Persian Style

Before I re-cap Sunday's episode of "Shah's of Sunset," I have to take a moment and ruminate on one of Asa's recent interview outfits:

What's up with the turban, girl? And that awful thing around your neck? If you're trying to tap your inner Persian--please!--for the love of all things good, veil yourself. This heinous outfit makes Asa look like she's peddling $5 fortune readings. To those who know nothing about traditional Persian dress: Please ignore this. Also, we do not have flying carpets. 

But at least Asa stuck with her original schnoz. We can't say as much about GG, the resident Mean Girl. It's clear from her "before" and "after" pics, that she underwent the routine Persian Nose Job (pretty much standard for all Persian chicks--no, I never got one).

GG: Before

Sweet girl with peach fuzz.

So she's a little busted, but aren't we all?

GG: After


The Wrath of "GG" and her modified nose, post-laser-hair-removal.

Bad Muslim

I didn't get a chance to watch Shah's of Sunset last night... but never fear! It's queued up to watch tonight and I will be back here tomorrow to let you know what I think.

What was I doing instead of watching my beloved trashy TV shows? I WAS EATING MATZAH LIKE THE BAD MUSLIM THAT I AM. Yes, that's right, I attended my first Passover. My Jewish boyfriend's parents invited me to join them. It was actually really nice. We had dinner with his family Friday night, and then an even bigger meal on Passover Saturday, and then we had a brunch on Sunday. Needless to say, my digestive tract will never be the same because--unbeknownst to me--matzah causes severe constipation. Forget about the 40 years of hunger it took for the Jews to escape Egypt, I'm thinking of 40 years of constipation. Those poor Jews! That is some serious remembrance I can get behind.

It was the numerous courses of food that did me in though. I kept thinking dinner was over, but then another course would come out. I haven't been in the dark about a tradition since the first bewildering time I was invited to a friend's house for dinner and they said grace. First, candles were lit, Hebrew words were said (that I remembered from my old best friend's batmitzvah!), then there was some stuff about goading M's 4-year old niece to hide a piece of matzah. We sat around and broke pieces of matzah and buttered them and ate them with chopped liver. Then there was salad. Then there was matzah ball soup. I thought dinner was done at this point, but I was informed that now dinner was only about to be served. There was brisket, chicken, and twice-cooked potatoes. Afterwards, we sat around and ate jelly rings and other kosher desserts. But, by far, my favorite part was when M's mom busted out a bowl of chopped bacon for our salad. Yes, they're my kind of Jews.

Saturday seder was the same meal but bigger and with more family members and nicer cutlery, and we actually went around the table and read the story of Passover from little booklets. Instead of dipping our finger in cups of wine after reading about each plague, we dipped our finger in diet coke (see what I mean? my kind of Jews!). On Sunday, brunch was matzoh "brie" (not the cheese), which was like french toast with matzah instead. It was all delicious.

Passover reminds me a lot of Ramadan. The meaning behind Passover is really very beautiful--it's about remembering that slavery and persecution should never be tolerated in any form for anybody. The Abrahamic religions are all really so similar in their core beliefs. It's a shame that politics have sullied the central messages and pitted us against each other. Really, the way my mom sneaks bacon into our meals and M's mom sneaks bacon into theirs should bond us together. Or maybe that just makes us bad Muslims and Jews. Haram! Every Persian Muslim should fall for a Jew. The pre-nups would be out of this world!

Telling time

The other day, my dad told me that if I end up marrying a Jew, I'll probably never be allowed into Iran again. I laughed it off. After all, the Islamic Republic has pretty much taken away my Iranian passport with no news of giving it back to me anyway--it's been almost a year since I applied!! What do I DO in this situation?!?!?! All I want is to go back to Iran one last freaking time!!!

In the meantime, I have "Shah's of Sunset" to entertain me... They wheel & deal as real estate agents! They get colonics! Their Persian parents have dinner with them! They get mad at each other for showing up late to their parties! The men are male sluts until they decide to "settle down" with nice Persian chicks. They have champagne-drinking parties! They think they're pop stars! Check this out:

MJ is wearing a watch made by The Persian Jeweler I dated a while back!! LOL! So, here's a fun fact: I recently tried SELLING the diamond watch The Jeweler gifted me. I posted on ebay for seven days for less than half of what it was worth and... not even a single bid. #FAIL Apparently, nobody wants a ten-pound watch with a map of the world emblazoned in diamonds on its face. I wonder why?

Looks like I may have this gaudy unwearable diamond watch for eternity. That's how you know that only a Persian could have designed it. 

"Shah's of Sunset's" MJ is a HOT MESS (a.k.a. We Love Her)

Did you honestly think I had forgotten to update you on "Shah's of Sunset"?! We're only two episodes in but, so far, my favorite character is MJ--officially the Hot Mess of this gem of a reality TV show.

Happy Persian New Year

"Noruz" happened at 1:11a.m. (EST) this morning, according to the lunar calendar. I'm staying at my boyfriend's place this week while he's in London, and he lives near the U.N., so I was not surprised when my alarm woke me up for the New Year and I heard Persians out in the street screaming "Happy New Year!" Only in New York (and only near the U.N.)!

The Christmas tree equivalent for Noruz is called the "haftsin," which is an arrangement of several symbolic items. For my incomplete haftsin, I had gotten a purple hyacinth, two red apples, and a small plot of wheatgrass obtained from a the Union Square farmer's market (I had a hell of a time trying to find wheatgrass last year). I carted all this crap uptown to my boyfriend's loft in a paper Anthropologie bag. The doormen gave me weird looks. I then arranged this sorry state of affairs on the granite bar counter (between a few bottles of liquor--whoops) so that when I woke up in the middle of the night to "celebrate" all by myself in my underwear and glasses, I'd be sitting at the traditional haftsin. The hyacinth and wheatgrass had wilted. I perched on the bar stool and diligently began dialing each of my family members to wish them a happy new year. I was done by 1:20a.m. and promptly passed out. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Asa from Shah's of Sunset

Not talented.

Not cute.

Not cool.

NOT M.I.A.

Shahs of Sunset Premieres

Since "Shah's of Sunset" (the new Ryan Seacrest-produced reality TV show about Persians in L.A.) aired, friends keep pinging me to ask what I think of the first episode.

I'll say the same thing I said about it back when I first heard this show was happening: While the show features the worst of the worst, I still like that it depicts Persians in America. I think people in the U.S. generally have very little understanding that there are Persian-Americans right here, next door, and that we are not all fundamentalists. I hope the show sparks dialogue.

The first episode surprised me. I knew a little bit about what to expect because I know the Persian community, but I had no idea they would be featuring a group of mixed Muslim and Jewish Persians. It's super interesting because I know not a lot of people know that there are a great deal of Persian Jews (the mayor of Beverly Hills is a Persian Jew, as are some crazy percentage of Beverly Hills, CA and Great Neck, NY residents). I just think that if your common moron who watches Fox News knew even this much (that not all Persians are Muslim), it would add that extra layer of complexity to their understanding of what they see on the news. That being said, while I think it's engrossing to watch Persian Jews say "Shabbat Shalom" in Farsi accents, I have never in my life seen Persian Jews and Muslims hang out in a tight clique like that. Maybe this is something common to L.A. specifically, but I've not seen this anywhere else. There was one scene in this episode where they're all having dinner and talking about how a Persian Jew and a Persian Muslim would never get married, and that is very much the idea that I grew up with, but otherwise, the show is really trying hard (maybe too hard) to show how "modern Persians" are different: Already, we see the inkling of a budding romance between the most generically attractive guy (Jewish) and most generically attractive girl (Muslim).