Between the lines

I click time and time again on the pictures he took of me. “Do they need some Photoshop retouch? No, I will keep them as they are. I am getting old and I like to see the wrinkles appearing” - I think to myself. I try to decipher my expressions in those photos. What did he see when he looked into the camera screen, was I giving away anything?

I remember how I felt when he started taking those pictures. He joked that I should stay natural, otherwise I am ugly. I remember how shy and uncomfortable I was, and at the same time how forcefully I pretended to be casual. Stay casual not to give away the fire burning inside.

When words cannot say what should be said, only eyes can communicate. I looked at him trying to find a cue. In return he was not stingy. He is a guy, a guy who likes to flirt. A simple after-lunch flirt. We talked, I joked and he laughed. He is a good sport. I realized how easy it would be to charm him. How easy if there was not the other.

The others; he has a family.

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This blog came to life thanks to Hossein Derakhshan’s persistent pressure. “You should make a blog and write all these things”, he would say, when I would tell him about my takes on Iranian society, my travel experiences, etc. It didn’t came out exactly as he wished though, he wanted me to write in Persian. I saw my audience more international. But, I am glad he pushed me to do this.

I am not the only person who owes his blog to Hossein. Actually the Iranian blogosphere (a word that reminds me of my ex-boyfriend), owes him much more. He was one of the first people who managed to write in Persian in his blog and soon, he made a simplified manual for all those who would like to blog in Persian. He is also known as the Iranian blog-father for his enormous contribution in this domain. A medium that is quite influential in the development of current Iranian society. Even, our infamous president has a blog!

Hossein is now in jail in Iran for more than five months. Till now, there has been no official, concrete clarification of his “guilt”. There is no trial date fixed. No sentence, nothing. He is held in jail without any rights to visit. He is allowed to call home every couple of weeks for one minute or two. All these, for writing in his blog. All these, for thinking differently.

Recently a group of his friends, with the support of “Internet sans frontière” (hats off to French), have launched a campaign to advocate his freedom. Hossein should be released and be tried if necessary. He doesn’t deserve to be in jail. His family should not suffer. His friends should be united and push for his freedom. There is no argument here.

If you believe in freedom of speech and freedom of expression, please sign this petition and pass it along.

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Last month I was getting ready for my annual Physics conference, which was going to take place in Pittsburgh. On one of the many Sundays that I stay at home trying to plan my life, I had the bright idea of making a two day stop in New York City to visit a friend and renew my ties with the city. It turned out to be one of the best things I have decided to do in the last year or so, well after having decided to go to a wedding in Brazil.

New York is amazing. There is this gravitational force that doesn’t let you go. It is not the fact that it is a city with tall buildings. It is the mixture of immensity, of bridges, of mess, of chaos, of ugly graffiti, of nice restaurants, of cool people. I kind of have the feeling of falling in love with a married man. I love Paris, I have decided to do everything to find a job here and stay, and now my old flame for new york is renewing itself. I don’t want to give in to temptation …

For the two days that I was there, I visited some of the places that I always wanted to visit but for one reason or another I never succeeded. I put my feet in Columbia’s campus. Ten years ago, my dream was to get in to Columbia! I walked on Brooklyn bridge, visited MoMa and the Apple store.

By a Chinese bus, I got to Pittsburgh at almost 1 am. I had never taken one of these infamous Chinese buses and I am glad I did. We stopped in many small towns to pick up or drop passengers. I was amazed at how all these was organized.

When my cab driver found out that I was a physicist, he explained to me that according to a news he has heard, neutrinos and people have some spiritual exchange. He found that very intriguing. I was speechless.

My conference went very well, both on scientific and social level. I was very happy to find my old lab-mates and my colleagues. I was once again, drawn in a sea of many thousand scientists, where you feel like a drop. You can either be a single drop, dry and vanish, or you can be part of a whole and become a powerful sea.

I celebrated the Persian new year in a conference room without feeling any magic. That part was sad.

I came back recharged and happy.

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Its another weekend and I have to think of what I would like to do. Every Saturday morning when I open my eyes, I see a long list of “to do” list. Then I close my eyes and try to relax down and relax; it’s the weekend for heaven’s sake!

Last weekend was quite successful. On Saturday, I did some cleaning around the house, then I went with my friend to see an exhibition by David Lachapelle, whom I didn’t know beforehand. It was a cold day and we had to make a one hour line to get in. The exhibition is in one of the buildings of Musée de la Monnaie, which itself is a nice place to visit. The exhibition starts with a huge photo-collage from “Heaven to Hell” collection. A photograph inspired by virgin Mary and Jesus, with the twist of talking Cortney Love and a Kurt Cobain look alike as subjects. It is not photo collage as you and I do in our spare time, this is a staged photo shot with lots and lots of details.

You could stay five to ten minutes in front of each piece and find new details. I quite liked his work. There were lots of photographs of nude real size people, lots of references to religions, celebrities and politics. Basically, what we have to deal with everyday!

On Sunday my siblings and I went to an Iranian restaurant that we had never been before. It is called So Rice and it is in Porte de Versailles.The food was quite good with nice presentations, different from the usual traditional decorations. As always we looked carefully at the menu, “Oh there is Albaloopolo, ah… there is Gheime bademjoon. Well next time I will try their Ghorme sabzi”, and then we ordered a chelo kabab e Barg each! Of course these next times never come since we always long for Chelo kabab. Even my half-Irish half-Armenian nephiew always gets a chelo kabab, he is aslo corrupted by us!

On this note I want to grumble a bit. I have this Italian friend who irritates the sh*t out of me whenever it comes to Italian food. Every time we have to chose a restaurant it is a big problem because he can not put his foot in an Italian restaurant outside Italy! Ok, I understand that the food made in ones own country suits the best. Of course, it should be like that. But making it such a big deal is to me a big snobbery and inconsideration to others. If that was the case, none of the Iranians, the Chinese, the Greeks, the Spanish, The Indians, etc.,  which have as rich if not even richer cuisine than Italians, should not go to their restaurants outside their own country.

Of course, this is the case of one friend, but I have seen this kind of reaction very often from Italians than any other of my friends. Anybody else is delighted to take us to a restaurant serving the food of their country, just to share even if it is far from what it is supposed to taste.

There is also the question of evolution of a plate. Every country changes the ingredients of a foreign dish due to lack of importation or simply because of adaptation to local taste. To me this is not a disaster at all. In the contrary, people whose food is being globalized should be quite happy and proud that in our world filled with diversity, some dishes are so popular that we find variations of them in every country.

Iranian restaurants don’t do well in France. I have not figured out the reason yet. In style, not in taste, they are quite similar to Indian food and yet you don’t see that many non-Iranians filling the tables. Maybe there is a big shortage of publicity. Maybe, the prices are higher than what people expect from a middle eastern restaurant. I don’t know.

Anyways, food and art are good week-end fillers, and even better when you share them with good people.

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For what it’s worth: it’s never too late or, in my case, too early to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit, stop whenever you want. You can change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. And I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of. If you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.

Probably one of my favorite passages in The curious case of Benjamin Button. I loved the movie for its fluidity, for its many nice quotes, for putting time in question, for the clock going backwards, and of course for Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett.

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