17/01/2026
This is a heartfelt reflection from one of our Iranian employees who has immigrated to the Czech Republic. We highly recommend reading it:
Be free, human.
Be prosperous, world....
When you are an immigrant, life isn’t very kind. 🥀
Our residency renewal needed just one official translation. To the immigration office, this is a completely simple and natural process; because they don’t know you are from a country cut off from the rest of the world.
No internet, no telephone, no messages, not even simple mail.
They don’t know you are from a country whose official stamps—from translation offices, the Justice Ministry, or even the Foreign Ministry—are refused by most other countries. 🚫🌍
The residency renewal process that started 7 months ago has now turned us into guerrilla commandos. 🪖
After emigrating, we had to relearn skills we never needed for the already tough life in Iran. We had to become commandos who need great international connections and must also be powerful logistics managers, just so, if lucky, we might arrange everything moments before the deadline.
In this picture, you see a few lines and the names of some cities.
But all the effort this package went through was just so I could prove, with one piece of paper, that my wife is still my wife and wants to live with me. 📄💍
This document:
- Traveled to over 16 cities in 4 different countries.
- Was handled by many different people.
- Cost over 700 Euros.
- Received approval stamps in 6 different offices.
- Got on a plane 9 times.
- Took 2 buses and 5 trains.
- Was moved around cities countless times by motorbike and car.
So much so that the CO2 used for just this one package will probably warm the planet by another degree next year! 🌍🔥
This document moved exactly in the middle of the killing of my compatriots in Iran, in Tehran and Zanjan. It suffered pain and witnessed the blood of those whose only crime was being born in Iran. 🩸🖤
These are not just simple papers.
These pages represent all the pain of an Iranian immigrant who, just for a stress-free life, left their entire homeland behind in a memory box.
When by chance you are born in a country where you must learn to run away before you learn to speak, perhaps freedom and peace will remain a wish forever.
When they drop you in a country where, before thinking about your future, they want to know if you are "for" or "against."
When you live in a place where you have to learn to run on a high-speed treadmill just so you don't get eaten.
The concept of freedom becomes a collectible item for you, seen only in the showcase of Western movies; just as understanding life in the "Third World" is a blurry, incomprehensible image for those born in free countries.
But we are still alive, hoping for fresher air. 🌱🕊️
Hoping to touch freedom, even for a brief moment in our long lives.
We are here to teach "geographical fate" that we didn't come just to exist; we came to taste the joy of life and to give life to others.
We drink life down, with all its bitterness and sweetness, and keep this sweet wish alive in our hearts. ❤️
We have hope, therefore we live.
📅 January 16, 2026
🚆 On the train from Prague to Mariánské Lázně, Czechia.
