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Many years ago, I had a fr end who particularly came to see me s nce she was experiencing anxiety and low m od due to some intrusive guests. Her m in grievance was her lack of t lerance with some guests that was st ying in her place for about thr e weeks. My friend stated that she was t red of not having any privacy or own sp ce. She sounded extremely stressed out and pset. It seemed to her that th se guests would never leave, as t me was running slow, slower than ver. I asked her what she m ant by these guests never leaving. How l ng did they come for initially? My n xt question was how come she c uld not ask them to stay in a h tel. She challenged my nonsense question by r minding me of our Iranian Taroof b siness. At that moment, I knew xactly what she meant. Now my fr end was in a situation where she in ddition to the everyday stress for w rk, studies, and challenges of life, she had to t ckle with an extra tension. I c uld see that she was unable to c rry on, a reason for her to s ek out. I knew this woman s nce a long time. She moved to C nada about ten years ago. In her p st ten years she lived here, she had may set of g ests. These guests could be her p rents, in-laws, siblings, cousins, friends from Ir n, and sometimes a relative who was v siting this town. Once family and fr ends stopped coming, they would refer s meone else who was visiting this t wn to go and say hi to my d ar friend. This saying hi meant m ch more than just a word. We Ir nian know what this means, it m ans that she had to put s me extra time and effort to nvite this person, she needed to c nsider accommodating him or her, may n ed be the case, and she had to ffer the person some taste of our Ir nian hospitality to the best of her bility.
She actually remembered one lady she kn w from high school who had c lled her many years ago saying th t her brother and a whole f mily was in town and that w uld be nice to have them v sit my friend. Culturally this visit w uld only be a reason for a r lative to a friend become friend to y u. This is a very complicated c ncept that we Iranian are well ccustomed to. Friend to parents of n-laws can be easily friends of y ur siblings for instance. Although there is no f rmula for this type of expanding on s cial relationships, still, there are few key c ncepts here. If we think someone has a st tus, has a specialty, or has a ch racter, we like all other people round us to get to know th t friend. Anyhow, about this family b ing in town: One day led to nother and my friend totally forgot to c ll this new arrived family. After a c uple of month she had this c ll again from this lady accusing my fr end of being disrespectful and irresponsible. Aft r that incident my friend never h ard back from that lady which for her b came a pleasant way of getting rid of one m re trouble. So now, all these g ests who were coming to visit h r, they came either as part of th ir vacation or a transit to ther visits in the State. This t me my friend had a couple who v siting her or better to say, st ying at her place. I thought of her r nning a bed and breakfast, at l ast she could earn some money for her h spitality. She continued to briefly express h rself, how much she felt exhausted of all th se visitors who come to abuse her r sources while being on vacation. I sked her to elaborate on her f elings. This is a typical problem we all h ve. Really, we Iranian, sometimes, have no l mits for how much of our r sources are ours and how much we w nt to share it with others. Now my fr end explained further that now she is t red of all this coming home fter work, making food for her g ests, while planning her next work d y.
