Taboo

Today in the class, instead of listening to the boring lecture of my professor which by the way is a really good man, I was thinking about what to write here. Because I had one week of vacation and by surprise almost didn't do anything useful. Suddenly I realized that I have done plenty of things, I just don't know what to write about them. Well! I went to Paris for two days and had a really good time. And then right after arriving at Toulouse from the train station went to see an Iranian film with my Iranian friends. It was called "Taboo", made by a girl who interestingly was an old classmate and friend of one of my Iranian friends in here. The film was a documentary on prostitution in Iran which is in fact a real "Taboo"! There are so many things to say about the film. About the structure which is weak and the story too! But the subject is so new and powerful that it can keep you thirsty even after the film finishes. But I think the interesting thing is the huge gap and distance between two major and important groups in Iran. First group is the ones who have participated in 8 years of Iran-Iraq war. Although this group is not very big in number but it sure is powerful.

In the war it was necessary to make the soldiers believe in the cause of the war. It is necessary for every country to have brave soldiers to defend the country. So they were somehow "institutionalized". Their minds were made ready for the war. They had believed that it was a war for "holly defense"- the official name for 8-year war!-but when it finished and they came back they saw a completely different society which was rushing through modernization with the huge tall buildings in Tehran as a sign of it. Some of them were able to accept the changes. Some preferred to isolate themselves from the society around them. But there was this third group who decided to fight against the changes which they believed were against the "Goals of the Revolution".

The second group which I am talking about, on the other hand was the huge number of young people which were searching new ways to overcome the limitations and wanted the opportunity to go their own way. Their parents made a revolution against the Shah and they were able to choose, although many of these parents might feel sorry for what they did. But now their children see themselves doomed to accept whatever is offered to them. They are nearly half of the population but without any power to change anything. So they live in a society which they can't participate in any part of it. 25 years ago when people established the new regime, all the members of the government were under 40 and the prime minister was only 27 years old. But now we are witnessing the very same people ruling still!

Enough for now! This was just an excuse to write these lines and these were only my thoughts when watching the movie. But I will write about the other side of this movie soon.

Contact

Everywhere must be like this. Meeting new people from far away countries brings people closer and brings more understanding among them. Last night we sat down and spoke about the world, history and everything which is happening around us in our countries. And we were Iranian, Pakistani, Indian and a friendly boy from Mauritius Islands.

Knock Down

Safin knocked down Federer at last!

I wrote the above line the day Safin won over Federer in Australian Open tennis games. I was unable to continue it since then. Now the news itself is not of any value but the story behind it and how dramatically in a 5 set game Safin finished it is his favor is incredible. I like Federer and I wanted him to win this game as the ones before, but after this game I just admired the will of a man to overcome an impossible.

Evolution

Can you believe it? My prediction –unfortunately- is becoming true. United States are becoming more and more like Iran. Religious beliefs are driving the country away from the real foundations of America. Look at this article in New York Times.

Space, the final frontier

Last week I received a mail regarding an internship opportunity to do a project about image processing in Mars explorations. Unfortunately in the bottom of the letter it said only for French students. I talked with my professor about it and explained to him how much I want to have this internship. Just a day after, I received a mail saying that the position is full. I guess they just couldn't say it is because I am non-French. But anyway, I just had a 5% hope so I am not very disappointed. I will try to find something else in a similar area because I'm sure that in a city with everything related to aerospace and space it is not a hard thing to do. I just have to do something with my nationality!!!
To be honest, in the last few days there were times which I hopefully believed I could get it. It was so good I couldn't believe it, so it was easy to dream, at least for a short period. Before this, I thought there is a difference between Europe and US about it, that US would allow foreigners more easily in these kinds of projects but now I think even US would not do that unless it is completely sure about that person. Somehow maybe it is not very illogical after all. It is their right to be careful about their high tech knowledge and not giving it away so easily. However, at the same time it is our right to not give up so easily too!

Nonsense Politics

I might reduce the amount of political articles in my weblog because it is making me tired. I think it is a useless thing but for now I want to add some things about my recent posts, especially two of them, one about the Indian and Pakistanis and second, about the article in NewYorker.
This is an explanation I made for my Indian friend who reads this weblog:

There may be a misunderstanding about my post about Iranians' opinion about Indian and Pakistani people. I didn't mean that Iranians don't like Indians or even anything close to that. Majority of the Iranians -if not all- have very close feelings toward India. Your leaders of the independence of India especially Gandhi have a special place in Iranians' hearts. But when it comes to a western country Iranians lose their self confidence and they think they are dealing with a superior force. Well, they might be right, but not totally. And the thing I had written about my friends may relate to that. Few of my friends in here told me my friendship with Indians and Pakistanis may cause the French people to make a distance with me. It may be true, it may have other meanings, for example it might mean that some of the French people may have racist thoughts but I felt this is not right. Even if French and any other western people feel like this we should not give up making relations among ourselves.

But about the view which western media have made of Iran. I don't say it is not true, but it is as if you show only a small portion of truth and claim that is the whole truth. This is not the way it is going to work. The difference about this issue between US and Europe is that I think European people have much more political information than US, so when their politicians and press want to say something they are very careful but in United States as you know this is not the case. US tends to exaggerate about just a small part of truth more than Europe. I am not a very patriot Iranian. I maybe one of the critics which criticize every thing in my country specially because I am from north western part of Iran and we are originally Azeri but when I see a false statement or impression about Iran I feel responsible to correct it. I like to clear up some ideas about my country now but I am not sure whether this is the right place or not. Anyway I will write it here. My next post will be my ideas about Persian weblogs and after that other topics which I think others might have some misunderstandings about them.