People have been asking us to write about budgeting and prices in Iran. We were planning to address this issue anyway eventually, and now seems like a good opportunity to do that, since we still haven’t resolved the problems with the internet here and so we can’t upload new photos and videos. We have some amazing stories to tell, but they can only be told with the adequate visual and audio documentation. Without it, those stories just wouldn’t be as amazing as they were.

The official exchange rate as of today is 1 euro for 14,811 rials. When we reached the Turkish-Iranian border at Bazargan and swiftly went through the border formalities, we were immediately approached by street moneychangers. We were wary of changing money on the black market and being swindled by experienced hands while doing so. But the man offered us a rate of 16,000 rials for 1 euro. After confirming several times we each exchanged 100 euros and immediately became millionares, each with a thick stack of 1,6 million rials in our wallets.

But the first rule of dealing with money in Iran is to quickly adapt to the local lingo. Nobody speaks in rials here. Everbody uses tomans. One toman equals ten rials. I don’t know why they don’t hack off some more zeros while they’re at it, because all those zeros are just mind-boggling. After paying 90,000 rials or 9,000 tomans for lunch, you first think you got ripped off, but then you realize a meal for two cost you 6 euros.

Since we were couchsurfing in Tabriz with Hamed and he and his wife were spoiling us with their generosity, we hardly spent anything in the three days there. We had to fight with him to try to pay for the taxi rides that we shared together. Most of the times we were unsuccessful.

Our biggest expenses were the odd taxi rides across the 1,2 million people city (from 20,000 to 30,000 rials) and an occasional bite to eat, such as the Iranian soup called ash that cost 24,000 rials for two.

Our first bus ride within Iran that took us to Qazvin (or rather didn’t) cost 110,00 rials per person, or a bit over 7 euros for a ride that took more then 8 hours and nearly 500 km. The hotel in Qazvin was my first accommodation expense since leaving home for Belgrade on October 26. A three bed room that we shared with Hilda from Hong Kong was 70,000 rials per person, or less then 5 euros. Although the room itself was of a no-frills variety, the shared bathroom was spotlessly clean and amazing altogether.

A delicious dinner in Nowshahr at the Caspian sea, a local specialty of rice, mashed eggplant, squash, garlic, tomato and egg, cost us 65,000 rials, or a bit more then 4 euros for two. The hotel there was clearly more upmarket, with en-suite bathroom, wi-fi and a balcony overlooking the main Azadi square and the Caspian sea. It set us back for 300,000 rials, 10 euros per person.

To give you another idea of the transport prices in Iran: The overnight bus from Nowshahr to Mashhad, nearly 1000 km, cost 155,000 rials, or about 10 euros.

After a week in Iran, we had to change money again. So we each spent almost exactly 100 euros during our first week. We arrived here yesterday, on Friday, which is the equivalent of a Sunday here anyway. But it was a national holiday in Iran as well. Thankfully we successfully haggled at our hotel for the room price and each of us paid 110,000 rials for a very basic room. After that we were left with only 3,000 rials combined (oh, about 20 cents) and all banks and exchange offices closed.

So we had to resort to the unofficial street moneychangers again. We thought it would be hard to find someone on a Friday evening and that we wouldn’t have enough money to buy dinner. After a quick inquiry on the street, we were soon sent to the nearby souvenir and cheap jewellery seller called Taj Mahal (yeah). We asked him to quote the exchange rate. 17,800 rials for 1 euro. We snapped at the opportunity and gained about 20 euros combined, comparing to the official exchange rate.

Our goal is to get by with 500 euros each through one month in Iran. So far so good. Our budgeting and expense tracking is made extremely easy by the awesome smartphone app called Toshl. We document every expense we have in the app and tag it under food, transport, hotel, taxi etc. And since we’re both pro users, the app converts all the expenses to our main pre-set currency (the failing euro) and allows us to have multiple budgets to follow. It’s really easy to go and check day by day how many expenses you had and browsing by tags I can see that I spent 49,48 euros on food and 51,66 euros for hotels so far. An amazing thing to have.

P.S. Ok, this was a rather technical account of our travel so far. But hey, you asked for it, and we welcome your suggestions to write about different topics. And it was convenient for us as well. But you can’t imagine how eager we are to finally set aside all the internet problems we have here and start delivering you some amazing content together with visual and audio documentation!

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