KEYWORDS: Comet Linear S4, Persepolis, Fire Temple, James Mosque, Sheik Lotfollah Mosque, Hasht Behesht Palace, Chehel Sotun Palace, Iman Square, Shaking Minerat, Vank Cathedral, Khaju Bridge, Abashi Hotel

SUMMARY : A small group of oversea participants ( mainly US space scientists, astronomers ) gathered at the ancient capital of Iran - Esfahan  at the invitation of Alireza Mehrani, for a 7-days talks, technical exchange cum sightseeing. The gathering was timed to coincide with the  'brightest' appearance of Comet Linear 1999/S4. However S4 fizzled out at perihelion ( 2 magnitude dimmer than predicted) but remain easily visible ( with a short tail and bright nucleus) in low power binoculars. The group had the opportunity to sample the rich culture, architecture of Persia and had the opportunities to mingle with the local astro-enthusiast and the general public in various walkabout.

     Barely a year after my Jordan visit last November 99, I again set my foot on Middle East soil. This time to Islamic Republic of Iran at the kind invitation of Mr Alireza Mehrani, the President of Adib Astronomical Society whom  I  met in our last year fabulous 99 Leonids trip in  Jordan. Somewhere in late April we started e-mail correspondence on the coming trip and I expressed my intention to come to Iran.  More e-mails as the July drew closer - as I started to plan for my trip, booking air tickets, reading up Lonely Planet Guide on Iran ( the only guide book available on Iran!) and other travel arrangement.  I soon found out there are no Iranian Embassy in Singapore, the nearest Iran Embassy is in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.  I took a flight up just two days before my departure and  pleaded with the official  to have my visa ready on the same day.  Finally the day come. The mid-night flight to Tehran is via Dubai ( with 1 hr stop over in Colombo, Sri Lanka) for 9 hrs and 2 more hours from Dubai to Tehran. It was an uneventful flight and I do not have a window seat either. The air port in Tehran look 'modern' and I go my luggage without too long a wait and 'sailed' through custom with ease. I was glad to see the familiar face of Alireza waiting patiently outside. 

   Day 1- 7/21/2000 Friday Tehran - I met up with Daniel Fischer, Yael and Fransco in Esteghlal  Grand Hotel. To kill time before our next the flight out to Esfahan, we visited two nearby museums- Museum of Coins and Museum of Contemporary Art. It is  amazing to find two identical face-value coins with physical weight differences of less than 1 gm!  We later flew to Esfahan on a twin-engine Fokker jet.   We checked into the  magnificent Abashi Hotel (later I found that it was part of the eastern wing of Chaharbagh School ) with a magnificent blue Dome of the Theological School. That night we had our dinner in the garden 'under the sky' with fountains and soothing background music ? Before I retired to bed, I attempted to locate S4 out of 2nd-storey hotel window with my 7 x 50 binoculars. After a quick star-hopping using the already 'tail-up' Ursa Major and in spite of  the glow from city light,  I kind of suspect I saw the comet - a slight smear with a stellar-like nucleus and a upward pointing faint tail. The 'faintest' binocular comet I have even seen. 

    Day 2 (7/22) Saturday Esfahan- Have early breakfast  and heading for Convention centre  to meet up with the Major of Esfahan. After a quick 'tour' through the Astro exhibition put up by local astro-clubs we were later ferried back to  Abashi Hotel for the Official Opening Ceremony. Just like in Jordan the opening ceremony involved the playing of National Anthem , Praying  and various speeches. So much for the formality. 

    In the early afternoon Jamshids ( another of the Jordan 99 participants)  took us for a walk to the nearby famous bridges across Zayande River in hot 35C but low humidity sun. Our elevation 1,500 m above sea-level according to my Casio triple-sensor watch. It is Summer now and the water level is very low.  Workers wading in the water, clearing the water plants that choked the waterway. Right in the middle of the river there is a water fountain shooting  water 40-60 meters in the air. On our return path via another bridge, I saw jets of waters shooting 45 degree into the river beds - perhaps acting as  man-make giant 'humidifier' for cooling the atmosphere? Despite the apparent drought conditions, nearby flower beds and trees were well - watered ( sprinklers) system . Roads were tree-lined ( despite my asking, no one seems to be able to say for sure what species of trees were they) with tree planted strategic placed in the swallow open drainage system! 

