Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Chahārshanbe Sūrī - چهارشنبه‌سوری

It's that time of the year, the night before the last Wednesday of the year. Time to celebrate the triumph of light and health over darkness and sickness!

Ali and I just did our own little Chahārshanbe Sūrī festival - چهارشنبه‌سوری - in our living room since we can't exactly build a bonfire on the streets of Lowell.

You are supposed to sing a song with these lyrics:

Zardî-ye man az (ane) to, sorkhî-ye to az (ane) man...
"My yellowness [sickness] is yours [fire], your redness [strength/health] is mine."

We sang to each other the best we could, and each jumped over a candle a couple of times while the other clapped and sang. To finish, we ate some Ajīl-e Moshkel-Goshā (= "problem-solving nuts").

[ wikipedia reference ]



Here's a great video my mother found from iran.tv outlining Norooz. Check it out around 6:40 to see what the fire-jumping is all about.

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