New Term, New Home!

We're all addicted to the Internet! I realized this when I was forcefully offline in my new home and had to sit at a computer with no Internet access and browse through the same old files and MP3 songs that I've had for years. No messengers, no email, no websites, no downloads, no Barobax, NOTHING! I DIED! And this evening I woke up dead! But just like a dream the gloomy days went by, and sunshine shone through the door as the cable guy entered my house. Now here I am communicating with you my friends all around the world using the touch of my fingertips. Ain't life grand!

This new home I like! With the exception of the excessively small rooms, everything else is close to perfect. Oh man I have this HUGE roommate, who seems to be a very nice guy in fact. He's the head security supervisor for the Bomber (University Bar) which is an awesome job. He gets to do all the kicking and bossing around plus he gets smooched by girls all the time as they suck up to bouncers to jump the lineup.

Farbod and Sumer haven't arrived yet, and right now the house is totally quiet and dead to be honest. I have almost settled with some shopping and some fine tuning to do around the house. Barobax are welcome to visit. This new house is at a perfect location indeed: King & Regina! Right in front of Dooly's and Tim Hortons and a bunch of other useful stores right up front. I'm at the second floor which means I don't get the best view but it saves the tiring walk up the stairs.

Term will be starting soon, some barobax leaving others arriving. Fairwell to those who are leaving, it was a very very nice summer here at Waterloo with you guys. And HELLO to the ones arriving. Notify me immediately as you arrive. Mammad is in town and my gut feeling is telling me so is Ashkan. So, let's bring it on, soon we will have our first of term reunion in the never-to-be-changed-all-loving "Williams". Meanwhile, enjoy the 13 day coma.

Update!

It's been a while since I updated the site, and it looks too old when I look at it. No good. I wasn't home for a couple of days as I had gone camping to Sturgeon Bay, a park which is about 4 hours drive from Waterloo. Good times. "jaye barobax khali".

My camera has been broke for so long which is the main reason I didn't come up with many picture updates. I have now made up my mind and will buy the Canon Powershot A75 from costco.com. It'll take a while for it to get here, and in the meanwhile I'll be working on the new look and features of the site. Hopefully all great things come together.

Saturday is moving day, so I have to get all my stuff from Amos and Cardil, and move it to my new home at 60 University avenue. Farbod you better be reading this, it's about time you get your ass over here as we have a lot of shopping to do for the house.

Cameras Drive Me CRAZY!

I have been doing so much research on these damn digital cameras that even when I close my eyes I see cameras flying around. I am coming to the conclusion that the best camera for me to buy is Canon's Powershot A75. The price of this camera varies extensively from place to place. Warranty is another important factor I have to consider, and there's also tax. So, here's the result of my research:

I will buy a Canon A75 from the US. This way I don't pay Canadian tax. But there's American tax, so I buy online. Regarding the warranty, there are many places that sell warranty online but there is one issue: if the camera breaks then I have to send it to the States. That's gonna cost me. So how am I overcome this problem?
Costco.com has the answer. Thanks to Payam. I called Costco, and they said that if you buy anything from Costco except for computers they have 100% unlimited return policy on it. So your product is covered for life! And the good thing is that you can return or exchange at any Costco warehouse, which means I don't have to pay for shipping. This way I can buy a new camera for the price of 329 Canadian Dollars with unlimited guarantee!

I think I'll go with this.

64 Archive Entries Added!

I finally imported my old archives. These include the postings from October 2003 (beginning of Barobax.net) up to April 2004 which is the month we went to cottage at Pinery together. The month of March is missing! I have unfortunately lost the archives for that month.
If you have some spare time, I suggest you take a look, there is stuff from valentine's day to Shandiz and From electrical toothbrush to exam days! I have also added a search feature so it must be easy to find stuff. chaX.

Nikon Around The World!

Repairing my Nikon camera has become quite a story! Nikon Canada responded with an estimate about a week ago. They said they will fix the camera for a price of $460 (tax included)!! As this price was ridiculous, I had to call to argue with them. I had to call several times to be able to speak with their manager. In fact, he didn't pick up until I shouted my head off at the operator so that she puts me through. Nikon Canada in a very unfriendly way first said this is the way things are and if I don't like it then I can go somewhere else. Following my extreme frustration, the manager realized that things are getting ugly so he said that he will try his best to find me a new camera for a good price.
At Nikon USA, the service department gave me an estimate of $238 (CAD) to fix the camera, excluding shipping.
My efforts did not stop there, I called our good old pals who are Indians and Arabs at Nikon Dubai and today they have responded. They will fix the camera for $198 (CAD).
My dad is in Tehran, and I have given him the number for Nikon Tehran. I am still waiting for an answer from them. I'm expecting it to be a figure close to the one Nikon Dubai gave me.
With the trust I have in Nikon Dubai, I will most probably send my camera there. Now go ahead, blame me again for liking Dubai. Dear Canada lovers how are you gonna explain this one?!

