Adventures of Mr.Behi

Cleaning Friday

The last weekend before Iranian new year and we are trying to put ourselves in new year atmosphere. Election is on inside Iran and I am sure I could see people shopping and I could go out and buy stuff for our "haft-seen" collection if I was there (look at the one we had once in our apartment in Tehran). Outside where we are in a place where there is no significant number of Iranians, instead of getting a ready to use green plate, we had to grow the seeds ourselves. After trying a couple of different types of seeds in the market, Mrs.Behi has been so passionately watching and caring for the seeds to grow and there are some signs of growth (see her wishing for the best). Read more about Iranian new year

One of the most important customs is the cleanup that we Iranians do every year before the new year arrives. Many in Iran are probably finished doing that or are doing this now. Likewise, the Islamic system of Iran has apparently done some significant cleanup in the list of parliamentary candidates and like all previous elections, many were disqualified. This is not something new in the system so I shall stop talking loud about the limitations and lack of freedom in Iran. Like all previous rounds of elections, this one is far from perfect and for sure there is no chance is given to people to elect someone against the system. Yet, at least there is an election and because parliament seats are dedicated to states and counties, down to districts and small cities, there is a chance of having at least a bunch who are critiques of current government slogans especially some who can question the government in what it claims in reaching for people in remote areas and its populist propaganda. There is little choice here and people shall choose between a complete pro-ahmadinejad parliament and a little less complete pro-ahmadinejad parliament with a reformist fraction. In the last presidential election many did not vote for reformists and pragmatists with the argument that  "Anyway! there are all the same and with the leader on top, it will not make any difference"...I had a lard time convincing those people that leaving the field will just make it easier for the opponent to score...and they did...

New year is here and there will be many days of holidays...people will be busy with their new year affairs and the hard-line party has already done a good cleanup to make the next parliament suited to its purpose. That is supposed to be the house of the people...they might have cleaned it up with an odorous sweep but shall we let them to re-decorate it as well with the owners of the house watching them stand still? Physics tell us that with doing nothing, no mechanical work will be done...and to be honest, at least there are elections...do we like it better to be like a sheikhdom or kingdom as some countries around us?
I shall get back to cleaning...   

The Orbiting Dream

The news was a real surprise: Iran launched a rocket to space to add yet another surprising stride to the basket of its advanced science collection. After active stem cell research and a really noisy nuclear program, I guess we shall now be happy about having something up there rotating! Oh we already had an Iranian lady who became the first woman space tourist. I remember when I was a graduate student, I spent some time as an intern in a government-owned agency in Tehran and our job was to analyze satellite images for environmental and meteorological studies. Many of these satellite were and still are out there with their images publicly available for purchase. That was well before the age of GoogleEarth and what we were doing was very classy and Hi-Tech. This agency later got transformed and merged into Iranian Space Agency. I remember seeing a couple of graduate students of IT and Telecom in one of the rooms spending a multi-million dollar grant to design a communication satellite together with the Chinese :)

When the agency started before the revolution, we were the big friend of the Americans and were the first in the region into which US started transferring space imaging technology. Near Tehran there was a huge imaging factory with a monster satellite receiver. The receiver had the serial number ending to 001, the first of its kind to be built for the purpose of receiving images from a new earth observing satellite for civilian applications. The station soon hibernated after the revolution. And now we sent a rocket!. I would be happy though if we really could have achieved the domestic potential to carry something that far but I hope it is really true and not like another thing bought from the Russians and the Chinese. Russia is practically sweeping its soviet warehouses to sell to Iran and China with its garbage quality exports, cheap labor and the VETO power has been busy waving its spider web for the Iranian cash.

Ahmadinejad needs a tour of the Student Park

These days while the story of Columbia University is still hot, Iranian blogs show their anger on both remarks of Columbia president and lies of Iran's president. The claim that he made about homosexuals that they don't exist in Iran in the way they exist everywhere else, looked like a joke in the first place just like many of his prior statements but created a set of furious reactions in Iranian blog sphere not just because of the topic of "Homosexuals" but because Ahmadinejad's tradition of denial. You ask him about x issue and he says: what x issue? who told you that? He did so for high inflation rate and high prices in Iran and also about lack of freedom of speech. Many of bloggers like Masih Alinejad reacted to the recent claim by suggesting him to tour "The student Park" in downtown Tehran where many believe is one of the main hangouts of the undercover gay population of Tehran.

The student park or "park-e Daneshjoo" is in downtown Tehran adjacent to the famous city theater hall. I grew up and lived in the downtown and can vividly remember how this park transformed in years. The name of the park came from old times and I remember when I was five and used to go in the play ground in there, tens of university students from the nearby Tehran university used to hang out there with their books, making study groups on the grass. The city theater has been one of the main attractions for art lovers and attracted theater fans to the neighborhood of the park whenever a good play was around.

Later when I was a high school student, they built a library in the back of the park. I was not a member of that library but it became so famous around the town as a place where student boys and girls used to start friendships. Later, the authorities divided working days of the library between boys and girls to prevent that.

When I became a university student, the lovely tradition of studying in that park was history and those scenes could barely be seen. The park was famous then as a hang out of drug dealers and prostitutes especially during the night but since then, you could see young boys with make up holding hands around the area and the student park hosted this very controversial group of people. Recently, the park hosted a very famous women demonstrations that was cracked down by the authorities and made the park famous all around the news.

Whatever the park is famous for, I still remember my running around its pool, using the swing and curiously looking at students on the grass solving mathematical problems...good old days.

See where the Park is on GoogleEarth

The academics who they are not

After watching the entire cast of Ahmadinejad speaking at Columbia, I can summarize my reaction in one phrase: "Feeling pity for two people who believe they have academic spirit and they are so far from it".

Columbia President Lee Bollinger repetitively called himself an academic with right to know while he used an outrageous language not expected from a professor. It is not the degree but you would expect some personal growth to have happened in a person after reaching such academic level. Seems that he panicky reacted to criticisms of holding such meeting and had to scape somehow! He did so but from the limits of social behavior. If you call someone a petty from the beginning, then you are not ready to listen and "academically speaking", you are biased. It was so disappointing  listening to those words and the shadow of those strong and unwelcoming words prevented enough attention to be given to some of his true statements and questions and gave chance to Ahmadinejad to escape them easily. Again, our first big academic of the day certainly lost the purpose. If I was a Columbia student, I would have delayed my graduation to avoid his signature on my degree!   

Interestingly, Ahmadinejad called himself an academic at the same time. He does so in many of his speeches no matter where. The start of his talk was funny when he made that religious speech on importance of science to enlighten humanity :) As if he was talking to a group of elementary school students in a remote village. This self-called academic was not afraid to make a lot of big-fat lies either and showed how he himself is biased with only a few information channels. This was true for the case of freedom in Iran, freedom of women, freedom of speech at universities and the Middle-East conflict. He did a lot of cursing in there by answering questions with other questions without getting to the point. This was a brief snapshot of his general policy...talking big, not specific, without aim and certainly not in the shape of a president nor an academic intellectual. I would however say that with him under such blistering attacks in there, not much could be expected.

Ahmadnejad in NY

There is a proverb in Persian saying “This coat is too big for you” used for someone who pretends doing what he/she is too immature for. Since Ahmadinajad became president, we started regretting as this proverb started to make sense about him. To me, He is politically so immature that he rarely thinks what he puts himself into and what future outcome his remarks might have or else he does think and his framework of thinking is so away from reality. He is a simple man for whom presidential chair is too big, so big that after two years, he still could not come to comprehend his own position and has never learned to abide to normal diplomatic behaviour that is expected from a president. From such an unfair election, no better president elect would have come out.

Last year after coming back from the UN, he claimed that during his speech, a rim of light surrounded him. Domestically, he claimed so many unrealistic things as well. I would say that his talks about holocaust and the wiping off Israel are as insignificant as his other statement. As a result, I think comparing him to Hitler is a very unrealistic and is truly propaganda to fuel a war. The regrettable fact is “why he has put himself and his country in such position by talking before thinking?” We will add this question to the tons of others we have left unanswered from the Islamic republic.

P.S: We arrived in Tripoli today from Rome with so many great memories from Italy and gigabytes of pictures. In days to come, I put all the details in the blog

Will you let it go?

It is like an epidemic feeling. When I was inside Iran, reading blogs of Iranians living outside, I could feel a certain degree of exaggeration or if not, an elevated level of sensitivity towards unpleasant political and social news in Iran. Now that I am rather outside, I guess I am getting covered by the same shadow.
The pathetic habit of media in bringing all the ugly in front of me makes this shadow much darker and more scary. Will Iran ever become what we are hoping for her to be? and what are we hoping for anyway? under the shadow, in the darkness, in search of what we are moving our hands so desperately.

Sadly, Iranian government is like an angry gangster that always avenges its owns citizens. They claim they are "Islamic" but they act so harsh to people. If you are an intellectual, you are a spy, if you are a cleric who does not like them, you are "diverted". If are young and want to be just young, you are "made fool by the enemy". I do not want to generalize and be like those who give a picture of Iran as if it is hell...it is not...but the government should just let people live as they want...they can not suffer from economic disasters AND more sanctions AND threat of war AND social restriction AND ban in normal stuff AND censorship AND lack of freedom of speech AND political limitation and and... will you please let it go in one area at least?

While I am getting more into work these days, too busy to write, Mrs.Behi is busy writing. Today she wrote about what she would be involved with if we were in Tehran (read her insights here).

