‘Farsi’ was the name given to ‘Parsi’ after Persia was invaded by Arabs. Because there is no letter P in Arabic alphabets, therefore they changed ‘Parsi’ to ‘Farsi’. Farsi is the official language of Iran which was known as Persia before 21st of March 1935.  The English equivalent of ‘Farsi’ is ‘Persian’. Persian people like to refer to them selves as Persian rather than Iranian because it can be used to relate all the Persian related items like : Persian rug, Persian cat, Persian gulf, Persian literature and etc . These are the collection of the flags that Iran has had so far.

 Interesting link http://www.iranchamber.com/geography/articles/flag_anthem.php

What is the difference between Hejri Shamsi Calendar and Hejri Ghamari Calendar ? Well all the arabic countries use Hejri Ghamari ( Lunar Calendar) as their calender and the only two countries that are still using the Hejri Shamsi calendar ( Solar Calendar) are Iran and Afghanistan.

Current years in Solar Calendar is 1386 and is Lunar Calendar 1428.  Have a look at the below calculations

Solar Calendar includes 365.5 days in one year and Lunar Calendar includes 354.75 days in a year.

Therefore 1386 x 365.5 = 506583 Days ————->  506583/354.75=1428

By dividing the total days of the Solar Calendar to Lunar Calendar days for one year we will get to the year on Lunar Calendar and it will work if you use Lunar Calender years to calculate the Solar Calendar current year.

I did this research because I wanted to understand why our year differs to Arabic year if both were set at the time when Prophet Mohamed immigrate from Mecca to Medina. In Iranian Calendar the first six months have 31 days, the next five months have 30 days, and the last month has 29 days or 30 days depends on a leap year. The reason the first six months have 31 days and the rest 30 has to do with the fact that the sun moves slightly more slowly along the

 ecliptic (    ) in the northern spring and summer than in the northern  autumn and winter.

Iranian New Year ( Norouz)  is in 21st of March every year ( Farvardin). Farvardin is the first month of the year in Iranian Calendar which is in Spring and the time for starting the new year will change every year base on the Solar movement.                                                                          

I only started advertising on Gumtree recently and have had many people tried to query for more information. I felt good to see how many people want to learn Persian for different reason really. One of them wanted to learn Persian because his girl friend was Iranian and he wanted to impress her by speaking Persian.

Link to the ad : http://www.gumtree.com/london/39/12139339.html

That was the title that caught my eyes when I was browsing the net this morning before starting my work. This carpet was designed by Iranian Carpet Company and it has taken over 18 months for completion of this work. Over 1000 weavers has taken part to finish this piece of art for a mosque in Abu Dhabi. This carpet is 6500 square meter and has been designed by Iranian artist Ali Khaliji. I could not find more than one picture for this article but I am sure when next week there will be more picture of this art when it will be laid at the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi.