Long awaited return

Fields of Change is also a definite change in direction from the last couple of albums which according to Sepehr were largely dominantly produced by the labels they used to be with. This effort is their first independent effort and the result of what they think sounds good to them, rather than a result of corporate marketing listener surveys from American-advertising fed New Age stations. Don't get me wrong, you will enjoy owning very single album you buy, the signature S&S sound is always tight, multi-layered, and an elegantly thoughtful, construct of harmonic sounds and encouraging and exotic beats woven together to bring about a convergence that is, in a word, pleasing.>>>

زیبای بی نام ونشان

رونا بالباسی که شبیه لباس کولی های دورگرد داره بغل ساحل ایستاده. اونوزاد یک ساله اش رادرون کوله پشتی که باپارچه ساده ای درست کرده درپشت خود قرارداده. رنگ لباس رونابارنگ خاکهای بغل ساحل تطبیق میده وچهره اورادرمقابل آفتاب داغی که همه فضارااحاطه کرده زیباترنشان میده. شنهای داغ زیر پای رونا اورابیاد فیلم ده فرمان میاندازه که آدمهاباپاهای برهنه توی بیابانها سرگردان بودند. آبهای آسمانی رنگ دریا بااینکه آرام آرام بهم برخورد میکنند نشان دهنده یک طوفان درونی است که درعمق دریا بطوردائم مسیری راطی میکند. سنگها وصخره های زیبا وشکست ناپذیرباعث تقویت قلب رونا میشوند.>>>

Maman jan

My mum has come to visit from the UK. [Brief description of my mum: a feisty lady whose age is a state secret - the very mention of it (or her height) will see her expression change to one of contempt. So nobody who knows her will ever go there. Except that is, my sister. My sister, Soheila, is fast turning into my mum. They share so many traits and similarities that they have been mistaken for sisters. Which has left my mum feeling elated and my sister staring daggers at the person who made the observation.]>>>

Dinosaurs & Religions

Religions obviously have created a niche for themselves and have survived and multiplied for millenia on earth. That brings up the analogy between religions and dinosaurs. Dinosaurs ruled the earth for millions of years and some biologists believe that they created an impasse for evolution. Meaning the meandering of the genes and random mutations took evolution on a path in the fitness landscape that was pretty much an impasse. Appearance of humans and intelligence would have been unlikely as long as this behemoths were ruling the earth.>>>

The Geniuses

Neither of them were bums, first off, the black bum or the Mexican bum. They were men, and a world that had somehow decided that it was going to include bums had decided to include them, and it was very nice to think that their situation was fixable, that hard work and determination could lift them out of it, but none of that changed the fact that a man who was down on his luck for a day was a man who was down on his luck for a day, and a man who was down on his luck for years was a bum. The Mexican bum could do fine among the people of the Richmond District of San Francisco. He could smile with them and he could hold the door open for them outside Gordo's Taqueria on Geary Street, making sweeping chivalric gestures towards women>>>

قداست و عقب ماندگی

روزگاری نيمايوشيج، پدر شعر نوی فارسی، داستانی نوشت به نام «مرقد آقا» تا نشان دهد که چگونه ذهن قداست بين و معجزه طلب از درخت و چوب خشگ هم می تواند امامزاده بسازد و آنگاه بر اين «قداست خود پرداخته» دخيل ببندد و از آن شفا و دفع بلا بطلبد. اگر آنچه او نوشت قصه بود و محصول خيال، ما اما، در همين بيست و چند سالهء اخير، با چشم خود شاهد ايجاد يک «مرقد آقا» ی ديگر بوده ايم. اول فقيهی از اهالی قم را مقام امامت بخشيده ايم و آنگاه، از «اين همانی» ی امامت او با امامت امامان دوازدهگانهء تشيع، او را صاحب معجزه و کرامت دانسته ايم، عکسش را در ماه ديده ايم، و رفته رفته او را به مقام عصمت و معصوميت رسانده ايم. سپس، امام که ساخته شد، بايد برايش مرقدی در خور امامتش بسازيم، بارگاهی بنا کنيم، به دور قبرش ضريحی فراهم آوريم، برايش زيارتنامه درست کنيم و زيارتش را با تشريفات خاص امامان همراه سازيم؛>>>

