POETRY

Bougainvillea
by Majid Naficy
27-Feb-2011 (2 comments)
You and I planted this flower
And placed it on my balcony
So when you are not here
I find your image
On its paper petals >>>

SIGNS

Forget About 1979

How Egypt 2011 is (and is not) like Iran 2009

by Shervin Malekzadeh
26-Feb-2011 (5 comments)
Is Egypt like Iran? It is a comparison that just a month ago would have been unthinkable. During the height of the 2009 protests in Iran, the Washington Post ran an article under the headline, “Arab Activists Watch Iran and Wonder: ‘Why Not Us?’” Now, with Mubarak gone and a resurgent Green Movement again taking to the streets across the Islamic Republic, the question has been unexpectedly reversed: Could Iran become like Egypt? Many Iranians look to Egypt and wonder, why not us?>>>

MIDEAST

The New World Order

Young people cleaning up corrupt, arrogant and wasteful autocracies

by Ardeshir Ommani
26-Feb-2011 (16 comments)
The Arab and Muslim nations in a short span of time, less than a month proved that for self-governance and real democracy – and not just corporate money-dictated elections – they have no need for a bully like George W. Bush at the head of a group of militarists from Texas and Zionist thieves from Brooklyn, New York to come down seven thousand miles to force the sword of "democracy and civility" down their throat, using bullets, depleted uranium, bombs, drones and the terrorists of Black Water Xe>>>

MESS

The Curse of the British Map Maker

How organized THEIR Middle East looked!

by bahmani
26-Feb-2011 (7 comments)
Once again, the world has been turned upside down by the Curse of the British Map Maker. Once upon a time, after the British army successfully turned back the scourge of the Ottoman Empire, the British Map Maker went to work. Being English, and naturally anal retentive, he could not stand the irregularities of the borderless Arabia and Northern Africa (and later Sub Saharan Africa but that is another story for another bed-time), and with an extra long ruler and an extra sharp pencil, began drawing straight lines in the sand. For fun and profit>>>

POETRY

نچکیده
by akoohbor
25-Feb-2011 (5 comments)
گاهی نور
خسته از تابش
پشت کرکره ابر
آرام در خواب است
و ما صدای هق هق اش را
از ابر می شنویم >>>

TRAVELER

Extremism Alongside Moderation

Cairo’s present is in the past

by Keyvan Tabari
23-Feb-2011
The story of today’s Cairo is writ in the past. It is not just the Pyramids and the Sphinx of ancient times, it is also the monuments of Cairo’s Islamic history that make it so “now”. Here lie the double-tale symbols of the Sunni-Shiite clash and co-existence, as well as the fault lines of both “extremism” and “moderation” in a resurgent Islam that now preoccupies the concerns of much of the world. The visitors who flock to see the likes of Tutankhamun’s jewels are at peril of remaining innocent for ignoring all others that Cairo has to offer>>>

GREEN

شکستن مرزهای خودی و ناخودی

منشوری که تمامیت جنبش سبز را نمایندگی نمی‌کند

by Hossein Bagher Zadeh
23-Feb-2011 (6 comments)
اگر در هشت ماهه اول پس از انتخابات ریاست جمهوری خرداد ۸۸ شعارهای اصلاحی در حرکت‌های خیابانی وجه غالب را داشت و به تدریج شعارهای ساختارشکن نمود پیدا می‌کرد، در تظاهرات اعتراضی ۲۵ بهمن به وضوح شعارهای اخیر عمومیت یافته بود. این تظاهرات نشان داد که جنبش سبز اکنون از مرحله خواسته‌های اصلاحی در محدوده قانون اساسی جمهوری اسلامی گذشته و با هدف‌گیری شخص خامنه‌ای و ولایت فقیه موجودیت نظام را زیر سؤال برده است>>>

PRISONER

Hengameh in Hell

Award-winning journalist in Islamic Republic's prison

by Elham Yaghoubian
23-Feb-2011 (9 comments)
In a cold, concrete cell at Tehran’s Evin prison sits 36-year Hengameh Shahidi, a single mother to one little girl. The well-respected, award winning journalist and fervent women’s rights advocate was recently sentenced to a 6-year prison term for “conspiring against the Islamic regime.” In the Islamic Republic of Iran, promoting Women Rights and speaking out against violations at the hands of the reigning Ayatollahs is clearly, a grave crime>>>

