Persian New Years in Southern California

Last week we flew down to Orange County, California to spend Persian New Years with my husband's family. I don't usually write much about our family visits because they're mostly about letting the kids connect with Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and Cousins and not about exploring the world, but Persian New Year is super special and I thought it would be fun to share a view into what is normally a private celebration.

Persian New Years (No Ruz) is the biggest, happiest, celebration of the year for Iranians. The holiday has its roots in Zoroastrian (not Muslim) tradition, and it falls every year at the exact moment of the vernal equinox (the first moment of spring) . This year it was at 10:48:19PM in LA. There's a countdown (just like with Jan 1) and if the holiday happens to fall in the middle of the night, everyone stays up to celebrate and then stays home from work the next day.

Families prepare for weeks for No Ruz, cleaning house, baking pastries, and preparing a special table with symbolic items called a Haft Sin Table (meaning a table with seven dishes each beginning with the Persian letter Sin). Each family's table is unique, and people go to great lengths to make it beautiful. This year was the first year that E was old enough to help prepare the table. His Grandmother had started growing the sprouts weeks ago, but he decorated eggs and helped by feeding the goldfish that took center stage on the table. He was impressed with the mounds of cookies and all the sweet smelling flowers that also decorated the table.

This year, my mother in-law hosted the family gathering for No Ruz. She spent days grocery shopping and preparing food for the 50 family members and close friends who would join us to ring in the New Year. She served traditional dishes like sweet rice with oranges and nuts, pomegranate and walnut stew, and whitefish. As always, everything was delicious and the amount of food was mind boggling. With a huge extended family living within 10 miles of her, my mother-in-law has three refrigerators just so that she can throw parties like this.

We got the kids changed moments before guests arrived and took family pictures around the Haft Sin table. Everyone wore new clothes as is traditional, and we had talked up E's new outfit for so long that he was thrilled to get changed and show his uncle and grandmother what he was wearing.

Every aunt and uncle brought gifts for my kids (older kids get gold coins or cash, ours were the only kids young enough for presents this year) and E and D were simply overwhelmed with joy. They've never had so many gifts all at one time before. We let them stay up until they seemed ready to drop and then got them into bed while the rest of the family stayed up to count down to the New Year. I ran around for the rest of the evening with a baby monitor clipped to my belt like a pager, and though I worried about the noise once or twice, both kids slept soundly until the party broke up.

Related Links:
Farsi Net: NowRuz, NoRuz, NoRooz (Persian New Year)

Save to del.icio.us | | Posted on March 24, 2008 | 2 comments

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Comments

  1. Gudrun

    March 26, 2008 at 11:22 a.m.

    thanks for sharing this interesting cultural tradition. I love the descriptions of the foods and I am impressed your MIL has three fridges! You have inspired me to try to find a recipe to use the pomegranate syrup in my kitchen!

    Happy New Year,

  2. JHS

    March 29, 2008 at 11:38 p.m.

    Thanks for contributing this post to this week's <a href="http://www.jhsiess.com/carnival-family-life">Carnival of Family Life</a>, hosted at <a href="http://www.blog.beyondhorizoncoaching.com">Intensive Care for the Nurturer's Soul</a>! The Carnival will be live on March 31, 2008, so make sure you stop by and check out all of the other wonderful posts included in this week's edition!

    JHS
    <a href="http://www.jhsiess.com">Colloquium</a>

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