Mysterious Moon

Ghazal Dear, I once went to Pompeji with somebody I was careless enough to fell in love with. We got lost there after sunset, when they closed the Pompeji necropolis for visitors. Walking around through the darkness we expected every second that a time leap might send us back to year 79 A.D., when the erupting Vesuv burried the town and all its people underneath. The red-orange background on the picture below is from a photo we did at this day, the mysterious moon in the foreground, however is from tonight. 

Happy Persian New Year - سال نو مبارک

Haft Sheen:  The 7 S..., a set of objects all starting with the persian letter Sheen

 

 

 

People in and from Iran, Kurdistan and Afghanistan celebrate the beginning of their new year today. By precise astronomical calculation it started already yesterday at 11:02 GMT, since astronomers calculated that at this very minute the duration of day and night is equal (vernal equinox).

For today, I'd only like to wish all Iranian people a happy Nowruz, hoping that 2572 will be the last year of a 34 years long period of political and intellectual oppression in their home country.

I will later today add an alternative calculation here proposing a more rational estimation of the precise timepoint of Nowruz.

A Blasphemic Journey to the Holy Land

Day 0, Travel to Jerusalem (and keep your passport clean from any trace of the "zionost entity") Day 1: Wet hijab day at Banana beach, Tel Aviv Day 2: "yes, Mame, me and Shlomo are sitting here on an ice-cream; I promise ..." Day 3: Sunset on Tel Aviv Beach, the Big Orange Day 4: Jaffa Cafe: Delicious Menue Day 5: Tel Aviv: Russian Immigrant is doing Sewage Fishing on Tel Avivs Carmel Market Day 6: Jaffa: In addition to the many beautiful Arab girls, there are also very enchanting Jewish ones, like the one next to me (dont try to date her, since she is my wife now) Day 7: Jerusalem, YMCA Guesthouse : In the tradition of the crusaders - but after adopting a more tolerant policy they also serve non-gay customers nowadays. Day 8: Marmilla Street near Jaffa Gate, Jerusalem: Each stone tells a story.   Day 9: Jerusalem: Gentlemen prefer blond (at least here, where it is still considered something exotic) Day 10: Old town Jerusalem: Bargaining for the price of grapes. Day 11: Old town Jerusalem: Cooling down the mood with some icecream. Day 12: Jerusalem, Church of Sepulchre: For those who believe in it, this red stone plate on which Jesus was layed down after his death, can do miracles. I tested it with my mobile phone, and indeed it got fully recharged after placing it there for just one minute.
Day 13: Jerusalem/Al Kuds: School is out in the Arab quarter   Day 14: Jerusalem: Goes together very well: Tasty Taybeh beer from Palestine and genetically modified Cherry-Tomatoes from Israel Day 15: Jerusalem/Al Kuds: Sabbath at western wall.   Day 16: Qumran / Death Sea: The dream of many young folks: Exodus to South America Day 17: En Gedi / Death Sea: Taking a refreshing bath where King Solomon met Suleika.   Day 18: Death Sea Shore: Baywatch at 42 degrees.   Day 19: Haifa / Bahai Garden: Members only (unless you fit through this fence)   Day 20: Haifa / Alenby street: Kosher rubbish bins: left one for milky products, righ one for fleshy products.   Day 21: Haifa / Allenby street: The Sadam Hussein memorial shelters.     Day 22: Jerusalem / Al Kuds: Western Wall, Mount Muriah, Dom of Rock at the beginning of Sabbath.   Day 23: Jad Vashem: The Tree to honour Oskar Schindler.   Day 24: Jerusalem/Al Kuds: Top Soccer Players. Arab boys build their playground on the roofs of christian or jewish houses. Day 25: Tel Aviv / Hayarkon Park: Red Hot Chilly Peppers concert   Day 1 after returning home: Reading Saul Bellows "To Jerusalem and return" and trying to understand how much I missed and why I should come back.

The Moon -- one year later, but more than one year elder

Ghazal my dear, 

What is age, and what is aging, if everyone uses a different measure for this. This came to my mind when I did another picture of the moon tonight. Tonight it was once again the night of the Persides meteor shower. But since nothing could top the spectacular meteor that we saw together with you at the same night in 2010, I put more attention to the moon again (1). A year ago at the same night, we have been at the Bulgarian blacksea coast, and then the Persides night fell together with the full moon. This year, however, the same day in the year (11th to 12th of August), the moon looked completely different. 

Its shape was already ascending to less than 25%, whereas full moon was already 10 days ago (exactly at August 2nd). So it is of some interest to understand why according to the solar calender exactly one year passed by (and even the Persides meteor showers declined to this (2), but the moon implies something different. As a proof, the picture on the left shows the shape of the moon as of tonight, and you can compare with the picture from a year ago.

The reason for this asynchrony is that the circular rotation of the moon around the earth and relative to the sun happens once every 29 days, 12h and ~4min. This means, that 12 month for the moon (or one year for it) take only 345 days, i.e. 11 days less than a normal year of 356 days. Therefore the full moon of August 2012 was visible 11 days earlier than the full moon of August 2011.