GIANT

من و دوست غولم

با يك ماچ نمي شد همه اش را بوسيد

by Fatemeh Zarei
23-Feb-2011 (9 comments)
دراز كشيدم رو كاناپه و سرم را گذاشتم رو شكم نرم و گنده آقا غوله. شكمش عين بالش بادي سفري بود. از آن هايي كه وسطش قد يك كله گود شده. قشنگ سرم رو گودي ناف غول جونم كيپ شده بود. او هم داشت موهاي مرا بهم مي ريخت. به خيال خودش داشت نوازشم مي كرد. اينقدر ترسيده بودم كه شرايط حرص خورن از اينكه يكي با دست هايي به آن گنده گي موهايم را درهم و برهم مي كند و مي كشد و مي كَنَد را نداشتم>>>

CULTURE

Yeki bood yeki nabood

Our culture – assaulted as it may seem - still maintains its profound beauty

by Ghahremani
23-Feb-2011
Among a pile of forwards I happened to receive a nice clip about the beginning phrase of Iranian fairytales, Yeki-bood-yeki nabood - one was and one wasn’t. And it went on to conclude that such a phrase being hammered into us from childhood may well be the reason why we choose to be alone, always “yeki” and never a team. That if one is there, the other is absent. As if someone had just offered the best food for my eccentric thoughts, my mind took off and hard as I’ve tried, I haven’t been able to get rid of it>>>

POETRY

صدای بهار
by Alef Mahan
23-Feb-2011 (2 comments)
اینجا زمستان است صدای بهار
مُچها جوانه زدند
آسفالت هم سبز شد زیرِ پاها
چاره‌ای نیست
باید شكفت یا مُرد
>>>

FREEDOM

Not Just A Number

Problems? Someone across the ocean that has it worse

by Sherry Ahkami
21-Feb-2011 (4 comments)
We forget that there are children, yes children, who are literally dying for a glimpse of the freedom we take for granted. They are risking their lives, so that they too can create an environment where their country can prosper through their ability to be free. Free to simply obtain the right of a human being. Instead every time they try to vocalize these rights, rights that are so natural to us here in North America, they are treated like objects. Beaten to the point where many are slowly dying on the streets in agony and pain>>>

UPHEAVAL

Clear Shift

Khamenei's hypocrisy has surely not been lost on Iran's youth

by Masoud Shafaee
21-Feb-2011 (4 comments)
The Islamic Republic finds itself in a precarious position. As protests in Egypt grew, the regime could no longer stay silent on such a seismic shift in its backyard. The official spin -- calling it an Egyptian "Islamic awakening" -- was of course necessitated by its own crackdown on post-election protests in 2009 and into last year. While such propaganda may serve well with older and more susceptible classes, Iran's youth knows the power of information and watched Egypt's youth achieve what they could not: the overthrow of their ruling dictator>>>

IRAN

Changing From Within

I will not see it happen in my lifetime

by bahmani
21-Feb-2011 (44 comments)
The key thing that many seem to forget or ignore is the way Iran's legal system and constitution is set up. This is the crucial point for all of us to get through our heads, because as wishful as we all are for various levels of reform to occur, it simply can't, according to established Iranian Law and it's strange Constitution. It is currently a felony crime to suggest that Iran's constitution be changed>>>

IRANIUM

Radioactive Fear

Propaganda to instill fear into the hearts and minds of Americans

by Touraj Daryaee
21-Feb-2011 (7 comments)
There is now a new semi-documentary, semi-science fiction propaganda film in the US, entitled Iranium (Iran + Uranium). As an Iranian-American, after watching the film, I felt angry that here we were with another Hollywood film demonizing Iranians. This of course had started with the movie Not Without My Daughter filmed in 1991 in Neve Ilan, Israel about Iran. Then there was more, more recently the movie 300 which took the IEDs wielding Persians (same as Iranians) to the sixth century BCE, against the freedom-loving Spartans>>>
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