Fifty Words For Snow

Ep. 11 Farsi Finds: Taarof and Khaste Nabashid

Maggie and Emily learn the Farsi words taarof and khaste nabashid with native speaker Navid Naderi Alizadeh and put the term “happy birthday” on trial. Poem by Emily: Taarof.

A linguistic expedition into brave new words. Maggie Rowe and Emily John Garcés hunt for words that lack an English equivalent. They like to think of themselves as Dora the Explorers of language, with their rucksacks and hats and notebooks and magnifying glasses, embarking on a cultural adventure, hunting and gathering useful new word specimens from far flung continents, and holding them up to see what new light they shine on old ideas.