This means that for people who rely on the sun as their calender reference, a year has some 11 extra days, as compared to people who rely on the moon as a calender standard (like muslims). In the long term, after 33 solar years (which the western civilisation and the Persians use) an extra year has already accumulated for people in the islamic world. I have no clue if muslims indeed celebrate their birthdays according to the moons calender, and count one extra life year every 33 normal years. And it is not completely unlikely, that the processes of real biologically aging (or lets call it maturing) is influenced to some degree by the imagination of aging. Maybe somebody who really feels elder, if he or she suddenly discovers that instead of 33, he or she is already 34 years old. So therefore you might conclude (together with the early Beatles) that it is better to "....follow the sun":

Sun is definitely good for a couple of physiological functions (vitamin D synthesis, production of serotonin which makes us happy and satisfied), but in higher doses it is doing the opposite: You know better than anybody else how UV-A and UV-B can accelerate the entire aging process, since you work on this issue and even got a scientific price for this. The Isar island, where some black ashes might still mark the site of our camp-fire, and which looked pretty uncosy and barely populated three weeks ago, today saw masses of locals who followed the sun and took advice from the 1960 Beatles song, rather than from your 2011 publication in Mutation Research.

I guess that now you'd like to know why I waited for an entire year, before sending you another photograph of the moon again. The reason was that after the Persides night in Bulgaria last year, my camera broke. I somehow smashed the display, and from then on it was totally black. But I did not want to throw it in the waste bin right away, since this camera was always a brave and reliable companion to us. So I left it untouched on my desk, before in a quiet moment three weeks ago I started to take it apart (like I did it with your wrist-watch two years ago). I soon realized that the broken display can be removed carefully and replaced with a new one. And soon I found through Ebay a possibility to get even seperate display units for virtually every single digital camera. I quickly located a provider with the funny name of GLOBAL-SHINING (3). Mr. or Mrs. Global Shining appeared to be a Mr. Ho, living with his GLOBAL STAR SHINING in Flat S30 1/F, Shopping Arcade, Tsuen Wan Centre, Tsuen Wan, Hongkong (4).

When I received Mr. Ho's delivery, the small parcell contained not only the brand-new Samsung camery display, it also had as a little extra a special screw driver (not only fitting the microscopic steel screws that held together the camera back, but also of perfect size for chinese fingers) and a handwritten piece of paper saying "Thank you for considering GLOBAL SHINING as business partner". 

By help of the microscopic screw driver and some forceps from the lab I quickly managed to replace the camera display, and the pictures on todays post are the proof how well the whole camera is working again. Since I was so happy about revitalising the nice camera with the Mr. Ho's help, I decided not only to give him excellent reference points on Ebay, but also send him some words of gratitude on a postcard showing Castle Neuschwanstein. It is nice to imagine how Mr. Ho mounts the colourful postcard to the wall of his Flat S30 1/F in the shopping arcade of Tsue Wan, Hongkong.

Is there a final take-home message from this post for you, Ghazal ?
I hope you will find one.
Take Care my Dear

Michael




Footnotes: 
(1) Surely you know that the Moon symbolizes the pure, innocent beauty in Persian classicla poetry. This is independent of the exclusive role of the Sun in ancient, pre-islamic Persian culture, philosophy and science. But because poetry is very much influenced by arabic traditions, their spiritual preference for the moon as symbol in religion and arts got access into the poetry of Hafez, Rumi, Atta and Omar Khayyun.
(2) The Persides Meteor shower lives up to its name: same as the Persian people do, it follows precisely the sun's calender. I guess that it follows in a precise and constant time after Persian Nouruz.
(3) Initially I could not figure out, if the name of the company GLOBAL-SHINING was referring to the moon or the sun. But now that I know that it is a Hongkong based company, I guess they even mean the Shining Stars.
(4) I guess Mr. Ho wont mind having his business address published here on my blog. But it might further promoted his excellent business. Just that Tsuen Wan does not have a postcode might discourage Hongkong tourists to drop into his store and buy camera displays.

Modern Cowboy

DOWN IN THE VALLEY Set in the present-day San Fernando Valley, this movie revolves around a delusional man who believes he's a cowboy and the relationship that he starts with a rebellious young woman. Tobe, A young girl, (played by Evan Rachel Wood), is on her way to the beach with some friends, when she falls in love with a modern cowboy, Harlan (played by Edward Norton), who is working at the local gas-station. Tobes father (David Morse) is against the affair between his younger daughter an the elder Harlan. He soon starts an open hostility towards Harklan and even threatens him several times with a gun. When Harlan comes along Tobes house to take her away from the violent father, the two have a short argument during which Harlan injures Tobe with his revolver, from which a bullet is released accidentally. Tobe falls into coma for several days, and Harlan runs away on a white horse together with Tobes little brother. Tobes father starts a hunt and when he finds Harlan, he shots him dead in a tragic show down. Modern Times are not made for romantic modern cowboys.

The magnificance of Irans Nature

Dear Ghazal, Yesterday night the french-german TV channel Arte broadcasted this amazing two-series documentary about the magnificance of Irans Nature. And by chance (or perhaps not really by chance but due to a telepathic link of two like-minded souls), both Omid and myself were watching it. When we met in the morning at coffee break, we were both still out-of-breeze about the beautiful pictures, so we decided that we will travel Omids home-country next summer. In fact he already invited me several times, but I always had some issues regarding the current political tensions between the Regime in Tehran and the West. And Omid convinced me that he will teach me how to get around all hussles there. So we made firm plans for 2013, we will begin the Great Game again. Whats about you, Ghazal, will you accompany us ? It would be so much nicer, and of course we both would take care of you and protect you from the wild creatures all around.

