I expected to see poverty:

very True! This is so painful! There are many baggers, and children forcing you to buy an agenda or something in the streets, or when you are waiting in traffic jam, trying to clean your car windows. Honestly I have seen this also a lot in Tehran. What was more shocking and reminding of war were many women and men without legs, or totally disfigured faces, which are sitting in the middle of the streets. I thought it is crazy, seemed like they want to be actually killed since the cars have to go around them in order to not run over them. When I talk to people I realized that they have real trouble with buying food. I met a lot of people from educated families, who you would think should at least fit in middle class. But that was not true, I would not compare with Dutch standards, that I am used to, but to even Iranian standards they were poor. It is very common to live in four rooms, with eleven people. They are actually pretty well off. Many of people I met had to feed at least ten people with their salary. I was invited to few people’s houses for food, they are very very hospitable people, I haven’t seen that much before any where else. I knew some people who really wanted to invite me to their houses but they were ashamed to show me their apartments.