Letters
September 5-8, 2000 / Shahrivar 15-18, 1379
Today
* Race:
- Why are we so rude?
- Persians & Aryans & ...
* dAyi Hamid:
- Knowledge & wealth
Previous
* Chat:
- Why do we forsake each other?
* History:
- Little people's history
- Putting down plumbers
* Nude:
- Free expression has no limit
- Some have wider view
* Iran-U.S.:
- Sarah Wright's granddaughter
* Googoosh:
- We forget
- Googoosh, Khomeini & the moon
- Tears for Googoosh, not just Iran
email us
Friday,
September 8, 2000
* Why are we so rude?
Regarding the article "Qaziyeh-ye
nejad" by Mohandes: I have so many questions but I can't come
up with any answers! I just want to know why we think that we are the best,
and nobody is like us? Why are we proud of what happened 3,000 years ago,
while we have nothing now?! I mean just look at us now! What happened to
that huge empire? And what are we now?! If we are the best, and the rest
of the world is nothing, how come we are all refugees in America, Europe...?
Has anyone ever thought of this? The pride we have for 3,000 year old things
has made us so blind that we can't see our present situation or think
about our future FULL
TEXT
Sara S.
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* Persians & Aryans & ...
Regarding the article "Qaziyeh-ye
nejad" by Mohande: intoor ke az maghaaleye shomaa daryaaftam,
shomaa bishtar dar in soe`tafaahom gharaar daaarid taa digaraan. nemedunam
ke cheraa in maghaale raa IRANIAN ejzaseye chaap daade az anjaa ke in eshtebaahe
shomaa, meetune baraaye deegaran ham olgoo baashe!
inkeh mardoome aam dar in baareh che megooyand hamisheh baa hagheeghat
hamsaaz nist. zamaani bood ke mardoom, khomeiny raa dar maah didand va
hamaknoon ham in eshtebaahaat meetune rookh bede FULL
TEXT
Nick
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* Knowledge & wealth
Thank you for dAyi Hamid's article "Elm
behtar ast yaa servat?". It brought back a lot of memories from
many many years ago, when I was in 4th or 5th grade in the Jahanbani elementary
school in Tehran.
In those days life was very simple and specially people were more simple
and innocent. What a shame that those days have long gone and will never
will be repeated.
Just like you, I obviously chose knowledge over wealth in my essay.
I agree with you that in this capitalist society we need money to have
a comfortable life. The bottom line is that we need both knowledge and
wealth together.
Ahmad Poudratchi
West Palm Beach, FL.
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Thursday
September 7, 2000
* Free expression has no limit
In reply to the comment made by one of the readers regarding nude art
on the cover
of The Iranian ["Hope God guides you (or
destroys you)"]: As an artist and scientist I believe in freedom
of expression, art has no limit!
I would like to remind the reader that we came to this world without
the hejab. Why should women cover their hair? Just because men can not
control their sexuality and get aroused easily by women's appearance?
Try wearing a scarf on a hot summer day and then see if you can say:
"I ask God to guide you and if not destroy you!"
God should not be feared. God does not destroy.
Morteza Loghmani
www.morteza.org
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* Little people's history
Regarding Mr. Khodadad Rezakhani's view of how Iranian history should
be studied in the universities ["Not
too deep"]:
First off, I certainly hope that "every midwife and plumber"
*DOES* come up to you and give you the reasons why an historical event
took place. History -emphatically- *IS NOT AND SHOULD NOT BE* the bastion
of elite historians and researchers who get bogged down in the minutiae
of a war that took place 25,00 years ago.
History is lived everyday by all of us, we each have our own version
of it, and frankly no amount of "historical documentation" makes
the lived experience of the "midwife or plumber" down the street
any less valid than the recorded version the scholars proffer >>>
FULL TEXT
Laleh Khalili
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* We forget
I agree with Nicole
Radmand's comment about Shahyar Ghanbari. Unfortunately we always forget
the people behind a successful singer. In Googoosh's case, nobody denies
her talent, her voice, her appearance and the emotion and feelings she
puts in her songs.
