The Nomad’s Journey: Life On The Move – The peaks of the Zagros range are still dusted with snow. Long, winding roads line the valleys and slopes here in western Iran. These are the ancient tracks that have been dragged by foot and hoof for thousands of years in the ever-repeating movement of migration.
In Khuzestan province, 14-year-old Masumeh Ahmadi holds his mother’s rifle. After a woman gets married, she gets a firearm – with the consent of her husband and father. Many women receive it as a gift from their husband after the birth of their first son.
The Nomad’s Journey: Life On The Move
Drought in Sikvand village of Khuzestan province forced shepherds to move their flocks in search of pastures. Many nomadic families are looking for a way of life that will allow their children to go to school.
Travel — A Nomad’s Life
These days, cars and hired trucks, rather than horses, lead the remaining Iranian nomads and their herds to summer pastures in the Iranian highlands near the town of Chelgard. Instead of trekking all day to an abandoned nomadic communications center for news, members of the local Bakhtiari tribe carry cellphones and complain about poor reception.
Iranian nomads have been making the same migration for millennia. In the spring they headed for the cooler pastures of the Zagros, where there was plenty of grass for herds of sheep and goats. In late fall, they returned to Iran’s oil-rich Khuzestan province, their animals strong and well fed for the winter.
Iran’s more than a million nomads have long resisted modernity because of the isolation associated with their way of life. Deep traditions and patriarchy have also sustained change. But a combination of persistent drought, dust storms that turn the sky orange, widespread urbanization, mobile internet and the spread of higher education have decimated their numbers. The elderly couples who still pitch their tents on the flanks of the Zagros acknowledge that they may be the last chapter in the history of one of the world’s largest nomadic communities.
Some members of the Zaman family cannot afford to rent a large truck to facilitate their movement while a pickup truck carries their belongings, the elderly, and their children. Due to poverty, many families have stopped moving and nomadic life in recent years. For others, animal husbandry is the only source of income.
Life Of Travel And Work: Pisareva Kate, A Digital Nomad
Thunder rumbled in the distance as a couple huddled in their tent. Dark clouds swept across the valley, pouring gray streaks of rain. 73-year-old Bibi Naz Ghanbari and her husband Nejat pitched their black tent in the same place where their family migrated 200 years ago. There were dozens of family members around. Now there was only one tent where a distant cousin lived. The couple said the sudden spring cold and rain got to their bones after they twice managed to save the tent during the storm. They migrated early to ensure their herds could graze on spring grass after a winter of almost no rainfall. None of the eight children joined them. The battery in Bibi Naz Ghanbari’s phone was dead, so she could not even reach them.
“Now everyone lives in cities. What was the point of their existence? ” He said of his children who sold their flocks to live in houses. “What kind of life is this?” he asked, pointing to the holes in the tent. “Last night we had to sleep under three blankets and it was still cold. I wish I could live at home too.”
Marzieh Esmailpour, 33, looks at his sons. Marzieh and her husband have sold most of their goat herd and plan to use the money to help the family move to the city so her children can attend school.
As the number of nomads declined, the strongest advocates of settlement were nomadic women. Their lives are hard and they know it. Zahra Amir, a 61-year-old mother of nine, wakes up at dawn and fetches water from the well with a long walk. After that, he bakes bread and prepares breakfast. She often joins her husband in shepherding, milking sheep, making yogurt and cheese. The hands and face are darkened by the sun. If there is time between jobs, he works on a rug or carpet. To reach their summer destination, his 24-year-old daughter, Foruzani, rode on horseback, leading her two sisters and eight mules, who had their belongings and a tent.
Senior Nomads Show The World How To Travel
“After all these years of work, I have nothing to show for it but these children and the sun,” Amiri said. “Our only joy is drinking tea.” Nomadic inheritance laws are officially no different from those of other Iranians, but in practice women rarely inherit. It is a nomadic custom that women leave their inheritance rights to their brothers. On the other hand, women are allowed to ride horses and carry weapons, and Amir had both. Many Iranian nomadic men say that smoking milk, drinking water, and giving inheritance to women are inappropriate for men. Marzieh Esmaelipour, 33, said he would not even consider asking for a share of the inheritance. “Everybody will talk bad about you if you do that,” he said.
10-year-old Mostafa Mokhtari sits in a tent in his grandparents’ yard. His grandparents decided to stay at home to help their grandchildren attend school and study. But those who are used to living in a tent did it for one yard.
Bibi Jan Mokhtar (center), 57, and Mahpasand Mokhtar (left), 62, are living at home for the first time. Six-year-old Elham Mokhtar plays with a handmade item made by his mother, Mahnaz Mokhtar (right), 39. The family makes and sells handicrafts as the main source of income.
Hard work, lack of rights, and the knowledge that other Iranian women have an easier life have turned many nomadic women into agents of change. 41-year-old Mahnaz Geibpour moved from the tents ten years ago. He and his wife migrate between two modest homes, one in the oil-rich province of Khuzestan for the winter and the other for the summer near Chelgard. “I will not allow my daughters to marry a nomad,” he said. “Our way of life is terrible. I want them to live and study in the city.”
The New Nomads
Geibpour got married when he was 16 years old. “I was a kid,” he said. “My 17-year-old daughter does not want to get married. He says to me: “Why should I make my life miserable like yours?”
The girls spend almost two hours on their way to the Bibi Mariam boarding school. Most of their families are nomads who move to rural homes so that students can attend school for a week.
Gender issues are exacerbated by a 15-year drought that has dried up many major rivers and lakes and made it difficult for nomads to find water for their flocks. Increasing development has created fences, roads and dams that now block the passage.
On the outskirts of the town of Lal, where many former Bakhtiari nomads live in simple dwellings, Mehdi Ghafar and his friend Aidy Shams shared a water pipe. The sun was setting as they reminisced about their nomadic past. Their wives are happier now, they admitted, and their children go to school. “There was no other option but to adjust,” Ghaffari said.
Enjoying An Incredible Life As Modern Day Nomads
20-year-old Parisa Zaman is riding a horse. He is considered a refined rider in his family. Many nomadic families changed their lifestyle and settled in cities so that girls could go to school.
One of the last on the mountain, Nejat Ghanbari, the 76-year-old husband of Bibi Nazi, claimed that the nomads are descended from the kings of pre-Islamic Iran.
“We are the descendants of Cyrus the Great,” he said, referring to the legendary Persian king Cyrus the Great, who ruled a world empire in 550 BC. Now he and his wife are the last. “And when we die, that will be the end of us. It pains me to realize that.” Travel is truly the best teacher. It introduces us to places, tribes and ways of life that we could never have imagined. It forces us out of our comfort zone and is a constant reminder of how much of a bubble we live in. I am grateful for my everyday world, but I love to go beyond it.
During this past stay in the Sahara desert, we took a day trip that turned out to be an eye-opening visit to a local nomadic Berber family. We planned this trip with Kam Kam Dunes and our original driver was our guide.
Digital Nomad: Pros And Cons Of Remote Work
Not so long ago, more than 600 nomadic families lived in the Sahara desert. But as resources became increasingly scarce, most families moved to nearby towns and adopted a more modern lifestyle.
Now about 40 families live in the Sahara in a nomadic way. These families live, survive and thrive in the desert. When their animals run out of natural food, they take their home and move to a more abundant desert where their animals can graze.
The
On the move band, on the move entertainment, robinson the journey ps move, desert flower the extraordinary journey of a desert nomad, on the move, life on the move, robinson the journey move controller, movers on the move, life is about the journey, on the move trucks, men on the move, church on the move