Highway Stressed Out

Driving to my work place, once I was witness to a road rage, which is sort of common conflicts happening every day in major cities like Tehran. A youth driver was maneuvering in the highway regardless other motorists, listening to a laud, irritating rock music.

Never before an old man complained, honking his horn, had I seen such a rude and disrespectful manner. The young fellow gave the man his finger, holding his left arm in the air out of his car's window. His gesture was enough to make a carefree person mad. Let alone a respectable decent old man.

Surprisingly, the old guy did not take it slightly! And sped up chasing the young man. So there they were, racing in the highway, disturbing other drivers, shouting and insulting about and nerving themselves for a confrontation! In my view, on no circumstances did they have the right to mess the highway up and the young guy was the main culprit of this messy situation.

Finally, the old man stopped the fellow, rubbing his car to the young guy's. And they continued their foolishness out of their cars, rowing over nothing! People, who had been watching this happening, mostly stopped by to enjoy a nice rage! regardless of the traffic increasing at their back.
Fortunately, by then, I could scape without getting stuck in the traffic jam, but I kept asking myself “should it really happen!!?”

The Glamor of Desert (part 1)

Although this is my third time traveling to Yazd, this time, flying to the city, I can see a large picture of Yazd for the first time, which is nothing but “a city in the heart of desert!”

It has just turned midday. we are landing in Yazd Shahid Sadooghi Airport after almost one hour flight, departed from Tehran. Naturally, The weather is hot and not likely to change in the near future, which can be easily understood by looking at the clear sky. however, the night predictably will be freezing cold. Going on lots of journeys to south of Iran , these features of desert is not strange to me but for my grandparents, not having so many traveling experience, these are far beyond their belief.

Lifting our luggage from the conveyor belt, I call my friend Hadi, who is recently graduated in architecture from Yazd University. Luckily, he still lives here with his wife although he has been planning to go back to Tehran since he finished university. By the time we step out of the airport's hall, I see him parking his car and coming towards us, having a big smile on his face; “I missed you a lot” he says, giving me a big hug. I introduce him to my grandparents and aunt, as he helps me carry our luggage into his car.

In order to get to our hotel, we should pass through the city to the other side. Hadi, who is usually forthcoming about history especially when he is in his own home town, is talking about different places in the city as we pass by and my grandmother, being very keen on history, is listening to him attentively while I am trying to figure out what we are going to do next.

Approaching Safaiyeh Hotel, he is carefully explaining hotel's history to his only listener, my grandma; “It used to have only one ancient building until they built a new one to improve hotel accommodation three years ago”. As it is the low season, the old building is unavailable and besides, we have already reserved the rooms before leaving Tehran.

I am unloading the luggage from his car's trunk while my aunt is checking in and he is still talking to my grandma, Hoping we don't face any problem with my talkative friend in the next few days.

(To be continued . . .)

Dream Holiday

After industrial revolution, having invented the aircraft, people, being tired from their intensive day-to-day work in the new age, started going on farther journeys, seeking their dream holiday!

As a traveler, I would go somewhere in which they can speak English rather than places where I might have problems with communication. Considering the small number of English speaking countries, under no circumstances do I dare to go on a journey as a traveler; as a matter of fact, traveling in tour seems to me more reasonable and safer.

Since I have not traveled abroad a lot, I am extremely intrigued to know different nations and cultures; in fact, traveling to any place in the world would satisfy my insatiable curiosity. However, if I had to select somewhere, I would go for Africa for their spectacular wildlife and South America for it's loving peoples.

Inasmuch as I don't feel comfortable with crowded places, which is because I am a private person, I don't usually choose high season to go on holiday. On the contrary, I would like to go on journey in low season, which, besides being cheaper, is much more pleasurable.

Having an introvert personality, I am not that kind of adventure lover person; therefore I usually spend my time resting and observing the beauty of nature; in other words, being exhausted of daily hard work, I prefer a relaxing holiday to an exhilarating weary one.

To sum up, possible as it is, it wouldn't be a dream holiday if everyone could have it!. Nevertheless, I, working my fingers to the bone, optimistically, have set my sight on my dream holiday!

