Firstly, I apologise in advance if I sound quite negative in this post. I feel that a traveller needs to be warned of said “queueing” in Iran, and that is the purpose of my writing here.
In an Iranian airport, I advise a couple of things. One, breathe and two, keep calm. There is not one set line where people queue up in an orderly fashion. There are six queues from various angles just to get to the check-in desk at the airport. Here you will see all sorts. People checking-in boxes of puffak (a Cheetos-style snack), boxes of glassware and winter blankets, which all seem a bit absurd. Do you really need all of those snacks? It’s summer, why do you need those thick blankets now?
In an airport in Iran, forget your British etiquette and politeness of letting people go in front of you, because you’ll be there all day. Get your elbows out and your blank face on. Some people can be mean, shove and be just downright rude. Stand your ground, hold your head up high and look out for any pushers in, which is a personal pet peeve of mine, regardless of where you are.
This kind of said pushing and shoving can also happen at religious shrines too. At the holy shrines in Iran, there is very limited space with so many visitors everyday. People pushing into you just makes you, or me, a not very happy person.
As an outsider on Iran, I could imagine queuing up in an airport would be quite humorous but equally frustrating and tiring too. Laughable in the sense that is it is ridiculous. Airports in Iran are just somewhere you just wouldn’t see in the West. In Iran, there is no concept of a queue. That is it, in a nutshell. Lots of people, disorganisation and no order is quite typical to see in the country, so just remember that before you start to join some form of queue or line or trail or however you would like to describe it. Keep calm and carry on, as the old saying goes. Rant over.
Another Iran 