It Was You And Me

The second refrundum for our Islamic Republic took place. Over 50% of us Iranians participated and despite all the limitations imposed on our freedom in choosing our representatives, we made a choice among the candidates. We said YES to this refrundum. We said we want you to stay, the answer was yes. It was us Iranians, and it was our parents, brothers and sisters, our cousins, aunts and uncles who participated and validated this regime. Don't you dare say it wasn't you. Whatever happened we were the cause. 1 out of every 2 people said yes to this election. So let's face it, either we are cowards who are scared to stand strong for our beliefs or that we love this regime and would do anything to protect it. Either case the outcomes of this election is our destiny and we totally deserve whatever it may bring us. For the next 4 years, I wouldn't allow myself to say a single word about the upsetting situation in Iran. It is what Iranians want, if I don't want it, I am the minority, my voice is worthless. I guess this is democracy, there was an election, there were candidates, people participated and chose their favorite candidates. Clearly in this sort of democracy the minority will be silenced, as in any other place in the world. So I will silence myself. I will shut up, as my fellow brothers and sisters of my homeland love this regime with all their heart.

To Do List

2 midterms and 2 assignments.They're keeping me busy. Oh I forgot to tell. I am working on a new look for Barobax.net so hopefully in two to three weeks it will have a little more functionality along with a new look. I have design tickets for ISAW's Norooz party and posters for Pendar's Norooz party. What else should I do? Hmmm, oh yeah I have to call this company and ask some questions which my dad wants anddd...what else? I should call the UAE embassy see if I need a visa to go back in the summer. I should have done something else? Oh yeah, I should hand in my 245 assignment, and not to forget ISAW's meeting on Monday at 12. Hmmm, I should probably print summer sublet ads and also start looking for a house for Fall. DAMN! so much to do, so liitle time. Anyways, I'm out. Wanna go take my multi-vitamin tablet and also eat an orange and a banana. Cheers.

Do You Remember The Excitement?

World Cup 1998, France. Oh My God! One of the best times of my life with no doubt. So much unity, so much to cheer for, so much excitement and anticipation. I remember, we used to watch the games in Al Massah Cinema, where the games were being projected on big screen, for free! Wow, the overwhelming feeling of that night when we beated U.S. two goals to one. I wish I was in Iran. I know for many of Iranians those times was one of the best. All Iranians all around the world, so happy, so excited. And today, after 6 years, World Cup Qualifications has begun. Today we beat Qatar 3 goals to 1. Let us see whether the boys can make us proud once more. Let us see whether the prayers will be answered once again, just like the game with Australia. Do you remember? One whole nation prayed, and yes the prayers were answered indeed. That victory was in fact a miracle. Let us hope that we can be excited, happy and proud once more. IRAN! IRAN!

Guestbook is up once again!

As I had mentioned before, I had to remove the guestbook when I move to this new host as it wasn't compatible. But, after lots of effort (converting access to sql killed me!) I must say, the guestbook is up once again. Many Many thanks to Ali B. who taught me how to speak PHP and also how to work with databases and MySQL. I had no clue what so ever about these two very important fields and now I can say I know enough to move forward with a lot of new things. So hopefully, I will be implementing the 'comments' feature for my daily posts next. I will try to bring the polls back also. So go ahead and leave a note in the guestbook if you haven't done so already. Cheers.

Is This Fair?

Study Room for Software Engineering Students (DC)

Houshang, Changiz and Jessica

There was once a cat who was madly in love with a goose. The goose was a student at McGill university, in the arts faculty of course. She was so hot that even the mice on campus would brag about her: "Today I have a date with Jessica the goose" bragged one mouse in the library. The cat on the other hand was a student at the University of Waterloo , a long way to McGill. Despite the distance between them, the cat used to drive hours and hours just to get to Jessica. He himself knew that he was a "ZZ" but he was so madly in love that he could listen to Bijan Mortazavi's "Lavand" all the way up there and not even feel the time pass by.

One day there was a rumour on campus that "reading week" is up and ahead. This news was a spectacular one for the cat, he could go to Montreal and spend time with Jessica for a week. But things did not go in favour of the cat. Reading "week" turned out the be a rumour as engineering students would only get 2 days off. But the cat of our story stood strong on his decision to drive to Montreal . So he took out his 1988 Ford out the residence's parking lot and drove to the closest gas station which happened to be at Columbia and Phillip. After filling up the gas tank, he said goodbye to the English speaking Tim Horton's staff and drove towards the French. Where he was yet to experience the feeling of an Afghani cat in the streets of Paris . Once he got there, he realized that he is lucky to get two days off, as McGill students don't even get that. Well of course with Montreal being the city of love, no body wants be sad even for a minute, let alone committing suicide!