    Later in the afternoon we visited some monuments in Iman Square - claimed to be the second largest square after Tienanmen Square and the nearby bazaar. The square is famous for its Blue-tilt dome. If you look closely around the square you will probably notice the whole square can be water-filled to transform into a large water way with fountains. Then you will see a reflection of the whole square with blue sky... The acoustic effect of the perfect dome of the mosque is amazing.  By stepping hard onto the stone floor directly under the dome , a clear but delayed echo is heard. A rough estimate of the height of the dome using speed of sound gave 75 metres.  ( ~half of second =>150/2 =75 meter height?) Meanwhile on the nearby bazaar  you can find all sort of things on sale there. From inside the bazaar you can see small circular holes open through the ceiling of the brick vault structure for ventilation and I was told the place  is cool during summer and warm in winter. (In Tehran winter can be harsh -6 Celsius) Water was sprinkled on the floor to keep it moist and cool. You would think the narrow passage is for pedestrian only but I saw motorcycles and even cars inside! This is the first stop for  the 'foreign' participants to pick up their souvenir ( e.g chess-sets, pencil boxes, trinkets, necklaces etc.) and start to consume their thick wads of Rials.  We stop for a ice-cream break. A group of young girls gathered around foreign participants asking questions and getting their autobiography signed ( with e-mail address request)  - a common 'phenomena' according to Lone Planet Guide. [ up till now I have not received any e-mail from the various autograph I signed ].

    In the evening we had our dinner in the beautiful fountain/flower gardens of the Abashi hotel compound. While waiting to be served , I noticed a  'intruder'  not far from Arcturus ( alpha Bootes)  and soon realized it was an iridium flare, flaring to a whopping MINUS 9 magnitude - my first oversea Bright Flare.  In reflex I quickly pointed out to Daniel standing nearby and mentally take noted the time and position of the flare for post identification[ turn out to be a south-bound Iridium #15]
Day 3 (7/23) Sunday

     Morning speeches were delivered by Douglas/Alan/Charles and Bruce at Abashi Hotel. Douglas dazzled the crowd with his video-playback of 'sun-grazers' while Charles went through methodology of visual magnitude estimation of comets.  Alan went through different slides images of the comet which bore his name and Bruce - a former NASA astronaut shared with us the many missions. He also showed us man-made object visible from space : circular irrigation plots of land in Saudi,  pyramids in nearby Egypt and not forgetting the famous space-walk image of him suspending in space.
     In the afternoon we visited James Mosque where we saw stucco work influenced by Mongol period. And witnessed portions of the mosque damaged by the Iraq bombing. We also visited  Chehel Sotoun Palace  with its marvelous fresco of battle scene in the afternoon. 
 

    In evening public speech - Charles Morris worked through his favorite top ten comets* with the involvement of participants. When he asked the audience for total number of comets seen , not many show of hands were seen when the number increase from one to three, apparently due to the relatively young age of audiences. In a slide on Ursa Major, eager audience wanted to know where was S4 w.r.t to Ursa  Major. In Charles list - Comet  Hyakutake ranked first.  I couldn't agree more as  Hyakutake indeed put on a fine display in Singapore sky - it was high up and was visible for many nights. I was following its progress from Scorpion ( incidently not 'far' from where Halley was in 86) to Arcturus.

 Comet Linear 1999/S4 . Perhaps with Charles talk still fresh in our mind, the group decided it was never the better night to go out and look for S4. we headed back to the hotel ( for those who choose not to follow) and skip our dinner and headed out to a dark spot one hour drive NW of the city . The van pulled off  the highway and the local group set up the Meade 12" SCT. It was already past eleven o'clock with comet 15-20 degree above the horizon. Despite the occassional blinding head-lights from passing vehicles, the sky was pretty clear( with milky way  plainly visible).    Ursa Major stood majestic with its tail up and I lose no time to locate the Comet S4 using my charts. S4 is easily picked up my 7 x 50s binoculars and the tiny straight-up tail was apparent. To confirm my sighting I asked another participants to describe the star fields. Meanwhile and Alireza called me to take a peep through the 12".  Allan and Charles were busy doing their own estimation.  Two or three meteors streaked through the clear sky. The dynamics of the burn-out trails had  far more interesting view than the light smear from S4. Oh well. I also took the opportunity to look at Scorpion - M4 and pointed out to others the rich NGC6234s. Pick up Andromeda and the various globular nebulae in the rich Sagittarius region. Just before mid-night we called quit.

