I was wrong about him.īahman was his name. In my thoughts, I had belittled the man and based solely on his reckless driving, I had taken him to be a callous brute. He showed us an English message on his phone that read: “You come to my home be my guests.” This time, a friendly smile graced his round face. When we asked to be dropped off at a hotel near the bus station, our driver, whom I had so fiercely resented just minutes earlier, surprised us by offering to host us at his home instead. We had mixed emotions about leaving, but under the circumstances, Iran was not a country where we wanted to risk overstaying our visas. It didn’t start smoothly or end as planned, but it was an experience like none other. Our bikepacking trip here had been a rollercoaster of ups and downs. Even our fast and furious driver seemed oddly subdued once we entered the city. Arriving in Saqqez, the tension was palpable. The police responded violently to the protests, and hundreds of demonstrators were killed. The incident stirred rage throughout the country and resulted in widespread protests. Four weeks earlier, on the same day we entered Iran, Mahsa Amini, a woman from Saqqez, was beaten to death by members of Iran’s religious morality police in Tehran after she was taken in custody for an improper hijab. The warm light cast a calm veil over the city as if to hide the tension that boiled within its streets. It was dusk when we finally arrived in Saqqez. My mind was awash with negative thoughts.The further we went, the more resentful I became. I tried to act cool, as if to be unfazed by his driving, but I was seething inside, and secretly I despised the man, even though I barely knew him. When I looked at him through the rearview mirror, I imagined seeing a spiteful smirk on his face. I could have sworn the man was getting a kick out of his reckless driving. The same thing had happened in Armenia a month earlier. Once again, we were leaving a country earlier than anticipated with our bikes strapped to the roof of a taxi. Our first visa was about to expire, and an extension was denied. We would’ve preferred to continue pedalling, off-road and at our own pace, but unfortunately, our time had run out. It reminded me of exactly why I dislike road transport. There was no cruising speed only flooring the pedal or slamming the brakes, both done with what felt like aggression and a complete disregard for the road’s geometry. He took daring chances, overtaking other vehicles on completely blind corners, each time coming dangerously close to a head-on collision. The driver was undeterred by the cars and motorcycles coming from the busy road ahead. Our taxi swerved at a devilish speed around the tight bends of the mountain pass.
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