Novruz in Bərdə

Probably the most exciting thing in Febr/March has been Novruz. Novruz here is considered the start of the New Year. It signifies the beginning of spring, and thus the beginning of new life. Four weeks prior to Novruz, on each Tuesday, bonfires are built, each one for one of the
different elements. Every person is to jump over it three times, uttering:
With every jump, you drop your worries and sadness.

So after 4 weeks of jumping, you are without a worry in the world. And to make this state complete, the morning following the earth jump (the last jump), you gather fresh water, sprinkle it over people, pets, cars and the house, and you also jump over it. This time, you announce your coming to the New Year, welcoming yourself to it. All too welcome, this cleansing. And it is fun to walk around the city with bonfires everywhere, seeing people jumping fires, feeling the excitement, and getting to jump too! In addition, Novruz equals holidays, thus the start of a week of traveling.

Karabaģ people celebrate Novruz on the last fire jump, while people from Baki celebrate the day of Novruz (21-22 March) itself. So we went to Bərdə to celebrate the last fire jump. Bərdə is a cities which has (proportially) one of the largest IDP communities in Azerbaijan. Our hosts are one such family: Murad is one of my students living down in Baku. His family invited us to join the festivities. They are liing in what was once a school, and have two classrooms to their disposition. The space is nice, if you are a student on anti- squad housing, but …. no running water, no toilet, and quite damp. The family quite ingeniously made little water reservoirs with taps. They also build a shed for the car, and have a key to a toilet together with some other people. There is also a keyless toilet, with separate rooms for men and women, but it is not a happy place. Not that it has shit on the walls, but the reservoir is simply full and overflowing. This sais something for a whole in the ground- what we call Soviet (French) style toilets. In neither toilet taps nor water, so you go with your little bucket… Somehow 20 years of living like that has not been enough to build some decent sanitation. But this does not stop people decorating their trucks. The one on the picture has written on it: Don't forget Qarabagh, and Agdam citizen.

Our reception was incredible. Novruz is the feast of cakes, cookies and baklava, but also a good reason for great pilaf (rice dish), shashliq, … just too much food. Men are to sit, women to serve… and if a man helps, this is laughed at.






The Bərdə tour: once a city of great historical importance, but little to show for it due to floods and earthquakes. There are the ruins of what was once a stone bridge, Nűşabә Qalası Mausoleum (1322-unfortunately not open that day), the tomb of Imam Zadə/ Bəhman Mirzə Qacar, and another brick mosque in which we unbelievers were not welcome (cűmə mosque). Other than that, the usual war memorials and some nice houses, colorfull bazar, and nice surroundings (forests, ruins) but it was too rainy and muddy to venture out. Novrus signs, and the building of big fires were the other highlights.



So after the tour and tea in the tea house, we head back 'home' to build the fire, to do the fire jump, and to meet the extended family. The next day we travelled back home again.