DRAMA

Benedictus

An ambitious international collaboration among artists from Iran, Israel and the United States

13-Sep-2007 (4 comments)
Only 72 hours before a scheduled US attack on Iran. Two estranged childhood friends, one Jewish and one Muslim, born in the same town in Iran, agree to a secret meeting in a Benedictine monastery in Rome to negotiate a price for safety and freedom. The above synopsis is the main plot for the upcoming play Benedictus, an ambitious international collaboration between artists from Iran, Israel and the United States. The collaborators -- Motti Lerner, one of Israel's most provocative contemporary playwrights; Torange Yeghiazarian, Artistic Director of Golden Thread Productions in San Francisco; Iranian-American director Mahmood Karimi-Hakak of Siena College... >>>

SON

My real Iranian

My precious boy was and will always be the best ëreal Iranian

12-Sep-2007 (58 comments)
Forty-three days ago, my wife and I buried our only son. Although he was a teenager, he was our baby. He was his mother's bright and shining angel and he was my best friend. I feel so broken and empty because now that I have had time to replay his short life in my mind a hundred thousand times, I don't think that I told him enough just how much I loved him and how very much he meant to me. The thing that hurts the most is that I know that there's nothing I can ever do to change any of that now. If God would give me just an hour to sit with my son and tell him goodbye, I would be willing to pay any price, but I know that is not going to happen.>>>

SYMPATHY

End of the world

I continue to cry for the victims of September 11

12-Sep-2007 (7 comments)
I asked the young Russian woman who was my translator whether they were saying anything about Ahmad Shah Massoud’s health after the explosion. She listened and said: “Some say he is still alive. Americans say he is dead.” In the afternoon, as we were driving back into the city, I asked her again if there was any news about Ahmad Shah Massoud. She listened and said: “No news about Shah Massoud. But they say an airplane ran into the World Trade Center in New York.” I didn’t believe her. She had made some mistakes with her English earlier that week, and I was sure she didn’t know what she was talking about. She was quiet and I kept quiet, too.>>>

YUMMY

A continental market

A continental market

… and the pancakes are highly recommended!

by shahireh sharif
11-Sep-2007 (9 comments)

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9/11

Then and now

Let Hollywood and Nintendo fight our war. We have a better chance of winning that way.

11-Sep-2007 (5 comments)
Much has happened in the world since September 11th, 2001. For one the terrorists seem to be winning the war on terror. They are more prominent, more popular and more active than before. They now have a new base in Iraq and “the liberation” of Afghanistan and Iraq is nothing but a joke. Iran was the only victor in the war with Iraq. The U.S. did such a bad job of occupying Iraq that anyone, like Ahmadinejad, who resists her in the region is deemed a hero. The Americans learned the hard way that it was much more difficult to bomb an ideology or a belief system than cities, towns and villages. The U.S. and her allies found out that unlike Saddam Hussein, fundamentalist Islam cannot be chased out of its entrenchment with guns.>>>

9/11

Separation of mosque & citizens

Dutch Committee of Ex-Muslims

11-Sep-2007 (80 comments)
Today, September 11th 2007, the Committee of Ex-Muslims is officially founded in The Netherlands. Ehsan Jami (22), a young Iranian member of the city council from Leidschendam, wants to raise awareness about apostasy in Islam. He is worried about the human rights of those who are born into the religion of Islam, but who no longer wish to believe. In Islam apostasy is not accepted and is punished with the death sentence. In The Netherlands where the number of Muslims is growing more than any other religion, there are growing numbers of honor killings and violence in cases when Muslims chose to turn their backs to the Islam.>>>

9/11

Numb

I wondered why those endless images of death and ruin weren’t moving me the way they should

11-Sep-2007 (2 comments)
I clearly remember the moment I heard the news on the morning of Sept 11th 2001: I didn’t feel anything. It didn’t strike me at all. I could have heard “The stock market has crashed” or “There is shortage of flu vaccine,” and my reaction would have been the same. I couldn’t understand why Americans were shocked. Hadn’t they been warned by those angry men parading in the streets on the other side of the world--the part of the world from which I escaped? Hadn’t they heard over and over, the shouts of “Death to America?” Hadn’t they felt the heat of hatred burning from those grieving women draped in black chador, the heat so intense it turned to ash any illusions of peace?>>>

