Saturday, November 2, 2013

Happy New Year again!

This coming Tuesday (November 5th and Guy Fawkes Day) is a holiday for the Islamic New Year and is just one of three New Year celebrations in this part of the world. Somehow I don't think it very appropriate to have the traditional boozy party on the eve of the Islamic New Year.

The next New Year is the Calendar one for January 1st, but the biggest party of them all is Newroz on March 21st when everyone gets at least three days holiday to celebrate.

Yazidi Temple,  Lalish, Kurdistan
There used to be a fourth New Year holiday for the Yazidis, but the government decided that four was just one New Year too many and dropped that. The Yazidi religion is a curious blend of Zoroastrianism, Islam, Christianity and Mithraism and is mainly confined to the north western corner of Kurdistan.

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