Love...Sinful...Forbidden

I can say I had the blessing to experience, practice and touch real love. Growing up love was sacred, it was not naked or shameless. Relationships were slow and based on love. I remember hidden small coffee shops were the most beautiful places to remember where you could meet with your love on a cozy corner and butterflies flying inside.. Love was real. Love was and is still forbidden in Iran and that is what makes it so pure. Seeking for love is real, youth believe in love. blushing phone calls and hanging up phone calls if a mother or father picked up the phone was so innocent. Each time our gray old fashioned phone was ringing I had a hard beating heart, is it him?! My mother would curse me now if she knew all the late calls that woke her up was my fault!

I remember first semester in university I lend my book to a guy whom I never thought he would like me and when he returned it , there was a love letter inside.. My first love letter!!! I was so excited.. Not that it created any connection between me and him but I always thought it was only in romantic books and love novels that one would write an actual love letter..But there I was with a love letter in my hand ( English one !!!) whom did I have to talk to about this? Aida?..Nah.. I rushed home and called my aunt and she laughed! She said 'you will be out there and many might come to tell you they love you but the only thing you will listen to is your heart!'

I remember first time I have been kissed, I had fever for a week and I couldn't talk to anybody as if I have crossed the sacred line and I was a sinner. It was great! And sinfulness of it was making it even more lovely. Any careless touch at a taxi or a restaurant could blush me up to my ears. Oh I miss those feelings...Love was what you had to fight for it and oh wasn't that adventurous

We would go back to a cozy coffee shop on a hidden back street and fear of getting arrested to be in love was a joy. Even looking at each other was a big deal! Soon after some gained courage we started to hang out at each others' house. Knowing that it would be treated as a real crime by Islamic government! SO we should appreciate every moment of being together. We could sing, play, dance, read, cry, laugh, talk , cook , talk, talk and laugh...But clock was so cruel, it wouldn't last long and soon one of us being scared of nosy neighbors would sneak out and head home. I remember putting a check mark in my calender to remember each day of adventure!.. and remember all the good things about that day.. it is a shame that time washes good and bad both off your memory and there is no way to capture certain moments till forever.

I have had the blessing to love and even till today I love the same way. I have the blessing to know how to love.

Back to cozy coffee shop and we would stretch our one cup of coffee for 3 hours! Intelligence and art was what we were trained to talk about, to connect. Eastern love is sacred despite all flashy Hollywood love which has a beautiful face but an ugly inside, Eastern love is still sacred. Love is part of tradition not a way to multiply or share expenses ...Now I know it by heart .. I have been lucky to be born in Iran. Many times I regret to be an Iranian but now that I think my love and my emotions have no deep scar on them! Didn't I learn to love steady and slow in those smoky coffee shops... When love is fake, cruel, naked and forgetful, it is not love anymore but a shallow urge.

Back to cozy coffee shops and another university classmate expressed such a force of love that I could not stop shaking but even then I knew true love can not be forced.... He was an insecure little boy with a shy look . Sure a book full of poetris about how beautiful I am was a good feeding for my ego and self confidence but I was not talented enough to go on with fake love!.. Roses hidden within love notebook was such a beautiful gesture but there was nothing inside...Then I realized I have certain tastes and desires that could not be faked.. I was back to that coffee shop again but never with the forced love but with one that I truly loved!



Back to cozy coffee shop and being a literature student I would go on and on and on about true love, Shakespeare or semi political books such as 'animal farm'. But there I had someone that he would listen to me and deep inside I knew how I feel: IN LOVE!! It was great... I was waking up with a smile.. going to bed with a smile and I knew it... I knew it there is a warm stream in my blood constantly... Didn't I ace my all courses? It is true love multiplies and Love multiplied my brain, my skills.. How can I appreciate the one who gave me such a wonderful feeling? How can I ever tell him he played a great role in my life by teaching me how to love!

Back to cozy coffee shop and sure we could have some fight over NOTHING.. honestly NOTHING!! But I guess saying : I am sorry was such a sweet action followed by such nonsense fights!