    By the time we reached the hotel, it was already well passed mid-night. Luckily food are still available. We ordered sandwiches, soft texture ice-creams and washed down with Zam Zam Coke (Iranian answer to Coke).

Day 4 (7/24)  Monday-   Morning - Two technical speeches were delivered by Eberhard Riedel and Daniel Fischer and Herman . Riedel video playback of the various lunar grazing occultation fascinated me and Daniel presentation on Meteor Storm and poster display brought back  my sweet memories of Al-Azraq Camp in Jordan. Herman shared with us his fantastic slides of comets taken using simple set up - tripods and camera.
    In the afternoon we visited more  historical bridges - grandeur bridge than the one we saw in earlier day. In Esafahan bridges served more than just a means for crossing the river. In late afternoon, you can find the place crowded with people - sitting on the raised steps, enjoying sight and sound of the rushing water. There are also tea-house situated under the bridge.  We later visited the  Hasht Behesht Palace.

    In the evening, Yeal and Francesco gave a marvelous presentation on solar system. We headed back to the Abashi hotel to had the final ceremony of the scientific section of the gathering.  At the closing ceremony the participants were presented with a printed  tablecloth and a Big coffee-table book on Esfahan courtesy of Esefahan Municipal Dept. ( the book proved to be a very valuable aid for  identification of the various names of the mosques and Palaces).

Day 5(7/25)  Tuesday   Morning is free. Woke early for my breakfast and change some Rial at the hotel. ( 1 US$= $8000 Rial). Afternoon we visited Vank Cathedral with its majestic wall mural depicting scenes from Old/New Testament ( no photography allowed inside) Shaking Minarets, Fire Temple, and one of the historical houses in the city. We had another peek at Linear S4 at Chadegan.- a resort nested in the mountains.  After off-loading our baggage some of us heading to a nearby place to have another view of the S4. It is not exactly the darkest site but we manage to view the Ursa Major OK. Allan brought along his C8 and Charles with his Fujinon 7x80s?. S4 were easily found again in my 7x 50s binoculars. While the rest were looking at the Comet, I again noticed another bright -8 magnitude Iridium flare  not far from Alpha Bootes again. [ Iridium #17]. The group went back and have dinners.

Day 6( 7/26)   Wednesday - We departed for Khansar and have a boat ride on a lake. (dam-up river) It is amazing to see so much fresh water right in the middle of nowhere. Very little water-spots are available and swimming was prohibited around the lake ( someone joking say may be it is allowed in the lake).  In the afternoon we returning to Esfahan and departure for Shiraz - the gateway for the ruins of Persepolis.

Day 7( 7/27 ) Thursday July 27 at Homa Hotel, Shiraz The group woke up early at 7:30 and after a quick breakfast left for a 40 minutes bus ride to Persepolis and zoraster - fire temple and nearby tomb.  In the evening we visited  the Tomb of the Great Poet Saadi. There is a  spring running through with crystal clear water and teem with many fishes.

Day 8(7/28) Friday - Morning visiting some gardens and a Sacred Shrine before we flew back to o Tehran at noon. 
After a hastily said good-bye our US friends hopped onto another van that ferry them to a rest house while waiting for their flights back to US. The same night Alireza came to say good bye to the remaining four of us as he needed to be back at Esfahan . Ali and the other two person(s) will be left to take care of us ..
We checked back into Esteghlal  Grand Hotel. This time we had a high floor - the 14th storey. At night with nothing to do and a poor light polluted sky, I  attempted a few twenty seconds shots in ASA200. 

Day9 (7/29) Saturday. : Departure to the home countries
    Visited Museum of Arts - where we were brief the art of making the colorful boxes. The design/patterns are NOT painted on  but were sectioned from composite bundle of camel bones, metal strips etc.  Later we visiting Shah's several palaces : viewed his personal collections of rocks and minerals, his gifts from the other world leaders and his costumes. I did my last minute souvenir shopping - picking up a pencil box or "Qalamdan" and small boxes.  We had our lunch in an interesting restaurant. My kebab came served with different vegetable stuffed into a green pepper. We also visited another museum of the animals at the out-shirts of the city.  We also had the opportunity to visited the late Ayotallah's  place and witnessed a group of visiting girls gathered to listen to his teaching. For keepsake I picked up a Chinese Edition of his ideology and surprised to find the translator was an Iranian (instead of a Chinese looking name) and the translation is in perfect Chinese.

