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Mikham....

Every time I look a bit tired, or don't feel well (which isn't often...but happens to be true today - both issues in full) the women in my Persian family ask if maybe, just maybe, we're pregnant.
This might be annoying for some - I've friends who tired quickly of the immediately-post-marriage questions about when and how many babies would be coming along.
These obviously hopeful questions don't bother me though. On the contrary.

Hamid and I named our future-certain two (one boy and one girl - that's the plan anyway, as if we have a say in the matter) mere months into our relationship, even before we were married (and no, I won't tell what we came up with - and have stuck to all this time, often referring to both of them by name in our conversations...).

We were sitting in a park in Bangalore (one in which you've to pay 50 rupees to enter, a paltry amount, but ironic considering the 'absolutely no sitting on the grass' and 'no running - walking allowed only in designated directions' rules) dreaming up our future, madly in love, and every single child in the area seemed to bring forth images of our own family.

If we didn't have another couple of months in India to contend with I suppose the possibility would be much more than just that - but I can't imagine growing larger by the day while managing the absolute chaos that getting simple things done there can be.

The other consideration, perhaps even more important, is Hamid's adjustment to the States.
We honestly don't know how long it will take us to negotiate his visa, etc. but once we're there there is a house to find, a car to buy, a city to explore (not to mention the nation with all of it's magnificent beauty) neighborhoods to acclimate to, friends and family to make up for lost time with - while getting used to the subtle but impactful differences in way of life from what we've been immersed in together the past nearly-two years.

And then, there's our absolutely mind-boggling addiction to eachother.
I know couples who are in love, but I don't know any who share every waking moment together intentionally.
It's hard sometimes, to imagine fitting another little personality into the equation - although I know we'd manage to fall in love with him too...no problems there.
But sometimes, when we're vascilating between 'should we?' or 'shouldn't we?' in terms of immediate procreation we find ourselves absolutely stuck in the middle.

On the one hand, biology, love, and circumstance all point out that it's absolutely possible in the most wonderful ways - and on the other...well - it's so very permanent. And maybe I'm just a little bit selfish, wanting to keep my husband all to myself for now.

It's still fun to talk about though - and considering the interest level around here, I'll continue to get lots of practice in that area.

Hey, That's Not Fair!

Not enough sleep last night (finishing a client website order, watching DVD's, and generally being silly with my darling = 6 a.m. bedtime) leaves me a bit unqualified to write much of anything today...but I'm facing my first personal experience with just how sanctions placed on Iran by the U.S. can affect one's life.
I've noted repeatedly since we've been here that I simply cannot see in what ways sanctions have impacted Iran - of course I'm not an economist, nor do I have a good understanding of how these things are supposed to work, but I thought the general idea was to inflict some sort of punishment on the sanctioned nation by removing access to goods and services originating from the States.
With American label products on nearly all market shelves and in showrooms all over Tehran - not to mention Iran's capacity to simply make everything it needs on it's own - I had a difficult time seeing just where the sanctions were making an impact, exactly.
Granted, we don't have Starbucks or Microsoft here (although you can apparently purchase a copy of any program you can imagine along with access code for about one dollar U.S.) but things run smoothly and the effects of the decades long sanctions on Iraq I'd heard described by my uncle (who visited the country in the 90's with Doctors Without Borders) obviously never made themselves known here.

However, while attempting to pay for various purchases via Paypal (a quarterly Christmas-every-season ritual we've established with my darling mother shipping our internet ordered goodies to us wherever we happen to be on the planet and thus satisfying my penchant for Michael Kors shoes and Hamid's for programming books) I was faced upon login not with the familiar account summary and funds balance but a big red-letter warning that the country from which I was trying to access the service was under sanction and therefore inaccessible to me.
What a pain.

Early Retrospection

In about three weeks it will be time for us to return to India - my visa to Iran will no longer be valid, or extendable (as they so generously did a third and final time this past week).
In looking back on my blog entries from the past two months, I realize I've not necessarily done a great job of sharing what's been going on on a daily basis...but then, I'm not really a "Today we did such and such" kind of girl.
My childhood diaries were never direct accounts of particular instances, and were rarely day-of entries.
Rather, they were an odd mix of little poems, observations (usually offered in hindsight), and meandering thoughts on whatever was in my head at the time.
Some things, I guess, don't change.

Certainly, I've had my share of good days and bad (mostly good) - but hot summer days are not scarf-friendly days...and I find them more and more difficult to endure - often not leaving the house in favor of avoiding the entire issue altogether. But this is Iran, and there are laws that must be respected - and so I continue to work my way toward accepting them as best I can (one excellent solution I've found is being constantly on the lookout for new scarves made with kinder, lighter fabrics - and my collection has thusly tripled since we've been here, nothing to complain about there.)
The language barrier continues to fluctuate between being absolutely devastating and not-such-a-big-deal.
I still find that I am a constant source of amusement for both friends and family as I learn more and more how to converse (and understand conversation).
Apparently, I sound something like a five year old girl - not because of my vocabulary anymore...but my accent and presentation.