Back to a cozy coffee shop and I came to decision that I want to learn to play ' Santour' Just to make me connected to him! I have tried music before and let's face it I was a failure! But I dared to try.. I was improving so fast and I loved it as it was opening new doors of communication.. this time less talk and more music! It was lovely..This time instead of a heartless music teacher I had him by me teaching to play...notes were not that boring anymore!

Back to coffee shops and I would innocently think about how to present a gift that I have bought with saving my allowance and taking bus instead of taxi home to have enough money to a purchase gifts for him or asking dad to give me money to buy something for myself! Hiding the gift inside book shelves and leaving it there, I would call and let him know there is something hidden there!.. It was a puzzle to solve!

Back to coffee shops and I was so drunk of love that I decided to put an end to this love before getting rotten or old! I knew first true love should not be the last one. I had such a confidence that I learned how to love and I will be fine leaving him ! Morning smiles were gone and phone calls were not interesting...

There was a hole in my heart...

But once I felt it so I can feel it again!.....
It took sometime...

Internet was a hip....chat rooms full of boys and girls.. coffee shops were getting less crowded and chat rooms were the new era's coffee shops! I started to chat to people around the world; Brazil, Peru, Lebanon, London, Canada, Iran!... day and night.. showing up to classes late... passing the courses with a C rather than good old A+!

I was back to a cozy coffee shop , this time on my own .....I can move to a place where I can explore more, rather than a cyber chat room exploring! .... and that was the end of an era for me...
1, 2, 3 years later I landed in Canada..

Here I went to coffee shop but it was not the same, it was a place to get coffee and feed caffeine addiction and run to work, run home, run to class.. run , run , run..
I was devistated but never hopeless..

No coffee shop...In my empty home there was one on the other side of phone, giving me hope, love and support...sending me Cds full of memorable songs and meaningful lyrics.... Love was not pronounced between us... .As it was a known fact but it hurt my feelings.. I shut the door and made myself blind to this love.. I don't regret it... I saved the love with replacing it with friendship!....

And then I was in love..shaking....fearful... different taste, different color,, different music........................

I had to build every inch of this love.. It was not easy.. It is still not easy....
Build,....collapse.. build.....collapse....build...collapse..

I want a cozy coffee shop and a large Cafe Glace and a true friend to listen.. talk...laugh.. cry.. and sing known songs and go through memories together....

I am walking on the edge...knowing if I lose love even for a moment...there will be nothing but collapse....

How far yet how close...

How far, yet how close we are from our past

A blink away and all of a sudden I go back to my childhood pastimes, traveling to my mother’s hometown a little town named Sarab. Muddy paths between my younger uncle’s house and my grandmother’s mysterious house! How many times have I run through that path? I still have scars form falling on unpaved path from my bike. Buying homemade icy ice cream with highly chemical colored taste from a neighbour was an adventure which made all the kids connected! We were so connected, was it childhood or was it the small town making us so close. Where are those cousins now? Really far. I cannot have a meaningful sentence with them. Childhood was happiness, happiness and happiness. Bombing Iraq was above us but we were happy. Smell of fresh milk and I had no idea one day I will crave for that smell. I will crave for my grandmother’s yogurt wrap.

Where will I run? Where will I run that happy again?

A cold 'back room' of grandmother’s house was a biggest playground, with blankets and mattresses piled up on top of each other. They were my grandmother’s ‘jahiz’: which means what a newly wed girl would take with her to her husband’s house as means of their living or accessories for serving potential guests! That house was full of visiting grandkids and kids. Cotton sheets with bright colors shinning under the light projected from a high ceiling was the most beautiful color I have seen and the feeling of those sheets as a summer afternoon nap cover was amazing. I could give my head to my aunt’s gentle hands and she would brush my hair with her fingers and she would go on for hours doing this while talking to my mother. She was whom I loved with passion and respect. She was a political activist yet very Schick one! She used to smell like the' Clinique' perfume, I wonder how could she get one those days among her political ideology and busy life! Her kindness was always a ray of sunshine saving me from my mother’s demanding discipline.

In that house nobody told me any nighttime stories, but I remember making up stories for myself in a big guest room where we all slept as a family when visiting grandmother. Little stove in the room would sing us a lullaby putting us to sleep.