Tehran 'famous' traffic - I always marvel at the skill of the drivers who seem to know how to weave in and out without getting into each others way. Horns are not commonly used. You can see everyone convene at the cross-roads just inches away from collisions before one party decided to let the the other to drive pass.  Motorcycles there sit three-or even four! ( and helmets are not required). Crossing a street is another challenging act.  Luckily our 'guides' shepherd us ,and I always cross the street with herd of others -  safety in 'numbers'.  Environmental Awareness was evident in the  recycling bins ( white/green/red) set up in the main streets. I also saw a large environmental emission bill-board showing the levels of CO, S02 etc in ppb ( all level appears to be below danger zone) despite the largely not unleaded petrol and zillions of vehicles. In the van , I caught a glimpse of the former US Embassy with  with ' slogans'  painted on the wall. The 'graffiti' looks fresh with recent paints. ( ..elsewhere whether in City or small town I have yet to see any graffiti at all! ). Since we were not told to look out of the van my interpretation is perhaps that is last infamous 'eye-sore' our Iranian friends wanted to see disappear. Back at the hotel- we stayed at the fourteen floor of the Esteghal Grand hotel with a small balcony,  with nothing much to do  I took the opportunity to do some night tripod photography of the city skyline.

Day10 7/30/2000 Sunday
 Historical Museum  (Prehistoric) - There are numerous displays of stone-age cutting tools, earth-ware, etc Notably mentioned is  the salt man***, his skull still with white hair kept in a large bell-jar. Nearby is one of his calf-length leather boot (complete with knee-cap and parts of tibia bone) in  Zanjan 3-4 Century AD.  Bumped into the Brisbane Aussie guy I met at Iran Embassy back in Kuala Lumpur.  He was surprised to find me at the same museum.

National Jewels Museum.  Situated at the side of the Central Bank Melli.  After surrendered your cameras/bags, and walked down to the basement you will find the Peacock Throne behind a glass wall. Turn  right and enter a darken room with heavy menace-looking 2 foot-thick armored door.  The numbered Display Cases are guarded by sensor alarm.  Once the alarm is tripped ( by sensor) the loud siren will sound and the exit gate will quickly shut. The guide speak fluently English and will go through explaining the background of ALL the display cases. Here you will  find the 182 carats  diamond: Darya-i-Nur or "Sea of Light " and a precious-stone studded Globe. There are other display of rare yellow and pink diamonds, turquoises, sapphires, ruby,  pearl  from Persian Gulf ( including  one black pearl). Other items include Coronations costumes and swords, dish covers... I have not seen so much precious stones since my last visit to Tower of London 1995 beside the Thames.
 

Homeward bound    Ali helped me to the crowded Check-in counter.  There were still hours before the plane depart. After check-in the luggage I wondered around. There are not much 'shops' but I manage to pick up a coffee table book on Tehran for 260,000 rial and were prepared to take the rest of the rial as keepsake.  The Air Bus flew over Esfahan and Shiraz en route to Dubai.  At around 11:15 pm local time I was 35,000 ft over Esfahan and was wondering what is Alireza doing this moment directly under me.  At  Dubai, the McDonald's manager had never seen  Rail and he  agreed for me to pay my burger in rial! in return for two 10,000 brand new rial.  In one of the duty free shop I saw a giant astro-binoculars for sale : Vixen 35 x125s for a listed price of $9,000 Dbi. The flight from Dubai to Singapore was full of homeward-bound  Aussies from their holidaying in UK. I sat beside one German doctor starting a new life in Australia. Maybe the French Concorde tragedy was still fresh in his memory - he asked the flight stewardess why there were 'smoke' billowing (actually was condensation) from the air con system.  

    The return non-stop seven hours flight was uneventful. I reached Changi Airport in a gloomy afternoon and was greeted with a blast of hot-humid air that temporary clouded my spectacles - I was home at last - our hot and humid Singapore.

Special Thanks & Acknowledgement& Achievement

    I must congratulate Alireza Mehrani and his team together had done a marvelous job amassing such a complex itinerary which involved a AM  presentation at Abashi hotel and evening public speech at convention town hall.  And coordinating the sightseeing trips in various towns/cities  towns involving taking two different domestic flights, land transportation, hotel arrangements,  and visa extensions/flight confirmation. On top of these they are flexible enough to accommodate  individual request.