To give you some taste of what will expect you if you come with us to visit the land of your ancestors, have a look at the Arte TV series (you can change the language to german in the tiny menue on the bottom, if you prefer):

The second serie goes to the north and north-west of Iran, visiting the reservation-area Golestan, Elburs Mountains and the Caspian Sea. It also shows peoples visiting Hafiz' tomb in Shiraz and reading his poems with great passion. Rare wild creatures such as Brown-Bear, the beautiful Ghazel, Leopard and Caucasian Deer. The animal photographs of the Serie were shot by Benny Rebel, a gifted expert of animal behaviour and the aesthetics of life.

(You can also watch the two documentaries full-screen size by pressing the tiny rectangular button below the videos.)

Verse aus dem EVIN Gefängniss

Bahareh Hedayat has been sentenced again to 7 years in the notorious Evin prison. The following letter she send to her husband. I have collected translations of this and other prisoner letters into various languages at the partner website Evin-Rosetta If you want to read other than the following german version, or if you want to contribute a translation into your own language follow the aformentioned link.

Ich sehne mich nach Deiner stillen Umarmung

Ich würde gern wissen, wo Du jetzt bist,
Und wie Dein Tag vergeht,
nachdem Du aufstehst,
und Dich wäscht.
Ich möchte wissen, was Du trägst,
wen Du morgens zur Arbeit gehst,

Ob Dir langweilig ist,
oder Du erschöpft bist,
oder müde oder ob Dich friert.
Der Wind, der durch die Gitterstäbe weht,
Trägt den Staub der Stadt herein.
Spürst Du das auch,
Wenn Du zu Hause die Fenster öffnest ?

Ist es noch dunkel,
Wenn Du morgens das Haus verlässt,
Und Dich auf den Weg zur Arbeit machst ?
Ist das Licht im Treppenhaus immer noch kaputt ?
Warum denke ich gerade daran,
obwohl mir die Erinnerungen an unser Haus langsam verblassen.
Ich habe vergessen, welche Farbe seine Mauern hatten,
Und auch wenn Du mich versuchst daran zu erinnern,
In meiner Vorstellung werden sie doch wieder grau.

Wo schläfst Du jetzt in der Nacht ?
Wer wäscht Dir Deine Sachen ?
Hast Du neue Freunde kennengelernt,
Seit dem Tag, als Sie mich von Dir fortgerissen und eingesperrt haben ?
Mit wem streitest Du jetzt, und worüber ?
Was liest Du Neues, und welche Musik hörst Du ?
Ich mache mir Sorgen, dass Du ohne mich noch länger vor dem Computer sitzt.
In den endlosen Stunden hier in dieser betonierten Zelle
wird jeder Augenblick Deines Lebens unendlich wichtig für mich.
Zum Beispiel was Du Dir kaufen gehst, wenn Du Hunger hast,
Gemüse oder Obst vielleicht.
Jetzt ist doch gerade Sommer bei Euch draussen, oder ?
Gibt es jetzt schon Aprikosen, Pflaumen und Himbeeren ?
Und die Berge von Wasser- und Honigmelonen bei den Strassenhändlern -
Die Erinnerung an ihren Duft macht mich schwindlig.

Bekommst Du immer noch Kopfschmerzen, wenn der Tee zu lange gezogen ist ?
Wirst Du unruhig, wenn Du wieder mal vergessen hast
Dein Telefon aufzuladen ?
Wäscht Du Dir immer noch die Haare im Abwaschbecken in der Küche,
und isst den Jughurt mit trockenem Brot ?
Hast Du Dir endlich eine neue Brieftasche geleistet,
und ein neues Hemd ?
Ich will nicht, dass Du Dich vernachlässigst,
nur weil ich nicht bei Dir sein kann !

Ich werde verrückt, wenn ich nicht weiss,
Woran Du denkst, wenn Du an mich denkst.
Worüber würdest Du mit mir sprechen,
Wenn Ich jetzt bei Dir sein könnte ?

Wenn Du mir etwas kaufen könntest,
Was würdest Du aussuchen ?
Sehnst Du Dich nach der Zeit, als wir zusammen waren,
Und denkst Du an die all die Jahrestage ?
Als ich im Juni zum ersten Mal nach Majideyeh kam,
Und Du mich in Isfahan herumgeführt hast.
Wir sind ziellos durch die Stadt gelaufen,
Nur um zusammen sein zu können,
bis der Sonnenuntergang im Saei Park uns daran erinnerte,
Dass der Tag langsam zu Ende geht.
Und dann Zav, und wie wir mit Ahmad nach Darband fuhren,
In jenem Frühjahr 2008.

Erinnerst Du Dich noch an meine Kochversuche ?
Ich habe Sie vergessen,
Wenn Ich frei käme, müsste ich wieder neu Kochen lernen.
Weisst Du noch, wie wir unsere ersten Möbel erstanden haben,
Stück für Stück ?
Und wie wir 2008 das Neue Jahr gefeiert haben,
Am Strand des Kaspischen Meeres.

Erinnerst Du Dich was am 6. Jui 2002 passierte ?
Ich kann es Dir genau sagen:
Du warst verzweifelt, weil ich mich nicht entscheiden konnte,
zwischen Dir und meinem früheren Leben.
Doch sechs Jahre später wurde mir klar, dass ich mich richtig entschieden hatte:
Denn vor dem Gefängnisstor hast nur Du auf mich gewartet.
Und kurz darauf hast Du mich an die Hand genommen,
so als würden wir ein ausgelassenen Spaziergang durch die morgendliche Stadt machen.
Dabei ging es zur Gerichtsverhandlung, und wir beiden wussten,
Dass das die uns wieder für lange Zeit auseinander reissen werden.

