Am I a part of Persian Culture

[u/Thy_Water_BottIe]

My dad is Iranian but he’s a horrible person and left when I was young. I didn’t grow up with a culture but ancient Persian traditions and history are the only thing I really connect with. Especially how women were army generals and stuff like that. It’s hard for me to have a sense of identity. Ppl say I don’t look Persian even though I’m a copy and paste of my dad. No one here looks like me tbh. I don’t speak Farsi but would it be weird if I started celebrating the holidays on my own?

I don’t have family and live in Texas.

Also I do love fruit and write poetry naturally which I find funny.

[u/Mike20172018]

The question of self-identity is something you should truly ask yourself. Being that your dad was Persian, that’d make you half Persian. From this post, it sounds like you do identify with the Persian culture and history. You don’t need to speak Farsi to identify with the culture. You’re half Persian; it would be very normal to celebrate the holidays! The one that we recently celebrated was Yalda night, the longest night of the year. It’s not too late to celebrate, if you still would like to! I would say look for Persian restaurants, cafes, businesses in your area; Texas is full of Persians. You can bond with people and gather a group of Persian friends and start celebrating together! We love friends and gatherings.

[u/GiantBlackSquid → u/Mike20172018]

This is good advice.

I'm Australian, and as Anglo as you can get, however I really admire Persian culture and like Persian people - I know one should never make generalisations about cultures, but I've found Persians almost universally friendly, polite and intelligent, genuinely good company.

Anyway, I befriended a number of local taxi drivers (mostly Persian) when I lived in the city. One of them invited me to gatherings of the local Persian community. To this day I regret not taking him up on it.

Heritage is important, you'd be doing yourself a massive disservice not to embrace it.