September 22,
2003
Archives
* ... va jaassoos shavid
This ad appeared on the New York Times online targeting
Persian speakers:
-- P.
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* Every day
I saw one of my neighbors in the elevator the other
day. She's very old. Her hand was trembling as she held
a glass wrapped in a napkin. I asked
her what it was. She said every afternoon at 3:30 she takes a glass
of fresh lemonande for the postman.
-- Nazy Sobhi
To top * Freedom?
A few days ago I had a dream that I was looking inside
a warehouse where there were whales kept in a water tank. I made
a request, and I can't remember what, but the owner (an Iranian
with
a moustache)
adamantly refused.
Moments later I was holding on to the back of a massive
whale swimming through the flooded streets of a city. It was the
most terrifying and thrilling dream. I won't forget this one.
-- Jahanshah Javid
To top * Poor husbands
A few days ago I was in a Tehran family court. There were many
Iranian men who have separated from their wives and cannot afford
to pay the "mehriye" (what
the husband promises to pay the wife upon divorce). They are thus
handcuffed and sent to prison. But Qasr prison has filled
up!!! These husbands are now being sent to Evin! In one
particular case observed, the husband had promised a "mehriye" of
400 gold coins, with each coin being worth about 85,000 tomans.
-- Pejman
Akbarzadeh, Tehran
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* Gorg
US "liberation" of Iraq reminds one of this poem by
Sa'di:
Sheneedam goosfandi raa bozorgi
rahaaneed az dahan o chang e gorgi
Shabaangah kaard bar halghash bemaaleed
Ravaan e goosfand az vey benaaleed
Kea z changaal e gorgam dar roboodi
Bedeedam aaghebat gorgam to boodi
-- Houman Younessi
To top * Iranian
Fischer
The German foreign
minister is getting divorced for the fourth time (news).
Earlier it was reported that he was having
an affair
with an Iranian student (news).
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*
A lot of donuts
When I first came to the US, I was frequently stuck in a conversation
like
this:
- What religion are you?
- I don't have any...
- What does that mean? You're Iranian right?
- Yes
- Then you've got to have a religion...
- I'm just not practicing anything...
- What is your parents' religion?
- They don't practice anything either...
- Aren't they born Muslim?
- Yes...
- Then just be proud of what you are and say you're a Muslim....
That
was when I got introduced to some deeper meanings of religion,
religion as a race not as a matter of belief. I later continued
my education in the medical feild and learned the fact that
all human genetical inforamation is packed in 46 chromosomes.
One day, I was thinking about my cousin who is half Zoroastrian.
It was
funny to imagine 23 of her chromosomes are Zoroastrian
(those she got from
her mom) and the rest are Muslim. Yet it sounded like
her cells are working
perfectly in complete harmony (she is gorgeous by the
way with a pair of
Zoroastrian eyes she got from her mom, and a Muslim nose
just like her
father's).
I remember doing medical research in
a lab and it
would take us weeks to change one simple genetic code
(DNA
sequence) in a mouse cell and I was thinking how easy
things used to be in the past. Back
1300 years ago the ersian's army was defeated by Muslim's army,
millions of Zoroastrian chormosomes changed into Muslim
chromosomes in matter of days.
PS. My cousin is dating an American guy, I wonder how
we can divide 23 by 2.
-- Arman Siavoshan
To top * There she is!
(Iranian state TV recently showed "Entrapment".
Viewers noticed the name of Catherine Zeta-Jones in the credits
-- but she had been cut out of the film. Later, those who have
satellite dishes, saw the full version on a foreign station.)
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