Teacher's Day

Just like every year, last Sunday 2 May was the anniversary of Morteza Motahari’s martyrdom. He was one of the intellectual architects of the Islamic Revolution, if not the main one, and his memory is celebrated every year by celebrating every teacher across the country.
The whole week that contains the anniversary is designated as “Teacher’s Week”. In schools, universities, adult education classes, everywhere where people teach and learn, students organise celebrations and buy their teachers presents and flowers. In my Quran class, one of the students collected money from all the students and bought our teacher a golden coin on behalf of the class and a box of pastry, which we al shared around the class after the lesson.
In my daughter’s school, where I am the deputy of the PTA (Parents’ – Teachers’ Association), a celebration was organised last Thursday. At one o’clock students and teachers were assembled in the hall, where the headteacher spoke briefly on the status of the teacher. She said that according to a prophetic tradition (hadith), whenever a person teaches, everything alive in the world prays for him/her. Then she handed out honorary certificates to every teacher to the cheers and applause of the students.
At quarter to two, the students had a picnic lunch in the school yard and were then dismissed. In the meantime, the school’s caretakers were preparing lunch for the teachers and the members of the PTA. Lunch was laid out in the school library in true Iranian style: chicken in ground walnut and pomegranate paste sauce (fesenjan), chicken with fried aubergines in red sauce, fragrant Iranian rice decorated with saffron, green salad, Mexican salad, drinking yogurt, and tea and Danish pastries afterwards.
When lunch was cleared out, the teachers offered a collective present to the headteacher (a gold coin), the school’s founder presented her with a white gold bracelet, the PTA gave her a complete set of non-stick cookware. She also got a complete commentary of the Holy Quran. Then, in her turn, she gave a non-stick cooking pot to every teacher and member of staff, saying that although the custom is to give personal items as presents, because she believes in strong family relations, she chose to buy them something they can use to cook for their family. She also wished that those teachers who are still single be married by the time of the next teachers’ celebration.
All this exchange of presents was accompanied by lots of jokes and compliments and asides. Although I only knew a couple of those present, I felt quite at home in the school’s friendly atmosphere; it reminded me of my teaching days in Southall, Middlesex back in the nineties. They felt so far away.