Canadian Iranian here , yes it’s a common name, even my dad was called “Ali” short for his full name “Alireza”.
Also I agree with everything parent said, we always go out, we even have trips with the 2-3 families and sometimes friends join as well.
Chess and Soccor are huge in Iran, you see kids running around in the street playing all the time and in the evening we have “parties” where people come to share food and then go out.
It’s very different from the West, I don’t even know what western nations would look like with that setup, it can get chaotic and there are many regulations that prevent these anyway like making noise outside after dark or kids being lowed to run in the streets with cars passing; not to mention the subtlies of not invading people’s personal spaces or coming off as a “creep” / annoying person here. In Iran no one cares and you just chat with anyone..
Really interesting stuff - also goes some way to explaining the absolutely massive gatherings you see on Iran on occassion.
As a probably permanent expat with kids, I've been looking for some sort of more social and family oriented culture to raise them, and stuff like that sounds amazing. If we could just pick and choose the parts that each culture excels at!
Though with Alireza I was referring to Alireza Firouzja - a top 10 chess player in the world who also ended up in France like the earlier poster.
Also I agree with everything parent said, we always go out, we even have trips with the 2-3 families and sometimes friends join as well.
Chess and Soccor are huge in Iran, you see kids running around in the street playing all the time and in the evening we have “parties” where people come to share food and then go out.
It’s very different from the West, I don’t even know what western nations would look like with that setup, it can get chaotic and there are many regulations that prevent these anyway like making noise outside after dark or kids being lowed to run in the streets with cars passing; not to mention the subtlies of not invading people’s personal spaces or coming off as a “creep” / annoying person here. In Iran no one cares and you just chat with anyone..