Als ich dann schon im August wieder raus kam,
Warst Du da und brachtest mich weg von diesem Ort des Schreckens
und wir fuhren zu uns nach Haus,
und die Abendsonne blendet mich so dass ich nichts sah.
Auf den Treppenstufen drehtest Du Dich um zu mir und sagtest:
"Warte eine Sekunde, ich will Dir etwas sagen.
Ich bin erst in den letzten Monaten aufgewacht, als Du plötzlich fort warst,
und erst da habe ich gespürt wie sehr Ich Dich brauche".

Weisst Du noch der 7. März vor 7 Jahren ?
Ich weiss das Du Dich erinnerst !
Amin, ich vermisse alles, was wir hatten,
Mein Leben hinter diesen Mauern und Gittern ist voller Schmerz,
weil ich die Sehnsucht nach Dir nicht ertrage.

Meine Nächte sind voller wüster Träume.
Soll ich etwas bereuen, doch was würde es ändern ?
Ich weiss es, genauso so wie Du.
Hier in der Einsamkeit der Zelle
Machen einen diese Hirngespinste verrückt.
Ich habe im letzten Jahr drei Mitgefangene sterben sehen,
hier in diesem Dreck,
und doch hatten Sie bis zum Schluss ihre Engelsgesichter behalten.

Kannst Du Dir vorstellen, was für einen unerträglichen Schmerz das bereitet ?
Ich wünschte, dass weder Du noch irgendjemand anderes das jemals erleben muss.

Nur Deine stille Umarmung wird mich wieder erlösen von diesen Alpträumen.


BAHAR, 9.Juni 2011, EVIN Gefängniss




Bahareh Hedayat ist eine iranische Studentin, Aktivistin für Frauenrechte, Mit-Initiatorin der Tausen-Unterschriften-Kampagne sowie Sprecherin und Zentralrats-Mitglied von Daftar Tahkim Vahdat. Sie wurde am 9.Juli 2007 festgenommen, und am 9.August des selben Jahres auf Bewährung entlassen. 2008 wurde Sie erneut vorübergehend verhaftet. Seit 2010 ist sie im berüchtigten EVIN Gefängniss (Abteilung 209) eingekerkert. Die Abteilung 28 des Revolutionsgerichtes setzte Ihre Haftstrafe auf  neun einhalb Jahre fest.


Den oben wiedergegeben Brief an ihren Mann Amin Ahmadiyan (Mitglied der Islamischen Studentenverbindung)  konnte Sie kürzlich aus dem Gefängniss herausschmuggeln. Er verleiht ihren Gedanken, Ängsten und Wünschen, vor allem aber ihrer Liebe zu Amin Ausdruck. Die deutsche Version folgt einer englischen Übersetzung von M.P.D.
 
 Source www.iranian.com

EVIN: A hotel named after a concentration camp

Hi Michael,

When somebody through facebook forwarded this sequence of nocturnal images from Teheran to me, I was almost prompted to ask if this is really the same place one knows from the news headlines of protests or from Ahadis movie "Green Wave".
Suddenly, it look more like a tourist promo for Beirut. Even during my last visit to Teheran in 2008, I have not seen the city in such glamour like here in this Youtube scenes.


but suddenly, at around 3:22 min a very short picture showed a neon-sign pointing to a "Hotel Evin", that convinced me it is Iran. Would like to know, is there really a Hotel in Teheran that carries the same name as the prison notorious for all the violence ? Which hotel owner would call its business after a place of death and violence ? And who are the customers booking in a hotel with this name ?



I heard the most horrible reports about Evin and other prisons, people in particular political prisoners are tortured there with pure saddism using physical and psychic violence in the most inhuman manner. People are killed there systematically. I feel anger imagine somebodies calls a hotel after this place of horror. When we visited last year with Shava the concentration camp near Munich (think it was called Dachau), at least people respected the memory of all those who lost their lives there. Nobody would consider calling a Hotel after this place Dachau, don"t you think so ?

Hope everything is fine with you, Take Care
/ghazal

Sunlight and the genetics of skin-pigmentation

Dear Ghazal,

Do you remember that we once talked about UV-exposure and skin pigmentation ? Last year in July you send some papers about it, and how this is regulated during tanning after sun exposure.
There is an other aspect, and this relates more to inherited differences  in skin-pigmentation (i.e. a problem that is similar to your MSc project and the search for genetic variations). Recently I found an interesting article that came up with a nice explanation for the reduction of the skin pigmentation during the migration of humankind to the northern hemisphere (from their origin in Africa about 100 000 years ago).

The reason is that UV-radiation has not only a detrimental effect (by damaging the DNA and potentially causing skin cancer, as you perhaps know better than anybody else), but it is also essential for the production of vitamin D in our body (important for skelettal development and other biological processes).
If humans during their migration from africa to the north would have kept their dark skin, the lower UVB level in europe would have caused a severe vitamine D deficiency. Therefore, reducing skin pigmentation genetically gained a survival benefit (since with less dark skin, more UVB reaches the dermis and more vitamine D can be produced).
Therefore, if dark coloured people move to the northern hemisphere for longer time, they might start to suffer from vitamine D deficiency. There is only one exception, and these are the inuit living in northern Canada and Greenland. They have relatively dark skin, but live with low UVB level. Their only way to get sufficient vitamine D is by eating raw meat from seals (in particular their liver is full of vitamine D).

