a sample chart

Been wanting to try out the recently released Google Chart API. It looks great for implementing things on web pages like Tufte's sparklines.

So here is a sample chart, with my respective ethnicity. Our family is a mixed bag, part which looks like a cross-section of early North America, and part looks like a cross-section of Central Asia, sampled right along the Silk Route. These things happen.

Anywhoo, it took all of about 2 minutes to build a first chart and have it labeled and colored the way that I wanted. All that plus the data is URL-encoded. Nice work, GOOG.

Meanwhile, happy Chinese New Year!

generations

My mom, Cherie - circa 1942, in Rifle, CO.
My daughter, Laurel - circa 2007, in Avila Beach, CA.

Their visual resemblance at that age feels uncanny to me. Laurel has a wee bit o' the Persian side of our family asserting, more like my brother and sister do.

Sixty five years. Thirteen hundred kilometers. Yours truly, gratefully in-between.

Laurel's photo by Flo Leibert

spinning iran

If you read just one article today, do just one thing to understand the world a little better, I recommend that it be to read Spinning Iran on Rafe Colburn's blog.

Bush's rhetoric about "War with Iran" is more neocon (read: pro-Israeli lobby) nonsense. The Newsweek "photo gallery" is like a page out of 1984. US diplomats are negotiating with Iranian diplomats now, brokered via Russia and Qatar. The results of those negotiations will be normalized relations, which are slated to become Bush's legacy (what's left of it).

The age of the "Great Superpower" is over, the Kissinger Doctrine failed, and with it goes the predominance of a whole other mess: Saudis, Tel-Aviv, etc. Welcome to a world where Asia becomes much, much more quintessential.

sufi coffee shop

On a recent trip to Palo Alto, I had missed nearly a full day and a half without an actual meal. There were too many hassles enroute and then lots of exciting work to discuss, once I got on the ground.

By the time I had a chance to call home and then get a little food, not much around my hotel was open (or looked any good). I wandered, frustrated and hungry. Amazingly, here in the heart of Silicon Valley, I stumbled upon a jewel called Sufi coffee shop. After I ordered an enormous amount of food, the proprietor, Parviz Rasti, looked at me carefully and asked, "Have you not eaten in days?" "Actually," I replied, "not in about 1.5 days!"

Okay, this place has wonderful food - huge portions, great quality, reasonably low price. Even more wonderful is the ambience and the spirit of the place.

I'm hungry now, I'm heading back to Silicon Valley soon, and I'm looking forward to visiting Sufi.

in praise of seitan

Recently my wife asked me how to cook eggplant. First, we had received some nice egg-shaped eggplant with our Greenling delivery last week. Secondly, there's a popular eggplant dish in Persian cuisine which I like to fix for the family, and Erin was perhaps hinting :)

The Persian word for eggplant is "bademjan". I remember a similar word used to describe a popular eggplant salad in Russia - which was delicious, but perhaps not quite as savory as the Persian variety.

However, this time we changed up the recipes a bit. We had a craving for "setian" - also called wheat roast or fu. So here goes one for our recipe book, an adaptation of a Persian lamb stew called "khoresh" with our substitutes for the meat - in prase of Seitan:

Slice eggplant - optionally peel them if the peels are too think and tough.

Soak eggplant in brine overnight, to leach out the bitterness - not required for Japanese style eggplant.

Drain eggplant, removing the bitter brine.

In a large iron skillet, heat a centimeter of grapeseed oil, adding freshly grated nutmeg, black pepper, and Hungarian paprika.

Once that begins to snap, add eggplant slices.

Cover and cook, stirring occaisionally so that all the eggplant becomes cooked evenly.

When the eggplant flesh becomes soft and somewhat brown/purple, add equal amounts of seitan (roasted kind).

Stir together, adding enough tomato paste to coat all the "meat".

I like to garnish with a chiffonade of cilatro and garlic chives, which just happen to be locally in season.

I also like to serve this over rice. A nice basmati should work well enough... Persian dishes tend to use a technique called "chelou bah tadig" where the rice is slightly under cooked, then placed into a tall pot which has hot oil and saffron in the bottom. Make "holes" with a wooden spoon all the way from top to bottom of the rice, and wrap the pot's lid with a towel.

The result is a golden crisp at the bottom, where the the rice above becomes a little fluffy and gains an almost "nutlike" or "popcorn" flavor. Place the tomato + seitan + bademjan mix atop that and you'll enjoy a tasty entree.

In fact, I have been tempted to name this dish The Great Seitan.

congrads, anousheh ansari

Congrads to Anousheh Ansari, first female private explorer in space, and first astronaut of Iranian descent (not to mention, a Trustee of Ansari X Prize, etc.)


http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/09/our-call-from-space.html

iran, leading the blogosphere

Oh, this is amazing...

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president of Iran, has a blog.

As my wife pointed out over my shoulder, now the real political leaders of the world not only have speech-writers, they must have blog-writers.

My paternal family name notwithstanding, I'm no fan of the Imams. Even so, their chess game played on the entire world over the past few decades (during all of my adult life, at least) has been brilliant. They've played the pieces in Iraq, Afghanistan, and now the Levant, pulling in China, Russia, India, and even Europe to argue their side, while cutting a deal with the US under the table. For the punchline, they timed their endgame during a faltering Republican administration.

In comparison, the US has lagging media savvy. Hillary Clinton's blog seems like an f-ing joke, though John McCain's blog at least seems to represent the guy. Guiliani has no clue about blogs, apparently.

Reading the post by Ahmadinejad, admittedly the Iranians who stood up against Iraq - with the US and its "friends" antagonizing from all sides - showed more cojones than have ever been observed in Tel Aviv or Washington, DC. As were those who stood up to the "Shah", which I'm grateful was removed from this world. I guess that after compromising the Bush legacy this way, the next monster in line for Iran to defeat may be Wal-Mart :)

You know, I'm proud to be (half) Iranian, but today in particular I am really proud.

I'm sorry about warfare in the Levant, and especially sorry about the horror brought on beautiful Lebanon - but that horror will never end anyway until the US recognizes Syria, while pulling the pants off Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. Of course, cutting the US dependency on petroleum will do that anyway. It's only a matter of time.