TUPAC

Living Dead

The inevitability of life in the mind of the dead

19-Apr-2012 (one comment)
Two American rappers about to go on tour are considering reviving their colleague to join them in holographic form – because he’s dead. Earlier this week CGI wizardry allowed Tupac Shakur, gunned down in Las Vegas 1996, to join his contemporaries Snoop Dogg and Dr Dre at the Coachela festival in California to perform his song Gangsta Party. Pac had barely changed at all: muscles rippling, bounce, and his distinctive tattoo, if now rather ironically, declaring: Thug Life>>>

KHAYYAM

زمان، زمان حال است

شباهت های همینگوی به خیّام

19-Apr-2012 (4 comments)
در مورد خیّام و همینگوی تا آنجا که من مطالعه کرده و می دانم تاثیر و ارتباط مستقیمی در کار نبوده است و آنها با فاصله ای حدود ٩٠٠ سال در دو گوشۀ مختلف جهان می زیسته اند ولی نکته اینجاست که با وجود اختلاف زمان و مکان، دو انسان چگونه می توانند یک سان بیندیشند، جهان را به یک گونه ببینند و حقایق را به یک شیوه به زیر پوست خود حسّ کنند>>>

BOOK

The Forbidden

Poems from Iran and its Exiles

19-Apr-2012 (3 comments)
The poems I have selected for this anthology represent the young, the old and the ancient. Although this anthology is divided into six sections, each a complete nugget, I suggest you read this collection from front to back because each poem is a musical note carefully sequenced so that by the time you finish the last poem you can hear the powerful symphony of the poets’ voices>>>

POETRY

The Pilgrim
19-Apr-2012
So he finally gathered his courage
which merely fit in a side pocket
and ventured south, in haze and heat.
One laden bus after another in wait,
the metal of the handlebars porous
from honest hands, or not, but too beat
>>>

WASHINGTON

من راضی ام

در حاشيهء کنفرانس مهرداد مشايخی در واشنگتن

16-Apr-2012 (9 comments)
در اين کنفرانس من توضيح دادم که از نظر ما انحلال طلبان «گذار به دموکراسی» نام ديگری جز برانداختن حکومت اسلامی بهر صورت ممکن، انحلال ساختار آن و لغو قانون اساسی اش ندارد و در مسير مبارزه برای اين هدف ما همهء اصلاح طلبان و اقمارشان را تخته سنگی فرو افتاده در راه خود می دانيم>>>

RACE

Persian for Peace

"Lord knows where we would be if the Athenians hadn't pulled the upset against the Persians." Huh?

16-Apr-2012 (3 comments)
Usually on the night before a marathon or an ultra-marathon race, we eat early and try to go to bed early. To relax and ease ourselves into asleep, we often read something inspiring or the information materials given to us at the race expo to make sure we have all the necessary information. The night before the 2010 race, I was doing just that. In the middle of the official publication of the Boston Marathon Association I came across an article that woke me up completely, and indeed distressed me>>>

WWII

Echoes of Polish Isfahan

Traces of the Polish wartime exodus to Iran

15-Apr-2012 (9 comments)
There was once a time when the streets of Isfahan echoed to the sounds of Polish songs, when thousands of little Polish girls made their way to school (or work) along the Chahar Bagh in their smart maroon jerseys and grey pleated skirts. It is hard to believe today: but from 1942 to 1945 Isfahan was home to an army of young Polish orphans (mostly girls) who found safety and freedom in Iran after years of forced detention in Siberian labour camps>>>

TITANIC

غرق تایتانیک

مطمئنم که سرنوشت تایتانیک در انتظار همه ماست

15-Apr-2012
وزیر ارشاد بعد از کلی من و من جراتی به خود داد و گفت: قربان امسال مصادف است با یکصدمین سال غرق کشتی مجلل و مسافربری تایتانیک در سال 1912. فیلم های زیادی در این باره ساخته شده ولی آخرین آنها با شرکت دی کاپریو واقعاً محشر است البته این فیلم از محصولات هالیوود است ولی همین هم فرصتی است تا نگاهی به زندگی پر تجمل سرمایه داران آمریکائی و اروپائی در اوایل قرن بیستم بیندازید >>>

POETRY

زاینده رود

برای نفیسه

15-Apr-2012 (one comment)
انگشت بزن! انگشت بزن!
هر آنچه خورده ای پس خواهی داد:
تلخ ها، ترش ها و شورها
پسابه های رود، لجن و لای >>>

DONKEY

Beh Name Khar

From the "Rajazzalin" album

14-Apr-2012 (13 comments)
...>>>

NUCLEAR

Time is not on Iran's side

Sanctions are something the regime cannot ignore

13-Apr-2012 (10 comments)
DW: Talks between the so-called 5+1 and Iran in 2011 failed to yield any progress whatsoever. So are this weekend's negotiations just an empty exercise? Meir Javedanfar: I think the talks are important for both sides. President Obama is facing an election in 2012 and needs to show that he gave diplomacy a chance. And on the Iranian side Ayatollah Khamenei is facing the toughest economic sanctions the Islamic Republic has ever been confronted with, which could lead to the collapse of the economy. The regime could not survive that>>>

VIEW

Old School Diplomacy

Nuclear talks in Turkey

13-Apr-2012 (one comment)
This weekend if you're not busy, why not head on over to Turkey for some fun? You too can stay at a nice hotel, have some surprisingly good Turkish food, see the sights, and try your hand at the new casino being set up for Iran, the US, and some other lesser countries who will irresponsibly gamble the futures of their peoples away with misguided attempts at what we can only call posing>>>

FOOTNOTE

Fiddler in the attic

Review of Asghar Farhadi's Oscar rival

13-Apr-2012 (3 comments)
I saw ‘Footnote’ with a dear friend of mine. Neither of us is Jewish, or speaks Hebrew. Nor has either of us seen an Israeli movie before. While still young at heart, neither of us has been exempt from the tyranny of time or biology. Our interest in seeing this film had more to do with the fact that (a), it did compete against ‘A Separation’ in the foreign language category of the 2012 Academy Awards, and (b), from what we had read about its plot here and there, it had a theme familiar to both of us>>>

MEDIA

Manoto Bahai?!

Islamic Republic “Journalism” at its best

13-Apr-2012 (4 comments)
This morning, an Iranian-based website entitled “Young Journalists Club,” whose slogan reads, “The Largest Persian Language News Agency In the World,” published an article with the following headline: “When the Veils of Deception are Rent Asunder: Membership in the Misguided Sect of ‘Bahaism’ as a Chief Condition of Employment with a Document Enclosed as Proof”cThe Article goes on to introduce a UK based website named “You and I” and notes that the efforts of its editors, who are directly financed by the “Royal Elements">>>

STORY

Ashura

Short story winner in UK writer's competition

13-Apr-2012 (2 comments)
That year autumn started with gusts of winds carrying dust, bits of hay and stench of dung. Dark-grey clouds gathered and frowned over the village. Flocks of carrion crows invaded the rooftops, branches of trees, and edges of the walls – cawing incessantly. The village folk were agitated because they were going to commemorate Ashura. Morose-looking, bearded young men were dressed in long, black shirts. Women, wrapped in black chadors, scurried silently in the narrow lanes and alleyways>>>