 Poster: A snowHead
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Iran's Sun, Snow Lure European Skiers to Nuclear Pariah's `Fun'
2006-04-13 02:16 (New York)
By Marc Wolfensberger
April 13 (Bloomberg) -- Iran, facing sanctions over its
nuclear program, is gaining favor with an unlikely clique: skiers.
Snow, sunshine and $6-a-day ski passes fueled a 40 percent
increase in foreign skiers visiting the Islamic republic in the
past two years. Ski visitors reached 5,000 in 2005, according to
the Tehran-based Iranian Ski Federation.
Iranian ski resorts, nestled in about 40 peaks that exceed
4,000 meters (13,000 feet), plan to build on their popularity
with advertising campaigns in markets including Germany.
Tourists say they're attracted by the novelty of skiing in a
country isolated from the international community.
The number of skiers visiting Iran compares with 700,000
nights spent at hotels in Zermatt, Switzerland, during the 2004-
05 season. Verbier, another Swiss ski resort, had 620,000 hotel
nights, according to local tourism officials.
``Iran is a bit more unsafe, but it's more fun,'' said
Hampus Huebinette, 24, a Swedish skier visiting Shemshak, Iran's
steepest piste.
Ski officials say Iran's row over nuclear fuel is hurting
business. Iran said this week that it has enriched uranium to
3.5 percent. That level is enough to fuel a nuclear reactor, but
short of the 90 percent level needed for a nuclear weapon. Iran
said it plans to move to industrial-scale enrichment, the
Associated Press reported April 12.
Uranium Enrichment
The United Nations Security Council's five permanent
members, which each have the power to veto resolutions, on March
30 said Iran must suspend nuclear-fuel enrichment and prove that
its atomic program is aimed only at producing electricity. On
March 29, the 15-member Security Council gave Iran 30 days to
show compliance with the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency.
``We don't deserve such a bad press over our nuclear
ambitions,'' Issa Saveh Shemshaki, president of Iran's Ski
Federation, said in an interview in Shemshak. ``If the West was
telling the truth, we would see many more tourists.''
Modern skiing arrived in Iran in 1930, 85 years after
competitions had started elsewhere in the world.
About 200,000 of 70 million Iranians ski each year,
according to the Iranian Ski Federation. In Switzerland, with a
10th of Iran's population, the Swiss Ski Federation estimates
that 2.5 million people ski or snowboard.
Plenty of Powder
``This place is a paradise for us because the Iranians
never ski off-piste,'' said Erik Rydingsvaerd, an area manager
for Hong Kong-based Esprit Holding Ltd. in Sweden and
Huebinette's ski companion. ``The powder is just for us.''
For Anders Swensson, 40, a tour guide for Langley Travel, a
travel company based in Gothenburg, Sweden, the main concern is
the infrastructure at resorts.
In Shemshak, an hour's drive from Tehran, the newer of two
chairlifts is 35 years old. Little investment has been made
since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, aside from two second-hand
snow machines bought from France for 150,000 euros ($180,000).
Skiing in Iran has a ``real 1970s feel'' and it's ``as if
time has stood still,'' according to Langley's Web site.
No new slopes, lifts or hotels have been built. The road from
Tehran, dating back to Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, frequently is
closed because of avalanches. A ban on alcohol forces those
wanting an apres-ski cocktail to seek out the black market.
``It means you ski a lot, you don't drink and then you go
to bed early,'' says Swensson.
Sharing Chairlifts
Gender rules have eased since the 1980s, when men and women
had to ski on separate tracks. Police still check that women's
clothing conforms to Islamic code, although bonnets have replaced
headscarves and chairlifts can be shared by people of both sexes.
A week's vacation with plane ticket, food and accommodation
costs about $1,200 from Germany, according to Tehran-based
Irantour Travel Company.
Tourists from most countries can obtain Iranian visas. The
main exception is Israel, which Iran doesn't recognize as a
country.
Visitors from the U.S. are fingerprinted upon entry, in a
tit-for-tat response to U.S. rules since the Sept. 11 attacks.
The U.S. cut diplomatic ties with Iran in November 1979, when
Islamic militants seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and held 52
American diplomats hostage for 444 days.
President George W. Bush said a report in this week's issue
of the New Yorker magazine that the U.S. may use air strikes and
tactical nuclear weapons to destroy Iran's suspected atomic
weapons program and bring down President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's
government was ``wild speculation.'' He has previously described
Iran as part of an ``axis of evil.''
Olympics Contender
Iran had one alpine skiing representative in the Winter
Olympic Games in Turin, Alidad Saveh Shemshaki, the nephew of the
federation's president. Alidad finished the giant slalom in 36th
place, 29 seconds behind gold medal winner Benjamin Raich of
Austria.
Foreigners are invited to compete in international ski
races in Iran for free. The first FIS Snowboard competition took
place Jan. 20, attracting racers from Poland to the Netherlands.
Television crews including CNN International covered the event.
Techno music, usually banned in Iran, animated the
snowboard races, while posters of Islamic republic founder
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and supreme leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei hung behind the winners during the prize ceremony.
``It's a wild, chaotic place,'' said Mike Wright, 34, a
Swedish International Mountain Guide based in Chamonix on his
third trip to Shemshak. ``You can only rely on yourself.''
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