Commodore 64: The Best Gaming Machine Ever!

The best games ever indeed, were the games that I played on my lovely lovely Commodore 64. That piece of hardware means a lot to me. I owe my love in computers and the ability to speak English to this machine. It all started on the last days before 1st grade. The last days in our old house in Sattarkhan and the few days before moving to Ekbatan. I remember that one day my dad walked in with a box in his hands and there it was, a brand new Commodore 64. With only 64 Kilobytes of RAM! The computers we use at home today have memories of about 10000 times Commodore 64. It wasn't until we move to Ekbatan that I actually started playing with it. The first game was Donald Duck. Soon I started exploring it and other exciting games came. Giana Sisters, Traz, Tetris and of course the great Last Ninja series. Perhaps you would call me bias, but I would consider these the best games ever made. The games that inspired not only me, but also those who have and will make the best games of all time. Those great days of innocence, along with awesome games to play. Those days I shall never forget.

Condition: ZERO!

4:49 AM. 1 basement. 1 dirty living room. 4 computers. 1 network. 4 crazy CS students. 1 fantastic game. 1 hell of a night!
It's the second night we get together here. Ali, Khosrow, Mahdi and I to play network games. Last night we played Counter-Strike 1.5 and tonight with the help of Ali's insider files we played Counter-Strike Condition Zero. WOWWW is all I say to this game.
Mahdi has now passed out. Seems like we can't break our last night record of sleeping at 8 AM. Tonight we are losers.
With the 4 meals that I had today: breakfast, lunch, dinner, after-dinner, I am now hungry at 5 AM. I tempt the guys to pay a visit to Mel's but appearantly we're all too tired for that.
A 12X DVD burner is sitting by my side. I have files to burn. No mood for that now. Should be done before it is returned to Futureshop before Mahdi leaves to Hamilton.
By the way, let me not forget to congratulate these two guys: Mahdi & Khosrow for having finished all their courses and have graduated. Shirini yadetoon nareh!

Yet Another Look!

I Love change! Here's a snapshot of the next design for Barobax.net which I am currently working on. The flower on the top left is the image which I found when I first started working on Barobax.net in October 2003. It is that flower which inspired me with all the colors you see on the site. Hope you like the new look. I welcome your comments.

آخه اینم شد مملکت؟

Regarding The Latest Poll

As I am monitoring the poll getting more votes everyday, it makes me realize how diverse our political thoughts are. I mean stop for a minute and think about this. We are a big group of friends who share a vast common ground in our personalities, location, age, etc. So many of the demographics are similar, yet look how diverse the results are. Excluding Masoud Rajavi who has zero votes and is probably just an option to prove the openness of this poll, the other candidates are nearly the same. Even the last option which is not voting has almost the same number of results as the other candidates.

This worries me. Even though diversity is a good thing, disperseness of ideas and differences can be dangerous. It is hard to bring all this difference together in one place. Sure one might say that's what democracy is all about. But do not forget that in order to achieve democracy we must first set aside our differences to establish a fundamental base where we can discuss those differences. Who can be the leader of this move? Who are we going to accept to carry out this mission?!

It is perhaps the job of a political analyst to come to such a conclusion, but it appears to me that we have a long way to go towards achieving that goal. With all of us being educated and very well informed of our sorroundings and being mature enough to know what's good for us it is impossible to blame the diversity of results on ignorance. Thus it is probably "time" which will shape our nation as a statue of unity, freedom and democracy.

Camping Trip, FarCry, School and Birthdays!!!

Camping Trip:
I was on a 3 day camping trip to "Saugeen Bluffs" with Hamed, Mahdi and his brothers and cousins and their friends. I had a great time there. A BIG thank you to Ali S. and Meisam S. for organizing the trip and the rest of the guys who really made this trip a blast. As you might know, my camera is at Nikon Canada, so I wasn't able to take any pictures, but everyone else did. I am hoping to have the pictures for upload by Wednesday.

Far Cry:
Before I leave I had got attached to this new computer game Ali gave me: Far Cry. Awesome graphics, awesome sounds, awesome adventure, an AMAZING game! It shall take up a good portion of my time before school starts.

School:
Today is the 2nd of August and school will start on the 13th of September. Only about 5 weeks out of 19 weeks is left of this summer holiday which passed by so fast. Some of the barobax took spring courses of course and now finals are upon them. Best of luck to all of you guys. For others these weeks will be the last of their work terms, getting ready to get back on campus soon.

Birthdays:
A good number of barobax celebrated and will celebrate their birthday in the past and coming week or so: Mahdi S., Khosrow E., Leyli S., Negar B., Majid S., Rana N., Arash Sh. and Melika S. A HUGE Happy Birthday to all you guys, wishing you all the best in your life.