Mona's first Baha'i Prayer in Farsi

Ever since Mona has learned how to say Baha'i Prayers in English, I've been wanting and meaning to teach her some Baha'i Prayers in French, Farsi and Arabic.
So far Mona knows 5 Baha'i prayers in English and 2 Baha'i prayers in French (she can sing and read the English ones, but for some reasons, she can only sing the French ones... lol).

I decided that now was a good time to incorporate the Baha'i Prayers in Farsi (Persian). But since I only know one very small prayer in Farsi, which my husband taught me while we were dating, I needed to learn some more before teaching them to Mona.

So last week, when we were at my mother in law's house, I recorded Mona's grandma saying a very small Baha'i Prayer in Farsi for children. She said it very phonetically so that we can both learn it easily. And we have been watching her video everyday since then.
And of course when Mona saw that I was recording a video of her grandma saying a prayer, she wanted to be in the video too. So with her khaleh (auntie) Roya, we recorded a second video, this time with Mona repeating the words after her khaleh.

It's a very small Baha'i Prayer for children from 'Abdu'l-Baha and here is the video of Mona with her beautiful khaleh Roya teaching her how to say the prayer in Farsi:

And the English translation of the Baha'i prayer for children is:

"He is God! O God, my God!
Bestow upon me a pure heart, like unto a pearl."

-'Abdu'l-Baha

And then, I asked Khaleh Roya to chant the 'Difficulties' Prayer by the Bab in Arabic, so I can record it and try and attempt to learn it myself...
I really love the way khaleh Roya chants this prayer, she chants prayer so beautifully.
And again, Mona wanted to be in the video.... so she sat in front of khaleh Roya and tried to sing along with her, pretending she knew the words to this Arabic prayer... lol.. it was quite cute to watch actually...

And here is the English translation of the 'Difficulties' prayer by The Bab:

"Is there any Remover of difficulties save God?
Say: Praised be God! He is God!
All are His servants, and all abide by His bidding!"
-The Bab

More cuteness from our trip to the Zoo

Some more cute shots from our trip to the Zoo...
I promise you that this is going to be the last post about 'ZOO' for a while!!! lol

Enjoy...

Mr Tiger and Miss ButterflyMona and Ajay, ROARing like a Tiger!! lol

Mona, straight after getting her face painted like a butterfly,
tried to fly like a butterfly...

She kept on moving her arms in up and down motions (like flutter of wings)
and she kept on persisting that she could fly
till about until we got home I think....

Still trying...

Yep.. still trying to fly... she told me several times:
"mummy i can't fly like the butterfly, it's not working!!"
I swear to God, it was her own words!! lol..

Awww... this shot of Mona and Ajay is just written cuteness all over it...
They look so cute and sweet together
and Ajay had his arms around Mona while taking the pictures!!

Here they were both roaring like a Tiger!! lol... so cute!!

What photo shoot would be complete without a shot of
Mona making a funny face, lol, as usual...

I love this picture below and how it turned out!

It was a really blurry shot, but I really like the way Mona looked on it, so i edited it (quite a lot) on photoshop and gave it this kinda of grungy look... which made this totally out of focus and missed out shot totally rocking now!!!

( I LUV Photoshop!)

And to end this series of shots from the Zoo, here is a picture of me and my beautiful butterfly...

Part 3 - Adelaide Zoo Trip #2

FACE PAINTING - The kids got some brilliant face art at the zoo, here are some pics:

First up, was Ajay...

Mr. Tiger!
Then it was Mona's turn...
I could not believe how easy she was to let the lady put the wet paint on her face...
she was quite enjoying it actually...
Almost done...
And here she is, my little butterfly...
Even Anna got some face art...
A little butterfly...

And here are some more pictures of my cute little butterfly...
I loved the pictures so much, that I had to used them almost immediately when we got home... (see my blogger header! lol...)

Part 2 of 'At the Adelaide Zoo - Trip # 2'

This is Part 2 of the photos from our second trip to Adelaide Zoo, mostly shots of us and the fun times we had ;)
Enjoy...

Mona and Ajay in their car.... we rented those little cars for them when we got to the Zoo...

Mona getting up through the 'sun roof' to see the animals... lol

My brother in law, Navid and his girlfriend, Anna

Here is a shot of everyone together looking at some really big birds...

These are fake pandas.... They are actually building a new section at the zoo, specially for the pandas! This means that we will have to go to the Zoo once more to go see the Pandas!! lol...

