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Post by shh on Jan 27, 2013 13:02:14 GMT -5
I don't have email Grainne. So I guess you could just post it here maybe?
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Post by shh on Jan 27, 2013 13:38:56 GMT -5
What also strikes me is your account of the knifing. It seems to have been the bend of Western media to persist in saying, "let the authorities take care of it". In other words, don't defend yourself. Call 911 and hope they get there on time. In a discussion with some friends on how we could prevent another school shooting, I suggested staff preparedness. My reasoning for this is that most people panic when they see an adversary with a gun and instead of uniting to disarm the solitary person, they all run for shelter. One of the posters boiled it down to "combat ready", doing a bleeding heart rant about the shooter being the "victim" because he is obviously mentally ill. He also, somehow, managed to compare staff preparedness with children living in a combat ready boot camp. Realizing he was a troll, I simply commented that comparing staff preparedness to combat ready was an interesting observation, to which there was no reply. My true perspective though is that we are learning; have learned; a sort of helpless dependency in the face of violence. It's taught to us at a very young age. If the school bully beats you up, don't fight back - go to the authorities or you will be equally guilty of violence. "Mitigating circumstances" have been swept under the rug as having no real definition. I honestly believe the art of defense needs to be reconstructed into the learning process. What if, instead of ducking for cover, people (children included) began spontaneously throwing every available object at the shooter? He may be able to murder some people, but I think the mayhem would be far more limited than ducking and running for cover. I'm with you here. Modern people are domesticated, tame. That says it all for me...it's the difference between a lion and a pet cat. A wild man...now that's a sight to behold. They are fierce creatures. I've had the fortune of meeting one. I always think if all people were of that type, human society would be awesome. IMO, everyone should rightly consider themselves a combatant at war, fighting for their lives. I think we've lost our fighting spirit, and that's why we fail in life. I'm convinced that all we need to live a strong life is a spirit tuned to struggle, and not complain, mind you. You know, in order to tame and domesticate an animal, you have to break its spirit, intimidate, and terrorize it. Sound familiar?
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Post by shh on Jan 27, 2013 13:51:11 GMT -5
Oh and I'm sure pussies like that elementary school shooter would piss themselves if confronted with someone with real combat training. No amount of assault rifles would make any difference IMO. People like that retard always look for someone helpless to gun down -- maybe because they want to feel powerful (but who knows) -- I mean he went on a killing spree in an elementary school ffs! A real man, IMHO, would run into a military base and see how many armed soldiers he can kill before he goes down.
I think people like that douchebag want to fight someone who won't fight back. If you fight back, they just won't know what to do. It's the last thing they'd expect. I mean for the love of god, we're a bunch of fat domesticated monkeys. We can't even run away from danger fast enough, let alone confront it head on.
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Post by sh on Jan 28, 2013 1:59:48 GMT -5
It's cloudy today. I mean really thick, dark overcast. And It's definitely gonna rain hard. It's actually very refreshing after a whole week of blue skies and sunshine. I can smell the humidity on the air, which is very rare in the central Iranian plateau.
Yesterday, while trekking through the jungle, I was debating with this guy who lived in the US for 30 years. He's sixty years old and an avid hunter and nature enthusiast. He is the man who brought hunting ethics to Mazandaran. (the province here.) He's like a chairman on some committees for wilderness preservation and stuff like that. He's very pro-US and anti-Iran, but not really against Iran per se, rather, he is against the Iranian regime. He thinks the regime should go fuck themselves and let the US rule Iran. He used to be extremely wealthy while he lived in Virginia. He had like 17 Porsches and a whole bunch of restaurants and bars. Then he lost it all, together with his wife and daughter, and so he moved back to Iran with only the clothes on his back. (He really did have 17 Porsches. No BS.)
So, we started talking about how it is illegal for more than 3 people to gather on the street in Iran, and how it's illegal to drive a motorcycle with an engine capacity larger than 250cc's without a permit. (You can only get a permit to drive them on the race-track, never on the street or highway.) He believed the reasons for these two crazy laws were purely political: i.e. A large group of people could turn into a mob of protestors, who could threaten the regime. And a big bike could be used to assasinate government officials on the street.
I thought he was full of shit. You know, up to a few years ago, the neighborhoods of Tehran were "ruled" by the kids/young men who lived in that neighborhood. The police had absolutely no business going into any "hood" and demanding shit. They'd get their heads cut off and mailed to their families if they did.
