Iran

Rima Shah To mark the arrival of the Persian New Year, students at Glendale Community College on Tuesday danced, ate and admired displays of Persian art and culture. The celebration of "Nowruz" as the Persian New Year is called, was organized by the college's Persian Club. "We had the Persian New Year from ancient times," said Anifa Avakian, president of the Persian Club. "It is a celebration of spring." The first day of spring has been celebrated as the new year by Persians for thousands of years, dating back to pre-Islamic times.

Talk on window restoration The Glendale Historical Society will sponsor a lecture at 7 p.m. Thursday about home window restoration. The event will be geared toward people who are considering replacing windows, especially windows on older homes. Ed Sanchez, one of the owners of Window Restoration and Repair, a window restoration business, will speak about how to preserve windows while maintaining the architectural integrity of the building. The event will be at the First Congregational Church of Glendale, 2001 Cañada Blvd.

Karen S. Kim NORTHEAST GLENDALE -- Glendale College Adult Education is offering a class from 1 to 3 p.m. Tuesdays at the Glendale College Life Skills Building, 1500 N. Verdugo Road. The class, called Archeology of the Holy Land will explore the ancient civilizations of Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey. Students will see artifacts, taste foods, follow maps and charts and learn about these ancient times. Pat Depew, who has a bachelor's and master's degrees in Biblical studies, will teach the class.

In November, refugees from Iraq, Iran, Uganda, Egypt and Eritrea celebrated Thanksgiving at the International Rescue Committee's Glendale location. It was the second annual Thanksgiving celebration that the International Rescue Committee has hosted. Many people enjoyed roast turkey and traditional fixings. The International Rescue Committee works in more than 40 countries in areas of conflict or war to provide people with clean water, health care, shelter and sanitation. The IRC annually helps to resettle thousands of refugees in 22 cities across the nation.

Town Council holding meeting The Crescenta Valley Town Council will have its executive committee meeting at 7 p.m. Thursday at the La Crescenta Sheriff?s Station community room, 4554 N. Briggs Ave. Thursday?s meeting marks the third time the council will meet for its executive committee session since the group voted last year to open the meetings to the public. For more information, call (818) 248-9387. ? Chamber to host readiness meeting The Crescenta Valley Chamber of Commerce will host a town hall meeting on emergency preparedness at 7 p.m. on Feb. 25 at the Crescenta Valley High School auditorium, 2900 Community Ave., La Crescenta.

A mental health program targeted at the Armenian community is struggling to meet its annual service goal, due in part, organizers say, to the cultural stigma attached to seeking help. For the past 10 months, the program through Didi Hirsch Mental Health Services - called ARMUNITY - has been trying to break through that stigma, but with the first anniversary approaching in March, organizers say they've only met about half their goal of serving 60 clients. “Historically we've always just held the issues inside the family, not taken it outside…it's been a difficult step for the elders to expose their issues,” said Arsineh Ararat, program coordinator for ARMUNITY.

Bob Hope Airport just got another air traffic controller for precisely the time when it sees a slowdown in takeoffs and landings. On April 13, in the wake of a scandal in which several air traffic controllers at other airports fell asleep when they should have been guiding planes to safety, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered a second air controller to work the graveyard shift at all towers staffed by a single night controller. The rule affects 27 airports, including Bob Hope.

Mehregan, a major holiday in Persian traditions, is being celebrated this weekend at the Orange County Fairgrounds. The two-day event, which is set to wrap up today, is being called the Persian Harvest Festival in English. Mehregan is one of Persian culture's two most important holidays and is a celebration of the beginning of autumn, said Parastoo Derakhshanian, who represented the Iranian Cultural Center of Orange County at the event Saturday. The holiday's roots go back to ancient Iran, she said.

A college classroom can be intimidating for students learning English as a second language. Responding to ESL students? requests, Roxanne Rafii, an Equal Opportunity Placement Services counselor, created the Conversation Club at Glendale Community College. Students can join any time, and the club is meant to make participants feel comfortable practicing their English skills while learning about different topics.?It?s not just meeting the conversational and listening and speaking needs of students,?

One of the many mean-spirited racists who are having the time of their life spewing their bile in the receptive pages of the News-Press demands that everyone should speak English in this country. Tell me, the white people who wiped out the indigenous populations of North America to appropriate their lands -- were they speaking the Native American languages? Did they speak Spanish just before they stole the entire length and breadth of what is now the southwestern United States from Mexico?