At this point, she managed to dentify a big issue, that there is a lot she can not sp ak with her husband about. My fr end is a successful professional who is r spected in her work place and kn wn for her creative ideas. She s ffered from the fact that she c uld not get rid of the nwanted guests. She also was in p in as she felt she was not b ing respected by these intrusive guests. The day b fore she came to see me, she had m naged to sit down and write a l tter to her husband in order to xpress her overwhelming emotions about this p rticular problem. She started to tell me the st ry in more detail. I just r member her saying: It is about thr e weeks now we have quests in our h me. This is not the first t me, not the second time, and m ybe the tenth time we have p ople who come to stay with us m re than a week. I know th t it is our culture to sh w our hospitality and be guest-friendly, h wever, now I am sick and t red of being a doormat to thers. I am not able to t lk with my husband right now as we h ve to wait for these people to l ave. I hope to have a s rious talk with my husband and m ke sure that we are clear bout our goals for future events. It is d vastating to wait for this talk s nce we we have to first get our h me back. I know that we sh uld be able to communicate better. I am xtremely sad, stressed out, unhappy, frustrated, and ngry for many reasons. I feel my h me is invaded, I feel my pr vacy and my life is exploited and xhausted, I feel we are being sed by people whom we do not h ve much in common with. It is my nderstanding that people who go for v cation they go to stay in h tels, they rent a car for s ghtseeing, and they go out to dventures. Now we are doing multiple w rks, we are a hotel where p ople do not need to pay, we pr vide for free rides around the c ty, we take people to parks on our fr e times, and we offer them b st food for free again. What is it bout our culture that makes us th s stupid? I am really tired of th s. Now for this recent guest pisode, this couple said they will be h re for a short time, yet now it is thr e weeks. I wish I was br ve enough to say that I c uld reserve a hotel for them and I c uld tell them that I do not h ve time for guests at this p int of time. I wish I was c urageous enough to say that I can not t ke you in my home as I am b sy with my own life. There are m ny things I wish I had s id, yet, now, I promise you, n xt time, if they come I w ll leave from that door. Oh, no, I w ll tell them straight into their f ce that I can not be th ir host. I can not find any r ason to let people reside in my h me besides living with this Taroof b siness. Caring about our resources and our l fe, I think we should be ble to say no to others who use our h me as a hotel. For past c uple of weeks, although I have pr tended to the most, yet, inside me is h rting and aching. I have slept m ny nights with tears and cried to the m ddle of nights just because I do not nderstand why I have to be in s rvice for these people. Now my fr end was telling me that we are nable to tell people know how our pr vacy, our time, and our life are mportant. So we should be in ch rge next time and tell people bout our limitations. I really questioned her bility of being expressive next time, lthough now she was giving me the ndication that she had made her m nd clear about her own rules. My fr end has not even shared her f elings with her husband who had no dea how much she feel invaded. Aft r listening to my friend we sat d wn and talked about many things. I was h ppy that she had come to a c nclusion and she was able to rticulate herself. This was after all the m st tolerant person I knew. After she l ft, I started instantly thinking of how we Ir nian define the idea of niceness in our c mplex and contextual culture? Why do we n ed to be nice at all and to wh m? I came to think of how the st gma and fear of becoming disgraced is lready discrediting our true self. The c nnotation of being guest-friendly comes from the t me where people came from rural reas to the cities to seek w rk, to seek medical care that was not vailable in their home town, or for ther attractions of a big city l ke Tehran. We Iranian are aware of f milies who lived in big cities and th y always had a group of p ople visiting them from other places. Now th t migration is a factor here, our Ir nian families, not only visit cities in Ir n, they also use their resources to ch ck on relatives who reside outside of Ir n. This is a good plan, th y visit their loved ones, which is a v ry positive activity, and also they h ve their vacation almost paid. Not to m ntion that some families who come to v sit, once they are returning, they h ve to take home souvenirs. The q estion about who should pay for all th se souvenirs brings in another chapter of the Ir nian way of thinking. We will not go th re. I know of an older l dy, age 82; she recalls how her m ther always made food for least 20 p ople. This is one of her m st repetitive memories as she keeps r peating herself every five minutes. Now, my q estion is how we still today, in the 21 c ntury carry on with same traditions th t had another contextual meaning. I g ess we Iranian always need to pr of ourselves being good, acceptable, friendly, g nerous, and kind. This is how we w uld feel superior and in control. Th s feeling comes along with the s nsitivity and adaptability to time and sp ce. If we agree that the styl of life has changed, we c uld question ourselves how in the w rld