The full paper about this is here:

I hope, Ghazal, you will have a sunny weekend, so you get enough UV to produce vitamine D.
You are lucky anyhow, since your light skin is the best condition to live in the north and stay healthy.

Take Care, Enjoy everything

Michael

PS: Have I already wrote you "Thanks" for the Nowruz power-point presentation that you send ? I think I forgot, sorry for this.

PPS: There is an iranian movie in the cinema here, called "Darbareye Ely". I will probably go and watch. Have you seen it or heard about ?

If you can"t love him, shot him !

Ghazal my Dear,

Tonight I have something very unusual to tell you. It is so unusual, because it is something commercial, about shopping and beeing happy to have found something very useful.

I know you got excited now, don"t you ?
You can"t stop reading any more, right ?
You wan"t to know what it is, don"t you ?

(You are really sweet !!)

But be aware: it again has something to do with you and me !! (just a little material and technical aspekt in addition to all the happiness that you brought to me by your shear presence).

It is about the little Smartphone-Adapter-Plug that somehow broke
(Could be that it broke because you poked and bended and cut it, since you thought it is a piece of your fingernail ?) It is not so important, how it broke and why, it is just the adapter, its wasn"t the Smartphone"s heart that broke, I know you wouldn"t be able to do this, you are too much an angel to break hearts.

Well, I searched this special Hewlett Packard Smartphone shop today and guess what:
I found the adapter (same colour: black, as you prefer for men. No pink. If there would be a pink one, I would have bought both of them: one for me and a pink one for you in case you need the GPS again).

And what is so amazing (and for this I have to be grateful to you, since I would have never found this):
This little adapter thing comes together with a SOLAR ENERGY RECHARGER !!!!
This means, I can not only mount the Smartphone to the car again, but now I can recharge it in the sun !!!

It will always remind me of this summer 2010, which in my memories will always remain as the most sunniest summer ever.
Although the nights in the moon-light and under the meteor showers and the stars were amazing as well. Who knows, maybe the light of the stars and of the moon is sufficient to recharge the phone with this little crazy adaptor.

Ghazal, my dear, tell me what you need to recharge your life battery !
You are always so calm, sometimes I"d like to make you explode, to beat me in the face, to shout on me, to see you holding a gun on me (of course only with bullets that hurt, but don"t kill), only to see that you are full of energy.

But this probably would change everything, you would not be you anymore, and for me the illusion, that you are the grown up daughter of the persian family that I met 20 years ago in Berlin would fall down in pieces.

Are you o.k., happy (I know, its hard to tell. One always could imagine beeing a little bit happier).
I permanently feel guilty, sometimes feel as if I have taken you as hostage here in Munich, keeping you in this single room in the guesthouse like a nun in an eremitage.
I only feed you with words, but they can not get rid of your loneliness.
At least I should have given you a cat, such one as Holli Golightly had in "Breakfast at Tiffany"s". It could lean on you in the evening, and purr if you crawl its fur. It would jump on you lap, when you watch a movie or listen to some music.


Wish you a pleasant night, funny dreams, sleep well

Michael
................................................................................................

michael,

im glad you found a better adapter for your phone! didnt know that such thing exsist, an adapter that charges the phone with sun. interesting. :)

haha i dont want to hold a gun against you and shoot, i will stay calm.think it is better. dont think my mum thinks im calm at home.

dont worry about me. i enjoy unterschleissheim. the guesthouse. i feel so relaxed and calm when i am here. and i am so happy with everything.
cats are cute, but only when they are babies.

see you tomorrow

/ghazal

...............................................................................................

See you tomorrow, my Dear.
Thanks to confirm that you enjoy and relax. Even if you would have told me this already a million times: I"d like to hear it once again !

Sleep well, dream something happy.

Michael

PS: Ghazal, my Dear, Can you imagine the head-lines in the newspaper:
"MSc student shoots down its supervisor". This would make us sooooo famous.




Anyway, have a sweet night, but this time I think I have to take care :-}

Beach without you

Hi Ghazal, my Dear,

I hope you are doing well and feel o.k.
Is it quiet now in the Lab ? Usually this is the best time to concentrate on the project. I hope so much that you find some intellectual satisfaction with the project and not have to consider it as a hard burden and a duty to fulfill.
I prepared some text about the mapping, the markers, the mouse strains and linkage. It should somehow fit into the thesis structure (as much as I remember it was part 2 or so). Just break it apart into the several sub-headings.

And of course, if you find in the text something difficult to understand or wrong or strange, please write me back. I very much like the intellectual conversation with you and I learn a lot from your questions as well.

I will also send you something that explains the animal experiments (the older ones we did years ago and the JF1 x FVB crosses). Was Prof. T. already around ?

I think of you and your aristocratic character, that is so much different from the people here around which are very loud and miss any sense of ellegance. This is usually what one can expect at a beach,but the kids like this and therefore I have to decline.
I"m waiting to see you next week.

Take Care,my dear

Michael

................................................................

Hi Michael!!

