The Archer Who Brought The Rain

Statue of Arash Kamangir,
Sa'ad Abad Palace, Tehran

According to ancient Persian legend, King Manuchehr of Iran and Afrasiab of Turan (which covered the territory of present-day Central Asia) waged a long and bitter war over the disputed border between their countries. The war raged on for many years without either side gaining an advantage until even the rain stopped falling and an eight-year drought ensued. Presumably the war angered Tishtar, the Zoroastrian angel in charge of rain and fertility, and he figured a good, long drought would bring the two embattled kings to their senses.

The angel was right (aren’t they always?), for eventually the two combatants decided to settle their differences once and for all. They found a brave archer named Arash Kamangir (literally: Arash the Arrow-Thrower), who was known for the lightning speed of his arrows. He was to go to the top of Mount Damavand in Iran’s Alborz Range, shoot an arrow to the east, and wherever the arrow landed would be the new border between the two countries.

Arash climbed the mountain and remained under the stars all night, praying to the god, Ahura Mazda, to give him strength. When dawn crept over the land, he released his arrow, putting all his vigor into the effort so that afterwards he lay down and died. The arrow flew for thirteen days and finally landed on the bank of the Oxus River, which is known today as the Amu Darya, the longest river in Central Asia. As soon as the new border between Iran and Turan was established, the rain began, bringing peace and prosperity to the whole region.

Arash Kamangir is one of the most popular heroes in Persian folklore. Iranian children learn about him from a story in the Shahnameh by the 11^th-century Persian poet, Ferdowsi, and an account can also be found in the Zoroastrian holy book, Avesta. Some Iranians today—mainly in the northern province of Mazandaran (believed to be Arash’s birthplace)—still celebrate his remarkable feat with a rain festival known as Tiregan. It falls on the thirteenth day of the Iranian month of Tir (one of the names of the angel, Tishtar), around July 1 on the Gregorian calendar.

Many of the traditional rituals associated with Tiregan have to do with water. Children swim and splash about in streams or, where no natural body of water is handy (and they can get away with it), run through fountains and man-made pools. In Iran, where the old Zoroastrian belief in the sacred power of water still can be felt, fountains and reflecting pools are found in nearly every public space.

Three days before the festival, people perform a rite known as chokadula, where each member of a family places a precious object in a clay pot, usually gold coins and rings or objects made of iron such as keys and locks. They fill the pot with water, tie a cloth over the top, and place it under a pomegranate tree. On Tiregan, they remove the pot, and each person pulls out his or her artifact while the family elders sing or recite a poem. Then they interpret the poem to see what the future will hold.

In another ritual, people take strips of cloth in seven different colors and twist them into bracelets, which they wear for nine days. On the tenth day, they remove the bracelets and toss them into running streams in a symbolic act of casting out bad luck.

A third custom is to hide bowls of water behind walls or on balconies and pour them over the heads of people passing in the street below. This may seem like a nasty, practical joke, but when you consider that summer temperatures in Iran can reach 100 degrees or more, it probably feels like the rains returning after a long drought.

Many of these traditional rituals have been lost over time, and Tiregan is not widely practiced in Iran anymore. A pity, for who can resist a celebration that involves splashing about in cool water on a hot summer day?

Off The Beaten Track: A Poem By Hafez

The small man

Builds cages for everyone

He

Knows.

While the sage,

Who has to duck his head

When the moon is low,

Keeps dropping keys all night long

For the

Beautiful

Rowdy

Prisoners.

~ Hafez

(Translated by Daniel Ladinsky)

A Few of My Favorite Things

By Edith McClintock

When I was young, my parents preferred breaking traditions to following them. But Christmas, luckily, they left to my Midwestern Irish grandmas. One Catholic and one Protestant. And each year we rotated between them, one year in Florida, the next in Missouri. New and old. Hot and cold.

My Missouri grandmother always made my favorite pecan puff cookies and allowed us to open one present on Christmas Eve. We’d spend hours circling the tree, shaking and measuring, contemplating the hidden secrets of each box. Choosing right meant a night of gloating over siblings and cousins. Choosing wrong, despair and jealousy—for seven long hours until we could open the rest.