Our impending move back to India promises at least a much more colorful set of entries (as there is much to complain and/or marvel about in India's lovely dirty chaos...and writing is often the only outlet for these things should I want to avoid daily nervous breakdowns.) And I imagine most of my writing on Iran will come once we've gone from here and I can look back at my experiences in order to put them better to paper - as has always been the case.

I dare say that my way of travelling also contributes to the lack of posts.
I am, of course, fascinated by and in admiration of my surroundings, wherever that may be (even in India, for that matter) but because I have always chosen to stay in a country for an extended period of time rather than as a quickie-tourist I tend to settle in and view things much as I would anywhere else. When you know you've planned to be somewhere upwards of three to six months the survival-insticnt necessitates handling things in such a way so as to avoid complete and total discombobulation.
The tourist attractions are still - well, touristy (and fun) but it's the flavor of a country as a whole experience that I'm most interested in and attracted to and as far as I'm concerned seeing a city or country in two days, or even two weeks, is not the same thing as being in it, not even close.
It's the overall impressions and intricacies that ultimately make it into my writing: what do the streets look like at two in the morning? What does it smell like after a rain? Where can I find the best something-to-eat and which will be my favorite cravings to fulfill after the first four weeks (at this point it's definitely the cream puffs I've previously mentioned, Heeva mushroom cheeseburgers, and kebabs - either kubideh from the delivery place or pan fried at home by my mother-in-law...with smoked rice.)
And so on....

I've been in Iran for almost two months and I still don't completely understand it - one minute I'll be queasily pondering one of the popular foods, on the lunch table recently, next to the Coca cola and salad (sheep's facial meat - including eye muscles - cooked in heavy broth) and the next moment Metallica is the focus of everyone's attention as they slide across the big screen television, guitars in hand, next in line after The Who and before Depeche Mode for "Greatest Legends of All Time" - and I have to place myself all over again.
I am in Iran.
It is different here.
But really, how different can it be when you still have things like Metallica and Coke?

Anyway, these things don't really matter in the end - none of it, none of what I think or write or feel ultimately matters except to say that it is my life, this inter-continental life...and I write what I can manage when the thoughts or impressions are there.
I live in a strange dichotomy - or trichotomy....depending on how you look at it.
Hopefully I'll do a much better job of writing about it in the future...

Running: The Anti-Topoli

Five years ago in Seattle I was running five miles every night, rain or snow or shine - I was running and I was healthy, and I didn't have a body complex.
Three years ago I gave up running for fear of heat stroke and being attacked by the packs of wild dogs that roam India, and took up swimming in the Indian Ocean. When it became clear to me that this just wasn't enough for a body rounding the the way-other-side of 30, I had two beach-volleyball poles crafted at the local metalworks, found a lame plastic sports net in Pondicherry, borrowed a ball from Youth Camp and set up shop at Repos (Auroville's beach).
A year and a half ago I had no choice but to give up the whole effort entirely as exercise in landlocked-Bangalore means one of a few things: get an inordinate amount of attention running on the street and work my way around snarling dogs all over again, get an extremely uncomfortably inordinate amount of attention running in a gym, or swim in a public pool I wouldn't be so cruel as to wash one of said dogs in, much less immerse myself.
Long story short, my once-glorious health and tone has deteriorated to a laze of muscles that once knew what they were for but now do me no favors other than keeping my skin attached.

It's been at least three years since I've managed any regular kind of exercise - and at 32 it's about the time to subscribe to the use-it-or-lose-it philosophy.
Plus, I'm really addicted to the little cream puffs Hamid's sister insists on buying for me every week.

So - after weeks of lamenting just how on earth I'd manage a run outside in a country where I basically have to be over-dressed to leave the house and must don a scarf on top of everything else, we came up with a brilliant solution and brought home a running machine.

It's a gorgeous, modern, beeping contraption that tortures me and leaves me happily exhausted and muscle-sore, and it is my new best friend.

Well, obviously...

I receive at least 40 junk emails every day - which is nothing, I suppose, considering that I have altogether twelve business and personal email addresses.
I tend to ignore them for the most part and delete them immediately - but there is a new rash of emails that not only perplexes me, but draws me in in a sort of fascination over their contents.
They don't offer to share the bounty of a twenty-five million dollar inheritence if only I will allow the deposit to make its way from under a mattress somewhere in Nigeria to my bank account, they don't contain any links with vicious worms waiting to attack my hardware, and they don't spout advertisements that assume I'm a man with 'issues.'
These emails come text-only, no images, no nothing - save for a long list of seemingly random keywords, strung together in an odd kind of poetry.
"post-modern neo-liberal war flowers proprietary antidote station...."
Whatever.

