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Yalda vs. Valentine
By Ali Mafi
ali@tehranavenue.com
January 2002
به فارسی بخوانيم
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A young and pensive Ali Mafi was walking the Avenues of Tehran on the first of the month of Dey. This was the longest night of the year. Ali was looking for keys to the secret of this night. He had been told about the set of customs and mores surrounding Shab'e Yalda. He knew that grandmothers used to recount stories on this night, that fathers bought Sweets & Nuts for the occasion, and that mothers sliced out-of-season watermelons. The family would gather around the now-rare korsi to survive the onslaught of darkness and cold.

 

No signs were to be found. Lovers were holding hands as they walked the streets, but few were buying Sweets & Nuts, fewer still were talking about the night. Ali was suddenly taken to the year past, when before  February 14 all his friends took note of the coming Feast of Saint Valentine. Cards circulated heavily from hand to hand, everyone knew about the customs of Valentine Day.

 

Yalda, he thought, had been left in the cold. No more will it spread its long, dark, cascading hair over the shoulders of the day.

 

Ali made it his business to search for Yalda, to find out where she has gone. But for that, he needed to search for Saint Valentine as well.



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