Monday 6 October 2014

Yazd and Persepolis









The top photos feature the Post office in Yazd. The Post offices here sell Definitive stamps only which currently feature the Persian alphabet. When I got to Shiraz I was able to find a philatelic office with difficulty. I was ushered in upstairs who were very friendly and happy to assist me with finding interesting stamps of Iran for use on the postcards. Iran and Kenya are simular in that they impose a tax of 18% on stamps, so you dont pay the face value. The make matters more complicated in Iran they talk in "Toumans" which is 10 to the value of the local Rial . So when checking you need to confirm what the Currency they are using. There is very little credit card international credit card usage here, so loads of cash required.
In all my Post office visits they insisted in using the alphabet stamps even when I placed the stamps I had bought in the philatelic section. Again not the first time I have had to deal with that. So in most cases they have more stamps then needed.
In one post Office in Esfahan they stamped my cards with a electronic meter. Once I explained I wanted real stamps , they said I wanted "old technology" . I found a friendly guy in the philatelic section who gave me a great selection of stamps . So I would say it is quite rare to find special stamps on Iranian Mail.
Some more photos of Yazd which is a World Heritage site as is Persepolis .
Finally the doorman from the hotel. The Moustache looked liked something out of a movie, but it was sure real. 


2 comments: