The JAFIO Report

For the first installment of the weekly JAFIO Report I thought what better way to get our feet wet than to take on the past year.

How to read this post: everytime you see JAFIO, you must say "Just Another Fucking Iranian Observation", preferable out loud, but to yourself is OK too.

...And what a year it was!

I'll get to the most important story from our perspective, namely the protest marches. Not the ones in Iran, but the ones in LA. Never before have so many Iranians walked so far for a cause that no one understood. JAFIO, but I'm pretty sure that Moussavi was never going to be our next savior. And Green? The official color of the Mohammad-related Seyyeds? I thought we were sick and tired of religion and it's symbolism?

This past week the protests continued again with the same old fucked up pointless strategy, namely everyone march in a line, and shout the same slogans as directed, and let's bait the Basijis to kill us again, throw rocks at them and burn their vehicles if you have to… If I'm not mistaken, isn't this how we got into this mess in the first place? And on Ashoora? And has anyone heard of a sit in? JAFIO, but if 10,000 people simply arrived outside Khamenei's house and sat down and sang a Googoosh song (Man Amadeh-am would be good), it would take hundreds of guards a week to haul everyone off one by one. Even Evin isn't big enough. Here's to what a Berkeley education can buy you…

Once again, the mythical Howard Hughes-esque founder and self appointed sex symbol of this esteamed publication, Jahanshah Javid, continued to elude us with his hermitage ways. Apparently he has now holed up in Chihuahua, Mexico. When asked how he felt living in the middle of a drug-gang-war, JJ replied, "It's actually safer! Hey at least here I can be a reformed IRNA translator and not have my ass handed to me every five minutes!" To which ROYALIST2500@GMAIL.COM instantly replied, "You aren't fooling anyone Mr. Javid, your consistent 19 year false front for the IRI is Oh so obvious. Although, we are quite impressed by your dogged perseverance at feigning your obviously transparent motives cleverly camouflaged as no-limits-unfettered-free-speech-objective-journalism since 1995. You could pose this way for another 19 years and we'd still... well OK..., I guess if you continued toeing the line for another 19 years like this, we'd believe you then, but... Ahhh! Never mind!"

Speaking of this publication... I think a little introspective critique is way overdue. Look, we as the readers and writers all applaud and support any reasonable fund raising event to help offset the more than reasonable yet still hefty costs of this invaluable site. JAFIO, but I'm not so sure that 3 Sopranos was the answer! I think I speak for all Iranian men, when I say that if you want us to listen to 3 shrill Iranian women shrieking, then don't expect us to have to pay for it too! Because any real Iranian man married to a real Iranian woman gets more than his fair share of it at home, for free. Personally, I'd rather sit through another Kiosk "acoustic" concert while my nuts are removed!

Speaking of Kiosk... dudes, what happened? The brightest light in all of (the 3 bands left?) Iranian Rock has all but flickered off, as some misplaced idea that mediocre Iranian rock music can be a political game-changer, convinced Arash Sobhani to lend his less-than-Dylan talents to "The Cause" on an awful sounding acoustic guitar during the protests this summer. Big mistake Sir! Mr. Sobhani must be required to always be in Kiosk, always play electric, and always Rock out! Kiosk Rock moves us! JAFIO, but a sedate, solemn, and sad Iranian guitar player with a "Message" can never ever be trusted!

Speaking of Trust... with his ongoing historic election and never-ending inauguration, Obama took his message of Hope to the World. And then promptly shit on, and removed all of that Hope from the people of Iran. Never before has a man of such intelligence and sheer potential, exhibited the most stupefying mis-analysis and gastrointestinal disorder of Iran. Gary Sick, the former ranking US Expert and Professional Mis-Handler of Iran, stated, "What do you think of me now!" At the party after the inauguration, Jimmy Carter handed the official handbook he wrote on the Iran, "How to Mis-Manage-Iran, Lose an election to a senile actor, and build a nice home for under $60,000" to Obama, and was rumored to have been seen finally breathing a sigh of relief.

Speaking of relief... Ayatollah Montazeri finally died! And nothing happened! The religious contention by the most liberal cleric in Iran, that God and any hope for reforming Iran existed, was finally proven to be false. Montazeri has finally realized that when you die, you pretty much stay where you are buried, under the dirt, and you remain there, forever, and that you do not in fact go to any cool place like heaven, as was advertised. When asked about it, Montazeri simply stared blankly and replied, "Fuck Me! I should have at least gotten a coffin!" Now that Montazeri is dead, things can finally get back to normal. It was way too weird listening to a Mollah that actually made any sense!

Speaking of coffin... Michael Jackson is finally in one. The bet that Michael Jackson would finally kill himself from shame or sheer stupidity, was claimed by every single person on earth, as the King of Pop ruined the memory of every single hit song he ever made, by reminding us, just how truly fucked up he really was, and that we all need to drop our "Daddy Issues". To make the irony worse, an Iranian boy Shaheen Jafargholi sang "Who's Lovin' You" at the funeral! No, really! I guess "MJ finally got enough... because he stopped"….get it? OK then how about this one, "MJ finally shook his body down to the ground, literally". OK just one more and I'll stop, I promise, "MJ looked at the man in the mirror and died of fright".

Speaking of scary things... the US economy groaned, rolled over, and tanked like one of the whales on "Whale Wars" with that crew that is so busy fighting each other that they never seem to be able to save one. The "crisis" took the whole world economy down with it, as the banks, who were jealous of the real estate market boom, infected the stock markets around the world with doubt and a huge misunderstanding. Even though all of it was based on the "perceived value" of electronic stocks falling in perceived price, apparently enough stock brokers agreed to imagine they saw a crash, that a real one damn-near happened. The leading world governments then printed more paper (money) to counter the perception of the perceived low value of the stock market and my house. And gave it to the banks!

Speaking of perception... JAFIO, but I thought the Swine Flu was supposed to be like, bad? Words like Pandemic and H1N1 were used with grim facial expressions  on nurses and doctors, to describe what has pretty much ended up being your grade school variety of the good old flu we get each and every year. Same treatment, namely lots of rest, plenty of fluids, and the TamaFlu shot, if it gets bad enough. Regardless of whether you got last year's shot, or not, you'll likely get it. That's why I bought 1,000 shares of Hand Sanitizer!

Speaking of shots... many more will be fired in Afghanistan soon, as this year's Nobel Peace Prize winner Obama, increased the peace in Afghanistan by increasing US military presence in the last remaining 18th century quaint tribal warlord-run country left in Asia. The newly refined US policy of more troops, seems to be to balanced by buying the loyalty of Afghan soldiers with $250 per month, an all you can eat buffet, and shoes! The only problem with the plan being that the Taliban instantly upped it's recruiting bonus to $350 per month and your choice of pretty goat.

To understand or make any sense of US policy here, all you need to know is this; The US likes Mujaheddin, but hates Jihadists.

If you understand that, send your responses to: uspolicyinafghanistan@hello?nobodyactuallycaresaboutafghanistan.com

I am sure many of you feel like I missed a lot of other things that happened in 2009, but then that would leave you with nothing to say!

... so HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Disclaimer: Please feel free to post cynical or humorous comments. Due to apathy, exhaustion, and boredom, any serious discussions, literal misunderstandings, irrelevant opinions, and virtual fist fighting will be entirely therapeutic.