Salam All,

Before I start writing I like to mention why I want to write about the cultural differences with in Iran. I was watching a film last week called “Bashu, the little stranger”. I watched this film when I was only twelve years old in Tehran. This film is about a boy who escaped his town in south of Iran and hid in a truck and end of his journey is north of Iran with all the greenery with everything different to his home town.

Bashu, was dark colour skin as many of you know south of Iran places like Bandar Abbas, poeple have much darker skin than other places in Iran and they speak different dialect. In south they mainly speak Arabic and in North they speak Gilaki and Mazandarani. Gilan and Mazandaran are the main two cities in North near the Caspian Sea and they both have beautiful towns and villages.

Ok back to the film, after finding the new place really strange Bashu finds a place to hide which is a place of Gilaki woman with her two young children. What is beautifully done in this film is the language barrier and cultural differences won’t stop Bashu and Gilaki woman, Naii to communicate and they both care for each other. Though Bashu was speaking Arabic in his home town he started to learn Gilaki so he could communicate with his new adopted family. Bashu and Naii cared and loved each other with no limit, Naii looked after Bashu like her own children, in return Bashu became a man of the house and helped with most of the responsibilities.

What I enjoyed personally about this movie was though they both were Iranian but the language and cultural differences were huge. Our Iran is a big country with 30 provinces and many dialect with in the country.

I reccomend to watch this film.

“Tarrof” plays a big role in Iranian culture and not many outsiders are familar with this habbit. The best way to describe the meaning of Tarrof is to not accept if something is offered to you for the first or second time and keep refusing in polite manner and at the end agree to it (this is not the case always). For example, last year when I went to Iran, we went to my aunt’s house for dinner and I wasn’t really hungry and when the dinner was served I helped myself to small portion of food which my family thought I was tarrofing and was shy to eat more and when I explained the reason they still would not accept and wanted to serve more food for me. I really think tarrof is keeping people from being direct towards each other. I know this is part of our culture but using it in excess has brought so much frustration and sometimes tarrofing with each other can be genuine which is not too bad. I know young generation are being rebelling against taroff kardan and want to have more direct approach.

Merci

Aila

I have to say one my favourite painter of Iran is Mahmoud Farshchian. When I went to Iran this year I really wanted to go to his museum in Saad Abad Castle. It was amazing exhibition with all his paintings, I like his painting because it is unique and each individual of them tells a story and if you look closely you never see a line ending in his paintings, they all disappear in one another.

Mahmoud Farshchian was born in Isfahan in year 1929. His father had a affection for arts and young Mahmoud showed an interest in studying art quite early in his life, after receiving a diploma for the Fine Arts from Isfahan High School he left for Europe where he studied the works of the great Western masters.

Ostad Mahmoud Farshchian is the founder of his own school in Iranian painting, which adheres to classical from while making use of new techniques. He has played a decisive role in introducing Iranian art yo the international art scene. He has been invited to speak and exhibit at various universities and art exhibitions. Currently Ostad Farshchian resides in New York.

www.farshchianart.com