Mona, drinking Litchi juice

Navid, Anna and Ajay...

Mona and me...

Mona in her car, she was posing for me and really having fun doing it...
she is so cute and is definitely not camera-shy!

That's all for now, well at least for part 2...
Part 3 will be uploaded very soon ;) lol

The six sense

WOW, this is awesome and brilliant..... and I definaltely need one of those!!!

This demo -- from Pattie Maes' lab at MIT, spearheaded by Pranav Mistry -- was the buzz of TED. It's a wearable device with a projector that paves the way for profound interaction with our environment. Imagine "Minority Report" and then some.

Time after Time..

As promised here is a little video, this time in English, for Ridvan Celebrations..

This video entitled 'Time after Time' is a Poem about love...
Love for one another, love for the world, and love for our Creator...
and was written by my mother in law, who also reads it in the video.

"Where there is love, nothing is too much trouble and there is always time."

-From the Baha'i Writings

Thanks for watching and Happy Ridvan to you all.

The Fragrance of Spring...

We just uploaded this new video entitled: "Fragrance of Spring" and it's all about the Divine Springtime and comes just right on time for Ridvan Celebrations.

The video is in Farsi, but there is an English translation of the poem at the end of the video.

The Poem is written and is being read by my mother in law, Shahla Nabilzadeh-Ghotbi and I've put the video together.

Thanks for watching!

At the Adelaide Zoo - Trip No 2

Last Saturday, we went to the Zoo, again, but this time with Mona's cousin, Ajay, and his dad and girlfriend.

Mona and Ajay doesn't spend as much time together as they used to when they were smaller, so when the opportunity comes for them to have some fun together, I am more than happy to oblige, even it it means doing the same things several times... and what 3 year old doesn't like to spend the day at the Zoo? lol...
The kids were so excited to go to the Zoo, I mean they were really super duper excited!! As if they've never been to the zoo before... lol...
We had such a great time and the weather was just perfect... sunny but not hot! And we got to see some of the animals that we didn't get a chance to see last time!
And naturally I took tons of shots of the two kiddos together and of course of the animals too...
I was pretty happy by how the 'animals shots' came out... I really got some good ones and will share those with you for now... (the kids shots will need another post of it's own!! lol).

So here are the 'animals shots' from our second trip to the zoo:

'The Giraffes'
we love the giraffes, so I had to take another shot of them ;)

'The King of the Jungle'

And his wife, the Lioness
''The King's wives'... lol

Ok, so you are gonna laugh when you see this video!
We were at the African Lion Exhibit watching the two lioness, when this one came right in front of us, and mind you, very very close to the fence. Then she decides to stop in front of Anna (my brother in law's girlfriend). She stared at Anna for a brief moment and then she let out a little roar and stepped forward as if she was gonna jump on us!!
It took us all by surprise! And it was really scary at the time.... you can see how surprised (no, I was not scared at all... just a tiny bit surprised! lol, yeah right, as if you believed that! lol...) I was on the way the camera flipped up when I stepped backwards when this lioness surprised us with her 'fake attempt of an attack'!
I think she was just showing us who is still the boss here!

The 'little guys' from Madagascar Movie

It's Joey ( the little kangaroo)

'Miss Pink Flamingo'

'Hibiscus Flower'
(reminds me of home!)

The 'beautiful blue bird' (Blue and Yellow Parrot)

That bird was just gorgeous and seeing it flying this low was at the same time terrifying (because of all the kids sitting and standing around in the park area) and magical...

After the 'flying' show, Mona and I went up close to see the bird!

He is really beautiful...

And here is a shot of the zoo guide feeding the little birdy

Ok, so we are almost at the end of the 'animals shots', so I'll just say this:

'See you later, Alligator!'

And: 'In a while, Crocodile!'

lol...

In this shot actually, there was this little cute turtle that was swimming in the same pond as the crocodile, and this little turtle was either very arrogant or just plain crazy...
He went to swim right next to the mouth of this crocodile.... as if he wanted to kiss him or something... really... I was captivated by this little turtle and at the same time very terrified for him... fortunately, the croc didn't budge!! And the turtle just got bored and went in the other direction!! oufff...

Ok, now I am really stopping with the pictures (yeah was about time! lol), and will leave you with this very peaceful shot of the big Buddhas statues carved out of rock in the 'Asia Escape' section of the zoo....

It's really..... hmmm..... how should i put it... meditative...