A sixteenth-century Persian proverb has it that Esfahan is “half the world.” When I visited the city five or so centuries later, in October of 2016, I was assisted in my appreciation of its charms by a handy volume I came across in a bookshop where I had taken refuge after one of various near-death experiences crossing the street. In Esfahan: A Tiny Earthly Paradise, Iranian civil engineer-turned-tour operator and intermittent poet Mahmoud Reza Shayesteh makes the case that any expedition to the half-world necessarily entails a “quest for the second half of this world inside one’s self through a spiritual elevation… perhaps enabling one to embrace a world of perfection.”
Over the centuries, Esfahan has hosted its fair share of guests, some more spiritually inclined than others. Passing from Sassanid to Arab rule, Esfahan became the capital of the Seljuk empire in the eleventh century before being invaded by the Mongols and then Tamerlane, who reportedly presided over the massacre of more than 70,000 Esfahanis on a single day in 1387. As the story goes, towers of decapitated heads were constructed around the city walls, and blood flowed in the Zayandeh Rood—the now-usually-dry river that divides Esfahan on an east-west axis.
The city fared better under the Safavid dynasty and was again appointed imperial command center in 1591 by Shah Abbas I, who relocated the capital from Qazvin for various reasons including, Shayesteh writes, that “the climate of Qazvin did not suit him.” Esfahan was revamped into a gem of architecture, art, and culture—in other words, perhaps, “half the world.”
The day of my arrival to Esfahan, I was operating in my own sort of half-world—a result of having achieved one of the top three hangovers on record thanks to a friend’s birthday festivities in Dubai. The pain was rendered more acute when the Emirati immigration official who stamped me out at the Dubai airport launched into a rendition of the Santana song “Maria Maria,” inspired by my first name. He asked why I was traveling to Iran alone; I said everyone else was busy. He volunteered companionship on the next trip.
The plane ride was characterized by the scent of McDonald’s French fries courtesy of a woman in my row with a collection of takeaway bags. Earlier in the year, CNN Money had in a bout of shrewd sociocultural analysis determined that, while the rest of the world was wondering how the removal of certain sanctions on Iran would affect oil prices, the burning question for Iranians was: “Will Tehran get McDonald’s fries now?” (Answer: no.) READ MORE AT THE REGION.