T. has not been here yet. I think he chose this week on purpose. Both
you and M. are on vacation.
It is a bit quiet yes. I put aside the labwork yesterday and today to
sit and read and write. btw, the sequencing worked!! im happy. me and
claudia will maybe analyse the data later today.
it is not a burden to do this project. everything has been good so far.

I do not know how to thank you for writing so much for me. i have
written a bit about the mapping and microsatellite and QTL. but it was
not as much as yours. so thank you. you should not do this on your
vacation. just go and have fun. right now i am concentrating at the
first part with chernobyl and thyroid cancer.

take care and see you next week!

/ghazal

...............................................................
Ghazal my Dear,

Good to hear that you managed so well to continue with the project and the thesis during this week. Good luck with the sequence analysis,hope you and C. find some interesting variations between the two strains.
I attache a piece of text that describes the rational for using the JF1 and the FVB/N strain in this project. Please double-check if any of the chromosomal loci or gene names are consistent with what you wrote before. Also, in case you find any other discrepancies with the other text-pieces,please mark it in red and we will go through when I am back.

Ghazal, please don"t feel obliged to say "Thank you" for these small pieces of text. It is my very duty as a supervisor to help you with this. It is you who is doing the sophisticated and very decent experimental work day-by-day, without complaining that it is getting boring. Therefore,it is in fact me who must be extremely grateful. Don"t forget this, please.
And what is maybe even more relevant, that you always have this endless patience with me, if I come around and require that you spend the time after work with me. No MSc student has the commitment of going to the movies or to an exhibition or to the beach with its supervisor, or attend with him a concert or watch the meteor shower in the middle of the night. You could have in fact complaine with Prof. T. right from the beginning and ask for another project or another supervisor. I know I was always a bit violently when I asked you to meet me after work,and who knows how often I have disturbed your planing for the evening when you wanted to read or write something for the project. Therefore,it is the least I can do to help you to get everything together know for the thesis, it is a very small compensation for all the nice days and moments you have been with me and for having been always so patient and listened to my silly stories and telling me something from you. You could have easily send me to hell, you never did (I hope you dont wish you could have done this, but you did not wanted to risk your project).

Ghazal, you will see at the end (and everybody will agree) that a successful MSc project does not need this archetypical and hirarchical relation between student and supervisor, but it also can be done if there is a (sort of) frienship.
For me,to be honest, you are too much a mystery to call this a simple friendship.

I wish you a pleasant evening, a relaxing night, and nice dreams.

Michael

PS:How is your watch doing ? I hope that "No news are good news" and it runs precisely now, since you gave it a bit more freedom around your arm.

...............................................................
hi michael,

i think i found one mutation on the third exon.

yes u are right i could ask prof. t. for another project (and he would not give me another since i already tried in the beginning). but i enjoy it here i would not do it. u could also be a bad supervisor and not wanting to help. so i am grateful.

i send u a text with some questions. answer just if u have time. no hurry.

my watch is suprisingly doing great!its strange.

have a good day!!
/ghazal
................................................................
Ghazal my Dear,

Congratulations for finding a sequence variation in FGF10 in one of the mouse strains..
You could check (using Ensembl and search for FGF10 in mouse,and click on the left panel on the button for variations) if this sequence alteration was already described in any other mouse strain. You should also check if it might cause an amino-acid change, in case it is still part of the coding sequence (I remember large parts of exon 3 were already 3" UTR. Maybe you find something.
Before I left, I already ordered primers to test the FGF10 transcript and expression. Could you,please write a mail to O. and ask if and where she has stored the JF1 and FVB/N RNA or cDNA from thyroid (she extracted it as part of her MSc for the expression array).

Thanks for writing that you feel o.k. with how the project developed and that you are o.k. with everything and don"t regret that you came to Munich. You gave me the nicest and most exciting summer of my life, Ghazal. I never felt so much inspiration, excitement and satisfaction to share with somebody a project and many hours after work as with you.

Take Care

Michael

PS:I go through your text today and send you comments tomorrow

PhD project in Munich

Ghazal my dear,

I hope you have a pleasant evening and that you are not only standing in the kitchen. Be careful, if the swedish authorities see this, you will be punished for not following the official policy of womans emancipation. I keep my hope, that the people are more free in their decisions and understand, that doing something in the kitchen can be very pleasant as well. I like it, it has some relation to science and to lab-work, don"t you think so ?
Anyhow, I would also be very happy to know that you enjoy these few days and nights of warm and bright summer. May and June was so awful, always grey and cold and wet, that even myself (who has an atypical high level of serotonin, dopamin and melatonin) started to get signs of depression. However, there was always the hope to see you the next day, which was and still is the best remedy against sad emotions.
You are completely different, I know this, you have this potential deep inside of you to stop any influence from the outside and concentrate on thoughts and memories and dreams (you call them day-dreams, for me they are end-of-the-day dreams). Maybe you can switch your mind to the angels universe, I would not be surprised.
I think when I saw you the first time sitting in the front raw in the seminar room, you were in exactly this state. It was winter time, cold, wet, streets covered with mud, snow-flakes penetrating the space between neck and coat, shoes did not dry anymore and looked like on a 1st world war battle field. But there you were sitting and filling the seminar room with the aura of an oriental garden. Ghazal, who you think could resist this picture ? Whom you want to blame for immediately feeling the desire to follow you in this other world ?

