Change of phase...

It was the end of February, a really tight month in the beginning, but nothing particular here in Iran at the end. The world seems to be in lag and the economic downturn all over the world is making it worse. We had some visitors in the evening and it was crowded just for a while in the office... but soon I was alone again...
I'm still not able to enjoy my stay here as work is always looming behind me 24 hours a day, but my worries that I'm a stranger seems to have past away. Maybe it's a time of change in the phase where the chemistry has undergone a shift in my emotion staying here in Iran. The sad part is that my enthusiasm and expectations have also disappeared and it will be my honest intention to just to try finishing my job without any troubles, because I've learned these 7 months that even reaching the target without a problems is a very ambitious goal!


some cakes from our guest! yummy!

PS

last night I had a nice bite!

And...

I had to fight with mosquitos!!

So fast...

After 9 o'clock I finally woke up... It was around six yesterday that I fell asleep, so that's... 15 hours of sleep!
I still felt quite drowsy and the day went past so fast!
I had to fight with my computer... it runs into so many freezes and hang ups that I seriously have to think about what I should do to make it usable...


these error messages... it's making me crazy!!

PS
It was the last day at work for my wife in Tokyo... I wonder how it would feel if I'd quit my job. I surely wouldn't cry and if I'd decided to quit, I'm sure I'm not worried about my future, but rather seeking a dream...
Well, the heroine of the story is my wife today and from the bottom of my heart, I told her "Otsukaresama!" (meaning something like "Thank you for the hard work" we always say at the end of work in Japan).
I hope she'll spend a nice time until she will leave Tokyo to join me here... of course I'm hoping she will have a much better time spending time with me!

Hopelessly tired...

It was just after 3AM I went to bed in a hotel room in Bushehr. It took us hours to finish the feeding and I also had to send some voices for the report I had proposed to Tokyo.
Waking up after three short hours of sleep, I was very drowsy but the morning chai gave me just enough strength to get to the airport again meeting many of my colleagues that spent the night. (They looked more fresh! I'm sure they had a nice dinner!)


time I went to bed...


teatime! at 6AM!


and breakfast!


last look of the streets of Bushehr...


the nearby square...


and the airport!

In the plane I was so groggy that I felt the flight was just a ten minute ride!


fly away!


back to Tehran...

In the afternoon, I attended a funeral service of a relative of my staff and worked a bit in my office as the drowsiness got worse and worse...

It was around six o'clock in the evening that I couldn't resist going to bed... never to wake up again this day... (obviously I'm writing this later on... well I think my memory is correct about this day!)

PS
In the garden...

it was now a battle of three cats to get the food!

Nuclear adventure!

After going to bed right after midnight, it was already time to wake up... With my cameraman I left the office at around 4:30 in the morning and joined a pack of journalists at the Mehrabad Airport. After about an hour and a half flight we reached the southern city of Bushehr and found out there were more of my colleagues waiting there for the tour into one of the most important sites for this country.


a pic from outside the site... for security reasons I won't paste the ones I took inside!

We were there all day as the press conference ended at nearly 5PM and my troubles continued as the feeding process we were planning did not work out... We had to skip dinner and fight our way to finish our task... This is our job and I really don't want any surprises...


in the street of Bushehr... colder than I thought here!

Too bad...

It was supposed to be a four day weekend for us... as the Government announced yesterday that tomorrow will be an official holiday which was in between two holidays; today being the "sad" holiday of the Demise of the Prophet and Thursday being another "sad" holiday of the Martyrdom of Imam Reza.
We had to be ready for tomorrow's sudden trip to the south and it really didn't feel like a holiday at all... But I must admit, the best thing that happened was... that I was able to sleep until noon!

PS
And as the Iranian New Year is coming up...

on March 20th is the New Year Day of Iran...

there's more holidays than ever in March!
all the days with pink circles are OFF!

PS
oh... it's going to take hours!

too bad I only have slow internet... it would've much easier in Japan!

Fighting with my computer...

I was supposed to take my time to reset my computer and recover the C drive to wither off some of the errors that continuously trouble me by making me restart the computer over and over, each time taking so much of my time waiting for the Outlook to finish its checking at restarting after about a ridiculous 20 minutes!

After finishing work, I started the process... I didn't know if I'd done the back-up process correctly, but who cares... I need to reset this guy!

PS
It took me hours to download the necessary updates for the OS, including Windows Service Packs... The booting process of the computer now only takes a minute and a half compared to 5 minutes before I started the recovery...


ok! let's start the recovery!


oh is it really okay to do this!?


XP refreshed!


and the applications are recovered too!


refreshed as new!

Cold again!?

Since we were struggling to find a story to cover, we went out to see the handcrafts exhibition held in central Tehran.

I couldn't find a nice story to cover, but found some nice cups...

