Naqsh-e Jahan Square is the second largest square on earth 

We're now in Isfahan where we've been adopted by an Iranian family we met having a picnic in the park on the first evening. They have been soooo kind to us, None of them speak much English, hardly any more than our Farsi, but somehow we have managed to communicate. We spent most of our second day here with them at their house. Saeed the father is a teacher too and he has 3 daughters and 2 sons who we all met. We chatted with them all using our Farsi phrasebook (thanks to Amin - it's been invaluable!) and their Iranian Leo equivalent. The food is of course delicious and it is really interesting to discover a bit of what life is like for a middle-class family, similar to our own, in Iran. At the same time it is a sometimes difficult to gauge what is really meant, either because of the language or because of the mentality.

Saeed & Vida

Nara & Yasmin

Hussien & Lodan

Ali & Liloofar

We had understood that they had invited us to stay the next 2 days at their home, so we checked out of our hotel. However, in the course of the day there was no more mention of picking up our bags and I felt the situation was unclear, so in the end we had to rebook in a different hotel. They had wanted to take us out to see the town, but we didn't set off till about 5.30pm. We then went to a beautiful palace, crossed town at high speed through the rush-hour in convoy to an Armenian church, which had just closed, then crossed town again and climbed a rocky outcrop which had been used for Zarathustrian Fire rituals and where we had spectacular views over the town and a thunderstorm with lightening .

Reza on a kooh in Isfahan ;)

When we got back to the hotel at about 1.30 am they were shocked and a bit offended that we had booked the hotel, but Norah and I were so exhausted that we were glad to get some rest. Leander went back and spent the night with them. He's struck up quite a relationship with Reza, their 21-year-old son, and went out to a tea-house and to a birthday party with him and friends - another whole dimension to life for young people in Iran.

The Hedieh family

Yesterday morning we met up with Leander in town and did some sightseeing, which was pretty Relaxing after trying to make sense of a converstaion with a dozen people using sign language, a mix of Farsi/English and a lot of guesswork. It's amazing that it works and our Farsi has improved in leaps and bounds - but Leander has definitely mastered it best!! It rained all afternoon and we had a bit of a rest in the hotel before going back into town to meet them at 6pm.

The Isfahan bazar at a more peaceful hour

However to our horror we discovered that they had been expecting us for lunch!! It was a very awkward situation, but they were so kind and we stayed the whole evening. In fact it was much more relaxed, the unmarried women could take off their headscarves in the house and we had a really wonderful time, rounded off with another midnight trip to another mountain where we had a beautiful view over the town. They didn't want to leave us and insisted on an ice-cream at the last stand open in town (in fact the police showed up as we were ordering and made them close up. And so to quite moving goodbyes! Today we're off to Shiraz!