capital has none of the jewel-like domes
of Esfahan, nor the romantic gardens of Shiraz, but with
its skyscrapers screeching into the clouds, its frenzy of
motorways and the bustle of crowds and cars jostling for
supremacy at every street corner, Tehran gives enough buzz.
Iranians are great walkers and, living as we do on the
skirts of the Alborz, Tehranis like nothing more than dawn
hikes. Even in the winter I get up with the sun and take
the hiking trail up through the village of Darband. Halfway
up the hill, before the rash of restaurants that are
built overhanging the rushing streams, I stop off at a
Barbari bread baker – it serves up all the traditional Iranian
breakfast dishes along with piping hot bread.
When the snow has turned to slush, I head downtown to
Aban Street and Tehran’s coolest café, Café 78, owned by
Mehrva Arvin, an Iranian female photographer who spent
many years in San Francisco and Europe before resettling
back in Iran. The light, airy café is popular with expats and
artists, who look out of the tall windows onto the street, and
for its eclectic menu which includes sharbats (traditional
fruit syrup drinks). Contemporary Iranian art is displayed
in a small basement gallery that draws a steady stream
of clients, including collectors and curators from abroad,
searching for the next young artist to introduce to the West.
In the years before the Revolution, one of my aunts
– studying at Tehran university and who appeared to me the
epitome of cool – would sometimes take me for a coffee
after school to Café Naderi (572 Jomhuri Avenue, between
Ferdowsi and 30 Tir Street), Tehran’s oldest European-style
café. Here, revolutionary thinkers, writers and artists held
court and it felt like the last word in sophistication, sitting
opposite my pretty, intellectual aunt, sipping on my café
glacé – a mixture of white coffee and vanilla ice cream.
Café Naderi still serves the best café glacé in town and
what it has lost in sophistication, it makes up for in pre-
Revolutionary ambience. But the young intellectuals have
been replaced by their contemporary counterparts – young
men with collar-skimming hair discuss various issues of
the day with pretty young women in butterfly-coloured
headscarves, in a haze of cigarette smoke.
Last December, more snow fell than had done for 30
years. One night, driving home after a party, I sat in one of
the traffic jams that clog the highways even in the early
hours. Suddenly, silently, the snow began to fall – huge flakes
tumbling fast out of the sky. In no time, impatient car horns
went quiet and people were craning out of their car windows
to watch the snow, to feel it on their faces. Before long, we
all abandoned our cars to run out into the road and start
pelting each other with fistfuls of snow. In that moment, the
fast-paced city was transformed into a playground again, all
normal life forgotten for the sake of a snowball fight.
Tehran-born Kamin Mohammadi is a journalist and writer