Upon his arrival he saw fabulous sceneries, beautiful places and above all, the romance. With Valentine's day only days behind, the sweet perfume of love had filled the air like Shisha's smoke would fill your lungs. The poor cat not having a cell phone stopped by at public phone to make a call to his beloved Jessica, where he ran into the following sign, written with red bold letters: "Si vous ne pouvez pas parler français, mourez! N'utilisez pas ce téléphone non plus! Chat Sale !" The cat who always had a Google dictionary with him, looked the sentence up, and after finding out the meaning, he started walking back to his car with a huge disappoinment. Since he discovered that there is no hope in calling his beloved girl, he decided to drive to McGill, where he hoped he could find the lovely Jessica in the student lounge. Once he got there, he took his fish cologne out of his backpack and sprayed it well on himself, he also made sure that his minty gum still has a freshening smell. He locked up the car and walked towards the lounge, where he opened the door to find his dearly loved Jessica…in the arms of another man. A bold muscular cheetah. Houshang, our broken-hearted Persian cat, stood there in shock.

Neither Houshang's flood of tears, nor the love making sounds of Jessica and Changiz would stop for a second. The roses fell from his hands, and his paws were shivering in pain. Jessica was all taken by Changiz, and Houshang did not have a chance. Right then the angels from the sky descended at Houshang: "Thou shall not have distance relationships, thou shall be saved". The scene was the single bitterest experience in Houshang's life, but after the cruel punishment by the expensive gas, the long, hefty bills of Bell Canada, the Visa statements of birthday and Valentine's day presents, and a broken heart above all…Houshang had surely learned his life lesson.

Where Is Excitement

It's been a while since I've written something I like. Something funny, or something interesting. I don't know, but sometimes I get the feeling that I am waiting for something. Something interesting to happen all of a sudden. And when I think to myself, I imagine what it could be. I don't really like surprises, but on the other hand I don't like a stiff, dead boring life either, where everything is planned and everything is going as expected. It's been a while since I haven't been excited about anything, and even though things all around have been going great, but at the end of the day, I sit behind my desk, in front of my computer and think that I'm becoming to live more like a robot than a human. I see that okay, everyday I wake up to go to school to learn, and then there is eating and checking emails and reading the news and sleeping, and the next day it's the same routine. Life should have change in it, life should have excitement. A boring life in my opinion is not worth living. If I am studying so that one day I can get a job that I go to everyday and repeat the same task, then to hell with studying. I'd rather do something different, something that changes. A job where I can travel, see people I haven't seen before, go to places I have never imagined. See weird and bizarre things. Of course this isn't but a dream but when I look at the 21 years that I've lived, I am kinda happy that I've been able to maintain that "change" factor, to live in Iran , Dubai and now in Canada . I haven't seen much of the world. I am not an adventurer, but I hope that in the future, I get to visit new places. I hope that I don't stay and settle in one city for decades. It is hard for me to imagine. I need excitement in my life, and until the time that excitement knocks on my door, I am going to be bored and sound boring alike, with the same depressing posts, on and on…

Friday the 13th, Valentine's Day Predecessor and Childhood Memories

بارباپاپا عوض می شود، ما کار و اندیشه، واتو واتو دوستاشو صدا می زنه، دارم می شنوم دارم می شنوم، پدر پسر شجاع، هاچ، نیک و نیکو، از سوسک سیاه به خرمگس، سگ آقای پتیبل، هاپو کومار، چوبین و برونکا، علامت مخصوص حاکم بزرگ می تی کمان، بامبزی، خانواده ی دکتر ارنست و ...
قلی و بابا علی روی الاغ سوارن توی الاغ سواری دیگه لنگه ندارن!!

On this haunted day of Friday the 13th, the day before Valentine's day I am sitting here listening to the techno version of our childhood TV series: "gholio baba ali" (Download MP3). My internet browser is pointing to Barbapapa's website as I am browsing the images that used to bring laughter to the days of our childhood. I'm happy.

