On Thursday, my brilliant third grade class went to my former teacher's wonderful second grade class to celebrate Persian New Year also known as Nowrouz. Nowrouz means New Day in Farsi. Persian New Year is the first day of spring, which falls on March 20th.
The exact second this glorious event takes place, one year being precisely 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 50 seconds, is calculated. When it occurs, the oldest member of the family kisses and hugs everyone and presents the children with an Eidi (a New Year gift), which is usually in the form of new currency, gold coins, or jewelry.
Here is a story of how it started:
In Iran more than 7000 years ago, King Jamsheed was devoted to his country. The whole country was sorrowful and depressed because for one whole season, they had been lingering inside since the climate was very frigid. As a result, many people became ill. King Jamsheed wanted the people to be jubilant, so he planned a celebration for the country. It made everyone forget about the winter and move on to spring.
First there is the haft-seen. The haft-seen is a table that Iranians place certain foods and plants on. There is sprouted lentils, a dry fruit, apple, a sweet, vinegar, crushed sumac berries, and garlic. Every Persian enhances the haft-seen in their own special way.
Before Nowrouz, there are a lot of things to do such as spring cleaning and Char Shambeh Soori. Char Shambeh Soori is when you jump over a burning fire. You can read all about it on Hannah's Hacienda. A few days ago, while I was jumping over the fire, I burned my ankle. That was very careless of me. I highly discourage anyone trying this at home without adult supervision.
After that, finally comes Persian New Year. Next, we go to relatives' homes and collect eidis. Eidis (ey•deez) are money that we collect from our friends and family that is a gift for the new year.
Seezdah Bedar comes afterward. Seezdah means 13 in Farsi. Seezdah Bedar is exactly 13 days after Nowrouz. This event is an annual outdoor picnic. Usually, we go to a park with a lot of friends and family, and the children always play on the delightful playground while all the adults are babbling with their buddies, play backgammon, or cards.
Here are some questions for you:
Have you ever been to an Iranian home at this time of year and celebrated with them? Would you like to?
If so, what was a similarity and difference to the way I celebrate this special event?
For the people that are Iranian, what is your favorite part of Nowrouz and what about this is most important to you?
 |
| Our Haft-Seen for our class celebration. |
Here is a story of how it started:
In Iran more than 7000 years ago, King Jamsheed was devoted to his country. The whole country was sorrowful and depressed because for one whole season, they had been lingering inside since the climate was very frigid. As a result, many people became ill. King Jamsheed wanted the people to be jubilant, so he planned a celebration for the country. It made everyone forget about the winter and move on to spring.
First there is the haft-seen. The haft-seen is a table that Iranians place certain foods and plants on. There is sprouted lentils, a dry fruit, apple, a sweet, vinegar, crushed sumac berries, and garlic. Every Persian enhances the haft-seen in their own special way.
 |
For example, here is my haft-seen from this year. |
 |
Now here is my grandma's haft-seen from last year. |
 |
Here is a picture of Char Shambeh Soori from last Nowrouz. |
Seezdah Bedar comes afterward. Seezdah means 13 in Farsi. Seezdah Bedar is exactly 13 days after Nowrouz. This event is an annual outdoor picnic. Usually, we go to a park with a lot of friends and family, and the children always play on the delightful playground while all the adults are babbling with their buddies, play backgammon, or cards.
Here are some questions for you:
Have you ever been to an Iranian home at this time of year and celebrated with them? Would you like to?
If so, what was a similarity and difference to the way I celebrate this special event?
For the people that are Iranian, what is your favorite part of Nowrouz and what about this is most important to you?
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteHappy Nowrouz! What a fantastic post about your family tradition! I enjoyed reading it!
You included the interesting history of the New Year, and I love how you helped your readers by including pronunciation keys! Very advanced and well done!
I really like the idea of a new beginning. It is important to remember the past, but also to wipe the slate clean and have a fresh start!
The presentation you gave with your friends and family in Mrs. Clebenoff's room was very informative. It was great for me to read your post having gazed upon the beautiful haft-seen you had set up that day. I loved that goldfish!