My Florida grandmother always made her jello-marshmallow Christmas salad—a tradition ripe for return! Either my aunt or grandfather dressed as Santa Claus, in a plastic red suit that fooled no one. After dinner, we’d ride out in her golf cart searching for lost golf balls, or lounge poolside reading Archie comics.

In high school and college, my sister and I began looking for our own holiday traditions, trying on various religions and foods and decorations. My sister introduced us to midnight mass, still one of my favorites. And with friends I celebrated Hanukkah and the Cuban Nochebuena, a Christmas Eve dinner with a roasted pig as the centerpiece. While living in Suriname in my twenties, a good friend informed me December is for family and relaxing, not work. A splendid idea I decided, adopting it immediately, although life rarely allows as long as I'd like.

But now that I’m living in the Pacific Northwest, my favorite Christmas tradition is to visit family and friends in Miami, and, as anywhere, curl in front of a Christmas tree with a good book and a fat cat. So as an ode to Christmas in Miami, I present a few of my favorite things (along with abject apologies to the original):

Café con leche and laze about days

Bright neon buildings and warm ocean waves

Pythons and ‘gators twisted in rings

These are a few of my favorite things

Long South Beach nights and salsa till three

Chickens in backyards but no hipsters to see

Sailboats that fly with the moon on their wings

These are a few of my favorite things

Two separate Christmases for both mom and for dad

A tree all in purple makes my mom twice as glad

My cute little nephew dressed in nothing

These are a few of my favorite things

Poolside at Audrey’s with all of the girls

The magic of sunset and islands scattered like pearls

Cool moonlit nights and hammocks gently aswing

These are a few of my favorite things

When the fog looms

When the rain falls

When the nights come too soon

I simply remember Miami is home

And soon I'll be quite tanned and new

Awful, I know, but I'm still following the rule that December is not for work.

For more, visit my author website and/or personal blog, A Wandering Tale. Even better, order a copy of Monkey Love & Murder on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or the Book Depository (free shipping nearly anywhere in the world).

Supriya’s Favorite Things

Oh, this is HARD! Where to begin… J

In no particular order…

The holidays! Gosh, I luv this time of year. And this year in particular, because preceding Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s, there’s a whole slew of lovely Indian festivals, such as Navratri and Diwali, that we’ve just started celebrating, and in grand style too. It’s been non-stop partying this season, though we haven’t had a moment to catch our breath. As it should be, right?

My family, including my precious hubby, who at 11 p.m. is digging for material our nine-year-old daughter needs at school by 6 a.m. tomorrow. The brilliant witticisms said daughter comes up with at the tip of her tongue on an hourly basis. That she asked Santa if he was related to the tooth fairy. That she is my real-life Hugo Cabret, inventing and tinkering and making blueprints. And our other daughter, all of six, who when asked to put on her shoes before school, performs a rap song about “rules, rules, rules” that she makes up at the spur of the moment. Who, when brushing her teeth, hears music. Love them!

Books, lots of books. Being surrounded by books. Swimming in books. Having endless hours to read and soak up well-strung words and ideas that transport me to new places and perspectives. This month, Jo Nesbo, Miyuki Miyabe, Helen Simonson, and Tin Tin.

Food. Cooking for friends and family. Trying out new recipes. Learning something new about ourselves and other cultures through their cuisine. We’ll be entertaining this Thursday, which happens to be Shabeh Yalda. As maybe you did too, I learned about this ancient winter solstice celebration through Heidi, and I’m adopting it. I’m cooking our favorite Persian stew for dinner, then we’ll eat pomegranates and watermelon while reading poetry aloud around the fire. (Shhh, don’t tell our husbands the part about the poetry. It’ll send them running, even with the addition of fine wine.) We’ll read bits of the traditional Rumi and Hafiz, as well as some Shel Silverstein and possibly a little T.S. Eliot.

Being surrounded by good people. It took me time to recognize so many of them in my crowded life, but now that I have, I’m awed by my great fortune and will make sure to appreciate them all year round.

Writing. When it flows. Er, to be continued...

Meanwhile, we hope you're enjoying your favorite people and activities as well, now and into the new year. 

Happy holidays to one and all!

Feliz Navidad

I spent my first Christmas away from Australia in South America. I had figured it wouldn’t be dissimilar from the Land of the Long Weekend. After all, South America was in the same hemisphere, and experiencing 40 degrees C on Christmas Day wasn’t unheard of at home either. Catholicism was common in Australia, as in South America, so really, how different could things be? You got it—our traditions were poles apart. I was living in Peru at the time and had the pleasure of celebrating with friends from various parts of the globe, including many South American countries. We decided to group together our Christmas traditions and make it one big cultural mash-up. Since then, I've adopted some of the following Christmas traditions into my own celebrations, and I love that I can travel the world in one day and remember the wonderful friendships I've made over the years. Here's what my friends taught me:

Colombia: The nativity scene is made of clay figures, known as pesebres. The Mary and Joseph figurines wear traditional Colombian attire, such as a poncho, fedora hat, and shawl. El Dia de las Velitas (Day of the Candles) is held on the seventh of December and that’s when Advent prayers start. December 16th marks the start of La Novena de Aguinaldos, a prayer that is said over nine successive days up until Christmas Eve. These prayers tell what happened during the nine-month pregnancy of Mary and Joseph. This Colombian tradition dates back to the 1700s, and little has changed since the first prayer was said.

Peru: Nativity scenes are called retablos. Historically, priests carried small altars from house to house with a nativity scene similar to the one in Colombia. Nowadays, priests use portable boxes instead. (I guess their muscles got tired). Dances and plays are put on throughout the festive season, and traditional Peruvian food is served up during these celebrations. As an act of good will, churches and generous people make choclotadas (cups of hot chocolate) and give gifts to those less fortunate.

Venezuela: On December 16, families display their pesebres. (They’re called the same in Colombia.) At dawn on Christmas Eve, church bells chime and firecrackers explode to wake up all the worshippers. On the 5^th of January, children leave out hay and water for the camels of the Magi (the wise men) and, in the morning, they find their offerings are replaced by gifts. If the children wake up and have a black smudge on their cheek, they believe that Balthazar, King of the Ethiopians, kissed them while they were asleep.

Ecuador: Children write letters to baby Jesus and place their shoes on their windowsills on Christmas Eve. The next morning, the children usually awake to find noise-making toys in their footwear. Firecrackers, brass bands, and dancing in the streets are popular, and most families attend midnight mass.

Brazil: Christmas is influenced by the Jesuit monks. But over the years, Brazil has adapted many North American traditions, which means the old traditions are falling by the wayside.

In South America, the commercialism of Christmas is no way near the frantic extent it is in other parts of the world, and to be honest, it's a welcome relief. The focus is on family and friends and celebrating beliefs that at times combine modern-day religion and the traditions of the ancestors. Santa and his presents are not the be all and end all. For me, I found the true spirit of Christmas in South America.

The mother of my “adopted” family in Peru did a great deal of volunteer work for the children’s hospital and a psychiatric home for children in Lima. On Christmas morning, she invited me to join her in her own Christmas Day tradition—handing out presents to children at the hospital and psychiatric home who either had no family or were so poor their family couldn’t afford gifts. Armed with sweets and books, we set off. I had no idea this particular morning would be the one that changed my whole view of Christmas. Previously, I had thought it was one commercial rip-off. But in that moment, when I was surrounded by children who just wanted a hug and were happy to see someone show them some love, I finally got what it was all about.

Christmas is one of my favorite times of the year because of the beautiful friendships I've made. I now celebrate these with my husband and our children, and I hope that as my kids get older and explore the world, they'll find their own favorite holiday traditions.

How about you? Have you adopted favorite traditions from other cultures to make your celebration of any holiday more special?

Seasonal Traditions, Old and New

Christmas is not a huge celebration in our house. We don’t trim a Christmas tree, bake holiday cakes, or hang colorful lights around the eaves. There are no milk and cookies waiting for Santa to come barreling down the chimney, hungry and thirsty from his sooty exertions. But before you get the idea that we’re a couple of Scrooges who do our best to ruin the joy for everyone else, let me reassure you that Christmas doesn’t pass us by entirely unnoticed. We have a rather eclectic set of holiday traditions, mixed and matched from my childhood memories and my husband’s Persian culture.

So even though Christmas is fairly low-key around here, we still manage to get into the holiday spirit. Here are my favorite ways to celebrate this joyful time of year.

