Iran has apps for everything! When it comes to booking domestic trains, flights, buses, hotels and more, almost everything can be done online in Iran. For travelling in Iran, I believe these apps are essential. Yet unfortunately, they don’t tend to be tourist friendly, with payment methods only accepting Iranian cards due to sanctions, and with little English information available. That’s why I’ve put together this article, to guide you through the process, and to
Many people know that the Arba’een pilgrimage to Iraq, is the world’s largest annual public gathering. In some years, the city of Karbala hosts more than 20 million visitors, such as in 2022, as reported by Al Jazeera. But this was not always the case. In fact, during the rule of deposed President Saddam Hussein, this entire pilgrimage was banned. In this article, I’m going to be going through the history of Arba’een and what
In the last year or so, several news agencies have written articles about the recent post-war “tourism boom” in Syria. Many of them claim that tourism in Syria is not ethical, seeing as tourist visits, especially those of influencers, amount to “whitewashing” the Syrian government, as claimed by The Washington Post. But, as someone who has been running tours to Syria, as well as to Iraq, since 2019, I have seen first-hand how tourism has
How does visiting one of the most tense international borders sound? Well, to most, it sounds quite frightening. Who knows when a war between Israel and it’s neighbours might set the region on fire. Although such a war could break out at any point, until it does, Southern Lebanon is actually very safe to visit, as longer as you’re aware of the political situation in the area and you don’t do anything “stupid”. In fact,
Among Iraq’s religious minorities, the Mandeans are some of the least known. In fact, many Iraqis haven’t even heard of them, and if they have, they have very little ideas about what they actually believe in. I was fortunate enough to meet the head of the Mandean sect (similar to the Pope in Christianity), where he explained to us many core principles of the religion, as well as answering any questions we might have. Mandeans