The other day, after a solid week of lamenting my fate as a bride in a country where I simply cannot communicate in any meaningful way and worrying over how on earth I'd manage the whole affair, I returned home very nearly to the point of nervous-wreck after topping it all off with a disastrous trip to the seamstress who had made a devastating wreck of a piece of fabric whose import tax alone doubled its price.
Granted, the dress was intended to be some kind of crazy piece of art, and in it's very intention defied the notion of gravity by at least claiming that it wanted to stay ON my body without the aid of shoulder straps.
The seamstress kindly asked me once and again....and again...and again, wouldn't I like her to add straps? (this much I understood) And I replied once and again, etc. (less kindly the fifth time) that no, I didn't want straps, the dress didn't want straps - and the whole thing devolved into a kind of cold war - and in the end I sat working away the now-familiar tears while she promised my mother-in-law she wouldn't make any dresses for me anymore, ever.

It was certainly not my plan to offend her, nor to upset my darling or his family who were simply trying to do me the kindness of creating a lovely gown for me to wear at the after-party for our wedding.
But what started out as a normal shopping excursion wound up with even more tears in the back of the car and a very bewildered mother-in-law.

At a certain point it wasn't the dress that upset me so - it was my inability to say just what it was I was thinking, about any of it. As hard as I tried, everyone ended up upset anyway, and the more upset they became, the more frustrated (and likely to cry) I became.

After escaping from the car and into our house, I dove for my computer, hoping to throw myself into work and therefore forget the entire mess...I was confronted by an inbox stuffed with the usual junk email.
I ignored their subject lines until one in particular caught my eye:
"Obviously, the only solution to your problem is suicide."

Yes...of course...no need to eke out a few new Persian words every day, no need to strain to understand what's going on around me....no need to work my way through the experience of just being here.

I decided, instead, to keep finding ways to talk to people (and to call the seamstress and apologize via my darling and his excellent translation services) and postpone the wedding.

We're married twice already anyway - and the sheer newness (however I've gone on about the normalcy...the language barrier has gotten more difficult to handle) of it all coupled with trying to muck my way through even the smallest efforts required of me in getting ready for a massive wedding, was just - too much.

So there you have it.

In the meantime, everything has settled down and is back to fabulously normal.
And I read those junk emails a little more often, searching for whatever the point is; an exercise probably as useless as agonizing over my distance from the language I'm surrounded by.
It is...justwhat it is, a bunch of words I can't understand:
"lacquered mischief under corporate rose-water justification memory
dove-tailed anger work between motocross staple"

Pity Party

I haven't been shy since I was 15, a new sophomore at the public high school after my parents realized I was too far out of the mold for the expensive private schools I'd wasted their money at.
There were days, many years previous to my self-imposed transformation to social-butterfly, when I couldn't even ask a stranger for the time. Ridiculously isolating - that condition - and one I have always been happy to have conquered.

Lately though, I find my shyness has not only returned in full, but is complicated by my inability to communicate. Persian comes to me in bits and pieces and I am now at what I would estimate is a first grade level of understanding - much less in terms of speaking. Moving beyond the baby-talk of 'I want' and all the necessary nouns has been liberating - and has been spurred on by constant exposure and a little Farsi phrasebook sweetly gifted to me by Hamid's father. But colors, numbers, a handful of new sentences, and a few adjectives get me nowhere when it comes to social situations and I end up feeling lost and quite honestly, thoroughly depressed.

There is nothing worse than sitting in the arms of my darling (who works hard to translate for me, but can't possibly help me mimic real, viable conversation in this way) while he tells some fabulous story, or hilarious joke that leaves everyone in the room laughing but me.
I haven't been the wall flower for seventeen years - and it's no fun at all to be forced back into it by circumstance.

Recently at a small party with friends I was suprised by desolation as I sat trying to keep up, trying to play along, and getting absolutely nowhere. The night started out ordinarily enough; happy to see everyone and excited to be out. But the energy in me quickly waned as a painful awareness dawned on me that I was the only one not laughing - soon enough I was exhausted and desperate to leave.

On the way home, trying to explain just what was I was feeling, I found myself blinking back tears of frustration as I worked through it all aloud.

I worry that they think I'm sullen when I'm so quiet and not laughing along, so I try harder but I worry that they think I'm strange sitting there trying to smile for no-good-reason-because-there's-nothing-else-for-me-to-do. I worry about Hamid having to translate all the time so I listen more carefully and worry that my questions about vocabulary will derail the entire conversation. I worry that they think I'm rude asking to go home at an early hour, so I sit tight, hoping it will get better, easier; but it doesn't and it all piles up as the seconds tick by ever so slowly and in my mind I'm fast-forward...at our wedding - where the audience is multiplied by a hundred and the conversation is quick and happy - and I'm worried I'll end up locked in the bathroom trying not to let the mascara-tears scar my white satin dress.

