The people of Central Asia are celebrating the Persian New Year, Narouz, marked on the vernal equinox each year. The holiday is celebrated from India to China to parts of Europe, among the Turkic, Iranian and Kurdish peoples, along with a few others. Under the Soviet Union, the holiday was officially banned as it was deemed Islamic. Now the regional governments are promoting it, for example, the Kazakh government is extending its celebration from one day to three, though typical celebrations elsewhere last 13 days. There are some lovely clips of Narouz celebrations here and here. Also, BBC has a nice slideshow of celebrations around the world here.
The most interesting development is President Obama’s Narouz message to the Iranian people. It reaches out to the Iranian people by showing that the US respects the Persian New Year and Persian culture and can overcome political differences through mutual respect. I appreciated the tone of the message and see it as a first step in fixing America’s image. I’m an optimist.