Respect and WCs

As I came to Austria, I created a blog and published an article (I wouldn't call it a "great article") about surprising things that I found in this country with the following picture:

The text said more or less:

"It's incredible that nobody ever had the simple idea of printing in toilet paper something different from flowers or stripes. It's a channel for spreading ideas or knowledge, or at least, that may have thought the manufacturer of the roll in the picture.

Question: In which year were the first football world cup held?
Answer: 1930

This roll is a monograph on football. I have to confess that when I found it, I unrolled a couple of meters, just to read some questions more. I left it as I found it. Sure you'd have done the same. It's tempting"

Later on, it was Monkey who proposed that such trifles (or -french-based synonym bagatelles) make a difference between modern, open minded countries and developing countries. Respecting the knowledge, and respecting each other is the basis to produce more intelligent citizens and a better society.

I do agree.

Inventing History

My father was a radio buff before his illness and old age could take that interest from him. That habit gave us the chance to always have those foreign radios sounds spread in our house every morning before we leave for school or every night when he got back from work. So during the war years we had the chance to listen to BBC, VOA and DW before we know anything about satellite TV channels, and they had become a pre-school-have-to-listen-everyday besides Pink Floyd's Time intro in The Calendar of History programme from the national radio.

Speaking about history, VOA Persian radio channel, had a history section too, which used to review some important events in the United States history happened in the same day. I can never forget the day the anchor said that: "today is the day Mr X brought the WC indoors for the first time in US history, and from then people started to build their WCs inside their houses"! I remind how much we laughed for the matter me and my brother. How important that could be to be written down in the history pages of a big country?!

Now speaking about 300 the movie, offended as any other Iranians by a country with 200 years of history with history books god knows how much thicker than ours having 7000 years of art (not history), and humiliated recently in Dubai, a country with less than 30 years of history, scanning my eye like a potential criminal or smuggler as an arrival welcome, I say that's all our own fault! Our own failure!

It's the matter of self respect. If you do not respect yourself, you shouldn't expect it from the others, how powerful it may be over you (US) or how panicked (UAE) it could be from you, if Iranians learn to respect each other, other things can get better. I bet there's no way out and I don't see any sign of it.

P.S. To know more about toilets, bathrooms, and WCs and their relationship to the self respect, I encourage my friend Gog to put an English copy of that great article about Austrian Toilets. Thanks in advance Gog.