Perhaps I should just give up nagging for the moment. We have rented new movies that we want to watch and it is 10:30 p.m after a long day. I need to go back to Mrs.Behi and did you know how cute she was when she was little? see this

Hugged by Hugo

Look at this...

Hugo Chavez indeed goes wherever wind blows. Some bloggers in Iran are complaining about the way he is presented in Tehran as our best bud! I bet many of Iranians do not even know where Venezuela is and there is a direct flight from Tehran to Caracas!  I am sure he knows how to search pockets when he hugs..too late...I guess he is counting what he gathered from his Tehran visit right now. (BBC report)

The one who made "Birds of a feather, flock together" was a very wise fellow.

Betrayed...

I am as old as the Islamic revolution in Iran. All these years, from pre-school to university, I heard slogans against Israel and in favor of Palestinians from every and each government tribune. Palestinian politicians have been coming and going to Tehran and all the time we heard about direct and indirect support to them by Iranian government.

All those years, Iranians paid a huge price supporting the Palestinians...how much pressure from the world we (as people) received because of our governments action in condemning peace process between Israel and moderate Palestinians (I am not sure if it has been a real peace process or not) and Iranian government never explained to us why we should do such unquestionable support.

I am ALL RED now!...reading the last paragraph in this BBC report.

"...In one Fatah video, the dismissed Prime Minister Ismail Haniya is shown embracing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran - picking up on Hamas's close links with Shia Muslim Iran to discredit the Islamist movement...
...Hamas touches on the same theme with a video showing the late Fatah-founder Yasser Arafat embracing "the enemies of the Palestinian people" Ayatollah Khomeini, as well as the pope"

These guys that Iranian government always supported with the price of isolating Iran are actually considering us enemies. This is the most stupid policy making ever...it is not strange, when Saddam fell and Iranians were celebrating, Palestinians declared days of morning...sorry dear Palestinians sorry if our backs hurt your knives!! I ask Mr. Ahmadinejad...please receive this... your government is putting Iran under blade of condemnation to support these guys...answer this question that "How Palestinian politicians relates to us when they use Iran as means of condemnation in their internal propaganda?

We want our feet out of the Palestine-Israel problem...out of Lebanon-Israel problem...out of Syria-Israel problem...out of any conflict or problem in the world. Let Iranian people to be able to support other people freely as they like...we do support those who suffer under human rights abuse and those who are in need no matter where they come from...do not spoil our genuine sympathy with others with your bitter politics....better say...stupid politics...it does not even in favor of you!   

The health function in dictatorship equation

It is a chaotic world but you can still fit some curves over the mass of events and find a nice, meaningful trend. I was reading this Persian blog today that compared two pictures from the Iranian leader, first one taken recently showing him talking to army generals calling the rumours of his illness "the conspiracy of enemies". That was said after rumours spread across the country that the leader is suffering from a serious cancer. And you know we are Iranians!, can we help not to exaggerate when passing the story to our friends?" so you could hear people saying on behalf of the cousin of the wife of their friend's uncle who knew closely the personal physician of the leader! that he was in his death bed. It did not help much after he showed up on TV sometime ago, with his voice abnormally changed and his body awfully crumbled.

But the question is not whether his illness is lethal or not? oh wait a minute, as the same blog also noted, the leader of Cuba also had to deny his illness and called it in the same way, conspiracy of enemies! Should these guys ask themselves why it is that the interest in their death is so high? can we conclude that dictators make people so sick of their always being there? that they just want them go for a change? oh...we Iranians are good at hoping for this aren't we. We always want change without knowing what we want to change into....chanting for things we do not have, burning whatever we do have...

But anyway....seems now we can also  predict where this equation goes, by a simple interpolation! Dictators often fall when their logical values supporting them start to fade. The slope of their power goes down and even when it looks like that they will go on till eternity, they hit the axis of doom one day! Alone...

Escaping Forward

Ahmadinejad is becoming a punching pillow domestically as his outrageous ignorance and mishandling of his tongue (let alone his decisions) has put the country in the slope of grave danger (he has already lost control but is in the back seat, waving all those scared bystanders who are killing themselves to warn him!). He talks about Iran’s “nuclear rights” every day and in every speech especially when he does not have an answer to questions regarding his real responsibilities. He does what some call “escaping forward” as if he is embracing more pressure to Iran to put the load of all his economical and political crap under the carpet of “Enemies actions”. He is more like a trapped convict who does not care if he drives into a one way road or hits another car, there is no turning back for him and his only friend is the unknown world of tomorrow. No wonder he is acting so stupid!

I was listening to state of the union speech and all the reactions towards sending more troops to Iraq and all the rumors about unprecedented attacks on Iran and I started to think” Is Bush also trying to escape forward from Iraq by hitting Iran?” If that is true, then that will mean a big crush for the plunging truck of Ahmadinejad! All that worries me is that we –The poor Iranian people- have the bad luck of being in the same car! .......Oh my goodness! There is no seatbelt!!