Off to Monday!

Five-year-old Daryon, is caught while trying to eat a popsicle for breakfast at 7:30 a.m. on the day after Thanksgiving. Simply precious! I don't know this child, but having raised children myself, I think I know him quite well! Brace yourselves and enjoy! (Sorry, it's in Farsi. If anyone is interested in knowing what is happening, just drop me a line and I will explain.)

Have a nice week everybody!

Sunshine and Onions

Picture of food prepared at Alborz Restaurant in Austin, Texas. I wonder what Tameshk and Hossein think of this restaurant's food! It looks great, don't you think?

It's a cold, dark, and rainy Sunday. One might take such a day to be gloomy and melancholic. It isn't such a day for me! My son came home for the holidays yesterday. He will be around for several weeks now. I am actually caught up on most of my outstanding writing commitments, and for the first time in a few weeks I feel a little more in control of what's happening around me! I may have worried a few of my good friends by the disappearing act of the past few days, and for that I apologize! Heeh! I am chipping away at a very large photo essay I am writing about my life in the San Francisco Bay Area. The project is complicated, because hundreds of photographs have to be numbered and sequenced to match the chronology of the text I am writing. When I get caught in that maze, I can't find my way out to do other things!

In celebration of our first weekend together, my kids and I and their friend Ardavan will be having Chelo Kabab in a few minutes! I'm so excited to be eating my favorite food with my kids on a Sunday. Simple joys of life always impress me the most! I think I will have a big fresh onion with my lunch, too! We will go to see a movie together tonight. It's a beautiful and bright day for me, despite the weather. I hope you all are enjoying yourselves wherever you are, near and shoulder by shoulder of those you love most in life. I hope you reach out and kiss them if the urge hits you. As for me, I'll do that just before I eat my onion! Be good y'all!

My Book of Matches

My beautiul friend and teacher, Dr. Zari Taheri, forwarded pictures of Zereshk harvest in Birjand, Khorasan, to me. Zereshk (Berberis vulgaris) is used as a dried fruit in Persian cooking. The fruit's taste is sour, so it is fried in butter and cooked with sugar, and a bit of saffroned water to create a sauce/mixture which blends well with Persian rice. Though Dr. Taheri had forwarded these pictures in a Peyvand link to me, I prefer using the original ISNA link for these photos to give their photographer, Amir Hossein Heydari his due credit.

O.K. So I'm walking down the road, observing "the signs*" these days. You know, like Paolo Coelho said* in his book, The Alchemist... I have been through a bit of confusion of late, and I'm trying to get on (and stay on!) the right path. And thinking about the signs I see, I'm thinking how many times have I been another person's sign/s...!? How many times the words I said, my actions, and my presence could have served to help another person to see his path more clearly?

I hope you all have a great day, full of good signs and candles, flashlights, lanterns, and projectors lighting up your paths, showing you to joy, peace, and happiness. I'm making do with a book of matches I have found somewhere, trying harder than I have ever tried in my life to see my way. Be good you all!

*“In his pursuit of the dream, he was being constantly subjected to tests of his persistence and courage. So he could not be hasty, nor impatient. If he pushed forward impulsively, he would fail to see the signs and omens left by God along his path.”

The Phoenix

Sheraguime Yushij, son of Nima Yushij, recites his father's poem, "The Phoenix," or Qoqnoos. The music is by composer Ahmad Nadimi. Mr. Yushij and Mr. Nadimi both live in the Washington DC Area. I tried to find the English version of this poem, which is Nima's very first free form poem, changing the landscape of Persian poetry forever, but I was unsuccessful tonight. I will look for it again tomorrow. I'm exhausted, so I crawl to bed now, wishing you all a beautiful Tuesday.

Mi Gilan

P.S. 12/18/2008: The video clip I had posted here earlier has been discontinued, unfortunately. In its place I have posted a picture of Gilan's rice paddies.

My friend sent me the link to this clip about Gilan. It made me very happy, remembering my beautiful memories of the land and people of Gilan. I thought I'd share it with you guys. I have said enough times that I am not from Gilan, but that through a bridge of love, I became an "Honorary Gilak!" Have a good day!

The Leaf That Hangs On

Autumn in Kurdistan, Iran. Photo by Shahrooz Sharifinasab, Fars News, December 7, 2008. Look at that stubborn heart-shaped leaf. It is hanging on with all its might. What an important sign that one was to follow tonight!

I am working on something for work through the weekend. It is an important document and I want it to be perfect when I send it in on Monday. Today I had a quiet day working my way through my project, so when my younger son invited me to join him for a late lunch and a funny movie, I jumped for joy and followed him! I know I keep saying this, but he has turned into such an interesting young man, wise and thoughtful and responsible, with an interesting sense of humor.

Tomorrow I will continue working on my project and will go to catch a Berkeley Lecture Series presentation in the afternoon. Deljoo Abadi will be talking about the Qisas Laws of Iran, and Director Mahnaz Afzali will be presenting a screening of her film, Red Card. (UC Berkeley, Barrows Hall, Room 110, 4:00 p.m.).

Bayramali wrote something about Babak Bayat tonight and made me remember the late Iranian musician. He was a composer who wrote many memorable Iranian songs and film scores. I found a videoclip of him playing and singing along one of his songs with Mani Rahnama. I leave the link for you here, in case you are interested. He had such a beautiful and strong voice, too. He is making music in heaven now. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_1XyaoyFk0

Have a happy Sunday everybody and take care of those around you. Kiss them often, hug them, and if you have love in your hearts for anybody, make this the day you will tell them, even if you have never done it, even if you have done it a thousand times before. You won't regret it, I promise!