Things have to change

Israel recently marked its 60th anniversary, at a time of great upheaval all over the Middle East and while the Israeli society is divided on a number of issues. In many ways, the leaders of the Israeili State have not achieved what its founders meant to do - create a secure, democratic state based on social and economic justice for all the citizens. Israelis may enjoy freedom but the freedom of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians whose land, property, livelihood, trees, gardens and homes have been destroyed is nowhere in sight. For the majority of Palestinians, this is, instead, the anniversary of what they call "al-Nakba." In Arabic, it means catastrophe>>>

Best kind of love

Maestro Loris Tjeknavorian was a guest of Berkeley Persian Center in the San Francisco Bay Area in March. A suite from his opera, Rostam and Sohrab, was to be performed by East Bay Symphony Orchestra on March 14th at the Paramount Theatre. The weekend before the performance I had the great fortune of meeting the Maestro at Darvag Group’s play in Berkeley, where I tagged along with him and some other good friends to a restaurant in Berkeley’s Gourmet Ghetto area. We had time for a brief chat, so I asked him what he would like to talk about, and he chose the subject of “love”! He also gave me the CD of his “Love Songs”, telling me stories about how he became inspired to write those melodies>>>

Don't be scared

Iran will not be attacked because Iran’s retaliation would trigger an out of control escalation which would require nuclear weapons to put an end to. Also, the rapid cycle of retaliations would most likely force Russia’s hand. Only recently Putin said, “An attack on Iran would be an attack on Russia.” The central reason Iran would be attacked would be to gain control of its oil and gas and attempting to achieve this through military means is close to impossible and would be too disruptive to the oil dependent world economy.>>>

Oh no, not another Persian rug shop

Some years ago, well before I began traveling regularly to Iran, I started to understand the disconnect between the way Iran was portrayed in the American news media and what I suspected the reality would be like. When I first went to Iran in 2001 it didn't take long to realize I was right, but it has taken all the years since to understand what was wrong and lacking from so much of that coverage, and still holes remain. Now the coverage always strikes me as simply one-dimensional representations; caricatures of a perceived reality>>>

Sir; are you Iranian too?

It was more than 35 years ago when I entered the United States for the first time, a non-stop flight from Tehran to New York City by Iran Air. I carried a big orange suitcase in my right hand full of stuff including half a dozen hand-made shorts packed into the suitcase by my mother, as if I was going to a shortless country, an English-Persian dictionary in my left hand, $2100 in my pocket, and a burning desire to succeed in my heart. Tehran and a couple of other Iranian cities were the only places I had traveled to before coming to the United States. I was acting like a nincompoop, bewildered and baffled. Any observer can surmise from my behavior that I was not a regular tourist. I felt like a functionary who was dispatched to an unknown territory for a really important mission>>>

لیز! لیز!

باز یک همکار جدید! دختر جوانی است با چشمانی زیبا و شاد و قامتی رعنا. لباس پوشیدنش در عین کلاسیک بودن شیک است! بالاخره سر صحبت را باز می کنیم، خوش صحبت است و خندان، و برعکس من که چشمان غمگین و تیره ای دارم او چشمانی شاد و روشن دارد. موقع حرف زدن "ر" ها را بدجوری کش می دهد، هیچ نمی توانم لهجه اش را حدس بزنم، آخر سر ازش می پرسم: "کجایی هستی؟" با همان چشمان شوخ و شنگ پاسخم می دهد: "آمریکایی! ایالات متحده!" با حیرت نگاهش می کنم و آخرش به حرف می آیم و از او می پرسم: "ناراحت نمی شوی اگر به تو بگویم من ایرانی هستم! ... از پارس باستان!">>>