Khoda Hafez, Iran!

I've been spending a lot of time in Iranian cities which suffer eye-watering automobile pollution, so I was desperately seeking fresh air. The most popular car here resembles the 1960s Vauxhall Viva, burns leaded gas and lacks a catalytic converter. Tehran on many days is like living in an exhaust pipe.

I took a trip to the Caspian coast but that was disappointing. I was beginning to despair until I arrived in a mountainside village called Masuleh, which is so steep that cars can't get into it. Restaurants, hotels and homes are supplied by wheelbarrows and when the taxis at the bottom of the hill leave for the day, the only sound left is the murmur of conversations in the open-air tea houses. It was magical.

Unfortunately, the conversations I have with Iranians who speak English always end up being about how desperately they want to leave Iran. The government only allows most citizens to travel to countries that meet its moral guidelines. Ironically, one of these countries is Dubai, where a man told me he goes annually to meet with prostitutes. Another guy told me he was so desperate to see another country that he took a bus to Iraq. Women here rarely speak to me, so I don't know much about what they think, although a teenaged girl who was with her family in Masuleh told me she dreamed of one day visiting Orange County, California, which she's seen on satellite TV.

I admit it's only one segment of Iranian society, but when everyone you meet seems so eager to get out of Iran, is tends to rub off on you. So by the time you're reading this I'll be riding the Trans-Asia Express, a three-day train from Tehran to Istanbul, Turkey. Khoda Hafez, Iran, which is Farsi for "goodbye." I wish I could bring some of you along.