a letter to mr. future president

[by SD]   Our role in the upcoming presidential elections, a topic I wonder about often as a student living abroad. I do not reside in Iran and have been out of the country for almost ten years. It is difficult to know what’s most important to the lives of Iranians from outside. But I am still and will forever be an Iranian and can still vote here in Berkeley; I would like to hope that my vote matters.

 

There currently seems to be two main choices in Iran’s upcoming presidential elections: Mr. Ahmadinejad and Mr. Khatami, both with previous experience as president!

I think about which one of these candidates is more likely to make life better in my country, in a general sense. Well, it seems that “the quality of life” is highly subjective. To narrow it down: which one is more likely to improve the economy, quality of education (I mean real education), freedom of thought and expression, international relations, and finally the state of our infrastructure and environment? Who is more likely to advocate for ethical practice in various fields? How would either of these candidates advocate for ethics when cheating and bribery are a part of everyone’s daily life from an early age?

 

 

I wish we had more choices and more fresh faces among the possible candidates. But we have to choose one president among the choices that we have got. As an earthquake engineer, I naturally care a great deal about the policies that will be adopted under the next administration influencing the budget spent on improving and retrofitting schools, hospitals, and homes before the next earthquake strikes. There are also other urgent issues that I care about deeply related to education and the economy. So, I write this letter to the next president, whoever it may be, and hope that he will read it carefully and forgive my lack of awareness of other potentially critical problems on his agenda. If he happens to read this, I would like to invite him to join this dialogue and share his ideas with us on TehranShake, of course if he has the time!

 

A letter to my future president:

—————————–

 

Dear Mr. President to be,

 

Congratulations on your decision to run in the upcoming elections. I admire you for your brave decision and for accepting a heavy load of responsibility on behalf of our nation.

I wish you success in your campaign and more importantly in your term serving as president of an important nation. Of course, Iran has a rich history of feeding other cultures with its knowledge, philosophy, and arts, is in a critical geographic location, enjoys a large reservoir of natural wealth and human talents. Iran has a large population of talented youth and excellent institutions committed to their training and future growth. Yet, as you are definitely well aware, many things can be improved. The existing issues facing our nation make your job a most critical one for the future of the region and of the world. I am sure that you have your own agenda and priorities, but as an Iranian student living abroad I, along with many others, have the following requests for your office to consider in the coming years. If you or people who control your decisions disagree with any of these requests, I would be happy to discuss them further:

super tuesday

[By Shideh]   Today is voting day (Super Tuesday), when nearly half of the states in the U.S. pick their republican and democratic candidates for the November Presidential elections.  The race has basically narrowed down to five candidates: Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for democrats, and Mike Huckabee, John Mccain, and Mitt Romney for Republicans.

It is definitely an exciting day here in Berkeley, a wave of enthusiasm for voting is felt as you walk through the south gate of the campus.  Mostly I hear Obama’s name on the student’s flyers and yes, they are hopeful for the future of their country.  It seems many older people see something nobel in Obama, something that reminds them of America’s older heroes, like Martin Luther King, or John F. Kennedy.  I like this feeling and atmosphere, and can’t get enough of it.  It reminds me of the presidential elections in Iran, for Khatami’s first campain.  I was a high school student then and one of his huge supporters at that time.   

Photograph courtesy of New York News and Features

As an Iranian living in America, I naturally care a lot about the outcome of today’s elections and of course the November elections.  If I could vote, I would vote for a leader who would concentrate on improving this country (in terms of education, health care, infrastructure, research,…) more than focusing on offense and war, a leader who would advocate tolerance and deep respect for all.  I specifically want a leader who would unconditionally support direct dialogue (political, scientific, etc.) with Iran and many other countries that have found their way to the U.S. black list for one reason or another.  I want change, a deep change in current U.S. foreign policies and in the budget spent on propaganda, racism, hatred, and offense.  I want this all to end, yet is a president alone able to make all these changes?  Is this country ready for change?  Is the president really the one in power or is he really only a puppet in the hands of lobbyists, investors, bankers,…, you know those quiet powers that are behind the scene?  Is this a game or does it somewhat matter who’s the president? If so, to what extent?

power of god

[By Shideh]  

I am auditing an awesome course on “human behavior and organizational factors, …” with Professor Bea, here in Berkeley’s civil engineering department.  He’s an amazing lecturer, one of those professors that you just can’t forget. 

Here’s one of his quotes that I’d like to share with you:

“You have the power of God in your hands, as engineers.  You can save lives and of course can easily take lives when your design fails.  Based on 50 years of experience as an engineer having witnessed many failures, I tell you now that almost 80% of all engineering breakdowns happen because engineers are not well trained in dealing with people and fail in effective communication and management.”

richard frye

[By Shideh]  A very interesting interview with an American scholar, Richard Frye, at Harvard University about his feelings for Iran.  Enjoy: 

engineering grad school application

[By Shawhin]  In the past few weeks, we’ve had the pleasure of getting questions on applying to grad school in the US and particularly Berkeley.  Most questions came from friends we made during our visit to Iran, blog readers, some family, etc.  Since I was sharing a lot of the same information, I thought it would be useful to put an entry here on tehranshake.  My timing is a bit off because most applications we were helping with were due sometime in the past few weeks.  Nevertheless, I’m sure applicants for next year could still benefit from this info – especially given that some advanced planning, in terms of getting familiar with professors, should be done well before the application.