Valentine's Day In Advance

The movement of planet Solaris has caused the worms of Atlantis to rise against the cruelty of machine driven mechanisms labelled as universal and existential quantifiers. The concept of logical conclusions of course arises after conception which is the union of sperm and ovum. This process is the complex alliance of technological behaviour and social and academic advancement of materialistic bi-products. Subsequent to the achievement of satisfactory energy levels on the surfaces of psychological and Platonic dynamics of the universe, the meaning of life transforms the transitivity of digital communication into behavioural analysis of chromosomes in the body of unary and binary vertebrates. This in fact, is where the huge concept of St. Valentine and his antecedents is introduced, "which brings us at last to the moment of truth, wherein the fundamental flaw is ultimately expressed, and the anomaly revealed as both beginning and end" (Matrix Revolutions, the Architect). February 14, marks the day of chaos and disaster where the human understanding and rules of logic lose their meaning and English literature finds itself in the outermost fragile layers of the cosmos. Happy Valentine's day in advance.

Dubai : The Barbie House I Miss Today

I often say that I don't miss Dubai, but when I come to think about it, I really do. When I think about the days that we used to go to Tohid school, grades 5-11, such a long time, I was raised in that school! And then, Mawakeb school at Barsha, that was awesome. But I guess my best memories come from my two years in AUD (American University in Dubai). That beautiful and fun place which looked more of a hotel to me than a university. All the nice cars parked in the parking lot. Ferraris, Porches, Mercedes and even Lamborghini. Quite a car show it was. And then, the mix of people, locals and their boldness and carelessness, Persians and their pride and popularity, Arabs and their friendliness and majority, Indians and their isolation, and perhaps Americans and Europeans and their shyness. Such great days. I used to wake up everyday, around 9-10, get ready, eat and then go to AUD with the bus, with our moody Pakistani bus driver: "Jahaan". He was sometimes so pissed he wouldn't even say hi, and sometimes so happy that he would start a conversation and laugh all the way to school. And when I got there, phone calls, missed calls!, gatherings in front of the cafeteria, "Tammam" the cafeteria manager and our foozball games, and the bets at the pool table. And not to forget, skipping classes to go for Shisha, with Soheil, Nima, Naghmeh, Dina. Sitting for an hour or two at "Istekana" : "لو
سمحت! فهم شوی" : Sir, some more coal please. And then fast rides back to AUD, radars on the way, flashing every minute or two at the cars flooring it at 200, 220 and even more. People used to die every week or so in that road, because of speed, mostly nationals, I wonder why!! When you have a Mercedes SLR and couple of screws in your head loose you don't care even if the highway is busy and the music loud, you're talking on your mobile and you're almost flying at 240 Km/h. At that moment, it doesn't really matter for you whether you kill someone or get killed yourself. But with all the cons and pros, Dubai is a beautiul place. I don't think you'll see better looking hotels and shopping malls anywhere else in the world and all the exotic and unique places: Palm Island, "The World" Islands, Burj-Al-Arab, Dubai Internet & Media Cities, Wafi Shopping Mall, Desert Safaris, Sand Skiing, gorgeous nightclubs, awesome Shisha and lots lots more! One hell of Barbie house as Sara used to say, but you know what, when you think about it, it's not so bad to live in Baribe house, where everything is so beautiful but not so deep and complex, and to be honest, I miss that Barbie house.

The Days That We Will Remember And Miss

We will look back at these days, we will remember the days that will be labeled as the best days of our lives. The memory of these days will forever echo in our days to come. The stories will be recited to our friends, to our children. Maybe one day, in years away from today, we come back to visit the places that we used to visit everyday. The classrooms that we used to fill every morning. Maybe one day, we will sit on that very seat we sat today or in the labs that we spent hours and hours trying to finish that late assignment. The nights that we spent at school, pulling all nighters to finish up that CS project, and the short naps over the couches in MC where we shut our eyes to get that rest we desperately needed in order to go on. One day we will miss the days we walked to university plaza with our friends, laughing all the way in the coldness of Waterloo's winters, so careless, so free of the heavy responsibilities of the real world. Free of the pressure of keeping that job, and comforting those who depend on us. I won't forget the softness of the chalk on my fingertips after playing with it at the end of class. I won't forget the days that appeared so harsh when we walked to PAC to write our final exams. I won't forget the days that I spent hours and hours in the Dana Porter library going over my notes and textbooks, and I won't forget the company of my friends in the nightclubs of Waterloo. I miss now even now. I will record every moment of these days, in my memory, in pictures, in words, because I know that one day, I won't be able to sense them the way I do today.

Hair & Beard

On behalf of all barobax we would like to cordially thank Payam's barber. In our opinion he deserves to be recognized and appreciated whole heartedly