One day I remember waking up with chickenpox and I was so happy to have the blessing to be there. Being sick and being home alone in Tabriz was not my favorite part of life. Sarab was cold but being together and having dinner all together with cousins was fun! And then tea would come followed by grown-up talks, being a kid I could listen or whenever I was bored I could take off to the cool back room, passing kitchen and I would be there. There was no obligation to be part of a lengthy conversation or being in front of 21 inch black and white television set.

There was a ISHKAF; a wardrobe inside 'back room', no wonder I liked that room so much! And grandmother’s so-called fancy clothes were there. They were worn only for special occasions. The whole closet smelled like some kind of a flower or an unknown scent that I can never find out what, it was simply grandmother's unique smell!

I remember mirror in the living room once was victim of my soccer game inside the room! And many times cookies put aside for norooz guests placed in front of that mirror were gone by my constant snacking, many times! Grandmother used to make those cookies herself ; Halva

My uncle’s house was just next-door. It was a modern version of grandmother’s house with two floors and all wall windows where I could chase sun through long summer days. Brown two-sided electric power door with an accessible door bell which was not too high to reach, I could ring that bell and could see right away an opening window from upstairs checking the visitor. My aunt ‘s kitchen was a different one! With a carpet in between where she would hang out with my cousins and talk for hours and laugh! I can still hear their laughter! Then she would serve food on small plates, my mother never got the idea! There was no rule in that house. No certain morning wake up call! I remember days opening my eyes being in my cousin’s room while ‘sobh e jome bashoma’ was airing. Oh didn’t I love that goofy radio show. Jokes after jokes and sitcom style of plots. Even today I follow such shows! And the fun was getting even more when we found out aunt will bring us another cousin! I remember that summer I spent the whole 3 months there playing with my new born cousin ; Farzad .He was the one I could practice my childhood mothering instinct , I could pamper him like a doll! A real doll that I could feed, put to bed, till I got sick and I had to go back to Tabriz home, where there was a whole renovation going on. I hated that phase. My books, my room was not accessible and we had to share rooms and give the contractors food and then clean and clean and clean. My mother was the only one interested in renovations and change of design.We all played a passive part in these kind of projects! Poor mother was on her own...She had the ambition to improve lifestyle consonantly, now I get it.

Another trip within Sarab was a 20-minute walk to my mother’s sister’s house. Walking by a pubic Turkish bath and through narrow allies, crossing the main streets and getting closer to a boring side street with no stores to watch! And another narrow street leading to a clinic on the opposite side of my aunt’s house. In this girl-free zone my aunt would cherish any female visit! But there was a Gestapo style of germaphobic rules! No wet shoes inside the room, extra rinsing after shower and so on!Lasting more than couple of days there wouldn’t be easy! It was far from center of the action! Back to grandmother’s house was like being back into my kingdom!

Tabriz to Sarab was a two to three hour drive. A short nap and then looking at other car’s license plates trying to find a relevance to their model year and the number. Or counting number of buses would occupy the time! And then a fast run to the covered entrance of grandmother’s would be the end of the trip. That entrance would be usually watered by grandmother as a welcome to her daughter and her family.

How far and yet how close those days seem to be! I can just close my eyes and let my mind take me to those smells and colors....

Grandmother I miss you and I miss my childhood....Have you stored that in some ishkaf for me?

To a Friend whom I love the most!

Your thoughts, (which are also energy) which are determined by your beliefs which in turn form your perceptions, are broadcast outward into the infinite field of "wave" energy much like a radio frequency, transformed from waves (spiritual realm) to particles (matter) and join together with additional energies which vibrate at a harmonious frequency and collectively join to shape what you come to see and experience in physical form in the physical world. YOUR physical world.

You quite literally have the ability to mold and shape the various areas of your life, based on how you choose to think, believe and feel!!

Just as the mystics and masters have shared for thousands of years, that is how our world was created to operate. Regardless of what you may currently believe to be true, you ARE NOT the victim of some capricious set of external events, conditions and circumstances. You are quite literally the creator of your reality!!

