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From, of all places, Al-Jazeera:
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2
"Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, do not fear the US but rather their own people's desire to live in a country more like the US.
In fact, in poll after poll Iranians have revealed themselves to be among the most pro-American and pro-democratic people in the Muslim majority world." - Al-Jazeera
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2
"Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, do not fear the US but rather their own people's desire to live in a country more like the US.
In fact, in poll after poll Iranians have revealed themselves to be among the most pro-American and pro-democratic people in the Muslim majority world." - Al-Jazeera
I'm not as proficient in Persian as I'd like to be. But I can tell you for sure that "Marg bar Jomhuriye Eslami" does not mean "The Iranian people bless the sainted memory of Ayatollah Khomeini."
- Shalb.:
hopeful
Iranians burn Basij HQ in Tehran!
- Shalb.: cheerful
I keep thinking about this dream that I posted a while back in LJ:
http://asher63.livejournal.com/184959.h
http://asher63.livejournal.com/184959.h
I'm in a MacDonald's in Tehran. By chance, I look up and see - either directly through the window, or reflected in the glass - a familiar figure: the scruffy beard, the cruel, arrogant smile, and the famous eponymous dinner jacket. He's surrounded by officials and bodyguards and he appears to be sitting down to a meeting in a neighboring building.
"He's here! Everybody get down!" somebody shouts in English (or else I can understand Farsi). Everyone in the restaurant dives under the tables. I steal a peek out the window in time to see a blinding flash, followed by a series of ear-splitting booms. Glass and overturned tables are everywhere, but people are cheering. Then there's the sound of sirens, but it's all over.
Best. Dream. EVER.
Anonymous Iranian woman, via The Spirit of Man:
http://thespiritofman.blogspot.com/2
I'll participate in the rally tomorrow in Tehran. It might be violent. I may be one of those who will die tomorrow. I want to listen to all beautiful tunes that I have heard in my life, again. I want to listen to some cheap Los Angeles made Iranian music. I always wanted to have much narrower eyebrows too. Yeah, I'll check in with my hair-dresser tomorrow before I go to the rally. Oh, there are some excellent scenes in the famous Iranian movie Hamoon I want to see before I leave. And I gotta re-visit my own bookshelf. Iran's poets Shamloo's and Farrokhzad's poems are worth re-reading. I've to see the family photo albums once again.
I'll have to call my friends and say good-bye to them. In this big world, my possession is only two bookshelves. I've already told mom and dad whom to give these books to in case I never come back. There are only two more courses left for me to get my BA degree but to hell with the degree. I'm anxious and excited.
I wrote these scattered words for the future generations so that they know we were not sentimental or uselessly emotional. I'm writing this so they know we did every thing in our power to make this work for them and so that they realize if our forefathers surrendered to the Arab and Mongolian invaders physically, but they didn't give in to their tyranny with their spirits. They resisted it. And I wrote this for tomorrow's children...
http://thespiritofman.blogspot.com/2
I'll participate in the rally tomorrow in Tehran. It might be violent. I may be one of those who will die tomorrow. I want to listen to all beautiful tunes that I have heard in my life, again. I want to listen to some cheap Los Angeles made Iranian music. I always wanted to have much narrower eyebrows too. Yeah, I'll check in with my hair-dresser tomorrow before I go to the rally. Oh, there are some excellent scenes in the famous Iranian movie Hamoon I want to see before I leave. And I gotta re-visit my own bookshelf. Iran's poets Shamloo's and Farrokhzad's poems are worth re-reading. I've to see the family photo albums once again.
I'll have to call my friends and say good-bye to them. In this big world, my possession is only two bookshelves. I've already told mom and dad whom to give these books to in case I never come back. There are only two more courses left for me to get my BA degree but to hell with the degree. I'm anxious and excited.
I wrote these scattered words for the future generations so that they know we were not sentimental or uselessly emotional. I'm writing this so they know we did every thing in our power to make this work for them and so that they realize if our forefathers surrendered to the Arab and Mongolian invaders physically, but they didn't give in to their tyranny with their spirits. They resisted it. And I wrote this for tomorrow's children...
Winston at The Spirit of Man
http://thespiritofman.blogspot.com/2
http://thespiritofman.blogspot.com/2
Just got off the phone with a friend inside of Iran. He has mentioned several points which I am going to list here:
1- We intend to be non-violent every day. Our strategy is silent resistance.
2- People do not trust the regime.
3- The free world should give us moral support
4- The whole idea of Islamic revolution is now under question by the people
5- Every body is anxiously waiting to see what will happen tomorrow. No one knows what awaits them
6- People of Iran are very agitated and angry with the government.
Updates on the Iran situation below the cut.
( More on Iran )
( More on Iran )
Going offline. No more entries for the foreseeable future. Thank you.
from the teenagers in the hall:
"Put your phone in your butt. And then it's a booty call."
* sigh *
"Put your phone in your butt. And then it's a booty call."
* sigh *
My post here.
Things that make me happy:
- my xkcd hoodie
- home alone on a lazy sunny afternoon
- the Mission Minyan
- coffee and conversation with an old friend
- coffee and conversation with a new friend
- reading a big fat novel all the way through
- finding money in a forgotten bank account
- finding an old notebook
- the smell of a good health food store
- a friend's pictures from Portland
- the kid smiling
- my xkcd hoodie
- home alone on a lazy sunny afternoon
- the Mission Minyan
- coffee and conversation with an old friend
- coffee and conversation with a new friend
- reading a big fat novel all the way through
- finding money in a forgotten bank account
- finding an old notebook
- the smell of a good health food store
- a friend's pictures from Portland
- the kid smiling
Unfriended by six, count 'em six, Russian spambots in a single day.
http://asher813.typepad.com/fiction/
The Gilkesh are star-gazers by nature, and from their earliest history have had an unslakeable thirst for the knowledge of that which lies beyond. The sciences were regarded as sacred doors to the mystical, and schools of contemplation arose to train the mind so that it is not overwhelmed by the mysteries of the Universe. These schools were the first Temples.
