ISCA celebrates Persian New Year traditions

The Iranian Student Cultural Association celebrated Norouz, Persian for New Day, on Friday… The Iranian Student Cultural Association celebrated Norouz, Persian for New Day, on Friday at Carnegie Mellon University’s Rangos Hall. The festival observed the spring equinox in ancient Persian cultures. This year the vernal equinox occurred Thursday, March 20, at 7:59 p.m. The first day of the New Year is Farvardin 1, 1382.

Imagine Thanksgiving, the holidays in December, and New Year’s Eve rolled into one – the result is Norouz. Persians in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, Pakistan, India and the territory of Kurdistan celebrate Norouz with family and friends.

Historians believed the celebration of Norouz began 3,000 years ago with the Zoroastrian religion of ancient Persia 1,400 years before Islam.

Holiday preparations began 15 days ago with the planting of lentil in a shallow bowl so the there is several inches of green for the celebration. The family cleans the house wearing new clothes to symbolize purification and the dawning of a new life.

A table, the haft-sean, is prepared with seven objects with the letter S from the Persian alphabet, a mirror, a book revered by the family, which could be a Qur’an, Torah, Bible or Persian poetry, and candles.

The Wednesday night before Norouz a bonfire is burning to celebrate Chahar Shambe Souri, Ember Wednesday. People of all ages are jumping over the fire yelling, “Sorki tu az man, zardieh,” which is loosely translated to mean, “Fire, may your red come to me and my yellow to you,” representing the bad luck left behind in the fire and good luck for the New Year.

The night of Norouz the family is gathering around the haft-sean prepared with the seven symbols for truth, justice, good thoughts and deeds, prosperity, virtue, immortality and generosity.

The lentil greens, called sabze, are on the table with a Persian sweet-samou, a coin-sekh, a hyacinth flower-sonobol, garlic-seer, dried fruit-senjed and vingar-serekh. Small goldfish are in a small bowl on the table to symbolize freedom. A Zoroastrian believer offered these gifts to the deity Ahura Mazda on seven trays.

The IRSCA’s Norouz celebration was held with family and friends at CMU. The haft-sean table was decorated with traditional Zoroastrian gifts. Persian pop music with an American flavor played through the speakers as a warmup to the party.

Family and friends brought traditional Persian foods – Dolmeh-grape leaves stuffed with rice and meat, Olvieh-chicken salad, chicken curry and Shish kabobs-lamb and chicken – just to name a few of the exotic foods wafting the smell of spices through the air.

Mehdi Ghajarnia, a medical student from Pitt and former ISCA president, opened the ceremonies by reading the introduction in Persian. Pedram Roushan, current president of the ISCA and sophomore physics major at Pitt, read the translation. Roozbh Ali Abadi played the acoustic guitar and sang about the goodness of southern Iran in Persian. And, The FOB Squad DJ’s played Persian pop music as the crowd danced into the late night. A trio of traditional Persian dancers performed to the pop music.