She's a little like a man!

"She's a little like a man!" I hear this all the time from other women. When I was little, I heard them say "she should have been a boy," as if god made a mistake.

I never intended to become a man. I love my womanhood very much but the universe seems to have had other plans in store for me. Being on my own for 30 years I have learned to re-finance my house, buy houses, set up investment accounts, buy cars, clean gutters, fix my sprinkler system and make a lot of money, i.e. bring home the bacon. I can take care of everything and anything and just when I think I can't get up any more, I get up dust myself off and continue. And slowly I have forgotten to be feminine, have feminine guile, play feminine games, be demure and look pretty.

One of my friends calls me "Woman of Steel" as in female version of Superman. This one is a compliment while other comments are like a spear at my heart. I want to scream at them and say "I have the power of a man and gentle heart of a woman." I have a balance of yin and yang. My yang (male energy) is just as strong as my yin (female energy). I try to believe this is a gift. It is truly a gift. I do not know many women (nor men for that matter) who can do the things I can do.

But the male in me has conquered and wants to retire. The female in me needs tenderness and hates that she has to fix the sprinkler. Most of the time I want to be normal, just normal, a soft woman that needs to be taken care of and loved. I look at other women in envy as they look at me in awe and envy. Isn't that strange?

The world is redefining our womanhood and manhood, perhaps not the way we want to but we need to decide if this is the path we want to take. Is this who we want to become?

Injustice

"If you tremble with indignation at every injustice then you are a friend of mine." Che Guevara.

We Iranians expect the world to tremble at the loss of our country men and women. We get angry when the news of Michael Jackson's death overshadows the news of the uprising in Iran.

But I wonder, what difference have we made in the world as a community, even as individuals. Michael Jackson rocked the world with music and dance. But forget Michael. Have we ever trembled at the injustice done to other people in the world? Darfur, Bosnia, Rwanda? Did we hit the streets? Did we protest? Did we start an internet campaign?

How it is that we expect the world to care about us when we really don't care about the world?

Choose Wisely

Revolution or Compromise? Overthrow of Islamic Republic (IR) or "eslAhAt" within IR? Can IR ever become a humane regime? Will they ever stop hanging women from cranes or kill and beat up the opposition, no matter how small and insignificant they are? This is the time to chose. We cannot reverse what we chose today as a people. Please Choose wisely! Tomorrow you have to live with your decision!

My choice is clear: IR can never be a humane regime and in any case religion should be separate from the government. I choose democratically elected President for a 4 year term and 1 re-election.

United We Stand, Divided we Fall

There are so many petitions going around to protest against the regime. It's ridiculous. Why can't we have one petition that has already started oing around? just like we always do, instead of using others petitions, we create our own, it is in our blood to "ensheAb", to do our own thing. It so saddens me.

Someone once said, individually we can move mountains but together we cannot move a chair. I see that Iranians in Iran are much much more mature than us outside of the US. They have suffered the unconciounable and realize united we stand and divided we fall.

Peace.

Candle Light Vigil in San Jose

Candle light Vigil I just came back from the candle light vigil to protest the death of Neda, the Iranian girl who was murdered by the Iranian regime. It was held in downtown San Jose.

About 200 people were there. there are 500,000 Iranians living in the San Jose area. Where are they? How come they don't come to the protests to show their outrage? They are outraged but sit home and hope someone will do something.

There was a semi-argument at the vigil. Some wanted to say "Death" to this and that. Some peeople wanted quiet. Some guy thought he was the owner of the event and kept talking and talking.

I thought "we are so pathetic!" We have no clue what democracy is, we have no idea how to practice it. It our minds we are all still dictators. How can we have a democratic government?

So Why This @!?#% Life

I was going to call it This Iranian-American Life, then I thought of This Rotten Life, given the events of these past few days. My daughter gave me a hug that made me think "What a Beautiful Life!" So I cannot decide what kind of life it is. And that is the mystery of it.