As we were leaving the venue, snow started to fall on us and we escaped the sudden change of weather... Are we back in the cold age again? I hope not...

PICS at the exhibition...


here we are at the exhibition!


traditional dresses and clothes...


beautiful turquoise wares...


uh... the shellfish!? what are you doing here!?


more beautiful tablewares...


and more nice dresses...


but I think the favorite for the ladies are these silkwares!


some pictures too... Azeri ones...


these might make nice souvenirs!


and some decorative things made of glass!


some useful for Nowruz... the seven "S"!


wooden tools... useful for cooking!?


and... ???


nice calligraphy... nice to hang on the wall!


oh... musical instruments too! handmade!


and nice ceramic tablewares!
I decided to get some of these...
only 10,000Rls for a cup!

Back outside...

SNOW!! OH NO!!

And my choice...


a nice pair of cups!
but the orange one is a little bit bigger...
oh well... they're handmade!

Burnout Syndrome!?

I think psychologically, I'm experiencing a "Burnout Syndrome". I see in wikipedia, reporters are included as the more prone to burnouts! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burnout_(psychology))
Sadly, concentrating on big projects and returning to normal times is what I've continuously done for perhaps the whole 14 years as a reporter. The first year being posted in Kobe right after the Great Hanshin Earthquake, the big issue of a 14 year old murderer in Suma Ward of Kobe in 1997, the development in the Air Pollution Lawsuit of Amagasaki in 1999-2000, the murder of 4 innoncent family members in Setagaya Ward of Tokyo in then end of 2000, and in the five years as a member of the disaster coverage team, the earthquakes and floodings... covering the Self Defense Force dispatched to the Middle East, the Horiemon and the Tokyo Air Pollution Lawsuit while working at the court... the three long trips abroad in my first year as an international correspondent... All has caused a burnout effect on me and I've went through them luckily with the help from God that it was not followed immediately with a greater topic.
This time the Presidential Election of this country is still four months away and though I have to seriously get ready from around April, there will be the Nowruz (Iranian New Year) vacations in late March and my wife is planning to join me at that time... So please... I'm seriously hoping a great issue will not bother me for a while... please...

Relaxing at nighttime finishing off earlier than usual...

having rice is one of the luxuries... a humble and modest luxury...

Still very tired... very...

I woke up in the morning as it is a habit to wake up around 8AM, but after checking my e-mails finding no important messages, I went right back to sleep. I finally woke up before noon time, and after fighting a little with my computer, I couldn't resist going to bed again... I was still very tired after sleeping another two hours. I don't understand why, but I would like to get rid of this drowsiness and maybe taking a vacation leaving this place for a while would help, but I'd rather like to go with my wife after she arrives here next month. Unlike many others, travelling alone is very boring for me and it would be really stressful if I wander anyplace alone...
After talking to her in the afternoon, we could not resolve our case about when and where we should go as we had no clue when the authorities of this nation will grant her a multiple visa... This is the major problem we are facing and we might have the answer tomorrow. Sadly it might be too late because surely all the flights would be booked with many Iranians fleeing the country for vacation... A very tough situation here!

In the nighttime, I fought with the piles of newspapers I hadn't reorganized for months... some papers were old as last October's and it took me three hours just to pigeonhole two piles of them... oh I'll do the other pile tomorrow... I'm so tired...


a pile of papers to fight with!

And I probably woke up like this!

fwaaah...

Time to rest... right!?

Waking up at around 6AM, it was time to finish the job. With my colleagues, we went off to the studio to finish my live coverage! It was the last one for the series: the 30th Anniversary of the Islamic Revolution...
I was so sleepy and I really wasn't satisfied with the quality of the work, but I was relieved everything was finished...

So I went out to finish some of the payments due...


going out to the exchange shop first!


oh, hello! an alien friend on the way!


a sunny and nice day!

And I took my colleagues out for lunch...
and my choice was of course...


meat!!

After my colleagues left the office, I once again fell asleep on the sofa of my office... Oh, I can really sleep tomorrow... right!?

One more to go...

The long journey of coverage will finish tomorrow morning. I was tired again today but had to stay up until 11PM as I had to record a radio report for the morning show in Japan. After my staff left the office before 7PM, I decided to take a nap for a few hours before waking up before 10PM. I didn't know if I were awake enough to do the job, but at least I wasn't feeling too dizzy like the Finance Minister at the G8, and managed to do the job. (Well it's not easy to get access to alcohol anyways, so there isn't a doubt about the reason I were dizzy!)
With tomorrow morning's live coverage, the coverage of the 30th Anniversary of the Revolution will finish... finally...

PS
I received a post package from my sister living in the US...


yeah they surely opened it and checked it thoroughly!
how challenging could it be getting a gift from a country without diplomatic relations!?


but the book... a Christian one... was okay...
wow... very interesting...
Well... Thank you for the gift!