You are the artist that paints the picture. You are the producer and director of your own movie. If you want to change the scene on the canvas you only need use a different brush. If you don't like the scenes that are being played out in your movie you only need change the script which is responsible for creating them. If you desire to change the events, conditions, and circumstances in your life you only need change the thoughts, beliefs and emotions that are responsible for bringing them into and making them your reality.

In a nutshell.....

Whatever you think about and believe to be true regardless if those beliefs are based on "real truth" or "perceived truth" are what determines how your life will unfold.

Quantum Physics has shown us that there exists no such thing as "untruth" only physical experiences in each area of our life which are formed based on our individual "perceptions" of truth.

Quantum physics tells us that it is the act of observing an object (events, conditions and circumstances) that causes it to be there and the outcome is based only on our choice and how we observe it. An object cannot and does not exist independently of its observer! link :http://www.abundance-and-happiness.com/quantum-physics.html

Uplifting Revenue Talk...

Here it comes another day, after so many days of doing almost the same thing. There is an illusion of variety in today’s life but not convincing enough. To sum up the daily routine the list could be something like: work, drive, eat, sleep and drive. Oh and for those who dare to get under some more debt: study!

Ambitions are there, knocking at your every cell; grow, grow, you can do it. You want to do it. You want to respond to your inner voice: Yes I can do it and I want to o it and I know how to do it. But here comes the heartbreaker: would it have any revenue? Would it sell? Is it worth sitting and creating something there is no use of it?

What if I don’t want to create anything with any use? What if I want to live my creating moments to the full and the most? What if I am tired and sick of certain people and their connection and seeing them climbing up the ladders of progression while there is not even a step in front of others, not talking about ladder!

What if I want to live my life and my life equals to happiness. Oh man what is the debt to asset ratio, or liquidity of such business? None! There must be a new formula to live, to breathe without spending some fake money we have been introduced to, thanks to the modern life.

I have come a long way; moved out to live, leave what I had or could have and my best friends. I have done this to be happy. To be able to love freely and smile and laugh with no question. Yet even here it is not the free world, in my homeland there were chains of norms and rules and dark religion and here there is only one chain and oh isn’t that heavy and impossible to ignore? This great chain has been named: belongings, or to be more sophisticated: Assets. You are a wonderful person, young, full of life, energy and happiness, and no asset? That needs to be changed ASAP.

Schools are no longer a place to discover, party, socialize, and make friends for life. It is a place where you learn the LANGUAGE. Only learning about tools to make assets. How is that anything to do with science? What happened to the formulas? How about deep philosophical theories and deeper conversations between professors and students? Where are humble parties after class and catch up with friends? Oh the system does not allow students be friends, as all of us competitors rather than friends. Whoever is closer to obtain revenue is considered successful and there is no need for friends if you are successful, right? There is no need for serious human bonds between people any more. Talk about short term and long term bonds!

Facebook and cyber places have ruined human relationships and yet people who have done such a crime are being rewarded by billions of precious green paper!

People have lost the sensation among each other, and they have lost the connection with their own wishes and desires. Desires are all calculatable ! Give me a calculator and I can estimate your wish…I have gone to school and I can do that ( possibly)!! A big house and a car and a mansion, that brings us to a total of 3 million dollars. Maybe I have to start a business generating high revenues: www.estimateyourwish.ca I will chose ca extension to my website just to show how I am grateful to be in Canada. Canada I love you. But can you wake up? Shaken up yourself and ask yourself do you really have to go a path that states have gone and failed? Land of peace and hippies help us to GROW as people not revenue generators! Salut to Canada, Salut to whoever questions this system and seeks for difference.

Iran..Democracy...June 2009

And democracy was what they named it...

Happiness was lost its shyness and it came out on the street,naked. People put happiness in their arms and danced to the melody of freedom. It has been a long time people didn't have a common reason to celebrate , to laugh .(Soccer games were the only reason in the last two decades to come to the streets , hence it was not out of damages to innocent car bumpers.)

Laughter and joy was there...streets became alive...music was on the air...

then...

streets were covered by blood...blood of happy people...who dared to be happy? who dared to laugh?.Freedom got tolerated for a reason...tolerance was a bribe paid to people to buy their votes...and where are the votes gone? Bought votes are no longer possession of the voters,are they?