LIFE

Wrap it right

Fear of Chinese packages

10-Sep-2007 (2 comments)
One has to have nerves made of copper wires to unwrap some of these holiday gift packages imported from China. These packages are put together in such a way to withstand the elements, constant mishandling by porters, impacts against cargo containers, and onslaught of buyers who constantly try to inspect the items before purchasing them. Let’s be honest, when was the last time you purchased an item that was already manhandled. Somehow, we don’t like to buy things when their wrappings have been torn already. There must be a sociological reason for this, maybe fear of missing parts, I suppose. >>>

ROCK

Saturday night fever

Saturday night fever

Kiosk's September 8th concert at The Opera House in Toronto

by Shadi Yousefian
10-Sep-2007 (one comment)

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9-11

Roger's story

Did the attacks on New York's World Trade Center make him gay?

10-Sep-2007
Roger was a ladies’ man, who frequently scored dates with the prettiest girls on campus, as his perfect charm somehow got girls to give in to his dating demands. He did attend church regularly so the combination of church related activities and functions enabled him to meet a myriad of interesting gals. After graduating from college, Roger landed a sweet job with Morgan Stanley inside the South Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. He learned to enjoy the city, loved his job and a few years later fell in love with his neighbor, a young Asian lady attending Medical School at Columbia. They both attended the same church. >>>

BIOGRAPHY

«جناب اشرف،» احمد قوام السطنه

گَرده اي از سرگذشت

10-Sep-2007 (2 comments)
برخورد دو جريان خواهان و مخالف تغيير آن ديناميسمي را به وجود آورد كه هيچ يك از آن دو رسته را ميسر نيفتاد تا بنا بر ميل خود بر آن بر مهار زنند و تغييرات را در جهت خواست هاي خود برانند. نگونبختانه، با اينكه قسمت اعظم اين گرده ي سرنوشت ها به نگارش در آمدند، گرفتاري ها تدريس، پايان دادن پژوهش هاي پيشين، و نيز بيماري مانع از اتمام پروژه شده اند. چند نسخه ازين طرح در اختيار چند متخصص ادبيات قرار گرفت تا از كمك و همكاري آنان براي نگارش گرده هاي پيرامون اديبان بهره مند شود. حال، نظر به توجهي كه اخيراً به برخي ازين «شخصيت» ها داده شده است، درست آن ديدم كه گرده هايي را كه نسبتاً آماده اند در اختيار خوانندگان قرار دهم. اينك يكي از آنان: >>>

PROSTITUTION

فقها و فحشا

"گر تو نمی پسندی, تغییر ده قضا را"

10-Sep-2007 (3 comments)
پس از حدود سی سال مبارزه ی اسلامی با فحشا, بیداد فحشا هنوز یکی از ویژگی های حکومت اسلامی و حاکمیت فقها ست.روش های مبارزه ی اسلامی با فحشا, برای چندمین بار در تاریخ , در سی سال گذشته نیز تجربه شد. آتش زدن و تخریب محل کار و زندگی فواحش( تن فروشان ), سوزاندن و اعدام تن فروشان, شکنجه و اعدام پااندازان خرده پا , محجبه کردن تن فروشی و دایر کردن " شهرنو" های اسلامی روش های به کار گرفته شده از سوی فقهاست .علی رغم اثبات نا کارایی این روشها ی ضد انسانی و ابلهانه, مرغ فقها در بکار گیری این روش ها "یک پا دارد" و کوتاه بیا نیستند, حتی به قیمت گسترش حیرت انگیز فحشا و عوارض آن >>>

TRAVELERS

Paris ups & downs

Paris ups & downs

Photo essay

by nima sheikhyvijeh
09-Sep-2007 (2 comments)

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LIFE

Nature's oasis

Splendor in the Alps

09-Sep-2007 (5 comments)
"What is so special about your flowers?" I ask. "Je besoin (I need) le nature," she replied eagerly. When I was a small child, I used to visit the Jura (mountains) and I took in the colors of the flowers. They gave me a kind of therapeutic feeling. I tried to bring this organic calmness to this village we call Geneva." Nicole enlightened me with stories of her youth, free in the mountains, surrounded by a bounty of soft flowers. She explained how privileged she was to be able to spend every day these past six years seeing, touching and breathing flowers. >>>