11:14

Although Hollywood has monopolized cinemas, producing variety of big-budget yet aimless and blue movies, you can still have an optimist attitude toward the future of cinema, having shown independent and, of course, low-budget films such as “11:14” on screen.

Awarded as a notable student from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, twenty seven-year-old American writer and director, Greg Marcks, was preparing to make his first long movie and obviously, in no way did he want to have people detecting any sign of weakness in his directorial debut. What he could never imagine was having accomplished Oscar-winner actress “Hilary Swank” signed on to produce and star in the picture who was enough to make other brilliant actors, such as Patrick Swayze, Ben Foster, and Rachael Leigh Cook, signed for their roles.

Enlightening the seemingly random yet vitally connected story of a set of incidents which all converge at 11:14p.m, the movie serves as an excellent and clear illustration of facing the conclusion of our actions which we call fate, the most controversial issue in cinema these years.

Following the chain of events of five different characters in five different storylines, the story conveys the idea of fate when a presumed innocent man at the opening shot proves to be the main culprit at the end of movie and all the characters being exacted retribution by their destiny, which understandably has been shaped by themselves, having committed culpable actions.

What first tempts you to try the Canadian movie, 11:14, is the eye-catching title which only consists of four digits unlike all the regular movie titles, chosen by most of film producers. Introducing the casts, Greg Marcks, imparts the whole idea, metaphorically, by simply showing bunch of names being driven, like cars, in streets and getting back to the starting point at the end.

An intriguing sequence of events makes you lose the ability of stirring in your seat from the very first moment of movie and multiple interpretations of the story make it highly dissimilar from the movies that you have normally been given the opportunity of watching and something that you can not afford to miss!

To be or not to be, What is the price?!

Islamic republic of Iran's government made an utterly hopeless future for the country by rigging the presidential election or as what people say, holding an electoral selection!

The tragic outcome of the election made for a simultaneous raising anger in people and, for the first time after the revolution, the government encountered a stiff opposition from the people who were protesting in the streets of Tehran. Now, after 3 weeks, the authorities have taken the control of the streets by arresting scores of demonstrators and opening fire on innocent people.

The question is “Is that the end?”. Iran's society has shown that there is no place for autocratic leadership style in this country any more although for more than 2500 years Iran had been under control of too many dictatorial regimes.

People, whose right of freedom has been denied, are expressing their revulsion by chanting “allah-o-akbar” every night, even in the brutal suppression of the militia. It seems that people are coming down on this government.

The Iranian governors are making a fatal mistake by subduing people and they will pay for it in future. Right now, the majority of people feel nothing but a deep loathing of the governors which is not something that a supposed democratic country can be proud of.

At the end, the price for insatiable appetite of government for power will bring down nothing on our society but being left behind in the rapid progression of the new world and everyone, even the governors, will be compromised.

Who has the leading role in crackdown on crimes?!

Generally, the official crime statistics in third world countries like Iran is unreliable because lots of them are unrecorded which, I believe, is the most serious problem we are facing nowadays. Victims of sexual crimes and young victims are mostly afraid of reporting and suing the perpetrator of crime.

The are two major root causes of crimes, financial problems, and lack of culture. Certainly, they are closely related to each other but I personally think that, lack of culture occupies a crucial role in raising crime problem. You can understand it easily if you just take a look at the rate of crimes which are committed in rich and uneducated families everyday. On the other hand, there are lots of poor families with cultural background, whose members have never been reported as a criminal in their lives, which both show that culture is more effective deterrent against crimes.

Financial problems such as inflation and unemployment are the other major causes of crimes in third world countries. Unemployed young people are likely to be tempted into a life of crime. When someone can not provide themselves with the essential facilities of living they would do anything to survive, even committing vicious crimes in cold blood.

Cross-sections of society such as -in order of priority- families, schools and universities, have a vital role in decreasing the crime level. These are the places that we educate every individual member of our society and given the fact that culture is something that formed in society, we can see how important it is.
Crime prevention program of the government which can be implemented by police and legal system is one of the factors that helps to reduce crime rates -particularly youth crimes- in Iran.

The media also plays a leading role in consciousness raising of society by warning them about the potential crimes around them. Especially in countries like Iran, where media is completely monopolized by the government, they can affect people easily.