My favorite ancient Persian ritual:

A few days before Christmas, we celebrate Shabeh Yalda, a winter solstice celebration whose roots go back to ancient Persia and its Zoroastrian rulers. (I blogged about it here last year.) On this longest night of the year, we stay up late eating pomegranates, preserved peaches, watermelon, and pistachio nuts, while reading Persian poetry, usually Hafez or Rumi. There is something about eating summer fruit in the deep freeze of winter that makes me think of people long ago who hoarded fragile produce as an offering to the sun god in hopes that it would give him strength to overcome the darkness and bring back spring. In our modern age, with our confidence in science and knowledge of the ways of nature, it doesn’t hurt to remember people who lacked such certainty yet paid greater attention to the world around them.

My favorite holiday meal:

Christmas dinner at our house is a far cry from the meal I grew up with. My mother used to serve a ham baked with pineapple slices and a brown sugar glaze. After the feast, the bone and remaining scraps of meat would go into a German-style split pea soup that would last us well into the new year.

Ham is not a big hit in my household today, so I make javaher polo instead, a Persian dish whose name means “bejeweled rice.” It may come from a culture that doesn’t celebrate Christmas, but I can think of no more festive dish to serve on a holiday table. The white rice sparkles with ruby-toned barberries, slivered green pistachios and creamy almonds, glistening orange peel, and a splash of golden saffron. No matter how much I prepare, this dish never lasts as long as my mother’s pea soup did, but paired with a roast chicken and served with a glass of sparkling wine, it looks and tastes just like Christmas should.

My favorite holiday decoration:

I may not deck the halls with boughs of holly or my house with garlands of lights, but my one nod to the neighborhood decorating frenzy is that I hang an evergreen wreath on my front door. I love wreaths of all kinds – herbal ones in the summertime, fragrant with mint, lavender, and thyme. Fruit wreaths in the fall as a tribute to bountiful harvests. A circle is such a comforting shape, with no beginning and no end.

My favorite family tradition:

Throughout the week between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, I slice up a Christstollen, a dense German cake filled with dried fruit and almonds and iced with melted butter and powered sugar. Arranged on a special plate along with a few decorative rosemary sprigs (which are usually putting out their tiny blue blossoms at this time of year), it makes a sweet addition to breakfast.

This tradition started many years ago with a crotchety old aunt of mine. She lived in Dresden, a German city that at the time lay well behind the Iron Curtain in the German Democratic Republic. This aunt despised my mother (and, by extension, my sister and me) and never wasted an opportunity to criticize everything we did, from the way we dressed (not fashionably Parisian enough – and this from a dyed-in-the-wool Communist) to where we lived (in the decadent heart of Capitalism). But she saved up her kindness for one act of generosity at Christmas, when she’d send us an authentic Dresdner Christstollen, purchased from a famous bakery whose holiday confections were intended only for export. You had to have serious political connections to buy one in its city of origin.

The pastry arrived in a metal box with a picture of a medieval city sketched on the side, and it took metal cutters, a hammer, and a chisel to pry the container open. But the treat inside, a gift from one of the most unpleasant people I’ve ever encountered, always reminded me that everyone, no matter how nasty they may be, has the capacity for kindness. Isn’t that what the holidays are all about?

Off The Beaten Track: Is 50 The New 30?

This week’s guest, Jayanti Shukla, is a busy career woman living her dream in Mumbai, India. After 24 years in the insurance sector, gaining her fair share of success, she decided to take that leap of faith to follow her true calling. Jayanti is now in charge of a major non-profit organisation in Mumbai.

I completed 24 years of service in the insurance industry in 2008, and I had enjoyed these 24 years. I got my promotions in time, was paid well, lived in a company-given flat in a posh suburb of Mumbai, and enjoyed all the trappings that came along with my comfortable job. I enjoyed the positions I held and the respect I received in the corporate world. But I knew by then that this was not what I wanted to do for the rest of my life, even if I was one of the youngest managers in the company and not done moving up the corporate ladder. I was 48 years old and the vice president of a major insurance brokering company.

For many years, I spent my spare time working with voluntary groups involved in social and civic causes. These interactions kept me grounded and closer to reality. When I turned 40, I told myself I would quit my corporate sector job at 50 then do only what I really wanted to do. But I was lucky. When I turned 48, I was offered a job to head a non-profit organization. The head hunters believed that my experience with voluntary groups combined with my corporate sector experience made me a suitable candidate for the post. Without thinking twice, I agreed – it seemed to fit into my long-term plans and, even though it was two years early, it felt right.

