Methinks I'm going to Iran in the wintertime. With much gratitude toward the AITO Tour Agency in Iran, my plans to travel in Iran were squashed. Two factors hinder my realizing this seeming feat: an itinerary and the lack of the academy's knowledge of its own schedule for three months from now. Vexingly, American citizens who are to travel to Iran are required to produce itineraries containing the minutiae of their stays. Furthermore, an American citizen must be accompanied by a government-authorized tour guide during the entirety of his or her stay. Nevertheless, I'd still like to go. I'm sure that I'll have quite the bitching time preparing an itinerary, given that (a) I must choose a limited number of places within Iran to which I'd like--and would have time--to go in three or four days, and (b) the itinerary with which I come up will very likely diverge from that which the travel agencies have pre-planned, which would slim my stud of a wallet (thanks to the 10-won and 100-won coins)...and quite alarmingly so, if I were to persist that my itinerary be followed. I also forgot to mention the fact that all of this must be done before applying for the tourist visa.

مرسی, America, مرسی.

Speaking of Iran and all, I've been rather languid when it comes to my pursuit of furthering my knowledge of the Persian/Farsi language. Actually, due to my attempt at implementing the Korean Method of SuperCompression .ZIP filing and Save As-ing Cramming-Into-My-Already-0.1-Microbyte-of-VSTM-and-STM (minus the spectacular results that Koreans seem to get from tapping into that oh-so-transient V/STM, whose content will be expunged anyway), I've been rather cauterized by the other languages I've decided to pursue.

Speaking of being Lost in Translation, I seem to be rather perplexed by the last portion of the سُورَة الفَاتِحَة:

صِرَاطَ الَّذِينَ أَنْعَمْتَ عَلَيْهِمْ غَيْرِ الْمَغْضُوبِ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلاَ الضَّالِّينَ

I know that to which it translates (thanks to the English translation in the book), but I just am unsure as to which word is which (e.g. which word is "incurred"? ...which word is "wrath"? &c.) and the syntactic organization of this part. That does not go to say that I am casting any doubt upon the Quran (because I am not), but that is something I must understand prior to proceeding.

Dearest me. It's almost time to shower with the 2 pL of body wash that I have left and make way to my oh-so-awesomerrific job.