Helina Blogs

My wonderful and loyal followers, how are you?  I have been away for some time because of my trip to see family in the US. I have two days until I say goodbye to America once again, a country that has been so good to me. I stayed a little over two months with my family in Atlanta this round of the summer. I did make a visit to the west coast, California to be more precise. I had the chance to reconnect with old friends and meet new ones. I had an awesome stay and I owe it all to those great people who made my trip a memorable one.  I want to take advantage of this blog to convey my sincere appreciation to each and every one of you who has made a contribution to my two month stay in the USA.  So here is what I want to say to each and everyone … Our house in Atlanta :) I will start off talking about the day I landed. “Atlanta has a new international arrival gate”, said the passenger from Atlanta.  I guess I have been away for way too long as I didn’t know abo...

Architecture in Bhutan is in harmony with its culture The idea for today’s blog came after a Friday get together with a group of friends who keen so much love for Kurdistan.  We had a wonderful lunch and then we decided to watch a documentary on the little Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan.  As I was watching the documentary and learning about their philosophy of happiness, ideas started flourishing; we could possibly consider parts of the Bhutanese approach in modernizing Kurdistan to meet our people’s needs. In the United States and in many other industrialized countries, happiness is often equated with materialism. Else where in world, a growing number of economists, social scientists, corporate leaders and bureaucrats are trying to develop measurements that equate happiness with the flow of money, access to suitable health care, free time with family, conservation of natural resources and other non-economic factors. But to the Bhutanese, happiness lies in the mi...

If you ask me about happiness, I would say its a mental attitude. It comes from appreciating what we have, instead of being miserable about what we don't have. It's that simple my friend yet so hard for the human mind to comprehend. Be happy, stay beautiful Helene :) Who can say they are not having as much pleasure and fun in challenging themselves and each other? Photo credit goes to an email forward I got from the amazing Stafford Clarry :)

The smile on their faces is priceless Photo credit goes to my mom, Ferwerdin Barzinji :) Hello my loyal blog readers.  There was quite of traffic in our way to massif today.  You know what that means?  Well it is March and people are already out picnicking and enjoying the beautiful spring here at my end.  Springs here in Kurdistan are a totally beauty.  I just love everything about it; the greenery, the wild flowers, the beautiful weather, the vegetables and fruits, the beautiful colors of fabrics that you see on ladies as you drive around picnic areas in Kurdistan.  I am here stuck in the traffic and all that runs in my head is the second I get on my blog to fill you guys in with these beautiful feelings. What caught my attention the most as we are waiting for the traffic to proceed was this super cute young boy carrying bunches of the famous Nergis flower in his hand. I wish you could see the beautiful smile on his face as soon as I chose to ...

Photo credit goes to Allen Kakony