At a centre that United Way of Mumbai supports,
offering classes to slum children

I knew nothing about this organization, though United Way as a non-profit movement is huge in North America and some other countries. Still, I’d never heard of them before interviewing with them. It was only after I began understanding the work that the Mumbai chapter of United Way performed in the non-profit sector in India, did I realize just how lucky I was to get into this particular organization – both in terms of the work the United Way did all over the world and how this opportunity supported my own career plan! My salary took a huge hit as did all my old perks. From a posh office in the business district, I moved into a small office tucked away in an old industrial neighborhood. I have never regretted the decision.

The two years to my turning 50 were life changing. I had a bonus two years' lead time to plan and work towards doing just what I had planned to do when turning 50. Now no two days were the same. At my new workplace, I found myself working with a bunch of well-trained social workers and, believe me, if you want to look and feel young, spend your time with young social workers. Friends I met after a long while mentioned how I did not look a year over 30, and I would mentally thank my new assignment and my colleagues for this. My office staff was in the social sector by choice, and their aspirations from life were so different from the more career-oriented young professionals I worked with in the corporate sector. Community impact, resource mobilization, campaigns supporting the girl child, fund raising for the cancer afflicted, microfinance programs for women’s self-help groups, how to stem farmer migration to cities due to failed crops – my world changed overnight and took on new meaning. 

With my young team of social workers

I was free from worries about the next promotion increment, performance parameters, and business targets, and at home, I was content my daughter was now a responsible adult, independent, and doing well. Now 50, I felt totally liberated and decided I wanted to throw a big party to celebrate my birthday – for me, a personal celebration of the more confident, focused, and happier me. After I lost my mother to cancer in 2005, I had run in the Mumbai Marathon – in the easy 6-km run – to raise funds for victims like her. It was cathartic. My interaction with other non-profits brought me closer to the challenges organizations face for funds, and I began participating in the marathon again, now with renewed vigor, and raised so much more. Participating in the Bangalore and Delhi Marathons were just logical next steps.

At the start of the
Bangalore Marathon 2011

My association with the voluntary groups I’d worked for before I joined United Way continued. For over a decade, I have been involved with a community trust that organizes a hugely popular community festival, the “Celebrate Bandra Festival,” where an entire community comes together to celebrate the uniqueness of its suburb, its multicultural population, its status as an education hub and the restaurant capital of Mumbai, and so much more. This festival is the only one of its kind in Mumbai that showcases the best a community can offer. In a unique model, the proceeds from the festival contribute towards funding projects that ensure a better quality of life for residents – solving water shortages through rainwater-harvesting plants, powering solar water heaters, and donating school buses for orphanages. After moving into the social sector professionally, my life seems to have come full circle.

With college-student volunteers

Is destiny my companion, or is all this just a coincidence? I was running the marathons even before moving to the non-profit organization, but I did not know when I joined my new job that United Way of Mumbai had, just a few weeks before, been signed on as the official charity partner of the Mumbai Marathon. Now I was heading an organization that was mandated to create and implement a strategy to get as many non-profits, working on just about any cause – education, disability, tribal welfare, sports promotion, mental health awareness – to register with the marathon’s charity partner and use the marathon as a platform to raise funds. There I was until just a few years before raising funds for cancer-afflicted patients, and here I am now, spearheading efforts to facilitate fundraising for a humongous number of causes. In fact, I was now responsible for heading the largest philanthropic exchange in the country. I knew for sure I had an angel above looking after me!

With my family at an awareness walk on the occasion of
World Disability Day earlier this month

Life could not be better. My energy levels have increased, my family life has improved, and my circle of friends greatly diversified. I look better and am at peace with myself. I am in my 50s, and I thank god for it. I was fortunate enough to have been able to change tracks at a stage in life when one doesn’t really want to risk rocking a “steady boat.” Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained! 

So I look forward to 2012 with anticipation and continue to set goals for myself as I do before every New Year. This time, it is learning how to swim and joining a piano class. Is there anything special about what I am doing? Hardly so. It is just a question of following your calling – the calling of your heart and mind!

What about you? What are you going to make happen in the coming year?