Let me explain. Every neighborhood, obviously, had a bunch of young men living in it. Those young men were pretty much always congregated on the street. They weren't really gangs in the sense that Americans understand the term. But rather, they just hung out around their neighborhood, playing soccer, smoking weed/cigarettes, etc...You know what young men do. Just by mere fact of their presence, they would assure the security of their neighrborhoodspeople whom they considered their brothers and sisters. For example, if a strange man "bothered" a girl from their neighborhood, they'd beat the shit out of him and send him on his way. Or if one of their own got beat up in another neighborhood, they'd gather their full numbers and move into "enemy" territory beating up every young man they could find, in retaliation. Or simple things, like if they noticed a stranger snooping around their neighborhood, they'd go ask him what he's doing, and if he appeared suspicious they'd escort him out of the neighborhood.
After hard drugs appeared on the market after the revolution, this simple system was corrupted. People started to see young people hanging around the neighborhood as a nuisance. i.e. The government-mafia got the young people hooked on hard drugs, turned public opinion against them, and sent in their police-heroes to clean up the neighborhoods as the ignorant masses cheered.
During the last days of the old system, the young men were already proto-gangs; breaking into houses, stealing cars, mugging women, dealing drugs, etc.
The way I see it, the Iranian government and the revolutionary guard corps, whose high-ranking officers were all educated in the US, set up these laws in order to avoid the "anarchy" that the US experienced because of "excess" freedoms. I was once arrested by three Sepah (revolutionary guard) officers. One of them spoke perfect English with a southern californian inflection. He claimed to have lived in San Diego and LA for over 20 years. He busted us for smoking pot. He thought I was a spy, although he didn't actually say it. I tried to act like a total imbecile lest he throw me in some pit for the rest of my life.
So you know, the reason they don't want more than 3 people assembling on the street, IMO, is because they don't want gangs and anarchist groups. And the reason people are only allowed to drive shitty bikes, IMO, is because they wouldn't ever be able to catch you on a 500cc, let alone a 1300cc. But how could you ever escape the police on a 125-200cc? They'd have you before you could even shift into second gear.
Today, the police has absolute power over the streets in Iran. They have zero-tolerance for young men hanging out in their neighborhood, unless said men are of the nerdy type. Crime has increased a millionfold compared to the old days. No neighborhood is safe. Hard drugs are everywhere. Criminals are almost never caught. The prisons are full way over-capacity with people charged with financial "crimes" like bounced checks, or men who didn't have the money to pay their wives' Mahr. (Women can have their husbands locked up in jail at the drop of a hat here. There's thousands of such men in prison as I'm writing this.)
Iran has been experiencing a decline in all aspects of life. There's no doubt about it. And it's been accelerating exponentially in the past few years. Soon, we will be in hell, and I'm afraid I'm going to be the only one left standing, as it seems I'm the only person in Iran who isn't complaining all the time. Everyone is dissatisfied. And the majority of people are really unhappy.
But I'm happy and I still think life is great. And Iran is great. And the whole world is great.
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Post by grainnerhuad on Jan 29, 2013 17:46:24 GMT -5
I will put it here when I'm done, in the "writer's workshop" room. You can see that room right? If not let me know and I will make sure you get access to it.
As for the rest, anyone who tells you America is somehow "free-er" than what you are describing in Iran is either oblivious or a worker ant. Seriously, we have the same sorts of crack downs, especially in neighborhoods that would have been traditionally overseen by those who lived there and for the same reasons. The U.S. government does not want to deal with gangs. And young men and women for that matter need something to do. So, when they cannot manage the welfare of their neighborhoods they turn instead to looting it and selling drugs. Or beating up hobos or jumping gays. Those things btw, seem fine to the government, although they will put on a show of it being otherwise, they really give less time and attention to a beat to death hobo than they do to a group of youth congregating in a park.
The more I hear from you, the more it seems our cultures are so very similar, although we like to propagate the idea that we are different in order to (probably) keep the option of eventual warfare open. If we see one another as the same, how could we make the other "evil"?
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Post by grainnerhuad on Jan 29, 2013 17:56:24 GMT -5
BTW, I just pulled all the stories today and will begin editing tonight and tomorrow. My week has gotten crazier than expected which really shouldn't surprise me because I always plan for calm and soothing weeks and the Gods ( or whomever) laugh...
I will get back to you though.