There is no way around it - the day is fast approaching - and as excited as I am the trepidation related to my new social retardation is creeping in on me like winter in Montana; promising to spill all of itself all over me all at once.
I think it's time to invest in some really good water-proof mascara.

The view from where I sit

Yes, I Was Ignoring You

I've not had much to say about the recent developments in the story between Iran and America...obviously.
I didn't jump on the speculation bandwagon as to the intention behind Bush's lunch invitation to his latest Middle Eastern nemesis or the possible conversational scenarios should the event actually occur - though I did like Mr. Bush (just a little bit) for his efforts toward speaking before bombing this time around.

It's an old story, this business with stalemates and qualifiers, negotiations broken down before they even begin.
I'm not the least bit suprised the offer was finally extended though, considering the voices of disagreement coming out of Saudi Arabia, China, and Russia et al., in response to all the talk of bomb throwing.
I'm also not suprised that the U.S. requires shutting down of Iran's enrichment program before talks can begin.
And it's not exactly shocking that Iran replied with a firm (and probably very tired) "No." while patiently waiting for a proper invitation.

It doesn't seem to me that the United States has any right to go around demanding things of Iran. The U.S. is the spoiled child tantruming at the other kids' getting a piece of the pie. Iran, smartly, ignores the whining and continues as it has, knowing full well that sanctions or no sanctions, at least a good chunk of the planet isn't going to support military strikes headed up by anyone, least of all the States. And who's worried about sanctions anyway? (I've yet to have even the slightest difficulty finding what I need in any respect, and petrol costs less than a pack of gum here.)

Finally, it has gotten to the point where the smaller nations (116 of them, at least) are speaking out in support of Iran's peaceful nuclear program as well - probably realizing that if America is allowed to go down this road (third time in the same neighborhood) there's essentially no telling what or where the next target will be.

I think Bush is making a big mistake, pinning rules down before the discussion can even begin.
Put the idea out there, by all means, let Iran know what it is you want - but don't squander the first opportunity these two great nations have had to meet face to face in over thirty years.
Imagine, George Bush, instead of being remembered as a war-monger, could go down in Brittanica as the president who warmed the chill between the West and the Middle East.
That's some kind of compliment.

George, take advantage of that famous Persian hospitality; there are loads of darling little places to lunch over discussion of the fate of the globe (and Heeva delivers, if you're camera shy), gorgeous parks, great shops to buy gifts for the family, and a view you can't imagine. Just order a kubideh and some tea, smoke the hookah (you've really got to try the strawberry tobacco, yum...) and TALK.
At this point, I'd say it's the least you can do.

Some Kind of Nowhere

I have random fits of being completely weirded out by the fact that I don't really have a 'home' - at least not in the traditional sense of the word.
My belongings are scattered in various suitcases, boxes, bags, and closets in cities in America, India, and now Iran.
I don't really own much of anything anymore. No real bills to manage, no space to call my own long enough to paint each room a different color, to shop for candles and rugs and all the fabulous junk I used to place purposefully about my abode.
Nothing is left, of what made me static.

It's a wonderful freedom of sorts, not being tied to any particular lease, or neighborhood, or country for that matter.
But still, it gets strange sometimes.

I'll find myself pining for the old brick buildings I had a passion for apartment hunting at in downtown Seattle where, in the last one, I would open my little wooden mailbox door to find a Seattle City Light bill and various other paper whatnots that have absolutely no meaning in a person's life other than the knowing that they're going to come and need to be paid, replied to, or shot into the recycle bin.
And, recycle bins....those lovely yellow and green solid plastic receptacles to hold the remnants of last week's dinner party drinks.
Dinner parties - and friends...all in one place, at one time; hopeless now that I've collected them from every corner of the globe rather than a one-locale life experience.
I miss them all at once instead - and then I forget them all because it's too hard - the realization that I'll not see most of them for way too long, and I fixate on the mailbox again. The (at least implied) permanence of it.

Funny, how such inane things can wrench a person's heart when they've been so absent from everyday experience for so long.

I'm not complaining - we've a lovely modern house here in Tehran full of everything I could possibly need and an extended family I love as much as my original. But then again, we're leaving back to India in seven weeks-ish and I know I will once again leave a part of myself (and my stuff) behind for the time being.

The only familiarity I can find:
I look to my right, our 'office' the dining room in our fourth floor apartment, and I see my husband typing away at his latest coded progeny and I realize that I already know in my heart that none of it matters.
No matter where we are and how scattered our life together may be, I am already home, as long as he is here.

Wherever that is.

LJNDawson.com