For the last couple of decades ,Iran was always on the news: Nuclear weapons, Islamic Republic, Freedom of Speech and so on.The propaganda hand in hand with the cruelty of the barbarian government made a good reputation for Iran and Iranians.No one from any nation could hear about Iran and resist to think of terror.

Iranians ashamed of their reputation ...ashamed of calling themselves Iranians always to introduce themselves as Persians, maybe that glorious name could give them some respect.Persian empire and its power has vanished yet some people are still carrying the same blood as noble Persians.They are still noble but tired of encountering the dark, deaf regime.

What made people to believe in freedom this time? What made them believe that THEY have been changed, THEY will not shoot them in their hearts and minds? What made people to smile again without hiding it? Any nation has a tendency to believe in positive thoughts .Iranians after 30 years of living in a different environment than any other country had an urge to think positive, to start to believe in uniting. They have experienced revolution which started from streets, homes and little parties. New generation heard the stories , wanted to make a difference just like their parents did 30 years ago.

Parents have lived this life before. They have felt the passion and patriotic sensation and they opened up their arms once more to danger, to uncertainty. One might think why? Haven’t they learned enough? Haven’t they got the wisdom of not countering with THIS regime? Why o Why?!Why did they let their children be a canvas for an ugly drawing once more in Iran’s history? When heart knows head stops thinking , as one saying says. Iranian’s heart start to believe that for once they can desire, they can dare to demand something. And yet lesson has learnt : NO to anything they want is the only way to control over them.

Sad people are easy to rule around. Happy people will taste the happiness and will want more. Just like good wine which is forbidden to the Iranians, what if they taste it and they want more?It is 30 years now that no one has tasted Shiraz wine, which belongs to Iranian .Wine is their culture and happiness is in their blood but culture is hidden in the back room of the old castle and blood is frozen in the veins.
Oh Iran….when will you disappear from nuclear danger news or human’s right neglect list..It seems only a hand from above will be able to remove the dirt from your beautiful face .

"Neda"s and all who were killed every day and yet they are alive under the cloud of pure darkness ( pretending to be eternal light),you are admirable to survive in this tough air.But please and please do not fall for another trick, please and please do not open your "SHENASNAM"s once more to their rape. Election is what they have. They will put a trap on your way , they will feed you with promises and temporary freedom to drag you to vote .After showing off on the global media of your support , they will kill you on the streets afterward and you will be pitied by other nations , but is that you want ? To be pitied by others? Aren’t you the nation of dignity, poetry and literature, great mathematicians and philosophers?Aren’t you tired of falling to same trap again and again?

A lesson to be learned: DO NOT vote

A path to follow: Be united in hearts not in front of them.Have your happiness to wear a veil on the streets .Harsh darkness will make your happiness pale very soon.

Believe in nothing but in yourselves.

Never again….never again ..no vote …your votes will be lost on their way to their destination.

To be continued………..

"Neda: is name of a girl who was killed on June -2009 after election on a street watching the protesters-Tehran.She was not participating in any political acts"
"Shenasname: a birth certificate which gets stamped voting."

Scar faces

Gray sky could not be enough to make such a scar on nation’s face yet impossible possible is more than enough to make people fed up with everything even themselves.
Smile is a myth forgotten long time ago. Faces are frowned in deep fear and hatred toward harsh life. Although hard time has passed according to media and capitalism has spread its liberating (?) wings over broad sky of Russia air is too heavy to breathe.
Intelligence is in the same gray hole of dark drunk, and to a bright future one still is obligated to go through the shabby hall .Hall of fame is targeted with several guns , actual guns, jealousy of others and proven idiot government.
Media is full of colors yet everything in reality is black and white, if white is not covered by the smoke of old trains and cars. Western style malls spelled in English –Russian way may ease the eye from grayness for a second but ease for life in people’s life is so obviously missing.
Glamor in the other hand is like a cheap prostitute painted in all colors standing on the corner of the poor neighborhood squeezes any visitor’s heart. Glamor is what others want to make priority in a growing country to grab the chance for creativity from the nation which needs to stand up and take steps toward real growth and development.
Russia, great power, great culture is in the cage of super powers. Focused on high tech weapons and nuke, authorities are so busy with building a super power in the eyes of globe that forgot the people. People are the first to be forgotten so far in any era in Russia. Socialism/Communism was for people against people (!!) and now nothing is changed .This time they are not the creative nation of communism they are just blind followers of the US.
Price tags decorated with huge amount of not Rubles but Euros are like one piece of sushi in front of starving eyes. One can not have it but desires it although he knows that one piece has no value but prestige.

