Saturday 5 September 2009

I don't want to tell...

We chose to get out of Iran but I don't remember where exactly was our destination. We never set a destination and I did not want to be one of those who feels nostalgic all the time. I did not ignore all the bad memories and did not keep only the good ones but something happened; the bitter memories seemed sweet when they got old and far. It was like making different stories out of one thing to maybe feel happy. I see people feeling homesick and they write about having a big heart that always beats for that soil. I don't want to live where I don't live and I don't want to feel nostalgic when "I" chose to leave and I don't want to forget the reasons that made us leave there. I don't like to tell people that we had a great civilization back 2500 years ago and we were doing just fine till the Arabs attacked us and I don't like to say what you see in the media is not the true face of the Iranian people and we dance too, and inside thinking and saying but we're warmer and more polite but we do with our kindness as we do with our money; spending it when there is a real reason and a worthy person and what is kindness, we define all its properties. I don't like to tell people we're not religious God forbidden and we hate people being prejudice against other races but feel offensive when people think we speak Arabic.
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Some Iranians blame all the problems in Iran to such and such causes as sarcastically mentioned above, I obviously don't think like that.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was shocked to read ur post today .. for long time I followed ur blog and respected ur ideas and thoughts .. and when I was reading I was about to feel connected to you in some points untill u mentioned the invasion of the arabs " that destroyed ur civilisation" .. and the offense u feel when someone think u speak arabic !..
the arabic language is an ancient and very rich " and beautiful" language .. u may say I don't like people to link persian language to arabic as they are so different and I will agree with u coz i feel the same ,, but never offended ! do u underestimate other cultures?? ,, and particularly the arabic culture .. I will be very worried if yes ..coz for centuries we arabs believed in the story of neighbourhood between as and ur country although most of the problems that happen now in arabic countries are linked directly to Iran and its huge influence on shiite minorities in these countries .. but I never linked that to Iran as a country ... the discussion here will take pages as it will never finish .. I just made my point that although u r free to write what u want on ur personal blog ( which I should confess that I like ),,u should try to consider other people's feelings before insulting a language or a culture ...

Behdokht said...

Oh, I'm very sorry!! The words that I wrote about the Arabs' influence and the language had an impression on you that I did not really mean to have that, in fact I meant to mention the very opposite point and made a sarcastic point about what some my Iranian fellows do when they want to blame their national problems on some thing that happened some 1400 years ago and while they make intellectual statements on prejudice and how terrible it is still they have this very wrong reaction when others think of them as Arabs. In fact I completely agree with you but I assume writing in English didn't reflect what I actually meant to say :(

Anonymous said...

Behi jan,
Many thanks for always being there in my darkest times. Many thanks for always thoughtful comments.

Anonymous said...

thanks for making it clear now .. I should say again that I'm a huge fan of ur and ur husband blogs and followed ur story throughout your posts .. the language could be a barrier for me and u since it's not our first language and for that I should appologise as well for not reconsidering what had been written here and jumped to my own conclusions ! ..

thanks again

Don Cox said...

When imperial powers depart, they tend to leave their language behind. For example, English in India, or Latin in France.

However good the colonial language, people tend to have a loyalty to their original language.

In the case of Iraq, unlike France, the imperial language never really "took" - but the writing system did.

Don Cox said...

"Iraq" - I mean Iran, of course. Typo.

Hiva said...

I 100% agree, I don't like any prejudice statement from my country mates either. I think Iranian are becoming more realistic and finding the main rout of their problems inside rather than outside.