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Post by sh on Jan 30, 2013 4:41:10 GMT -5
Hi Grainne. It's been a little chilly and overcast here for a few days now, no sunshine at all. It feels like the pacific northwest, exactly. It's almost unbearable for someone who is used to the constant sunshine of the interior plateau. The thick cloud cover is forecast to stay put for another week. It's been drizzling non-stop in the foothills to the south, not very nice if you want to go roaming about in the jungle. You know, I'm well aware that life in the US is not "free-er" than Iran. I grew up in northern Europe and America, and I even lived in western Canada for a couple of years. All I can say is, by contrast, no one in Iran really "works" at all; pretty much everyone has hours and hours of free time to themselves here. Whereas the working class in the west don't even know what it means to have free time IMO, like Iranians don't know what it means to "work." And I'm probably the king of free time, which is why I love it here. The point, I think, is that the majority of Iranians don't know or appreciate what they have. They think the grass is greener in the west. They don't realize that even with the shittiest most fucked up economy in the world, they work less than any people any where. I think this is an official fact. Like, south koreans and the japanese are at the top, and iranians are at the very bottom of the list. And make no mistake, Iranian culture _is_ very similar to American culture. I think this has nothing to do with the fact that I'm describing things as I see them through the eyes of a western man. Like, the same similarities don't exist between Iran and Finland, for example, you know? And I think I can see the workshop area. I'll have to logon to know for sure.
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Post by sh on Feb 1, 2013 1:17:26 GMT -5
Apparently, that dickhead judge voted in favor of the shepherd. (the one who had claimed his sheep were poisoned) Turaj has to pay 3 million tomans in "damages." That's about a thousand dollars, give or take.
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Post by sh on Feb 1, 2013 3:16:13 GMT -5
I've been meaning of writing a description of the province of Mazandaran, which was the favorite place of the Shah and his father (also the Shah) who were originally from here.
But I've been really busy. We were at an orange orchard yesterday, helping out, picking the fruit, washing it, boxing it, etc.
The citrus trees that exist in Mazandaran are natives, according to the locals. There's oranges, tangerines, sour-oranges (Don't know the latin name; never seen or heard of 'em outside of Iran.) and half a dozen other citrus fruits that I've never heard of anywhere else. The vast majority of citrus orchards in Mazandaran are situated up in the hills, as opposed to the rice farms that are always on the plains.
The locals here have no concept of irrigating/giving water to their orange, tangerine, etc. They laugh when I tell them we have to water our fruit trees twice a month. Their fruit trees bear plenty of fruit without any irrigation on the farmers' part. This only reinforces the idea that these trees are natives of this region. Also, for example, there exists a historical record of when tea was first brought to Iran hundreds of years ago. (All the tea in Iran is grown in Gilan, next door.) But there is absolutely no record of citrus trees ever having been imported to Mazandaran. The sour-oranges, for example, grow wild all over the place. And the native oranges (and pretty much the whole family, lemons, limes, etc.) grow straight from seed. ie. drop an orange seed anywhere and in a few years you will have a tree that bears practically the same fruit as the parent tree.
Citrus fruits and rice makes up 99% of the agriculture here. Most people graft European varieties (like Thompson, etc.) onto the native citrus root-stock. And it's really a wonder how these trees bear so much fruit without being irrigated at all. The locals wouldn't even know how to water their trees anyway. (You have to shape the dirt into canals every spring, and guide the running water row by row, with a shovel, where I come from.)
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Post by grainnerhuad on Feb 1, 2013 22:48:10 GMT -5
Thanks for the Turaj update. I started working it up and got stopped by a migraine that kicked my ass, i am planning on having it done in time to run next week. Get back to you on that soon.
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Post by sh on Feb 2, 2013 6:06:02 GMT -5
Thanks for the Turaj update. I started working it up and got stopped by a migraine that kicked my ass, i am planning on having it done in time to run next week. Get back to you on that soon. No rush, Grainne, take your time. I know you're busy, and I'm really sorry to inconvenience you with this. It's very rude and inconsiderate of me. I'm gonna talk to a lawyer here today, or maybe tomorrow, before I head back to Tehran. Hopefully, he won't tell me the battle's been lost already.
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Post by sh on Feb 2, 2013 6:14:59 GMT -5
Is it really your birthday today Grainne? Happy birthday! Hope you have a good one, with your family and friends close. ...And I didn't even get you anything.
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Post by sh on Feb 3, 2013 15:49:59 GMT -5
The new comment-thing tells me my browser isn't supported. ..Lies.
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Post by grainnerhuad on Feb 4, 2013 11:46:13 GMT -5
ADP- I see your comments? So you are saying you cannot see them? Thanks this is important as we want to make sure the most people possible can see them. Tell me, can you see anyone else's like mine in the spying on you piece? Also are u able or have u noticed being able to see Disquss format comments at other sites? Thanks again, very helpful. Oh and yes, it was my birthday, thanks. I had a nice quiet weekend. Quiet Weekends being unusual, so it was a gift.
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Post by sh on Feb 5, 2013 1:28:28 GMT -5
On the "you are being spied on" thread, at the bottom of the article it says:
Sorry, the browser you are using is not currently supported. To use the comments, Disqus recommends the following browsers:
Then there's a list of a bunch of browsers. And below that I can see stacystec's comment, then your comment"...you are doomed" and three more comments, one from me and two from you.
But I can't post comments.
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