Suffer has lead people to create art master pieces in the past but now Fashion is the outstanding so called art in Russia. Pushkin is just a statue on the other side of a coffee shop in St. Petersburg .Past is too bloody to remember and future is so blurry to see, being lucky is desire of people at this time even if it will be achievable by conducting useless suspicious act such as wiping dust out of historic sculptures! No one even knows why they have been built but they sure know clean feet of these massive sculptures will bring opportunities in their lives.
Beauty of historical touches on the scar face of cities is only reason to smile. Europe is here ,yet life style is so far from European easy life.
Who to blame is not the case, how to fix is the concern. How to plant smile on faces and take off the deep route of negative feelings from hearts? Faces are tensely against smile and eyes are vacant , no light of life nor hope .Long boots and Gucci bags are every where but no village smile is left. Which one is better: smile or being a fake American?

Neda
November 2008/After a short yet long Russian trip
A bouquet of love and flowers to Russians, nation of literature, art and heroes. May sun shine in their difficult life as soon as possible.

Classical elements so long!

Earth, Water, Air, Fire, and sometimes also "Idea"were the elements of life and balance was rulling over universe and harmony was the main charachteristics of each day and peace seemed eternal although lions were yet killing foxes and foxes were hunting rabbits and rabitts were knocking down grass .Cycle was on and on .No cruelity was defined and life was just life .Faith was tangible and all chakras were full of freshness .Layers of truth not covered by interpretations and misunderstandyings .Ideas were existing and truth was not curropted by temptations .Till time brought a deadly souvinier ,Satan’s gift .

Ideas got dependant to gold, power and acceptance in society.Galiles were harrased and thinking was aborted . Freedom songs got swallowed and grayness came in to all skies.

Money got invented and power shaped .Kings and crowns and their clowns were born .Cruelity was not for surviving anymore but for money and power.Believes went under the umbrella of fear and thoughts were blocked.Memories of freedom vanished.Slavery started with power-related intentions and human stand against humanity.Power was a blood covering eyes all eyes and third eye was far gone as well as pure feelings and unpolished thoughts.

Modernity was the fruit of money and power’s union and yet it shaped in a User-Friendly design althogh was the real weapon targetting mankind.Robots came to action and mass production change the meaning of attempt and creativity .Hands and legs as weel as brain went on a long-term brake .

Creativity got ignored and bar code of modern time hacked on forehead of any new born baby and purposes of each individual’s journey of life programmed in hands of power.One group was sentenced to be in third world and the other was sentenced to be in a first world .One was slave of belief and other slave of anti-belief

Power got into people like a malady just like a dark ink in pure water .Humanity got lost . Thoughts were shredded.Monks got into power traps and right or wrong came to the same point of no point!

Time is a mess and seems no pure existance survived .

Printing , flying in the sky and talking far distances and walking long distances are no more dream of a mankind ,man found whatever he wanted .We are all Adams lost in heaven! Like a bird with a big cage with lots of food.lots of water which doesn’t want to fly..no more need to fly any way.

Happiness is in hands of power so as sadness .One news title can take people till extreme depression and balck hole of fear and one pill can take man till ultimate destination of happiness.Human does not exist without an external entity.

Like a leech .Nothing inside but a desire to swallow whatever around no matter of taste or feeling .

Is it time to get together and re-assemble the whole pure existance and expand all over again or that is the end? spirit is lost in small pieces which are floating in universe with no aim nor desire.Flying where wind of power takes them.There is no noman’s land ,no more fields to farm and no unknown to discover .( as Modernity convience humanity to stop struggling and live eyeryday life )


Aristotales and Platoes seem like allians far come and far gone .



There is a sun in the sky but let’s take our own little lantern and look for it.If no looking for there will be no finding