One final element I loved was that you hyperlinked your post to Hannah's post about the Char Shambeh Soori. That was a lovely thing to do!
Terrific tradition and fabulous reporting!
Happy New Year!
Your proud teacher,
Mrs. Y♥llis
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteI, too like Mrs Yollis really enjoyed reading your post about your family tradition.
I always find family tradition really wonderful because of the fact it does go back in time. Whats even more interesting is that tradition like yours and many others are still celebrated today with family and friends.
Thats what it's all about when it comes to traditions making sure that the tradition will go on and on. I just love this aspect of celebrating old traditions.
From your blogging pal,
AA.
My Dearest Adia,
ReplyDeleteI first want to wish you and your beautiful family a very happy Norouz filled with every happiness in the world.
Your post about Norouz was so well articulated and researched. It is one of the best descriptions of our wonderful tradition I have ever read. My dear Adia with your permission I will include your writing in my presentations of Norouz I do for Donya and Laila's classes, you say the history better than I can. You are an amazing writer and I am so proud of you.
This year in Irvine the city we live in they had a celebration of Norouz in the city hall and our mayor read a proclamation for Norouz and the wording was: "the City of Irvine hereby proclaim March 21, 2011 as commencement of Norouz, Persian New Year and urges all residents to become more aware of this beautiful tradition, the cultural marvels of the ancient Persian civilization and the contributions of the Iranian-American community in the City of Irvine". It was such a great honor and we were all so happy to be recognized.
Donya and Laila send their love for you. They have joined a Farsi class for the past 4 months and they also had a big Norouz celebration which was featured in our local paper. It was fun for them to wear the traditional costumes and sing songs. Donya played "Gole Ghandom" song on her violin.
We miss you very much and hope to see you soon. Please give all our love to your dear family. We are so proud of you.
love,
Samila
Dear Mrs. Y♥llis,
ReplyDeleteThank you for leaving a comment on my blog! Also, thank you for complimenting me on the pronunciation keys and the history of Nowrouz.
I agree that it is important to remember the past, but it is important to also wipe the slate clean and have a fresh start.
Great expression, Mrs. Y♥llis!
I hyperlinked to Hannah's post because I really didn't have time to explain the whole thing about Char Shambeh Soori, and I thought that she had an outstanding explanation about that event. Also, I would like Hannah to get more visitors too.
Thanks again!
Your student,
Adia ♥
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteThanks for teaching me all about the Persian new year celebrations. It is all new information for me and I love learning about different cultural traditions. You did a remarkable job explaining the different parts of the celebrations. I especially liked learning about the Haft-Seen, with your fantastic pictures.
For those of us that live in the Northern Hemisphere I think March 20th is the perfect time to celebrate a new year. It is when the days start to get longer, plants begin to sprout, birds return, and the cycle of seasons starts over. It seems like Nowrouz celebrates these new beginnings in a beautiful way.
I hope you got some good eidis!
Again, thanks for sharing this with all of us.
From,
Mr. Salsich
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteI think you wrote a fabulous post about Nowrouz! I was not familiar with this Persian holiday before I read your post. Now I feel like I have a clear understanding of this very special day.
In particular, your photos extended my learning and helped me visualize what you were describing.
This is my first visit to your student blog and I am very impressed. I will have to tell my students about your blog.
From,
Mrs. Hembree
with the Bulldog Readers
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful post about your family tradition! As you know, every year I celebrate Norooz in my classroom. I always learn something from you when I visit your fabulous blog!
Happy New Year!
Your former teacher,
Mrs. Chalfin
:-)
Dear Adia joonam,
ReplyDeleteWhat an incredible post, indeed. You have become a phenomenal writer and it makes me proud to have been a part of this amazing journey thus far. I'm certain that your hard work and dedication to excellence will pay off in life.
It is lovely to be able to celebrate a tradition, which has been celebrated for thousands of years, especially one with such depth and meaning like the one we celebrate, the Persian New Year, called Nowrouz.