Now at least the climate changed for the better. After work I always pass along a lake to go swimming. Later I spend the night in the garden and read or play some guitar. The only audience usually is our dog. The rest of the family sits inside and insists they don"t hear. In summer time, southern Germany can be a pleasant place. And winter time is also fine, with a lot of snow and clear sky. What is usually less pleasant are the few month in between.
Ghazal, maybe you consider doing your PhD in Germany. I think the competition is less strong than in Sweden. Talk to Iria or Olena, they will tell you that in Munich it is easy to live and have fun without knowing a lot of german. There are so many high-class institutes in Munich, the two Universities and the Max-Planck-Institutes and Helmholtz also has some very strong groups. And Sweden and Germany are virtually neighbours, only the Baltic Sea between them.

Oh, something else I have to ask you: I bought today this pink Panasonic MP3-player station (the one we looked at last Friday in the Electronic Super-Market).
It was by the way a unique product, something like a prototype. Therefore, I got it without a proper box. Only at home I found out that it is completely incompatible with my Hewlett-Packard Mp3-player. I therefore will give it to you tomorrow. And you keep it (at least till the end of your project), we already know it works perfectly with your IPod.

Sorry, that I wrote once again such an endless mail. And you might consider it complete nonsense.
Take Care
Michael

...............................................................................

hi michael,
no i dont stand in the kitchen, i dont like to cook.

you should maybe go inside and play for your family then:) but its nice to play for the dog as well i guess.
no i would want to go back to sweden. its better. i will be with my family. im not saying munich is a bad place. but home is always the best place.

you bought exactly the one we saw? why, i dont think your son likes it. but you should keep it. i use my computer and listen to music through it. but it was kind of you.

have a good night!! :)

/ghazal
................................................................................
Dear Ghazal,

You are right. I should more often ask you for your opinion before doing something. The MP3 players design does not suit our sons taste: He only accepts black stuff. He is at an age when boys are very concerned to appeare maskuline, and the slightest risk that somebody might think he loves girls stuff makes him mad (the player is pink, as you remember).

Take Care

Yours Michael

PS: I feel very sorry about the watch. You might think I broke my promise that it will work at the end. Now it appears, it does not. Instead, I only wrote you endless theories about time shifts and angels universe.
If you agree, I"ll open it once again.

Sleep well

Spiders and Swans and other creatures

Hi Ghazal, my dear,

When I wrote you yesterday evening "Thanks for the wunderful summer" this was not a spelling mistake !! It was such a nice evening that on its own would give the whole summer 2010 a special glory. You have a very professional way to choose the right radio-program. I did not know that just a few fingertips away from the radiostations I usually hear there is still so nice music. I will try to find some of the titles among my records and bring them to you tomorrow.

Ghazal, you know that in Germany it is illegal to make photographs of somebody without asking his or her permission ? I don"t mean the white swan. First of all, swans are usually very vain, and like to be photographed as often as possible. And in addition to this, he received some cakes as a payment from us. But you forgot that there was also me on the picture, and I was not officially asked for approval. I mean I"m not so concerned that you will do something bad with the pictures (like putting them on facebook to make the entire world laugh about me). But, maybe as a compensation, you could finally agree to have a photograph made of you on the bike wearing the beige coat. It would be more than logical, especially since you said that lady with the bicycle on the french poster does not bear much similarity to yourself. I somehow agree with your opinion, I think you would look much more attractive.

I hope you enjoy the evening

see you tomorrow , take care (don"t kill the spiders, germans belief they can bring you luck).

Yours Michael
.............................................................................................

hi michael,

im glad i could find a good radiostation that you like.
i did not know its illegal to take photos. only your arm is on the photo. so it doesnt count!:)

i havent seen more spiders and im glad.

see you tomorrow and good night.
..............................................................................................

Ghazal, my dear.

How nice to read that you keep your sense of homour. About the photo, I"d like to keep the final decision open.

Take Care.

Michael

PS: Ghazal, I just want to tell you: In case of an emergency (candle setting your apartment on fire or a spiderman starting an attack on you), you also can call my mobile number instead of 112. I"ll be at your site for help probably faster than the police.

No tears about a failed PCR, Baby

Hello Ghazal,
I hope you are not in the lab anymore. You work a lot, maybe too much, my dear. I hope this is because you like the project, I hope it is not because life outside the lab does not bear any promises for you.
I did not checked the weather-forcast for tomorrow, but my superstition tells me that whenever one plans something nice, it will be sunny. Lets see.
In the worst case, we can quit the beach and go somewhere else, into town if you want to hear some music or to watch a movie (yesterday the movie-festival started here in Munich). But I would prefer to go to the lake.
I checked our collection of DVDs which can be played with english tone. Not many hollywood block-buster among them, unfortunately. Some Stanley Kubrik classics, "Cabaret" featuring Liza Minelli, "Hitchhikers Guide through the Universe", "Rocky Horror Picture Show" and "Brazil". You have probably never heard these titles, but if you like I can give them to you (none of them is really bad, none of them is adult-only. They are entertaining, I would say.)

How do you spend the evening ? Have you tried the Himalaya-rice already ? The chocolate you brought is delicious, but it is such a large box, it will last for month.

Relax, Take care, Don"t forget to put out the candle before you go to bed.

Michael

...............................................................................................
Hi Michael,

I did a lot today in the lab, but I only got bad results. You will see the gel for the modified PCR tomorrow. And the other gel that I ran had really weak bands, so i run it on the PCR overnight again.