Every Gilkesh science student has heard of the great mathematician Zedkis, who pioneered the theory of infinity and went quite mad; or Morva, the natural philosopher who proved the existence of many universes - the foundation of hyperspace travel - and died by her own hand.
But other kinds of knowledge have their own dangers ...
***
In the Internal Security office of the colony on Planet 138, Chief Garris hasn't shown up for work for a couple of days. Her second-in-command, Inspector Shihar, knows her boss well enough not to ask any questions. Whatever it is, she figures she'll find out soon enough. She suspects it has something to do with that book they're not supposed to talk about.
***
Alone with her memories under the stars, Queen Amira wonders how it all went so wrong. Her ecstatic embraces with her young assistant Joli, now turned from a shining hope to a guilty memory - one she must forever conceal from her mate Kathris. Never again can she let Kathris awaken her passion; she cannot risk letting down her mental defenses, for fear of what the other Queen might discover about her past.
Life was so much better, so much sweeter, when she was young. And again her thoughts return to her native land of Ullari, and to her first lover, Terimi.
And to Terimi's last words ...
The Gilkesh are star-gazers by nature, and from their earliest history have had an unslakeable thirst for the knowledge of that which lies beyond. The sciences were regarded as sacred doors to the mystical, and schools of contemplation arose to train the mind so that it is not overwhelmed by the mysteries of the Universe. These schools were the first Temples.
Every Gilkesh science student has heard of the great mathematician Zedkis, who pioneered the theory of infinity and went quite mad; or Morva, the natural philosopher who proved the existence of many universes - the foundation of hyperspace travel - and died by her own hand.
But other kinds of knowledge have their own dangers ...
***
In the Internal Security office of the colony on Planet 138, Chief Garris hasn't shown up for work for a couple of days. Her second-in-command, Inspector Shihar, knows her boss well enough not to ask any questions. Whatever it is, she figures she'll find out soon enough. She suspects it has something to do with that book they're not supposed to talk about.
***
Alone with her memories under the stars, Queen Amira wonders how it all went so wrong. Her ecstatic embraces with her young assistant Joli, now turned from a shining hope to a guilty memory - one she must forever conceal from her mate Kathris. Never again can she let Kathris awaken her passion; she cannot risk letting down her mental defenses, for fear of what the other Queen might discover about her past.
Life was so much better, so much sweeter, when she was young. And again her thoughts return to her native land of Ullari, and to her first lover, Terimi.
And to Terimi's last words ...
And here's an easier mnemonic than "Thirty days hath September ...":
4 + 6 + 9 + 11 = 30
So, I've decided once and for all to change the title from "The Queen's Courtesan" to "Queens of Space". I think it's a little catchier and it also allows for a broader range of sub-plots so I don't feel I have to keep focused on the Kathris/Amira/Joli love triangle.
Also I am going to stop numbering the chapters because I found that I was getting distracted by trying to keep everything in strictly linear order. I am still calling the chapters chapters, but they're not really chapters.
Two more new chapters in the works, should be posted shortly.
Also I am going to stop numbering the chapters because I found that I was getting distracted by trying to keep everything in strictly linear order. I am still calling the chapters chapters, but they're not really chapters.
Two more new chapters in the works, should be posted shortly.
[Click here for the story so far.]
The Book of Q'ormis was not banned in the realms of Oroven. In Ullari to the south, however, it was banned.
Following the exposure of the Singularity cult in the capital city of Ullari, and the subsequent suicides of hundreds of its members and of its founder Q'ormis, the Queen of Ullari and its parliamentary government proscribed Singularity and its teachings in perpetuity. Within two or three generations, all traces of the cult's existence had been expunged from official records and histories. The few highly-placed officials who knew the truth believed that they had eradicated the threat.
In Oroven to the north, the situation was different. Because Singularity had not grown on their own soil, the queens, princesses, and ministers of that realm saw no urgent need to conceal its existence. So if a scholar wished to learn the little that was known about Q'ormis and her followers, she would have to travel to the libraries of Oroven, thousands of miles from the lands where the events actually took place.
The leaders of Ullari believed they had eliminated the threat from their land, while the leaders of Oroven imagined that it was never present in theirs. Both were wrong.
The Book of Q'ormis was not banned in the realms of Oroven. In Ullari to the south, however, it was banned.
Following the exposure of the Singularity cult in the capital city of Ullari, and the subsequent suicides of hundreds of its members and of its founder Q'ormis, the Queen of Ullari and its parliamentary government proscribed Singularity and its teachings in perpetuity. Within two or three generations, all traces of the cult's existence had been expunged from official records and histories. The few highly-placed officials who knew the truth believed that they had eradicated the threat.
In Oroven to the north, the situation was different. Because Singularity had not grown on their own soil, the queens, princesses, and ministers of that realm saw no urgent need to conceal its existence. So if a scholar wished to learn the little that was known about Q'ormis and her followers, she would have to travel to the libraries of Oroven, thousands of miles from the lands where the events actually took place.
The leaders of Ullari believed they had eliminated the threat from their land, while the leaders of Oroven imagined that it was never present in theirs. Both were wrong.