What I enjoy about this yearly event is that a high value is placed on respecting the older members of the family. It is our custom to visit them first and thereby showing them the respect and gratitude they have rightfully earned. Children learn at a very young age that the elders, whether it's their parents, aunts, uncles, or grandparents, are to be respected and valued. I love that about our Iranian culture. The high level of respect and gratitude that we extend to the ones who have the wisdom and insight into life, is something I value tremendously.
I find it sad that we, as a culture, have become accustomed to celebrating events, which we don't know anything about. St. Patrick's day, for example. Kids celebrate it at school but if you were to ask them why, most of them would think it's about wearing green if you're of Irish decent. Beautiful and meaningful celebrations become meaningless. I believe that we, as parents, and our teachers owe it to the kids to explain and teach them about these special celebrations and their significance.
It is my desire that everyone of your readers will have a blessed and favor filled new year, whether Iranian or not.
I love you my beautiful girl. Keep up the exceptional work.
Your happy MAMA
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteI truly enjoyed your informative post on Norooz. I never get tired of reading and hearing about Norooz, and think of it to be a wonderful holiday. I still remember the excitement that we children felt around Persian New year when we were kids and lived in Iran. There was a special magic and sense of joy that you could not help but notice. The stores would display their Norooz items, people would be busy shopping, and kids would be looking forward to the thirteen days of Spring vacation that follows the New Year. I am so glad that we have the opportunity to celebrate our traditional holidays on opposite sides of the world.
So, did you go to Sizdeh-Be-Dar (the picnic) yesterday?
Warmest regards,
Parisa (Iman's Mom)
*********************************************************
ReplyDeleteDear AA,
Thank you for your awesome comment on my blog! I totally agree with you that family traditions are really wonderful because of the fact that it goes back in time.
Traditions are really amazing in a way... somehow.
I would like to thank you a lot for always supporting other peoples' blogs by leaving a quality comment for them on each and every post. I know that I have thanked you a bunch of times already, but I would like you to know that I really appreciate it.
Your blogging pal,
Adia
*********************************************************
Dear Samila joon,
ReplyDeleteThank you for supporting me on my blog! Also, thank you very much for the compliments about my post about Nowrouz being so well articulated and researched.
Oh, no, I do not mind if you include my writing in the presentations of Nowrouz that you do for Donya and Laila's classes. That would be a great honor. Thank you!
Wow, that is amazing that you had a celebration of Nowrouz in your city hall. That is very nice that you got recognized. That must have been a glorious day! Our city did not have a celebration of Nowrouz, but of course, we had our Seezdah Bedar celebration just yesterday. It was fun, although we only stayed for approximately an hour. My mom went to church until 2:30, and I was invited to a build-a- bear workshop b-day party.
I can't believe that Donya and Laila joined a Farsi class! I should talk my mom into signing me up.
Love,
Adia
Dear Mr. Salsich,
ReplyDeleteThank you for babbling!
Yes, Mr. Salsich, I did get some good eidis! I am saving up for trading my birthday party that I have every year for an iPad that I have always been hoping for. I really would like to get it!
Yes, it is a perfect time of year to have a Nowrouz celebration. Persians celebrate this special event especially in Spring because blossoms are blooming, and Spring, to Persians, is a new year, when we forget about the bad, old memories and remember the good, new ones.
"See" you later!
Adia
Dear Mrs. Hembree,
ReplyDeleteThank you for leaving a quality comment and for complimenting me on the use of the photos, which extended your learning and helped you visualize what I was describing.
I hope that you can visit my blog more often. Could you please send me a link to your classroom blog so that I can add it to my list?
What grade do you teach? I'm curious.
Do you celebrate any special holidays that you would like to share?
Warmly,
Adia
(P.S. I like the name Bulldog Readers. How did you come up with it?)
Hello my dear Adia joon,
ReplyDeleteI think its great that you are teaching the meaning of Nowrouz to people. To be honest I didnt even know some of this stuff so thank you for teaching me.