The Western Man's Music of Our Hearts

Kees van den Doel plays Laleva, a Mazandarani tune on the Ney with an Iranian ensemble (I think their name may be Sheevash, but I'm not sure). Isn't that fabulous? I searched high and low for Mr. van den Doel on the internet, but couldn't find out much about him. Hopefully he will find us, as it has happened in the past! I want to know where he learned to play the Persian Ney like that!

Enjoy this fun and beautiful piece of music everybody, and have a great Friday! Oh, yes, I forgot to mention...I'm exhausted! I had to do some things for my friends and had to work on a bunch of writing for work today, so I'm all "typed" and "written" out! I promise to write something meaningful tomorrow, but I also promise not to bombard you with posts like I did last night! I had to peal myself away from the keyboard and take myself to bed last night, or I would have written five more posts, so you guys were spared! That occasionally happens to me, where I have too much emotion and too many thoughts to share, but luckily for you, it always passes! Whatever that burst of energy was, it has been put to good use and it's almost completely exhausted by this hour. Tomorrow will be a great day, I just know it!

Tonight's Last Thought...

And one last thought tonight...

Remember the story of that four-leaf clover?

Two weeks ago, my son gave me his four-leaf clover for good luck.

These days I walk around remembering my son and my four-leaf clover all the time.

And I'm thinking, how can I get any luckier than this?

Through The Fire

And sometimes,

All you need to do

Is to remember love

How you loved,

And how you were loved

Remember,

The mountains you moved for love

Remember,

The fires you walked through for love

Remember,

The mountains that were moved for you

Remember,

The one waiting for you

On the other side of fire

Remember,

The joys of love

And forget

The pain

Remember love.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNLQ_hvWQh4

Two Embraces

My coworker lost her brother last week. He suffered from bipolar disorder, lived alone, and took his own life. I saw my friend in our office kitchen today. What do you say to someone who has lost her only sibling in the world? How do you comfort her? I said to her what I remembered her having told me of this brother over the past year; how much she loved him and how hard she had tried to care for him. She was listening, as though she needed to hear an objective person tell her that she had done everything she could for someone with mental illness. As I was talking to her, I abandoned the words, reached out, and embraced her. She came to me like a child, looking for the arms of someone bigger, wiser, and stronger. We just stood there embracing for a while and we cried together. No more words. Our silence said all that needed to be said.

This afternoon, my coworker Mary Ann, stopped by my office. She was so happy, she came over and hugged me, smiling! She said her nephew announced his engagement to a young Iranian woman, named Susie over the Thanksgiving holiday! She said how nice this young woman is and how happy she and her family are to have her in their family now. She said Susie is beautiful and oh-so-kind and considerate. The two of us talked about this happy event in her life for a few minutes. My happiness was two-fold, one because my friend was so happy and the other for learning that a beautiful young Iranian had brought joy into another family's life. Mary Ann asked me if I had a relative by the name of Susie, and I laughed with joy, feeling happy that Mary Ann would want to be related to me! I said Susie is related to me through my culture and tradition and as a good ambassador of good Iranians, I consider her my family without having ever met her!

My life has meaning, for I am connected to a large family all around me. I am seeing and reading my signs these days.

Following The Signs

Autumn in Golestan province of Iran. Photo by Sohrab Sardashti, Fars News, December 2, 2008.

This week has gotten off to a good start, it seems. I'm not superstitious, but I do believe in signs. Did you read Paolo Coelho's Alchemist? He talks about signs all through his book, one of my most favorite books in the world. I see signs around me which give me hope and strength for breaking out of my tough times of late. I received a phone call with mildly bad news yesterday. I hung up the phone and sat there thinking, "why am I not sad?" Then I tried to see how I did feel. This is when I realized I felt relief. I couldn't believe I was feeling relief at hearing bad news! I guess though the news wasn't good, knowledge of it felt good, hence the relief. In a somewhat twisted change, I felt lighter and happier afterwards. Does that make any sense to you?

Mehran came to see me in Berkeley after work today. We had such a good time sitting in a cafe, talking, and laughing. It felt good to hang out with a good friend and forget about everything else in the world for a couple of hours. I am so much lighter today than I have been in a while. I am following the signs.

Where Joy Was Planted

Autumn in Mazandaran, Iran. Photo by Mohammad Rezaee, Fars News Agency.

For several weeks every autumn, our front yard and the blue pool in the middle of it would fill up with fallen leaves. The leaves were in so many different colors, yellow, orange, brown, and red. Our gardener, who had a name I have never heard since, Arabali, would sweep the leaves to a corner and fetch the ones in the pool, putting them in piles around the yard, until he could get a chance to collect them all and remove them. One of the funnest things my sisters and I used to do was to jump on the piles of leaves in the backyard, throwing them around and burying ourselves in them. We would leave a mess and if we were caught by my mother or Arabali himself, we had hell to pay! This never stopped us, though! That yard had so many of my childhood memories in it. From the spring roses around which we did our annual Nowruz photos, to the mulberry trees which come May would be filled with delicious fruit, to the pool which was our sanctuary during the summers, to the leaves which were our autumn joy, to the snowmen we would create during the winter, all my childhood is now planted in that yard. It's still around, you know? Well, modified and made a lot smaller, but I have gone back to see it again, and it's still there. Trees and plants have grown where those joys were planted, I know. I miss my childhood house's yard, but I am happy in the knowledge of the life that goes on in it, still.