Thirty hours after getting out of bed in Bali, I arrived at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport. Joining the foreign passport queue at immigration, which was about two-thirds shorter than either of the Iranian passports queues, I waved at my [Iranian] friend from the plane who had tied a tea towel around her head as the plane taxied to the terminal.

The airport is about 35 kilometres out of the city and is surrounded by exactly nothing. There is no public transport into town although an extension to one of the existing Metro lines has been planned forever and will take about forever to be completed. I jumped in a taxi driven by a younger man in a clean, crisp white uniform and sped through the barren landscape at 140km/h to a thumping soundtrack of Persian techno. As we hurtled up the highway towards Tehran we passed boys on the verge of the road selling flowers, people waiting in small groups to be picked up by vehicles, the enormous and unfinished shrine to Imam Khomeini, and giant concrete fists with fingers pointing to the sky.

Although it was early in the morning, the thick blanket of smog hovering over the city diffused the strong sunlight and produced a bright, squint-inducing glare. Because of this pollution it took a while before my eyes picked out the imposing 4000-metre mountains that rise to the north of Tehran. I mean, they are huge, and it’s some pretty impressive car exhaust that produces a curtain of fumes thick enough to block them out.

As we entered the city I was surprised at the lack of traffic on the roads, but as I was later to learn the city doesn’t really wake up until midday and the mornings are eerily dead. The city itself looks as you would expect: lots of concrete in various states of disrepair, air-conditioner units hanging out of every window at precarious angles, monolithic ’60s-era high-rises poking their heads above a sea of smaller concrete buildings, and lots of areas lacking in any sort of greenery or plant life.

I arrived at my hotel and was told I couldn’t check in for three hours as my room was still to be cleaned after the last guests. But the manager looked at my drawn face, dark circles and bloodshot eyes and took pity on me, like the kind owner of a stray dogs’ home. He showed me to a room where I could sleep until midday and then he would come and show me to my actual room. This was my first experience of the much-vaunted and very genuine Iranian hospitality and helpfulness.

That first afternoon, still feeling groggy after the trip, I decided to bypass tourist sights and just walk around the city to get my bearings. Over the next four hours I must’ve walked six or seven kilometres in a 35-plus degree heat that’s concentrated and amplified by the concrete jungle. In contrast to the early morning the city was now pumping and the footpaths were packed with Tehranis going about their business. Some women wore traditional Islamic dress while some wore very Western clothing with only a token headscarf pushed dangerously far towards the backs of their heads. Two young locals had plasters on their noses indicating recent nose jobs, which is apparently an important symbol of status in Tehran. There are blue metal boxes on practically every street corner into which many people were pushing coins and low-denomination notes for the poor.

I couldn’t seem to drink enough water and in the late afternoon an ice-cold Coca-Cola — not normally my drink of choice — with its sugar and caffeine tasted like gold-plated liquid. For breakfast/lunch I had one of the ubiquitous kababs that are sold out of shopfronts — chicken and lamb shoved into a long bread roll with onions and tomatoes cooked in the meats’ juices, pickles and mayonnaise. I’m not even going to pretend I’m vegetarian on this trip.

Three times on my walk I was approached by locals who spotted a confused-looking foreigner staring at a map. “Can I help you?” they’d ask, or “for where are you looking?” Always with a big smile and a big-hearted desire to help. A shopkeeper, fresh from gently chuckling at my confusion over banknotes asked where I was from and after I’d answered, exclaimed, “karngaroow!” As so many who’ve been to Iran have told me, the openness, generosity and kindness of the Iranians is overwhelming, and my 24 hours of experience so far seems to confirm that view.

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