It is interesting to know that Ghanbari started his career as a song
writer at 18 years of age and he wrote"Deegeh ashkam vasseh man naaz
meekoneh" for Googoosh. Before that, she used to sing other singer's
songs. Ghanbari wrote about 25 songs for Googoosh. Coincidentally, "Hejrat"
was the last song that Ghanbari wrote for her >>>
FULL TEXT
Simin Habibian
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Wednesday
September 6, 2000
* Sarah Wright's granddaughter
To Robert Burgener, author of "Iran's
American martyr": My name is Laura McDowell, the granddaughter
of now-deceased Sarah Wrigh who grew up in Tabriz during the early 1900's.
She was the daughter of Presbyterian missionaries John and Mattie Wright.
She was also a personal friend of Howard Baskerville's.
I've had the great fortune to read a diary she wrote when she was 15.
In it, she details the news of Baskerville's death and his April 21 funeral.
The diary is a very interesting portrayal of the rich events and mosaic
of personalities and cultures in the area at the time.
Sarah ultimately married Phillip McDowell, who was also from a long
line of Presbyterian missionaries in Iran. They raised my father, David,
in Iran along with their other children: Martha, Phillip and Ed. I enjoyed
your article. It has helped me put my grandmother's diary in context.
Laura McDowell
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* Why do we forsake each other?
What I found most interesting about Mr. Mosadegh's piece ["Love
at first click"] was not even of his own doing. His piece is so
arrogant and egotistical that I was forced to laugh a little bit as I was
reading -- but it did make me think about the idea of human interaction.
What really makes this piece an interesting read is how Mosadegh characterizes
his marriage as "a happy marriage." He found a beautiful, humble
and submissive wife whom he sees as perfect -- yet he falls in love with
an anonymous confidante via the Internet. Technology is his culprit --
the cause of isolation and what drives us expose ourselves from the safety
of a modem connection.
I guess I'll leave this letter with a final question and thought: I
don't understand why we forsake each other in person and seek each other
from the safety of distance. And why choose a partner to build a life with
if that person does not engender your trust and rouse your emotions? Food
for thought.
An Iranian javan
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* Putting down plumbers
Mr. Rezakhani's article ["Not
too deep"] is anything but deep. And isn't it a little insecure
to put down midwives and plumbers in an effort to obatin identity and make
a confused and incoherent point?
If Mr. Rezakhani is a historian, no wonder why "every midwife or
plumber" feels free to express views on the subject matter--while
not wasting time carrying out the necessary "research" of the
type that in any case apparently only Mr. Rezakhani knows how to do.
I also advise Mr. Rezakhani not to envisage lecturing an electrical
engineer (let alone a midwife) how to do their job! Signal processing (not
to talk of bringing people into this world) is too valuable for him to
pester with.
Hossein Samiei
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Tuesday
September 5, 2000
* Googoosh, Khomeini & the moon
In the midst of all the hyper-adoration of the legendary Googoosh ["Baptized
in tears"], undoubtedly the most influential and mimicked Iranian
cultural icon in the past century, it may be relevant to remember that
at the time of the Iranian republican revolution she is said to have seen
the likeness of the Ayatollah Khomeini on the face of the moon and eulogized
the leader of the revolution, only to be sent packing, shut up and left
to sing in private, as she has said, for her husband. On the occasion of
her second coming, the irony should not be lost that the future that she
promoted robbed her of twenty years of artisitic life, for which we are
all the more poor.
Guive Mirfendereski
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* Tears for Googoosh, not just Iran
In addition to the "Malaagheh"
letter, I would like to respond to "Baptized
in tears" gibberish as well, point by point, and more. I was also
at the New York concert. Yes, everyone was crying but every tear shed was
out of joy. Rozeh khooni is a melancholic event. The comparison was absolutely
irrelevant.
I have never known an artist being able to make 15,000 people cry at
the same time. All the tears were shed for Googoosh and not just Iran and
nostalgia of good old days. If Iran had never experienced a revolution
and was still under Pahlavi monarchy and Googoosh had still decided not
to sing for 21 years, the same tears and wave of emotions would have existed
in her concert >>>
FULL TEXT
Fariba Behnegar
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* Some have wider view
In reply to Mehdi Payravi's letter "Hope God guides
you (or destroys you)": You should not assume that you can speak
on behalf of all Iranians. Some Iranians have a wider view that doesn't
exclude any aspect of human experience from the realm of what art can legitimately
address.
Zara Houshmand
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Monday
September 4, 2000
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