The young surgical assistant looks at me and thinks for a second, as if searching for the right words. He then smiles and excitedly says with a heavy Iranian accent:
“This, uhh… Oxygen. Breathe!”
Just before he pushes a breathing mask on my mouth, I manage to say a weak mersi (thank you), one of the very few Farsi words I picked-up during the past few hours.
I take a deep breath. Whatever it is I breath, it feels fresh. I notice how the anaesthesiologist starts to tinker with the syringes connected to my intravenous catheter. Finally. I have waited for this moment for the last 5 hours. The last thing I can remember is how I smile as my consciousness slowly dissipates into a comfortable blackness, taking away the blinding pain from my dislocated left shoulder.
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Imam Khomeini Airport. Local time is 1:10 am and the temperature is 7 degrees Celsius. On behalf of the entire crew, I’d like to thank you for joining us on this trip and we are looking forward to seeing you on board again in the near future. Have a nice stay in Tehran!”
I open my eyes and quickly check again my documents for on-arrival visa. Not that it would help to find out that I’m missing anything at this point in time, but it helps me to calm down. There is still a slight mystery encompassing the bureaucratic process of arriving to Iran, and as I decided to have a taste of this country only few days ago, I didn’t have much space to obtain a registration number at an Iran embassy.
Photos, check. Insurance, check. Second passport that I won’t need in Saudi, check. Money, check. One shady-looking invitation letter from an almost genuine hotel, check.
I exit the plane and try to stay ahead of the crowd. I’ve heard that the process of receiving the visa can take up to few hours and even though I don’t mind waiting or enjoying people watching, every single person I overtake means few more minutes of sleep for me before a long day in Tehran.
I arrive to a huge lobby and are greeted by a smiling gentleman, who looks like he was born for greeting people.
“Welcome to Tehran, please first obtain your insurance here, then come back to me and I’ll guide you through the next steps.”
“Sure, but I already have a global insurance right here.”
“Please, receive the verification then at the insurance window first.”
I take my carry-on and go to the designated window with a queue of 7 people, intensively hypnotising one older officer sitting and issuing documents.
After maybe 15 minutes of waiting, I smile at the officer and show him my Confirmation of travel insurance which I printed out in color. To make it nicer. The officer, approaching his 60s in style with a heavy beard, looks at it and asks how long I plan to stay in Iran. I try to establish a connection with him and smile:
“Unfortunately only 3 days, but I heard that it’s a beautiful country and I would love to stay longer.”
“It will be 14 EUR then.”
“Wait wait wait, but I just showed you my confirmation.”
“Yes, but it’s not valid in Iran.”
“It says the insurance is valid worldwide, right here!”
“But it doesn’t say it’s valid in Iran.”
“That’s true, but worldwide means that it works on the whole world and Iran is a part of this world if I’m not mistaken.”
The officer laughs and looks at me. I raise my eyebrows and smile:
“So… we are fine then?”
“14 EUR please.”
I look at the long queue of impatient foreigners behind me, sigh, and pay him the full price for my short visit. The officer hands me over a piece of paper and go back to the Greeter. He asks me where I’m from and upon receiving the answer produces a small piece of paper with “75” written on it. He directs me to go to the bank window, located maybe 5 meters behind him. There is where I pay 75 EUR, receive a confirmation letter, and go back to the Greeter. He briefly checks the confirmation letter, asks me for the invitation letter, the insurance, my passport, and tells me to wait.
“How long should I wait?”
“I don’t know, maybe 20 to 40 minutes.”
I know it makes no sense to push anything. With Saudi visa in my passport and a not-really-genuine hotel invitation letter I could be sent back home (wherever that is) at any time so I decide to calmly lean on a pillar standing in the centre of the hall and wait.
I watch the composition of the people around me: a handful of business-men, a young couple heavily inspired by the hippies, holding a baby, a 40-years old woman that has “wanderlust” written all over her face, a hungry pack of Swedish backpackers, a French couple, and few older ladies in long, black cloaks. Each one of them expecting something different. Each one of them waiting for one single visa officer sitting behind a thick glass, meticulously going through papers, slowly typing on a keyboard, and occasionally licking his right index finger when swiping through the documents sorted on his table.
After maybe 30 minutes, the Greeter smiles at me and gives me my passport. I quickly go through it and feel delighted when I discover the shiny visa on one of the pages.
I swiftly go through the passport control, haggle for a good price at the taxi station, position myself comfortably on the seat of an old Peugeot, and watch the lights flicking on the side of the highway. It’s more than 50 km to the northern part of Tehran, where my friend offered me to stay for few days.
“Cigarettes?”, the driver asks.
“No, thank you.” The only time when I somehow allow myself to smoke is when I’m heavily drunk and I was sure that to achieve that state in this country would be slightly challenging (but not impossible).
“Internet?”, the driver continues.
“Yeah, sure.”
My roaming service isn’t working and I want to check if my friend was still awake. After sending her few messages on WhatsApp without receiving any reply, I understand that she isn’t.
It’s 2:00 in the night and I know that after arriving at her place in about an hour, I’ll stand in the middle of a cold Iranian street and see two possibilities:
1. I do manage to wake her up and everything will be fine,
or
2. I don’t manage to wake her up, spend a lovely night in the streets of winter-y Tehran, and everything will be kind of fine.
I close my eyes, muse for a second, and smile.
“Tehran, bring it on.”