    And judging from the response from full house participation  in public speeches and  the close rapport and  interactions between foreign and local participants I dare said the objective of the technical exchange was accomplished. Through the speeches and talks the audience were able to enjoyed a wide spectrum of topics from solar/meteor, solar system, comets, space travel.

    It is obvious a lot of energies and efforts are put into the exhibition hall from local astronomical clubs. It might be a good idea to have them each presented a talk about their involvement and projects.

    In my opinion, the gathering achieved its goal of bring people together to share and exchanged view point. We see for ourselves first hand the eagerness of reaching out.. despite differences in race, language, religion and political background. I hope this first meeting pave the way for more opportunity to have bilateral exchanges in the field of astronomy with - a field as old as the stars itself and Esfahan will in time to come become the 'CENTER' for modern astronomical study in Iran. I am also surprised to find the large number of female participation in astronomy - another example indicating the relative high literacy rate of the female population.

    As Dr Bruce McCandless pointed out - Earth when viewed from  Space -there are no boundary visible separating one country from others. We all are inhabitants  of the planet called Mother Earth.

The People
During our entire stay in Iran, all the people we met are extremely friendly to us. Even total strangers walk up to me and asked where i came from and wished me a good stay in Iran. One guy in Iman Square was eager to find out whether I knew a certain Singaporean working in the one of the shops there. I have to tell him there are 2.3 million Singaporean and quite likely I do might not know him.  Another interesting thing I observe is, if you wave at anybody, it is guarantee that  it will be returned immediately. You probably get a blank stare else where.

The weather while we were there - July it is the hottest month( hot and dry) to visit and may be I can blame it on S4's itinerary!

My personal triumph/'achievement':  Viewed the much talk-about comet Linear S4 - my sixth comets ( two were southern hemisphere objects during my undergraduate study in Palmerston North, New Zealand - Austins , Bradfield; while the last three were observed from Singapore Sky-  Halley, Hyakutake , Hale-Bopp and perhaps Wilson)  but visible faint - first light for my Fujinon  7 x 50 s, chanced upon two  -8 mag Iridium Flares!! , learnt how to like plain yogurt, tasted tons of kebabs. Saw a persimmon tree in Abashi. [ i remembered  my first 'thrill' of seeing an apple tree one cold drizzling wet winter morning - at Auckland, New Zealand 1978 ]( sorry, as a tropical folk, I was fascinated how a temperate fruit tree look like]. I am not much of museum/ mosque goers ( hardly notice how one look like in Malaysia or Singapore with the exception of the golden dome mosque in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei )  but what I saw in Esfahan greatly impressed me and also it is a rare opportunity for us to be inside the Holy Shrine.. and last but not least - we get to know others in person.

Other Info of interest

Credit Cards: ( Diners/ Visa (not popular)). 

Currency: US$  is accepted in top-hotels, while rials everywhere?

  Food/Drinks: Pizzas, Kebabs/with fluffy short grain rice, eaten with nuns, (rolled with green vegetables e.g. mint, spice) , ice creams,  Zam Zam coke, Zurphan, Pepsi.

  Char/Tea Drinking Iranian Style : take a sugar cube ( two in a pack), chewed one corner and sipped tea, let the sugar dissolve in tea INSIDE the mouth, swallow tea ( what else). 

Hubble Bubble: as in Jordan..smoke a water pipe. In Iran low and broad carpet-lined bench are used for relaxing under shades and while you puff away. 

Fruits: Red water melons, honey dew, Shiraz small but sweet grapes, peaches, apricots, apple 

Confectionary: Candy, dates etc - Kermani GUS- a soft white chewable sweet( with pistachio nuts.

Souvenir: Persian Carpets- can be expensive (US$200 for a 2'x1 1/2') , Pencil Boxes(40,000), Display Boxes.60,000-1000,000 rial. 

Map: Pick up a Map by Gita Shenassi for 20,000 rial. I bought this one so that I can get a long / lat estimate for Chadegan for my Iridium sighting confirmation. However Heavens-above huge database included this town. 

Power Supply: 240, wall socket - two pin (round)** for charging your handy-cam batteries. Some hotels TV had RCA video IN, audio IN ( to play back on TV screen)