FARROKHZAD

Because we love you

Because we love you

Fereydoun Farrokhzad's grave moved to more prominent spot in Bonn cemetery

by Parsi's Friend
09-Sep-2007 (12 comments)

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FREE SPEECH

شرافت کاری و اخلاق حرفه ای

بزرگترین آفت دروغ از بین بردن و سست کردن اعتماد بین افراد است

09-Sep-2007 (10 comments)
حسین درخشان ...دست به جعل زده است و از خود چیزی ساخته و به من بسته است. برای من جالب است که کسی که فحاشی مردم را به خود منتشر می کند تا مثلا آزادمنشی خود را به رخ بکشد تذکر حقوقی مرا ادیت می کند. او نگران است که روشهای غیراخلاقی اش با نقد حقوقی و اخلاقی همان اندک تاثیری را هم که ممکن است در بعضی اذهان داشته باشد از دست بدهد. بسیار با معنی است که او اگر هر کامنتی در هر جای وب بر خلاف خواست و نفع او باشد رسما می نویسد و اعتراض می کند و خواهان برداشتن آن می شود اما کامنتی را که در برابر رفتار ناجوانمردانه او گذاشته می شود و در آن هیج اصلی از آزادی بیان و احترام به مخاطب مخدوش نشده کوتاه می کند.>>>

MEMOIR

A path to nowhere

A book of first Persian Gulf War (Iran-Iraq War 1980-1988)

08-Sep-2007 (3 comments)
It was the second day of winter 1986. The sun had already set and the snow-spotted Alborz Mountains to the north of Tehran were still visible behind a haze of smoke hovering the city. Two nights earlier I had toasted the birth of the Iranian god of Mehr (Mithra: god of the Sun) in a cave in the Alborz with some fruits and nuts along the longest night of the year in an inn in the City of Mashhad; and now I was at Khazaneh Bus Terminal in south of Tehran taken a seat by the window of a bus full of uniformed men like myself bound for Khuzestan in southwest of Iran wondering whether that would be my last trip from that terminal or it was just the beginning of a series of such trips that I had to take to the war fields in the south and west to fight an endless war regarded holy by many, unholy by many.>>>

TENNIS

My Mecca

My Mecca

A wonderful and memorable U.S. Open in New York

by shoosh
07-Sep-2007

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ROCK

Watch out, here they come!

PART 1: “it’s not the music. Kiosk is more about the poetry"

07-Sep-2007 (2 comments)
"We’re not Pink Floyd" he says. "Why do they expect us to be Pink Floyd?" Those are words from Arash Sobhani, singer/songwriter of Kiosk, the Iranian rock band that has been making quite a name for itself in the past two years. Since the days I wrote and published the conversation we had on Orkut in November 2005, the band has made a major leap in making itself known to the general public, and quite successfully, I might add. As I also run the Kiosk fan community on Orkut, the release of their second album a few months ago gave me the opportunity to have a second conversation with not only Arash, but also with Babak Khiavchi, head of Bamahang Productions (Kiosk’s record label) and Ahmad Kiarostami, the director of the now famed Eshghe Sorat video. >>>

IDEAS

نهضت مشروطیت و دیانت بهایی

نگرشی نوین به گفتمان جامعه بهایی در عصر مشروطیت

07-Sep-2007
در حالی که انقلاب مشروطه ایران در سالهای اخیر به طور علمی و دانشگاهی مورد نقد و بررسی مبسوط دانشمندان قرار گرفته است لکن رابطه دیانت بهائی و انقلاب مشروطه ایران تا حد زیادی مجهول مانده است. دیدگاههای بهایی در مورد جنبش مشروطه به اشتباه ساده انگاشته شده و یا به یک یا دو جنبه محدود گشته است. نمونه واضح نوع اوّل ساده اندیشی را می توان در آثار ادوارد براون یافت. او که مهم ترین مستشرق اروپائی آن دوران به شمار میرود معتقد بود که بهائیان به دستور حضرت عبدالبهاء موضعی انفعالی در پیش گرفته بودند.(۴) به عقیده براون بهائیان فاقد برنامه ای جامع و همه شمول برای اطلاحات در ایران بودند>>>