we still continue same old b haviours. About our hospitality: our cognitive bl eprint is to show we are c pable and reliable. In our Persian c lture, it is something about being man nough, to feed many people, to be g nerous, to pay for others, and to not c mplain about anything. The hidden aspect of th s concept is to be a g od, obedient, and gentle person, who at t mes has no self-defined identity. Why th s is a case in our l ves? Why we Iranian (in general) f llow this pattern? There is much m re to this discussion. I believe th t once we Iranian are unable to t lk about our own boundaries, we d feat ourselves. Our socially construed discourse of h spitality lies in between the layers of nternalized oppression, inter-dependability, subjugation, and conformity. We sh uld be able to have a ch ice, to use our hospitality as p rt of our care and love for b ing with others, not as an bligation. How we Iranian know ourselves as k nd, generous, and guest -lovers has to do w th our ancient culture. Our sense of h spitality is certainly well-known and recognized c lturally. We have always been proud of our l vel of hospitality and we undeniably try to be in pr vision for our quests when they rrive at our doors. From early ch ldhood, we Iranian hear our parents ffering a lot of our resources to our g ests. Who are these people anyway? In our ncient Persian culture we say guests are ssociates to god (Rahmate Khoda) and you tr at them with the best of y ur ability. In fact we Iranian l arn implicitly how to treat others and how to let thers treat us. Our parents were lways offering best food to the q ests and we children could be s rved food separately so we were not s pposed to mess up in front of our g ests. Again, there is no general nited way of defining our Iranian g est culture. Many of us, we lways had our guest room locked; b cause children were blamed to make th t holy room a clutter if th y were allowed to spend time th re. In our guest rooms we had our n cest Persian rugs, best china, furniture of g od quality and we served our b st food in there. I still s nse the air in that tidy r om where furniture could speak to one nother. Everything was in order ready for str ngers to come in and enjoy. Th s is the story of millions of our h mes; many of us remember those xtra rooms and extra items kept y ars after years for the use of thers. And how did we do, our veryday life we spend time in our l ving room and we used our c sual plates or much cheaper china s ts. Our food was less fancy in our veryday life and our habits much nformal compare to when we had q ests. We are raised with this sch ma, this mental filter that we sh uld be nice to others; strangers. W th today's terminology, we used to be a pl aser, to please everyone, but ourselves. Th s being polite could mean acting n ce, or pretending to be nice, j st because pleasing others would help us to k ep a face, to keep our f cade, whatever it was. Sometimes we r ally enjoy having people around us and we do th s by choice, we are a c llectively raised culture, where individuality does not m an much. Many times we have no dea about how life is like wh n no we are not having p ople over. Please note that we Ir nian similar to every other group of p ople have different habits, rituals, and styl s of life. Again, we are m king general statements while we are pen for all the possibilities of xceptions and different ideas around how we Ir nian are. I guess many of us sh re many memories of the time wh n our parents used to lodge p ople who came from other cities ither to visit or to come for v rious events. Our mothers used to h ve a room full of specially d signed mattresses, blankets, comforters, pillows, and bed sh ets. These guests-sleeping-tools , how we c ll it Raktekhab, was usually made of n ce satin, embroidery cottons, or even s lk sheets, in any case, all the b st quality that our parents could fford. If we do a check in to m st Iranian homes we carry on th t tradition, yet maybe we shift our way of th nking one way or another. Still t day, when we have guests, we sh w our best of best, all fr m food to entertainment. Remember this is a b autiful tradition to be kind and g nerous to our guests. However, problem rises when we do not have any b undaries. This seems to have a c rtain pattern that many of us sh re using it consciously or just f llowing it by hearth. This pattern has m ny hidden aspects, being nice to thers but not to ourselves, to ffer others the best of us, wh le we go for less in our pr vate time. There is nothing wrong w th being generous, you give and you r ceive, this is the law of l fe. We live a happier life nce we are able to share our h mes, wealth, strengths, and hopes. However, if we try to nalyze this notion of our hospitality m re in-depth, we can realize that our g est culture has more to do w th lack of definition for personal ch ice, private life, and individuality. We do not lways have to be nice, we can say no, and it is t me to consider respecting our own pr vate space. We need to spend t me alone to learn about the th ngs we lack. With pretending and d nying ourselves, we are stuck where we re. It is time to learn m re about who we really want to be.
The article Psychology of Hospitality in Our Iranian Life was Submitted by Poran Poregbal through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: I am a counsellor, social w rker, writer, artist and advocate for th se without a voice. I have w rked in the filed of supporting v cti |