I also really liked all the pictures you posted for us. Very cool! Im the proudest uncle in the Universe!
Please keep up the good work and keep making us proud!
Love,
Ali
Hi Adia!
ReplyDeleteWe would have been there, celebrating New Year with you, if we would have known. Thank you for walking us through history.
Without knowing, we had lentils, dried fruit, apples (we get them every day in school for lunch anyway), garlic with everything, vinegar, but we did not try the sumac berries yet --.
No, we have not been to an Iranian New Year Celebration, but we'd love to participate sometime. (Does it involve gold fish?)
We don't think there's any difference to the way of celebrating this special event.
We love you all! You are very special!
With love always,
Athena, Christina, and mommy
PS: On our Good Friday we have a special thing going on: we go to church. They give a good tour of the church, teach us about what Easter means, we do nice projects, they have grottos showing what happened when, (We get the education that sinful mom could not fully explain to us), be with children our age, and get Holy Communion. We bring nice Easter things home. If You'd like to join us, we'd have a blast!
PPS: Mom would love to have the recipe for whatever it is called involving dry limes and meat, and baby leeks -- she loves that dish.
We did not know about Nowrouz, but we'd love to learn about it.
Dear Mrs. Chalfin,
ReplyDeleteThank you for leaving an exceptional comment for me! (I learned that high-level word from when I was in your class last year :-) I always am looking forward to reading your wonderful comments that I receive from you. So far, I think that you're such an outstanding blogger that you are good enough to have a blog. :-) That would be well earned!
I have a question:
How was the Norooz celebration in your classroom?
I'm sure it was sensational! (That's another word I learned from you. :-)
I hope that you are having a great time teaching your sort of new class. I bet all your students love you as a teacher. I sure did!
Hope to see you soon,
Adia
:-)
@ Mom,
ReplyDeleteThank you for leaving a comment to help me with family blogging month! I am so relieved that you are such a great writer, and that you would be able to do all these wonderful ideas Mrs. Yollis has prepared!
I would like to notify you that you are one of the greatest mom bloggers that I have seen in a long time. If you think that is a lie, you are completely mistaken!
I hope you leave so many comments Mrs. Yollis’ e-mail will explode!
Your son,
Iman
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteHappy Belated Nourouz! I hope that you had the most loveliest of New Years with your family! I loved your haft-seen. It was the most beautiful that I ever saw before. I wanted to share with you that I celebrate this holiday like you do. My favorite thing this time of year is when families get together and they all seem very happy. I love all of the fun festivities which are very educational for my family and I.
Sincerely, Mrs. Crystal and Family
Dear Mrs. Crystal and the gang,
ReplyDeleteHappy belated Nourouz to you, too!
Thank you for your compliment on the haft-seen. I'm sure yours was very pretty, too! By the way, the colors that came on the picture is not truly the real colors on our haft-seen. Just so you know, there was purple tablecloth, not blue like it appeared in the picture.
I have some questions:
Did you go to Seezdah Bedar? I did, but didn't stay there for long because mommy (Ava) went to church until 2:30, and I went to a b-day party.
Did you go to Char Shambeh Soori?
Love,
Adia (And Stefan says hi, too)
My dear Iman,
ReplyDeleteThank you for the compliments. I am so glad that you liked my comments. I think of you as a fantastic writer and great commentator. I hope that you continue to flourish as as writer and make your teachers and me proud. Keep up the good work and continue reaching for the stars. :-]
Love,
Mom
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteI have never been to an Iranian home but your description of the Nowrouz celebration makes me eager to do so. Perhaps we could make a list of seezdah items that we would like to learn about during our visit. What do you think of that idea?
Your story telling skills are quite remarkable. Even though I have not celebrated Nowrouz, I feel like I know exactly what would happen. It sounds like lots of fun!
Thank you very much for leaving a comment on my EDM310 Class Blog. My students want to be teachers. You are helping them understand the power of blogging and commenting on blogs.
Thank you very much!
