The last few months have been crammed with festivals. I have been trying to keep track and participate in as many as I can. And then, when two major festivals fall on the same day, that I start to realize how interconnected calendars in this part of the world are.

The 15th of March was both Ugadi, the Telugu and Kannada New Year and Charshambet Soori, "the last Wednesday of the year in the Persian calendar". Both these festivals fall near the Vernal Equinox, that completely symmetrical day in Spring, that I have never noticed, maybe because it is perfectly black and white?

In the morning, I drank "Pachhadi" (pictured above) with my Telugu friends, a drink that helps one predict how the following year will be. Every one in the group predicted: 'tangy'. We sat around talking as the IPL played in the background. The thing that felt most like New Years, was actually playing with my friend's sister's new baby (yet to be named). It seemed kind of exciting for this new kid to be born at the start of Spring. Maybe he has something ahead of all of us September-October babies.

Then, in the evening, I went to a friend's house to make a fire in the abandoned lot out behind their apartment. Anarchic, no? Though political scientist claim Russians were the some of the first anarchists, maybe it was actually Zoroastrians. Chaharshanba Soori is an ancient Zoroastrian festival which is debated, among my friends, to be anywhere from 3,000 to 15,000 years old. Wikipedia claims 3,000, but only cites BusinessWeek and the UN. My friends cite their pride.

Anyway, on Chaharshanba Soori every one is supposed to jump over a fire, giving the fire the paleness and weakness acquired over the last year and soaking up some of the fire's health. We did small fire hopping at home, and then went to EFLU where a host of Iranis, Tajiks, Afghans, Uzbeks, Kazakh, Kyrgyz and Kurds danced and skirted around a much more official fire.

So with the coming of Spring inscribed in my head, I wonder, why doesn't the US celebrate the coming of Spring? Why don't we notice the day when both halves, night and day, are just that halves? I don't have an answer. Neither does Google, just some sites about horse-racing (go figure) and picture of barbecues and block parties. I was hoping for something more incendiary.