After lab I always get tired and just want to go back home to study and relax. But it is very kind of you to think about me, i appreciate that you care. but i prefer to just go home and relax.

i havent tried the rice yet, was too tired. but i will. maybe tomorrow.
good that you liked the chocolate. i bought one for claudia as well.

you were right , i have never heard of the movies you suggested. sounds like books? and you know what i think about books.

take care goodnight

/ghazal
...............................................................................................

Hi Ghazal, my dear,

Sorry to hear that your evening yesterday was overshadowed by the frustrations about this unseccessful PCR. Don"t take it personel !!
I"m sure there was something wrong either with the new batch of the green master-mix (might be they gave me the last two packs and they were already old) or I made a mistake when setting-up the new PCR program. We will check today.
But it is also important during a project to experience that things don"t always run perfect, and pitfalls can happen everyday. But it is crucial trying to find out why it happened and consequently trying to eliminate the source.
Don"t worry, we will find the bug that made you so sad yesterday evening (or to speak with H.C.Anderson, we will find the "pea under the matress that did not let you sleep").

No tears, please.

See you today

Michael

Day Dreams at a Summer Night

Hello Ghazal, my dear,

Sorry I came back to the office much later than planed and therefore did not met you any more to wish you a pleasant evening.
I hope you are alright and could enjoy these marvelous last hours of a summer day. I remember you once told me that you used to escape into day-dreams.
I"m wondering if a beautiful day like the one today might not be superiour to a dream? But who knows what your dreams are about?
I was making a short ride-out with the bike and our dog, through the wild nature around our village. There is a tiny river, but it is cristal-clear, and there are old stone-bridges (look like from roman times) that were in use maybe hundreds of years ago. Now they are abandoned and stay there on the plain fields without having a function. But they are build in such a solid way that they will be there for the next thousands of years. They are just beautiful, without having a function any more. And now people living here use them for a rest. At the first bridge I arrived, some teenagers were just preparing for a party (it is a quite hidden place and they probably wanted to smoke something illegaly). They wanted to invite me, but I am probably to serious to accept. At the next bridge, a young man was sitting and playing a bandoneon, very silently but you could imagine that he might soon perform at an tango concert. At the next bridge my dog forced me to stop for a while, since she likes to jump into the water and swim. While I was waiting for her, two girls arrived and started to make photographs from each other. Still being there to play with my dog and listening the silly chats of the two, a young man arrive also on a bike and prayed this paradise-like evening.
Ghazal, do you also have moments like this when in the light of the evening sun all problems and difficulties seem to disappear in nothing ? Is this what you call day-dreams ? Probably a very special type of them, which should be rather called end-of-day dreams.

wish you a good night Michael

.......................................................................................
hi michael,

haha no the daydreams are just things that i have in my mind. things that i have to do or something. not really dreams.
i see that u had a nice and interesting day, thats good.

see u in the lab tomorrow! take care

regards
ghazal
.............................................................................................
Hi Ghazal,

It was a pleasure to read your words. I think that with the ability to dream, every day, every evening can become a miracle, does not matter where you are or what you own. Somebody said that the beauty of a picture lays in the eye of the viewer. Maybe it is the same with how we see the entire world and our own life.
I"m talking silly things. I should better let you sleep, it is already late.

See you tomorrow

Michael

Max Speed Driving Home

Dear Ghazal,

Are you still awake ? It would be fair enough to escape this grey evening into morpheus empire (as an explanation for us and all other atheists : morpheus was the god of dreams and sleep in greek mythology).
I probably will watch a movie tonight in TV, therefor I stay up. Movie is called Brokeback Mountain, maybe you heard about it. It is about two gay cowboys and got very good critics and won several Oskars. I saw some other movies by the same director Ang Lee, which I liked.
Do you have some films to watch on your PC ? I will check next week if I find some DVDs in english language that I could give to you.

After I dropped you at the guesthouse tonight, I drove back along the completely empty Ingolstaedter Strasse. I tried maximum speed and for a couple of seconds reached 170 kmh. Thanks god, I did not fall asleep again. But this would have be extremely unlikely today, first because it is low altitute here, and second, but more relevant, because I always feel very inspired when we drove somewhere together and I ccould listen to your voice.

O, before I forget, here is something important for you (you see I first let you wait and make you read all this nonsense about a movie, my high-speed adventure and your voice before releasing the information that you asked me for):

There is indeed a shop called Adidas Original Munich. It is in Hohenzollernstrasse, near Munchener Freiheit. I"m sure you will find something suitable for your brother there. Lets go there tomorrow after work, and later I can bring you straight to your Airport Bus.

Hope you are fine

Good night

Michael

Driving north

Why was it so much easier to talk, when we were driving in my car north out of town. You seemed relaxed, your smile returned, it was a pleasure driving through the evening sun. For the first time since days you began to tell me something about you, something that was more than pure facts. I so much enjoy listening to your voice, it has a dazzlingly beautiful sound and if you laugh it is like the whisper of a small river running through a mountain plain.
How sad, that I was driving too fast, and that we arrived at your place already after 5 minutes. Is it possible that you lost your spontaneity as soon as I stoped the car and got my hands off the steering wheel ? If it is this what makes you nervous, then maybe we drive next time a bit further, maybe to Ikea where you can have swedish pizza with some extra mouse-sausage on top. I promise I leave my hands on the steering wheel, I would not need pizza in this moment, as long as you will be there to talk with.