Dr. John Strange
University of South Alabama
Dear Adia,
ReplyDeleteI am a student at the Univeristy of South Alabama. I am currently in Dr. Strange's EDM 310 class! I enjoyed your post about your family tradition! I am not familiar with this Persian holiday but now after reading your post I feel like I have learned so much!This is a very special day to you and your family! I loved your photos! They really helped me grasp the meaning of the holiday. Thank you so much for allowing me to comment on your blogpost! Feel free to comment on my blogpost too!
From,
Cherish
Adia!
ReplyDeleteMy oh my! This was such an informative post. I had no understanding that such a beautiful celebration occurred! You are quite lucky to be a part of this and i am sure you are grasping much of history and cherishing time spent with your family. I enjoyed learning of the process on how you celebrate in stages. Your haft-seen is very stunning to the eye and firstly caught my attention, I am thrilled to have learned about your traditions!
- In my family, we usually celebrate New years, where we eat something green for prosperity * I usually choose turnips for they are yummy, and we also eat black eyed peas for good luck and a family tradition we incorporate is hiding a quarter in our corn bread and this signifies you should earn lot's of money throughout the new year! This tradition is quite different from your's but a great one indeed! I am pleased with your efforts, a great job done! I am thrilled to have received comments back onto our class blog, from yourself, Hannah, and Gracie. You girl's keep up the good work and please keep in touch!! You can visit my personal class blog if you would like wHiTnEy's cLaSs bLoG
∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆
ReplyDelete@Dear Uncle Ali,
Thank you for leaving a comment on my blog! I was very excited when I got a comment from you.
To be honest, I just learned these things also. I just learned when I asked Mehdi (Dad) to tell me a little bit about Norouz.
I'm the happiest niece in the Universe! =)
Love you!
Love,
Adia
(Stefan says "Bye, DAYYYYY ALLLLLLLLLI.")
@Dear Mom,
I totally agree with you for everything you said. Except the first paragraph. That would be like overstating if I said that to myself. Imagine that! I'm talking to myself......"What an incredible post, indeed, Adia. I have become a phenomenal writer and it makes me proud to have been a part in my own journey thus far. I'm certain my hard work and dedication to excellence will pay off in my life." Ha, ha!
It is lovely to be able to celebrate a tradition that has been celebrated for thousands of years. That's why it's special. Plus, It's FUN! Isn't it? =)
Talking (I mean blogging) about the word exceptional, you are an exceptional writer! You definitely should be an author when you grow up. You already are grown up, but still you have a looooong way to go. =)
Keep up the sensational work!
Love your (lovely) daughter,
Adia
@Dear Athena, Christina, and Mrs. Monica,
Thanks a lot for commenting on my babble blog! You sure are good babblers! In my opinion, you should compete in the babble of the month. Babble of the Month is a competition that is monthly. I am really behind on that post!
That's funny that you had lentils, dried fruit, apples, garlic, and vinegar without knowing. =)
Yes, actually an Iranian New Year Celebration does involve goldfish. A lot of goldfish!
We love you all!
You guys are very very very special.
Love,
Adia
(and family)
@Dear Dr. Strange,
I think your idea of making a list of seezdah (thirteen) items that you would like to learn is wonderful! You said that you are going to visit. Are you going to visit L.A.? Maybe my class and I could meet you. That would be fun!
Thank you for the compliment.
One of the reasons that I am happy that I earned a class blog is because my dream is to be an author (also a Lakers cheerleader) when I grow up, and having a blog definitely helps with that!
Your class blog is wonderful! I think that many of your students would make outstanding teachers!
It would be magnificent if your class would be able to skype with our class on the internet. Now that would be fun! We have skyped before with many classes before such as 2KM and 2KJ in Australia.
I am very grateful that you left a comment because now I get a visitor on my flag counter and cluster map from South Alabama. Also, I am grateful because you are an amazing commenter, and I love when my comment section is full of quality comments.
Thanks!
Warmly,
Adia
(P.S. I like your avatar.)
∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆∆