4 ms·

Tajikistan is a very different vibe to Iran, though. There's not much cosmopolitan about Dushambe. Also, if you learn to speak like a Tajik, Iranians will prob

by rvense 6y ago

Tajikistan is a very different vibe to Iran, though. There's not much cosmopolitan about Dushambe. Also, if you learn to speak like a Tajik, Iranians will probably think you're dim, or at least sound like it. But yeah, I remember eating out alone in one of my first nights in Iran, so already marked as a weirdo, of course, and the waiter says "Qabel nadare!" when I ask for the bill, and I'm very confused, and I get out my dictionary because I don't know the word, and he just starts repeating the phrase louder and louder at me like they joke about the English doing when someone doesn't speak English... it just wasn't a good time for anyone. I did pay, though.

eganist 6y ago
> Iranians will probably think you're dim, or at least sound like it. But we won't tell it to your face. We'll be quite nice to you up front (taarof) and then will backbite like nobody's business. If you want to learn Farsi (or Tajik), please, go to Tajikistan. For your own good, learn it there instead. Or Kabul, for that matter.
- rvense 6y ago
  Actually, after my month of language lessons in Dushambe I came back to university, and we were a group who had a meeting with the Iranian ambassador here. There was a round of introductions and I said that I had just spent a month in Tajikistan, and the ambassador looked at me and said that it sounded like I had started speaking like those people and I should stop it. In a friendly, "for your own good" sort of tone.
  - eganist 6y ago
    > There was a round of introductions and I said that I had just spent a month in Tajikistan, and the ambassador looked at me and said that it sounded like I had started speaking like those people and I should stop it. In a friendly, "for your own good" sort of tone. And now you've run into another one of our culture's more disgusting trends - bigotry. I'm sorry you had to experience it, and I'm sorry for our people consistently dumping on Tajik and Afghan peoples. I'm embarrassed you had to witness that kind of casual bigotry; there's nothing invalid about any group of people for any reason, including dialect. Second and third generation westernized Persians will do a much better job of accepting you for your effort at learning the language without taking pot shots at how you learned it or from whom you learned it. --- -2 points, yikes. Never change, HN.
    - rvense 6y ago
      I actually thought it was hilarious. Once in a blue moon I get to speak a few sentences of Persian, and I try to overemphasize the Tajik traits, just because. The young Afghan guy I met in Shiraz who was honest with me but told everyone else he was from Mashhad and constantly lived in fear of being found out and fired and dumped by all his friends, that was a lot less funny.
Mediterraneo10 6y ago
> Tajikistan is a very different vibe to Iran, though. There's not much cosmopolitan about Dushambe. I actually like Khujand more, it is definitely more multiethnic than Dushanbe. > Also, if you learn to speak like a Tajik, Iranians will probably think you're dim, or at least sound like it. It depends on what you are learning Persian for. Quite a lot of Westerners who have studied Persian have done it out of Middle Eastern/Central Asian areal studies needs, or because they wanted to learn to read the wealth of Persian literature. In those cases, going to a Persian-speaking country can be helpful because direct immersion can boost one’s vocabulary learning, but in the long term one doesn't intend to actively speak the language so much, and so it doesn't matter much if one initially learns a variety of Persian that some Iranians find distasteful. Note that even if one learns Persian within Iran, inevitably one would be picking up regionalisms that people from other parts of Iran nitpick – Iranians can be such snobs about dialects and accents from within their own country.

by rvense 6y ago

eganist 6y ago

> Iranians will probably think you're dim, or at least sound like it. But we won't tell it to your face. We'll be quite nice to you up front (taarof) and then will backbite like nobody's business. If you want to learn Farsi (or Tajik), please, go to Tajikistan. For your own good, learn it there instead. Or Kabul, for that matter.

rvense 6y ago
Actually, after my month of language lessons in Dushambe I came back to university, and we were a group who had a meeting with the Iranian ambassador here. There was a round of introductions and I said that I had just spent a month in Tajikistan, and the ambassador looked at me and said that it sounded like I had started speaking like those people and I should stop it. In a friendly, "for your own good" sort of tone.
- eganist 6y ago
  > There was a round of introductions and I said that I had just spent a month in Tajikistan, and the ambassador looked at me and said that it sounded like I had started speaking like those people and I should stop it. In a friendly, "for your own good" sort of tone. And now you've run into another one of our culture's more disgusting trends - bigotry. I'm sorry you had to experience it, and I'm sorry for our people consistently dumping on Tajik and Afghan peoples. I'm embarrassed you had to witness that kind of casual bigotry; there's nothing invalid about any group of people for any reason, including dialect. Second and third generation westernized Persians will do a much better job of accepting you for your effort at learning the language without taking pot shots at how you learned it or from whom you learned it. --- -2 points, yikes. Never change, HN.
  - rvense 6y ago
    I actually thought it was hilarious. Once in a blue moon I get to speak a few sentences of Persian, and I try to overemphasize the Tajik traits, just because. The young Afghan guy I met in Shiraz who was honest with me but told everyone else he was from Mashhad and constantly lived in fear of being found out and fired and dumped by all his friends, that was a lot less funny.

Mediterraneo10 6y ago

> Tajikistan is a very different vibe to Iran, though. There's not much cosmopolitan about Dushambe. I actually like Khujand more, it is definitely more multiethnic than Dushanbe. > Also, if you learn to speak like a Tajik, Iranians will probably think you're dim, or at least sound like it. It depends on what you are learning Persian for. Quite a lot of Westerners who have studied Persian have done it out of Middle Eastern/Central Asian areal studies needs, or because they wanted to learn to read the wealth of Persian literature. In those cases, going to a Persian-speaking country can be helpful because direct immersion can boost one’s vocabulary learning, but in the long term one doesn't intend to actively speak the language so much, and so it doesn't matter much if one initially learns a variety of Persian that some Iranians find distasteful. Note that even if one learns Persian within Iran, inevitably one would be picking up regionalisms that people from other parts of Iran nitpick – Iranians can be such snobs about dialects and accents from within their own country.