By Manijeh Rezapoor
TEHRAN -- I clearly remember when I first met our late senior editor Hamid Golpira for the first time in the editorial board of the Tehran Times English Daily.
It was a summer day in 2001, the very first day I had begun to work for the daily. I was new and had neither a seat nor a computer in the office.
There were going to be changes in the decoration of the office and the newcomers were still wandering around to find a seat and a pc to do their job.
Therefore, I got an empty seat right inside the editors’ room. Hamid entered the room and sat down next to me and began to talk.
An Iranian-American journalist and author, Hamid was very concerned and committed to his job.
He lived alone and had nobody around to talk to, so he used to converse with his colleagues, and with those he felt more comfortable with. So we began to talk. It was a pleasant conversation and we became friends.
He always expected the best from us. Most of his complaints were about the types of news and their English translations, the every-day situation of the country, the future of the younger generation, and many other things.
He always tried his best to produce the best work he could. I never saw him ignore a word, even a single character in sentences. I sometimes saw him forget his food on his desk for hours working on an article. All his love was to recreate the most fluent text out of the news he worked on.
I gradually found out more about him, I think he was a genius, no matter what the text of the news was, it was as if his fingers acted like the wand of a magician, producing a beautiful article.
Hamid was very kind and personable as well, but he used to get angry on occasion. And what made others angry about him was that he was often late for work. Of course, his not being on time is something that developed gradually over the years.
Later on, I got my own seat and pc but we remained good friends and he used to talk to us expressing his feelings whether he was angry or even happy.
Hamid sometimes talked about his sister and used to show us the gifts he received from his sister who lived in the U.S.
I also remember we used to complain to him about his smoking and he only had one response: “This is my only bad habit”.
But his only bad habit led to a catastrophe leaving Hamid in a condition of poor health, and gradually his entire body deteriorated.
He died of terminal lung cancer when he was only 55. It was too soon to lose him here. I could hardly say goodbye to him when we--all of his colleagues--gathered in Tehran’s Behesht Zahra Cemetery to say our final goodbyes to him.
He will never be replaced; he will always be missed in the office and in all of our hearts. He was a unique individual who taught me many things and he will always be there in my heart.
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