Everything seemed perfect on tuesday! I spent a great day with some Iranian climbers in Pol- e- Khab which is about an hour of driving away from Tehran. The climbs were exactly my style, long vertical or less than vertical routes and the setting was great: a beautiful valley with tiny villages surrounded by fruit gardens and a stunning mountainous landscape.
In the evening- we climbed until dawn- a quick dip into the river refreshed us perfectly and then we had some nice food in a nearby café.
So, why do I name this post “shit happens”?- Well, because shit happened!
When we came out of the café, we just wanted to get home. But as we opened the car`s trunk in order to put our wet clothes in there, two of our three backpacks, which we had left in the car, were nowhere to find. Apparently, during these 30 minutes we spent eating, somebody opened the car and stole the two packs. In both of them was climbing gear, cash, important documents such as passports, driving licenses and, in my case, my DSLR- Camera including both lenses and my kindle.
Shock! No Passport, no visa, no money… I was dead. In Iran, without these documents. That definitely meant the next days, or probably even weeks, would be no fun at all.
I had the worst imaginations, having to deal with asian bureaucracy at its best and being considered somehow illegal, for instance
So after contacting the police and agreeing over making the report the next day, we went back to Tehran in order to get my passport copy which I fortunately had saved on my laptop and returned the next morning.
Now, to make a long story short, I can tell we spent about 2/3 of the day in different police offices (which was actually quite interesting) figuring out how to write “Till- Jakob Kieweg” in Arabic letters and completing the report. But just as we were on the way to one of the offices, I got a call by an unknown guy who claimed he had found my backpack with “some documents” in it.
Booom!! I first could not believe it and thought it might be a trick. But, several hours later, it turned out to be nothing but the truth- and I got back everything except for the money, camera and kindle. Which is still bad enough, but at least I would not have to deal with all the paperwork.
So now, why do I consider myself still lucky? Losing a huge amount of money and a device which meant a lot to me as it was a big part of my journey is definitely not lucky.
But there is something I really want to make clear: at first, the natural reaction on happenings like this is to think how bad things and people are. That is also what I did first. Understandably, I guess.
But then, as things started to become better again, I realized how the situation actually was.
First of all, it is “just” money and materialistic value, that is lost, no serious danger for my life or health.
Second of all, I am lucky enough to have extremely supportive people around me. Be it financially, mentally or directly through translating, driving around or anything else. On maximum 3 “bad people” (the thieves) comes a whole bunch of great, dear and supportive people. And that is exactly the reason, why I am still lucky!
So, to finish this post, I want say how tremendously grateful I am for these lovely humans. To have such parents and such friends is doubtlessly the best thing that could ever happen to a human!
Till on the road 