Archive - Aug 2007 - Article

Chef groupie

On occasion, I’m sometimes asked by certain Chefs or my industry peers to review a restaurant, or act as a Mystery Customer and review a restaurant for it’s food and service etc. Try and visualise a hot-tempered Chef asking you to go ‘undercover’ to review his own food! Surely it’s a contradiction in terms, but foolishly, I seem to always accept! I find the challenge lies in phrasing the review carefully, so not to infuriate the Chef, but get my point across. (I feel another skill listing coming on for my Resume... “Shabnam the Diplomat”) And I didn’t even have to study politics to get it!>>>

Javoonaa

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Caspian rain

FROM THE STREET, all you can see is the red brick wall that surrounds the garden, the giant mulberry and persimmon trees, and the top floor of the house, which rises higher than the wall. Inside are three bedrooms, a living room with a gold-leaf painted ceiling, a dining room with a round balcony that overlooks the yard. There are porcelain tubs in the bathrooms, a fireplace in the kitchen, sunlight everywhere you look: all the doors, even the one leading into the kitchen, are made of etched and mirrored glass. They reflect not only the inside of each room and the light from all the windows, but also the images cast in the other doors -- creating an endless echo of shapes and colors that go on for as far as the eye can see.>>>

Only option

For more than 3 years now, the same arguments have been traded and recycled in US policy talking/making circles regarding Iran's nuclear program and what must be done to stop it. Most "analyzes" go something like this: Iran can't have nuclear weapons because it would upset the balance of power in the Middle East (thus revoking Israel's cart blanche uses of force against whomever, wherever), would trigger an arms race (in which arms dealers would make a killing), and would destabilize the entire region (since it is so stable right now in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lebanon, etc...). The conversation has boiled down to 3 options--do nothing, attack Iran, or sanction now and try to negotiate. Two of which are pointless in my opinion (guess which ones!), leaving only one viable option on the table.>>>

What matters is her work

This is the second time in as many months that someone has written a piece attacking poor Parsipur and defending Mahshid Amirshahi on the grounds of the former's personal opinions on certain issues. Grow up, people. And this nonsense is coming from individuals obviously living abroad. Who cares what a writer thinks about this or that issue, what matters is her work. If we were to disqualify writers and filmmakers and poets based on their politics or positions on social issues then T.S. Elliot or Ezra Pound should never be read.>>>

Coming to getcha

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Time traveler’s nightmare

Sometimes a loss is best left alone because looking back may entail a whole new defeat we can no longer handle. That’s how I felt when I visited Turkey, a land with an uncanny resemblance to Iran of forty years ago>>>

Juvie court

Today is my first time appearing at Juvenile Court. Juvenile Court or "Juvie", as some in-crowd criminal defense attorneys call it, is different than a regular courtroom. This one especially is a trip... it's next to a golf course and looks like an elementary school>>>

Citizen of the world

Walking in the flatness of this world,
listening to the same old abrupt sound.
What if our memories hadn't been lost
and our ancestors claimed the laces of our roots?
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Ode To #148240

those eyes deserve a home
that glare and the stare
should fall on eyes
that reflect back >>>

American ideals

It is as if we are
In a horrific dream
What has happened to us?
Is this what we are about? >>>

Azizam, Azat Motenaferam

You arrogant prick!
Thinking of you makes me god damn sick.
How could I, the strong one, be so easily deceived?
You crawled in, little by little, inch by inch...
>>>

Mystic, misfit

lover of longing's songs
and whispered promises
born exile,
homeless at last >>>

L= The Markov Chain

It was an evening in June
When like a monsoon
Liberation came (with the capital L)
With a single name (for which I fell) >>>

Metal Sanaz