Learn Persian with Chai and Conversation11 Mai 2022

Interview | Growing Up Irooni- Caspian Chef discusses returning to his Iranian roots after decades of assimilation

In this Growing Up Irooni we talk to Omid Roustaei, better known as the Caspian Chef. In this conversation, we discuss the process of coming to the United States on his own and figuring out his own path for assimilating into American culture as a means of survival. Omid has has a very rich and varied path, first studying biotech engineering, and then becoming a personal chef and yoga teacher, to pursuing a career in psychotherapy, to returning to cooking and his Iranian roots only in the past few years.This was one of the most fascinating conversations I've had- and we really go into some territory that I think will resonate with so many of us- life is certainly not linear, and we can see that in Omid's story. We talk about career and pursuing your dreams- he first went down the ‘traditional Iranian path' of becoming a biotech engineer and worked in that field for a while, before pivoting to the perhaps more American notion of pursuing his passion- cooking and psychotherapy. We also talked about the process of assimilation as a coping mechanism- what it means to arrive in a country and need to fit in. And finally, what led Omid back to the path of rediscovering his Iranian roots- from cooking Persian food, to becoming reacquainted with the Persian language, and to ultimately seek out and become part of the Iranian diaspora community again.I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did!

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Episoder(223)

Interview | Raising Neem-Roonis- An Interview with Shabnam Rezaei

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Interview | Growing Up Neem-Rooni- An Interview with Adib Khorram

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19 Mai 202021min

Interview | Raising Neem-Roonis- An Interview with Maz Jobrani

In this Raising Neem-Roonis interview, we talk to the most well known Iranian-American comedian, Maz Jobrani. Maz is the father of two half Iranian, half Indian children, ages 9 and 11. He gives advic...

5 Mai 202022min

Speak Lesson 65 | Food (Vocabulary Sprint)

In this vocabulary sprint lesson, Leyla and her husband Chris go over Persian/ Farsi vocabulary associated with food. Food is an important topic of conversation in Persian culture, as Iranians have a ...

1 Mai 202020min

Interview | Raising Neem-Roonis- An Interview with Arash Karami

In this second Raising Neem-Roonis interview, we talk to Arash Karami, contributor to Al-Monitor and commentator on Iranian politics. We talk about the challenges of passing on the Persian language an...

28 Apr 202024min

Interview | Raising Neem-Roonis- An Interview with Naz Deravian

Raising Neem-Roonis is our podcast series about the joys and challenges of raising half Iranian children, specifically when it comes to passing along language and culture. Our first interview the seri...

7 Apr 202032min

Speak Lesson 64 | Transportation (Vocabulary Sprint)

In this Persian/ Farsi lesson, Leyla and her husband Chris go over different vocabulary associated with the topic of transportation, which we are referring to as 'coming and going'- raft ō āmad. We di...

1 Apr 202015min

Speak Lesson 63 | Time and Date (Vocabulary Sprint)

In this Persian (Farsi) lesson, we go over common vocabulary words for the time and date. This includes the words for the seasons, and the words for the days of the week. The days of the week in Persi...

1 Mar 202012min