i had visited all the sights that i had intended to see in the shiraz , expect for a village called qalat
years ago, a shirazi friend of mine in chicago had told me about it , and i remembered some of the
details , according to him , his father had taken him to see this village in the sixties, when he was barely
tean years old.he had described the village as being far and difficult to reach;his father had to park their jeep
,and then they had to ride horses to get there.he was surprised by what he had seen.
there was a huge waterfall and many trees,but waht was most amazing was that the inhabitans were christians, had
a church,and spoke a 'strane' language that did not resemble Armenian.ever since hearing aout qalat, i had hoped
to visit the mysterious village someday.i had wondered if the village were descendants of the seventy thousand newly converted
Christian prisoners brought by Shapur after his defeat of Hadrian.Or were they Zoroastrians who had accepted
Christianity at the time.or perhaps Assurians from northern Mesopotamia or Azarbaijan who had settled there?
while returning from Persepolis, i had asked AMir if he Knew anything about Qalat.yes he had.in fact he had once been there .
These days, it was possible to get there in an hour on an asphalt road, and he agrred to drive me there.
so we were now on our way to Qalat which is situated to the Northwest of shiraz and next to Shiraz's famed vineyards
.these were acres of well-tended and trellised vines.The shiraz Wines,especially the robust reds, have been famous since
antiquity.in the seventeenth century Tavernier wrote about wine from shiraz and called it the best in Persia,
mentioning that is was saevd for the king and the courtiers( "...celui de schiraz, comme le meilleur, est gard3/4 pour
le roi et les grands de la cour") .at that time
Armenian traders even xported the wine to Southeast Asia.french winegrowers finally discovered
the high quality of the shiraz grapes and started cultivating them in france, but despite the correct French
pronunciation by tavernier , they named it syrah.American winegrowers in California adopted the same name,
but Australians remained loyal to the orginal and still call it shiraz.with the restrictions placed on alcoholic
drinks by the Islamic Regime.only those making moonshine wine in their basements can now savor a sordid version of the
famed elixir.
as we neared Qalat , we could see first the mountain and the waterfall with its white
foam and then the many oak and fruit trees on both banks of the roaring.amir parked the car near the village, and
we started walking toward it. The village had an abandoned look to it.The houses had thatched roofs and were
mad of mud and stones and there were shrubs growing around the dirt paths between the houses.Amir had already told me that young had
left the village and the remaining few inhabitants were known to be opium addicts.
The only person we had seen so far approached us. he was about thirty years old .he was shabbily dressed in old worn clothes.
his worn-out shoes were covered with dirt.and was wearing waht appeared to be old makeshift headgear.a walrus
moustache covered his mouth.His eyes,like those of many opium smokers were glazed. i Told him that we were looking
for a church and he volunteered to lead us there.he dis speak persian but with local accent.the small church
appeared to be new;there was nothing ancient about it.The floor of the small rooms was littered with garbage.a black
cross was dawn underneath an arch.the white walls were all covered with graffiti.the frame and inttel of door
were missing, and broken pieces of mud bricks were visible. i asked the guide what had happend to the lintel
"I removed it and took it home"
"What was written on it"?
"i dont know .it wasn't in persian.it was in a diffrent language"
" can we go to your house and look at it?"
"no i gave it to a friend"
"can we got to your friend house and look at it?
"no he is in shiraz"
he obviously thought that we were inspectors from the cultural heritage foundation of iran.there to arrest him for
vandalixing a historical site.
as we were talking to the car, we saw an ancient lady sitting in front of her doorway.she was not wearing hejab
but, like Zoroastrian women.had a faded old scarf wrapped around her face and pinned under her chin.her skirt
was worn and faded too.i approached her and, after greeting her and calling her madar(mother), tried to carry on a conversation with her. fortunately, she was amenable
to conversation and turned out to be a chatterbox; but unfortunately, as hard as I tried.i could not figure
waht she was saing.i was unable pick out any latin or aramatic sounding words.though i heard some words that resembled
persian.my historic guest was thus in vain.the so----called church was a chapel, probably built several decades ago
by british members of the Anglican church of shiraz, who had used it during their summer sojourns.the few remaining
inhabutants were probably descendents of Zoroastrians who had converted to Islam centuries earlier
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